Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi interpreted the verse regarding the Amalekites. “When evildoers approach me,” these are the Amalekites, as it is stated: “The Amalekites had raided the South and Tziklag” (I Samuel 30:1).4The Amalekites burned Tziklag and took the people who had been there captive, including the wives and children of David and his men. “To consume my flesh” – “David’s two wives were taken captive” (I Samuel 30:5).
“My foes and my adversaries are mine” – “David smote them from twilight until evening of the next day [lemoḥoratam]” (I Samuel 30:17). What is lemoḥoratam?5The verse could have used the term “the next day [lemoḥorato],” but instead uses the plural term lemoḥoratam, which the midrash interprets as alluding to an additional night. Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi said: Two nights and one day. Who illuminated for him?
The Holy One blessed be He, with shooting stars and lightning. That is what David said: “For You will illuminate my lamp” (Psalms 18:29). From here on, David said: “If a camp” – of Amalekites “besieges me, my heart will not fear.” If war” – with Amalekites – “comes upon me, in this [bezot] I will put my trust” (Psalms 27:3), Rabbi Levi said: In the testament that Moses dictated to us in the Torah, when he said to the elders: “This is [vezot] for Judah.”