And the king and his men went to Jerusalem against the Jebusites, the inhabitants of the land; and they spoke to David, saying, Thou shalt not come in hither, but the blind and the lame will drive thee back; as much as to say, David will not come in hither.
Israel has just made David king over the whole nation. His first move is against the one place in the middle of the land that Israel had never taken. The Jebusites answer him with mockery, not an army. Why did this fortress matter so much to David? And why did God love this city above every other?
Jerusalem's fortress had never fallen — not under Joshua, and not in the long years since. Its owners knew it.
Whatever Joshua had conquered, and whatever Israel won later, this stronghold still stood. It was in the very middle of the land, in the centre of Jerusalem itself, held by the Jebusites. The time had come to mark a most important change. The kingdom could not be what God wanted while Zion stayed in enemy hands. It had to be won for the king from people who had dared to defy God's people. David felt this with full force. He felt keenly the dishonour done to God: the very heart and fortress of the kingdom belonged to an accursed people of Canaan.
The Jebusites did not say the blind and the lame were their best defence. They said such men were all the defence needed.
They were sure of their walls, and sure that their stronghold could not be taken. So they saw no need to use fit, healthy men to fight off the king's attack. Even these disabled people would be enough for the task, they thought. "Nevertheless, David took the stronghold of Zion" (v. 7). Not another word about it; the project succeeded as simply as if it had cost nothing. In fact, this victory costs God nothing. This is how He will fight all man's enmity against Himself and against His Anointed.
Even the name of these people says something. So do the ones who stood with them on the walls.
The Jebusites held the key position in the land. The fortress of Zion was in their hands... Strangely, it was the stronghold of the "treaders down," for that is the meaning of the name Jebusites. The "blind and the lame" were there, and David's soul came to hate them. The Jebusites taunted him that even these could hold the castle against him, since it was so strong. There are always those who hold key positions and tread down God's heritage. They usually bring with them people whose sight and walk are both wrong.
Nothing in the city itself explains the choice. The reason lay on God's side.
What reason did God have to interest Himself in this place more than another? There was no reason at all except that He loved this city. It had been under the power of the Jebusites, the enemies of Jehovah and of His anointed. He set His heart on this place, for here He wanted to set up the throne of His grace on earth once and for all.
Scripture gives the capture one quiet sentence. Yet Israel's whole later story turns on it.
I know nothing more striking in Scripture than this. The Holy Spirit records so quietly how complete the blow was. It fell at the heart of the land, on a place that had challenged and beaten every effort of Israel until that day. Zion, in short, becomes a new name of the deepest importance. It is the sign of divine grace in royalty. That grace took up the people at their lowest, and through the man God used it raised them step by step to a place of power and blessing and glory such as never was before, and never can be again until Jesus comes and makes this very Zion the centre of His earthly government, with the blessing and glory due to His name.
David conquered the city but had nothing to give the disabled people inside it. A later King came to the same place.
David the King took possession of Zion. But he hated the blind and the lame inside it. He did not have in him the grace that could free such people from their bondage. Its display awaited the coming of great David's greater Son. He has already come. He walked in His temple as Zion's true King, though people did not recognise Him, and "the blind and the lame came to him in the temple, and he healed them" (Matthew 21:14).
The same pattern appears elsewhere in Scripture: a loud boast, then a short record of the work done anyway.
These principles stay the same, whether the task is to defend Jerusalem or to take it. Tobijah says, "If a fox went up, it would break down their stone wall"; but Nehemiah says, "we built the wall". The Jebusites said to David, "You will not come in here, but the blind and the lame will ward you off"; but "David took the stronghold of Zion".
- Defiance. The Jebusite fortress had held out since Joshua's day. Its owners were so sure of it that they said the blind and the lame could hold the walls.
- And yet. The boast cost God nothing to answer. Scripture settles the unbeatable fortress in one calm sentence.
- Zion. God chose this place for no reason found in it — He loved it, and set His king's throne of grace there.
