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- Ruth 4:17. The women living there said, "Naomi has a son." And they named him Obed. He was the father of Jesse, the father of David.
- Ruth 4:22. Obed the father of Jesse, and Jesse the father of David.
- 1 Samuel 16:1. [Samuel Anoints David] The LORD said to Samuel, "How long will you mourn for Saul, since I have rejected him as king over Israel? Fill your horn with oil and be on your way; I am sending you to Jesse of Bethlehem. I have chosen one of his sons to be king."
- 1 Samuel 16:13. So Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him in the presence of his brothers, and from that day on the Spirit of the LORD came upon David in power. Samuel then went to Ramah.
- 1 Samuel 16:14. [David in Saul's Service] Now the Spirit of the LORD had departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the LORD tormented him.
- 1 Samuel 16:19. Then Saul sent messengers to Jesse and said, "Send me your son David, who is with the sheep."
- 1 Samuel 16:20. So Jesse took a donkey loaded with bread, a skin of wine and a young goat and sent them with his son David to Saul.
- 1 Samuel 16:21. David came to Saul and entered his service. Saul liked him very much, and David became one of his armor-bearers.
- 1 Samuel 16:22. Then Saul sent word to Jesse, saying, "Allow David to remain in my service, for I am pleased with him."
- 1 Samuel 16:23. Whenever the spirit from God came upon Saul, David would take his harp and play. Then relief would come to Saul; he would feel better, and the evil spirit would leave him.
- 1 Samuel 17:1. [David and Goliath] Now the Philistines gathered their forces for war and assembled at Socoh in Judah. They pitched camp at Ephes Dammim, between Socoh and Azekah.
- 1 Samuel 17:12. Now David was the son of an Ephrathite named Jesse, who was from Bethlehem in Judah. Jesse had eight sons, and in Saul's time he was old and well advanced in years.
- 1 Samuel 17:14. David was the youngest. The three oldest followed Saul,
- 1 Samuel 17:15. but David went back and forth from Saul to tend his father's sheep at Bethlehem.
- 1 Samuel 17:17. Now Jesse said to his son David, "Take this ephah of roasted grain and these ten loaves of bread for your brothers and hurry to their camp.
- 1 Samuel 17:20. Early in the morning David left the flock with a shepherd, loaded up and set out, as Jesse had directed. He reached the camp as the army was going out to its battle positions, shouting the war cry.
- 1 Samuel 17:22. David left his things with the keeper of supplies, ran to the battle lines and greeted his brothers.
- 1 Samuel 17:23. As he was talking with them, Goliath, the Philistine champion from Gath, stepped out from his lines and shouted his usual defiance, and David heard it.
- 1 Samuel 17:26. David asked the men standing near him, "What will be done for the man who kills this Philistine and removes this disgrace from Israel? Who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?"
- 1 Samuel 17:28. When Eliab, David's oldest brother, heard him speaking with the men, he burned with anger at him and asked, "Why have you come down here? And with whom did you leave those few sheep in the desert? I know how conceited you are and how wicked your heart is; you came down only to watch the battle."
- 1 Samuel 17:29. "Now what have I done?" said David. "Can't I even speak?"
- 1 Samuel 17:31. What David said was overheard and reported to Saul, and Saul sent for him.
- 1 Samuel 17:32. David said to Saul, "Let no one lose heart on account of this Philistine; your servant will go and fight him."
- 1 Samuel 17:34. But David said to Saul, "Your servant has been keeping his father's sheep. When a lion or a bear came and carried off a sheep from the flock,
- 1 Samuel 17:37. The LORD who delivered me from the paw of the lion and the paw of the bear will deliver me from the hand of this Philistine." Saul said to David, "Go, and the LORD be with you."
- 1 Samuel 17:38. Then Saul dressed David in his own tunic. He put a coat of armor on him and a bronze helmet on his head.
- 1 Samuel 17:39. David fastened on his sword over the tunic and tried walking around, because he was not used to them. "I cannot go in these," he said to Saul, "because I am not used to them." So he took them off.
- 1 Samuel 17:41. Meanwhile, the Philistine, with his shield bearer in front of him, kept coming closer to David.
- 1 Samuel 17:42. He looked David over and saw that he was only a boy, ruddy and handsome, and he despised him.
- 1 Samuel 17:43. He said to David, "Am I a dog, that you come at me with sticks?" And the Philistine cursed David by his gods.
- 1 Samuel 17:45. David said to the Philistine, "You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the LORD Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied.
- 1 Samuel 17:48. As the Philistine moved closer to attack him, David ran quickly toward the battle line to meet him.
- 1 Samuel 17:50. So David triumphed over the Philistine with a sling and a stone; without a sword in his hand he struck down the Philistine and killed him.
- 1 Samuel 17:51. David ran and stood over him. He took hold of the Philistine's sword and drew it from the scabbard. After he killed him, he cut off his head with the sword. When the Philistines saw that their hero was dead, they turned and ran.
