translation_id: net-engnet

label: NET translator note

text: Heb “he said.” The referent (the Lord ) has been specified in the translation for clarity and for stylistic reasons.


label: NET textual note

text: The expression “the cities of Hebron” is odd; we would expect the noun to be in the singular, if used at all. Although the Syriac Peshitta has the expected reading “in Hebron,” the MT is clearly the more difficult reading and should probably be retained here.


text: Heb “house.”


text: Heb “and they told David.” The subject appears to be indefinite, allowing one to translate the verb as passive with David as subject.


text: Heb “men.”


text: Or “loyalty.”


text: Or “loyalty and devotion.”


text: Heb “will do with you this good.”


text: Heb “let your hands be strong.”


text: The MT here reads “the Ashurite,” but this is problematic if it is taken to mean “the Assyrian.” Ish-bosheth’s kingdom obviously was not of such proportions as to extend to Assyria. The Syriac Peshitta renders the word as “the Geshurite,” while the Targum has “of the house of Ashur.” We should probably emend the Hebrew text to read “the Geshurite.” The Geshurites lived in the northeastern part of the land of Palestine.


text: Heb “And the number of the days in which David was king in Hebron over the house of Judah was seven years and six months.”


text: Heb “play.” What is in view here is a gladiatorial contest in which representative groups of soldiers engage in mortal combat before the watching armies. Cf. NAB “perform for us”; NASB “hold (have NRSV) a contest before us”; NLT “put on an exhibition of hand-to-hand combat.”


text: Heb “let them arise.”


text: Heb “and they grabbed each one the head of his neighbor with his sword in the side of his neighbor and they fell together.”


text: The meaning of the name “Helkath Hazzurim” (so NIV; KJV, NASB, NRSV similar) is not clear. BHK relates the name to the Hebrew term for “side,” and this is reflected in NAB “the Field of the Sides”; the Greek OT revocalizes the Hebrew to mean something like “Field of Adversaries.” Cf. also TEV, NLT “Field of Swords”; CEV “Field of Daggers.”


text: Heb “servants.” So also elsewhere.


text: Heb “young men.” So also elsewhere.


text: Heb “Why should I strike you to the ground?”


text: Heb “lift.”


text: Heb “he”; the referent (Asahel) has been specified in the translation for clarity.


text: Heb “the.” The article functions here as a possessive pronoun.


text: Heb “him”; the referent (Abner) has been specified in the translation for clarity.


text: Heb “and they stand.”


text: Heb “were gathered together.”


text: The Hebrew verb נַעֲלָה ( na ’ alah ) used here is the Niphal perfect 3rd person masculine singular of עָלָה (’ alah , “to go up”). In the Niphal this verb “is used idiomatically, of getting away from so as to abandon…especially of an army raising a siege…” (see S. R. Driver, Notes on the Hebrew Text and the Topography of the Books of Samuel , 244).


text: Heb “stood.”


text: Heb “they no longer chased after Israel and they no longer fought.”


text: The word “River” is not in the Hebrew text, but is supplied in the translation for clarity.


text: Heb “and they went, all the Bitron.” The meaning of the Hebrew word “Bitron,” which is used only here in the OT, is disputed. The translation above follows BDB 144 s.v. בִּתְרוֹן in taking the word to be a proper name of an area east of the Jordan. A different understanding was advocated by W. R. Arnold, who took the word to refer to the forenoon or morning; a number of modern scholars and translations have adopted this view (cf. NAB, NASB, NRSV, CEV, NLT). See W. R. Arnold, “The Meaning of בתרון ,” AJSL 28 (1911-1912): 274-83. In this case one could translate “and they traveled all morning long.”


text: For location see Map5-B1 ; Map7-E2 ; Map8-E2 ; Map10-B4 .