- Grace. From this day Zion stands as the sign of grace in kingship, lifting a people at their lowest into blessing.
- The greater King. David hated the blind and the lame; the Son of David healed them in that same city — the mercy David lacked.
But David took the stronghold of Zion, which is the city of David.
One word carries the fall of a fortress the Jebusites thought no one could take: "Nevertheless." Behind that quiet sentence stands a turning point. The stronghold at the heart of the land passes to God's chosen king, and gains a new name.
One stronghold in the middle of the land still belonged to the enemy.
The kingdom could never be what God meant it to be while Zion stayed in enemy hands. That enemy had openly defied His people. The king had to take it, and David felt this with full force. He felt the full dishonour done to God. The very heart and fortress of the kingdom belonged to an accursed people of Canaan. There they sat, proud and at ease. They had held the fortress so long that they laughed at every attacker.
Scripture spends no words describing the assault. The brevity itself is the point.
"But David took the stronghold of Zion" (v. 7). Not another word about it; the project succeeded as simply as if it had cost nothing. In effect, this victory costs God nothing. This is how He will fight all man's enmity against Himself and against His Anointed. What divine irony! "Let us burst their bonds apart and cast away their cords from us." God answers: "He who sits in the heavens laughs; the Lord holds them in derision" (Ps. 2:3-4).
From this moment the name "Zion" carries a weight it never had before.
"And David lived in the stronghold and called it the city of David." The Spirit names this briefly, yet it becomes a turning point in Israel's history ever after. Now that David had taken the fortress from the Jebusites, this becomes the great fact that stamps its character on Israel. In short, Zion becomes a new name of the deepest importance. It is the sign of divine grace in royalty. That grace took up the people in their lowest condition. Through the man God used, it raised them step by step to a place of power, blessing and glory such as had never been before. It can never be again until Jesus comes and makes this very Zion the centre of His government on earth.
Nothing in the place itself recommended it.
What reason did God have to interest Himself in this place more than in another? There was no reason at all, except that He loved this city. It had been under the power of the Jebusites, the enemies of Jehovah and of His anointed. His heart was set on this place. Here He chose to set up the throne of His grace on earth for ever. "The LORD has chosen Zion; He has desired it for His dwelling place: this is My resting place forever; here I will dwell, for I have desired it" (Ps. 132:13-14).
Zion stands against another mountain. What sharpens the contrast is the moment God acted.
No mountain in the Old Testament stood in such contrast with Sinai as Zion. Sinai was the never-to-be-forgotten scene of the nation's responsibility to the law. Zion was Jehovah stepping in with grace for His king when all was ruin. People and priests alike were wicked. The Philistines had taken the ark. Israel had confessed that the glory was gone. Israel's king and his sons had been killed. And the Jebusite was not only in the centre and stronghold of Jerusalem, but defiant and insulting. Then it was that Jehovah, as He chose David, so also chose the mount Zion which He loved.
The verse has a sequel. The Son of David came to God's house in the same city.
2 Samuel 5:6-8 records David's sentence against the blind and the lame: he said they "shall not come into the house." The great Son of David had now arrived in Zion, and He reverses David's action. That day He loved and blessed the very people "hated by David's soul." The money-changers had misrepresented the God whose house it was, and made men blaspheme His name. By healing the needy, Jesus truly represented the very heart of God, and the result was praise.
Believers are not left waiting for this mountain.
"You have come to Mount Zion," says the apostle. None of the requirements, none of the terrors of Sinai exist any more for those who believe. While still here on earth we have found the mountain of grace in the place where the cross of Christ was set up. We have set our foot on this sure foundation, the first rung for climbing up into all the heavenly blessings.
- Ruin first. David takes Zion only after ruin: the ark taken, the king and his sons killed, the enemy defiant inside Jerusalem.
- Grace next. God chose the hill for no reason but love, and made it the throne of His grace on earth.
- Nevertheless. The fortress that disabled men were meant to hold fell in half a sentence. Fighting man's enmity costs God nothing.
