1 Samuel 26:4

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

David therefore sent out spies, and understood that Saul was come of a certainty.

World English Bible · Public Domain

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Word by word

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מְרַגְּלִ֑ים

râgal

H7270

“walking”

Verb, Piel, Participle Active, Masculine, Plural, Absolute

Appears 25× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears at Genesis 42:9

Full BDB Definition

Origin: a primitive root

TWOT: 2113

to go on foot, spy out, foot it, go about, walk along, move the feet - (Qal) to be a tale-bearer, slander, go about - (Piel) - to slander - to go about as explorer, spy - (Tiphel) to teach to walk

About this verse

These counts appear in no published source. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged text and Lemma’s own curated glosses. What Lemma adds →

9: words
9: distinct lemmas
Historical: section

Notable vocabulary

The rarest word here is מְרַגְּלִ֑ים to walk H7270 — appearing just 25 times in the whole Hebrew Bible.

Shared distinctive vocabulary

מְרַגְּלִ֑ים to walk H7270 occurs in 24 verses of the Hebrew Bible. Also found in:

Grammatical profile

5 verbs
2 nouns
1 preposition
1 conjunction

Verb forms

וַיִּשְׁלַ֥ח Qal · Sequential Imperfect
מְרַגְּלִ֑ים Piel · Participle Active
וַיֵּ֕דַע Qal · Sequential Imperfect
בָ֥א Qal · Perfect
נָכֽוֹן Niphal · Participle Active

Hebrew & Septuagint length

In English translation the verse runs 14 words from the Hebrew and 14 from the Septuagint (LXX English) — the same length.

A rough comparison of the two English renderings, which tokenize alike — not a word-level alignment.

Word counts can differ between the Hebrew and the Greek without any difference in meaning — e.g. the Hebrew direct-object marker אֵת has no separate Greek word, and Greek often adds the article ὁ.

In the original languages it is 9 Hebrew tokens and 12 Greek tokens — but the two are counted differently (Hebrew bundles its prefixes and suffixes into one token; the Greek is in lemma form), so that isn’t a like-for-like length.

Cross-references

Topical passages linked to 1 Samuel 26:4 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — connected by theme and wording, ordered by reader-vote popularity; previews shown in the World English Bible.

Matthew 10:16 "Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents, and harmless as doves.
Joshua 2:1 Joshua the son of Nun sent out of Shittim two men as spies secretly, saying, Go, view the land, and Jericho. They went and came into the house of a prostitute whose name was Rahab, and lay there.

Cross-references courtesy of OpenBible.info (CC BY 4.0).

Hebrew and Greek witnesses Masoretic Hebrew ↔ Greek Septuagint

The same verse in the two great witnesses to the Old Testament, shown verse-for-verse.

These are two independent witnesses, not word-aligned to each other, and the Septuagint is shown in lemma (dictionary) form.

Hebrew 1 Samuel 26:4 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

וַיִּשְׁלַ֥ח דָּוִ֖ד מְרַגְּלִ֑ים וַיֵּ֕דַע כִּֽי בָ֥א שָׁא֖וּל אֶל נָכֽוֹן

David therefore sent out spies, and understood that Saul was come of a certainty.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Greek LXX 1 Samuel 26:4 Septuagint · lemma form

καί ἀποστέλλω δαυίδ κατάσκοπος καί γιγνώσκω ὅτι ἥκω σαούλ ἕτοιμος ἐκ κεϊλα

And David sent spies, and ascertained that Saul was come prepared out of Keila.

LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) · Public Domain

On this verse, Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary discusses the Septuagint’s reading. Read the note in Commentary ↓

Hebrew: Westminster Leningrad Codex (CC BY 4.0). Greek: Septuagint (public domain); English from LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) (Public Domain). How the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew →

Targum (Aramaic paraphrase)

The Targum is the ancient Jewish Aramaic paraphrase of the Hebrew Scriptures — an interpretive translation, not the Hebrew text itself. Onkelos (literal) and Pseudo-Jonathan (expansive) render the Torah, and Jonathan the Prophets. Coverage is partial: where no permissively-licensed English translation exists for a verse, only the Aramaic is shown. This is verse-level text, not a word-by-word alignment to the Hebrew.

Targum Jonathan Prophets (Joshua–Malachi)

וּשְׁלַח דָוִד מְאַלְלִין וִידַע אֲרֵי אֲתָא שָׁאוּל בִּקְשׁוֹט:

(no public-domain English translation for this verse)

Targum Jonathan — Aramaic: “Mikraot Gedolot” (public domain). English: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “London "Chaldee Paraphrase," 1871” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.

Commentary

Notes on 1 Samuel 26:4 from classic Christian and Jewish commentators (each source and its license shown beneath its notes). The classic Christian expositions comment on the surrounding passage and are grouped to its opening verse, so a note may address several verses; the Jewish commentaries on the Tanakh (Rashi and others) are per-verse, so they appear only where the commentator wrote on this verse.

Lemma curates 59 commentaries, every one of them public domain or Creative Commons licensed, each selected and text-cleaned for this edition rather than reprinted as found. About our sources →

Trapp's Complete Commentary

John Trapp

1Sa 26:4 David therefore sent out spies, and understood that Saul was come in very deed.

Ver. 4. David therefore sent out spies.] A practice in war both lawful and prudential.

That Saul was come in very deed.] The devil driving him: for as he, being cast out of heaven, keepeth ado, and is restless; so do unruly spirits, led by him. And as he, being god of this world, is vexed to see men in the world to walk above the world: so are his instruments. See. Psa 27:12.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Geneva Bible (1599)

Geneva Bible translators

Or, to a certain place.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

Robert Jamieson, A. R. Fausset & David Brown

David . . . sent out spies . . . and David arose, and came to the place where Saul had pitched--Having obtained certain information of the locality, he seems, accompanied by his nephew (Sa1 26:6), to have hid himself, perhaps disguised, in a neighboring wood, or hill, on the skirts of the royal camp towards night, and waited to approach it under covert of the darkness.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

John Gill's Exposition

David therefore sent out spies,.... To observe if he was coming or come, and where he was, that he might not be surprised by him; for though David knew the Lord was and would be his protection, he thought proper to be upon his guard, and to make use of means for his safety:

and understood that Saul was come in very deed; that he was most certainly come, and come to some certain place; which he himself went to reconnoitre, as in Sa1 26:5.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary

Certainly, or in a place strongly secured by nature. Septuagint, "well armed."

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Whedon's Commentary on the Bible

Daniel D. Whedon

4. David… sent out spies — Who knew all the windings of that desert. A most wily chieftain was David, and not to be taken unawares by Saul, or any other foe.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Lesson kit

Teaching starters — assembled from the data on this page, not authored interpretation. Every prompt links to the verse data it draws on. Edit before teaching.

1 Samuel, in the Historical, opens this verse with 9 words (9 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is râgal (“to walk”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

How does “to walk” (râgal) shape what this verse is saying?
Genesis 42:9 shares the word «to walk» with this verse. How do the two illuminate each other?
These translations render this verse differently; the difference is in the English rendering, not the original. What questions does that raise?
The verb «וַיִּשְׁלַ֥ח» is Qal Sequential Imperfect. How does its form color the action?
Reading how Trapp's Complete Commentary and Geneva Bible (1599) read this verse, where do the two commentators agree and where do they part?

Things to notice

This verse counts 9 Hebrew ↔ 12 Greek words.
These translations choose different wording for 9 words in this verse.
9 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 9 words in this verse.