And they came thither into the midst of the house
They not only came unto it, but entered into it, and went into the inmost part of it; the guards being asleep also perhaps, or not on duty, so that there were none to obstruct them; or if there were, they deceived them, since they went in
[as though] they would have fetched wheat;
out of the king's granaries, for the payment and support of the soldiers under them, who in those days were paid in corn, as were the Roman soldiers F25 in later times; and these granaries might not only be in the king's house, but near his bedchamber; for in those ancient ages of simplicity there was not such grandeur in the courts of princes as now; the Targum is,
``as sellers of wheat,''in the guise and habit of such persons, pretending they came to sell wheat to the king's purveyors, who were at the granaries; or, as others interpret it, they went in along with the wheat merchants as if they belonged to them, and so found their way to the king's bedchamber:
and smote him under the fifth [rib]; (See Gill on 2 Samuel 2:23);
and Rechab and Baanah his brother escaped;
they got out of the palace after they had committed the murder undiscovered and unsuspected.