- A new name. From that day Zion means grace in royalty: God lifting a people from their lowest condition through the man He chose.
- A greater King. David shut the blind and the lame out of the house. Jesus came to the same city and healed them. Believers have already come to that mountain of grace.
And David said on that day, Whoever smites the Jebusites and gets up to the watercourse, and the lame and the blind hated of David's soul ...! Therefore they say, The blind and the lame shall not come into the house.
David now rules over all Israel. One place still holds out against him: a fortress in the middle of the land. The Jebusites there mocked him from the walls. This verse is his answer. He points to a way in through the water shaft. He also voices a hatred of "the lame and the blind" that would later become a proverb about the house.
The fortress stood in the middle of the land God had given His people, and an enemy held it. One writer explains why David could not leave it there.
The kingdom could not be according to God while Zion stayed in the hands of the enemy who had so boldly defied His people. It had to be taken for the king, and David felt this with full force. He felt deeply the dishonour done to God: the very heart and fortress of the kingdom belonged to a cursed people of Canaan. They sat there proud and at ease. They had held their fortress so long that they laughed at every attacker... The blind and the lame were enough to keep the stronghold against David and his men.
The capture itself takes one line to tell. Another writer draws out what that says about God:
"Nevertheless, David took the stronghold of Zion" (v. 7). Not another word about it; the project succeeded as simply as if it had cost nothing. In effect, this victory costs God nothing. This is how He will fight all man's enmity against Himself and against His Anointed.
The word behind "gutter" in older translations is a technical one. A reference work defines it plainly:
tsinnor, "waterspout or watercourse," spoken of by David in reference to the attack on the stronghold of the Jebusites in Jerusalem.
The gates were shut. David sent his men to the one opening the defenders had missed. Another writer finds a lesson in it:
When the gates were barred, the watercourse was a way of entering the city that the Jebusites overlooked. This is just as true as a picture. The fresh water supply pictures the living word of God. If we attack evil in the living power of God's word, evil cannot stand against us.
One writer does not excuse how David answered the taunt:
David was not only too sensitive to the taunt, but could not rise above it... Generous as David was, he was wounded and resented the insult on people who were innocent of it.
Another asks why the enemy held the city so long, and finds the cause in Israel itself:
What has kept the Jebusites ruling the place of Israel's throne and the Lord's? Only one answer is possible: sin alone could have done it — the sins of God's people themselves. Sin has proved so stubborn in their case that the Jebusite may seem justified in his taunt... Israel has been blind to all God's dealings with them. They have been lame in walking the paths God's voice has called them to for so many generations! Yet the very name of Zion is a lasting reminder of a promise that stands and will still be fulfilled in David's victory.
Older translations of this verse also record the reward David promised for the assault. Commentators read Joab's claim to it in two ways. One sees a king rewarding raw energy:
David is no longer the man of faith. He led Israel's armies in dependence on God and guided whatever Israel's circumstances asked of faith. Now he is a king who can promote whom he pleases. The man very soon appears — the energetic man, but not the man of God. "Whoever gets up to the gutter," the king said, would be rewarded: "he shall be chief and captain." Joab goes up, and he has natural claims on David.
Another sees God's hand in the appointment:
Here he is not the ambitious, vindictive man, but the man appointed, according to God's purposes, to conquer the fortress of Zion for the king.
The verse ends by shutting the blind and the lame out of the house. One writer points to the day that changed:
The great Son of David had now arrived in Zion, and He reverses David's action. The kind of people who were "hated of David's soul" were loved and blessed that day... In healing the needy, Jesus rightly represented the very heart of God, and the result was praise.
- Taunt. The Jebusites boasted that blind and lame men could hold their walls against God's anointed king. David felt that insult as a dishonour done to God.
- Tunnel. The "gutter" was a watercourse. It was the opening the defenders overlooked, and the way in when every gate was shut.
- Type. Sin kept the city in enemy hands: Israel blind to God's dealings, lame in God's paths. Yet the name Zion still holds a promise.