- 1 Samuel 17:54. David took the Philistine's head and brought it to Jerusalem, and he put the Philistine's weapons in his own tent.
- 1 Samuel 17:55. As Saul watched David going out to meet the Philistine, he said to Abner, commander of the army, "Abner, whose son is that young man?" Abner replied, "As surely as you live, O king, I don't know."
- 1 Samuel 17:57. As soon as David returned from killing the Philistine, Abner took him and brought him before Saul, with David still holding the Philistine's head.
- 1 Samuel 17:58. "Whose son are you, young man?" Saul asked him. David said, "I am the son of your servant Jesse of Bethlehem."
- 1 Samuel 18:1. [Saul's Jealousy of David] After David had finished talking with Saul, Jonathan became one in spirit with David, and he loved him as himself.
- 1 Samuel 18:2. From that day Saul kept David with him and did not let him return to his father's house.
- 1 Samuel 18:3. And Jonathan made a covenant with David because he loved him as himself.
- 1 Samuel 18:4. Jonathan took off the robe he was wearing and gave it to David, along with his tunic, and even his sword, his bow and his belt.
- 1 Samuel 18:5. Whatever Saul sent him to do, David did it so successfully that Saul gave him a high rank in the army. This pleased all the people, and Saul's officers as well.
- 1 Samuel 18:6. When the men were returning home after David had killed the Philistine, the women came out from all the towns of Israel to meet King Saul with singing and dancing, with joyful songs and with tambourines and lutes.
- 1 Samuel 18:7. As they danced, they sang: "Saul has slain his thousands, and David his tens of thousands."
- 1 Samuel 18:8. Saul was very angry; this refrain galled him. "They have credited David with tens of thousands," he thought, "but me with only thousands. What more can he get but the kingdom?"
- 1 Samuel 18:9. And from that time on Saul kept a jealous eye on David.
- 1 Samuel 18:10. The next day an evil spirit from God came forcefully upon Saul. He was prophesying in his house, while David was playing the harp, as he usually did. Saul had a spear in his hand
- 1 Samuel 18:11. and he hurled it, saying to himself, "I'll pin David to the wall." But David eluded him twice.
- 1 Samuel 18:12. Saul was afraid of David, because the LORD was with David but had left Saul.
- 1 Samuel 18:13. So he sent David away from him and gave him command over a thousand men, and David led the troops in their campaigns.
- 1 Samuel 18:16. But all Israel and Judah loved David, because he led them in their campaigns.
- 1 Samuel 18:17. Saul said to David, "Here is my older daughter Merab. I will give her to you in marriage; only serve me bravely and fight the battles of the LORD." For Saul said to himself, "I will not raise a hand against him. Let the Philistines do that!"
- 1 Samuel 18:18. But David said to Saul, "Who am I, and what is my family or my father's clan in Israel, that I should become the king's son-in-law?"
- 1 Samuel 18:19. So when the time came for Merab, Saul's daughter, to be given to David, she was given in marriage to Adriel of Meholah.
- 1 Samuel 18:20. Now Saul's daughter Michal was in love with David, and when they told Saul about it, he was pleased.
- 1 Samuel 18:21. "I will give her to him," he thought, "so that she may be a snare to him and so that the hand of the Philistines may be against him." So Saul said to David, "Now you have a second opportunity to become my son-in-law."
- 1 Samuel 18:22. Then Saul ordered his attendants: "Speak to David privately and say, 'Look, the king is pleased with you, and his attendants all like you; now become his son-in-law.' "
- 1 Samuel 18:23. They repeated these words to David. But David said, "Do you think it is a small matter to become the king's son-in-law? I'm only a poor man and little known."
- 1 Samuel 18:24. When Saul's servants told him what David had said,
- 1 Samuel 18:25. Saul replied, "Say to David, 'The king wants no other price for the bride than a hundred Philistine foreskins, to take revenge on his enemies.' " Saul's plan was to have David fall by the hands of the Philistines.
- 1 Samuel 18:26. When the attendants told David these things, he was pleased to become the king's son-in-law. So before the allotted time elapsed,
- 1 Samuel 18:27. David and his men went out and killed two hundred Philistines. He brought their foreskins and presented the full number to the king so that he might become the king's son-in-law. Then Saul gave him his daughter Michal in marriage.
- 1 Samuel 18:28. When Saul realized that the LORD was with David and that his daughter Michal loved David,
- 1 Samuel 18:30. The Philistine commanders continued to go out to battle, and as often as they did, David met with more success than the rest of Saul's officers, and his name became well known.
- 1 Samuel 19:1. [Saul Tries to Kill David] Saul told his son Jonathan and all the attendants to kill David. But Jonathan was very fond of David
- 1 Samuel 19:4. Jonathan spoke well of David to Saul his father and said to him, "Let not the king do wrong to his servant David; he has not wronged you, and what he has done has benefited you greatly.