- Trophy. Joab claimed David's offer of the chief command. Commentators differ: one sees a king rewarding raw energy, another the man God appointed to take Zion for the king.
- Turnaround. The saying that shut the blind and lame out of the house was reversed when the Son of David came to that city, welcomed them, and healed them.
So David dwelt in the stronghold, and called it the city of David. And David built round about from the Millo and inward.
David moves into the fortress that had beaten every earlier attempt, names it after himself, and starts building. Writers call this short note a turning point in Israel's history, and they ask why God set His heart on this hill.
Scripture reports the settlement in a few words, with no fanfare. One writer finds that restraint itself remarkable.
"And David lived in the stronghold and called it the city of David." The Spirit names it in a few words. Yet from then on it becomes an epoch and a turning point in Israel's history. I know nothing in Scripture more striking than a fact like this, small as some may count it. See how quietly the Holy Spirit notes the completeness of the blow. It was struck at the very heart of the land, at the thing that stood as a constant challenge and defeated every effort of Israel until that day. Now that David had wrested it from the Jebusites, this becomes the great fact that afterwards stamps its character on Israel.
David gives the captured citadel his own name. That name carries a meaning.
It becomes then "the city of David," which, we are glad to remember, means "Beloved," and it will yet be the city of the infinitely glorious One, when the time of Jerusalem's "treading down" is over.
One writer asks why God settled on this hill and not another — and where that choice finally leads.
What reason did God have to take an interest in this place rather than another? None at all, except that He loved this city. It had been under the power of the Jebusites, the enemies of the LORD and of His anointed. His heart clung to this place. Here He wanted to set up the throne of His grace on earth for good. "For the LORD has chosen Zion; He has desired it for His dwelling place: 'This is My resting place forever; here I will dwell, for I have desired it'" (Ps. 132:13-14)... This is the place God chose, because here He in grace establishes His king. Jesus, the Root of David, is the King of grace when all is ruined, just as Jesus, the Offspring of David, the true Solomon, will be the king of glory.
Another writer states the reversal plainly.
That which had been the stronghold of the enemy is from now on to be the brightest spot of all.
The timing of this victory carries its own message.
God took them up out of the depth of ruin, and only then was Zion won. So the kingdom was set up in power after the people had been ruined completely. They had gone through every kind of change meant to help them, yet every experiment only sank them deeper into the dust. After all this Zion was won, and not till then. Nothing shows grace so well. It is not only great activity of goodness. It is perfect goodness shown after everything had been lost.
The same writer sets this mountain against another one, and asks when the change actually takes effect.
Mount Zion offers the most complete contrast to Mount Sinai. In Hebrews 12:22 the apostle writes to Jews who had been set free from the law and become Christians. He tells them: "You have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem." This is an absolute change in God's ways towards Israel. 2 Samuel 5:6-9 shows us the moment in history when this change took place. God chose a new mountain, in contrast to Sinai, to establish David's stronghold there forever. In fact, this transfer could not happen for Israel at that time. The king who carried the responsibility was unfaithful. So the people must wait for Christ's reign to be set up before they can enter the blessings of this new covenant. For us Christians this transfer has already taken place.
The verse ends with building work, and with a name: the Millo. One writer explains what it was.
David then lived in Jerusalem, called "the stronghold" and "the city of David." He built up the city, plainly to strengthen its defences. The verse also mentions "the Millo." This was clearly a citadel or tower of great importance in the city. From this time David's greatness increased (v.10). That is only a faint picture of the kingdom of the Lord Jesus. Of Him we read: "Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end" (Isa. 9:7).
- Taken. Israel could never clear this one fortress. David takes it, and one quiet sentence marks the turning point that stamps the nation's character.
- Named. David names the captured citadel after himself — the city of the "Beloved," and one day the city of the glorious One.
- Chosen. God's only stated reason for wanting this hill is that He loved it and desired to dwell there.
- Grace. David wins Zion not at Israel's best but after total ruin. That is why writers set it opposite Sinai as the mountain of grace.
- Increase. David settles, builds the city around from the Millo inward, and grows greater — a faint sketch of a government whose increase will have no end.
And David became continually greater; and Jehovah the God of hosts was with him.
David has just taken Jerusalem, and his throne is secure. Scripture sums up the years that follow in one short line, then names the reason in the same breath — God was with him.
David's rise begins with one captured fortress. Scripture gives the capture a few words, and Israel's whole story turns on it.
"So David lived in the stronghold and called it the city of David." The Spirit names it in only a few words. Yet from then on it marks a turning point in the history of Israel. I know nothing in Scripture more striking than a fact like this, small as some may count it. The blow fell at the heart of the land, on the very thing that had defied and beaten every effort of Israel up to that day. Yet the Holy Spirit notes how complete that blow was in the quietest way. David has taken it from the Jebusites, and from now on this is the great fact that stamps Israel's character. Zion, in short, becomes a new name of the deepest importance — the sign of divine grace in royalty. That grace took up the people in their lowest condition. Through the man God used, it raised them up step by step to a place of power and blessing and glory such as never was before — and never can be again until Jesus comes and makes this very Zion the centre of His earthly government, with the blessing and glory due to His name.
The verse does not simply report success; it names a cause. Commentators read the second half of the sentence as the explanation of the first.
After David captured Jerusalem from the Jebusites he became greater and greater. Best of all, God was with him, which was no doubt the main reason for his continuing success.
The same phrase — the Lord being with him — is treated elsewhere as David's one indispensable possession, weighed against the man he replaced and against the Lord Jesus.
And the LORD is with him. This was David's greatest asset. All his natural ability and charm would have been worth little without the presence of the LORD. We see this in Saul, who had so much that was naturally attractive; but when he lost the Spirit of the Lord, all his personal greatness was useless. Of the blessed Lord Jesus we read in Acts 10 that He went about doing good, and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, "for God was with him."
The verse names God by a title, not just a word. That title first appears when Israel was at its lowest, and it gathers every power in heaven and in nature under God.
We do not meet with this name until 1 Samuel 1:3. It came in with prophetic testimony. Faith took hold of the LORD's glory when Israel had corrupted themselves and were weak and low. Scripture shows that there is a mighty heavenly host, and rulers and powers in the unseen world. God is the God of them all, as well as God of all the elements of nature, which He has often used to punish His enemies. "The stars in their courses fought against Sisera." We read of 'the God of hosts' only a few times; mostly it is 'the LORD of hosts,' and at times 'the LORD God of hosts.' This shows that God revealed Himself under this name in connection with Israel. … Psalm 24:10 shows the Lord Jesus to be "The LORD of hosts, he is the King of glory!"
David's growing kingdom is a small picture of a greater one.
From this time David's greatness increased (v.10), only a faint picture of the kingdom of the Lord Jesus, of whom we read, "Of the increase of his government and of peace there will be no end" (Isa. 9:7).
Growing great carries its own danger. Blessing from God can change what a person leans on.
The power of God leads us to do the will of God. Our constant dependence on God is the result of God's power in us and of confidence in God. When the blessing of God inspires us with confidence in ourselves, it is turned against us. Christ was perfectly dependent on His Father. Such dependence makes us humble and gives us all power. … When we are not before Him, our knowledge and our victories become traps. They fill us with confidence in ourselves.
- Zion first. David takes one stronghold from the Jebusites. That capture turns Israel's history, and Zion becomes the sign of grace in royalty — grace that lifted the people from their lowest condition.
- Presence, not talent. God was with David, and that is why he kept rising. Saul shows the other side: natural gifts without that presence are worth little.
- Hosts behind Him. The title goes back to a time when Israel was weak and corrupt. It claims for God every force in heaven and on earth.
- Increase without end. David's growing greatness is only a faint sketch of a kingdom whose increase has no end.
- Watch the gift. Victories become traps the moment blessing shifts our confidence from God to ourselves.