- 1 Samuel 19:5. He took his life in his hands when he killed the Philistine. The LORD won a great victory for all Israel, and you saw it and were glad. Why then would you do wrong to an innocent man like David by killing him for no reason?"
- 1 Samuel 19:6. Saul listened to Jonathan and took this oath: "As surely as the LORD lives, David will not be put to death."
- 1 Samuel 19:7. So Jonathan called David and told him the whole conversation. He brought him to Saul, and David was with Saul as before.
- 1 Samuel 19:8. Once more war broke out, and David went out and fought the Philistines. He struck them with such force that they fled before him.
- 1 Samuel 19:9. But an evil spirit from the LORD came upon Saul as he was sitting in his house with his spear in his hand. While David was playing the harp,
- 1 Samuel 19:10. Saul tried to pin him to the wall with his spear, but David eluded him as Saul drove the spear into the wall. That night David made good his escape.
- 1 Samuel 19:11. Saul sent men to David's house to watch it and to kill him in the morning. But Michal, David's wife, warned him, "If you don't run for your life tonight, tomorrow you'll be killed."
- 1 Samuel 19:12. So Michal let David down through a window, and he fled and escaped.
- 1 Samuel 19:14. When Saul sent the men to capture David, Michal said, "He is ill."
- 1 Samuel 19:15. Then Saul sent the men back to see David and told them, "Bring him up to me in his bed so that I may kill him."
- 1 Samuel 19:18. When David had fled and made his escape, he went to Samuel at Ramah and told him all that Saul had done to him. Then he and Samuel went to Naioth and stayed there.
- 1 Samuel 19:19. Word came to Saul: "David is in Naioth at Ramah";
- 1 Samuel 19:22. Finally, he himself left for Ramah and went to the great cistern at Secu. And he asked, "Where are Samuel and David?" "Over in Naioth at Ramah," they said.
- 1 Samuel 20:1. [David and Jonathan] Then David fled from Naioth at Ramah and went to Jonathan and asked, "What have I done? What is my crime? How have I wronged your father, that he is trying to take my life?"
- 1 Samuel 20:3. But David took an oath and said, "Your father knows very well that I have found favor in your eyes, and he has said to himself, 'Jonathan must not know this or he will be grieved.' Yet as surely as the LORD lives and as you live, there is only a step between me and death."
- 1 Samuel 20:4. Jonathan said to David, "Whatever you want me to do, I'll do for you."
- 1 Samuel 20:5. So David said, "Look, tomorrow is the New Moon festival, and I am supposed to dine with the king; but let me go and hide in the field until the evening of the day after tomorrow.
- 1 Samuel 20:6. If your father misses me at all, tell him, 'David earnestly asked my permission to hurry to Bethlehem, his hometown, because an annual sacrifice is being made there for his whole clan.'
- 1 Samuel 20:10. David asked, "Who will tell me if your father answers you harshly?"
- 1 Samuel 20:12. Then Jonathan said to David: "By the LORD, the God of Israel, I will surely sound out my father by this time the day after tomorrow! If he is favorably disposed toward you, will I not send you word and let you know?
- 1 Samuel 20:15. and do not ever cut off your kindness from my family--not even when the LORD has cut off every one of David's enemies from the face of the earth."
- 1 Samuel 20:16. So Jonathan made a covenant with the house of David, saying, "May the LORD call David's enemies to account."
- 1 Samuel 20:17. And Jonathan had David reaffirm his oath out of love for him, because he loved him as he loved himself.
- 1 Samuel 20:18. Then Jonathan said to David: "Tomorrow is the New Moon festival. You will be missed, because your seat will be empty.
- 1 Samuel 20:24. So David hid in the field, and when the New Moon festival came, the king sat down to eat.
- 1 Samuel 20:25. He sat in his customary place by the wall, opposite Jonathan, and Abner sat next to Saul, but David's place was empty.
- 1 Samuel 20:26. Saul said nothing that day, for he thought, "Something must have happened to David to make him ceremonially unclean--surely he is unclean."
- 1 Samuel 20:27. But the next day, the second day of the month, David's place was empty again. Then Saul said to his son Jonathan, "Why hasn't the son of Jesse come to the meal, either yesterday or today?"
- 1 Samuel 20:28. Jonathan answered, "David earnestly asked me for permission to go to Bethlehem.
- 1 Samuel 20:33. But Saul hurled his spear at him to kill him. Then Jonathan knew that his father intended to kill David.
- 1 Samuel 20:34. Jonathan got up from the table in fierce anger; on that second day of the month he did not eat, because he was grieved at his father's shameful treatment of David.
- 1 Samuel 20:35. In the morning Jonathan went out to the field for his meeting with David. He had a small boy with him,
- 1 Samuel 20:39. (The boy knew nothing of all this; only Jonathan and David knew.)
