translation_id: net-engnet

label: NET translator note

text: and the LXX mistakenly read “Mephibosheth.”


text: Heb “his hands went slack.”


label: NET textual note

text: The present translation, “Saul’s son had two men,” is based on the reading “to the son of Saul,” rather than the MT’s “the son of Saul.” The context requires the preposition to indicate the family relationship.


text: Heb “until this day.”


text: Heb “and was lame.”


text: For the MT’s וְהֵנָּה ( vÿhennah , “and they,” feminine) read וְהִנֵּה ( vÿhinneh , “and behold”). See the LXX, Syriac Peshitta, and Targum.


text: Heb “and they struck him down.”


text: After the concluding disjunctive clause at the end of v. 6 , the author now begins a more detailed account of the murder and its aftermath.


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


text: Heb “they struck him down and killed him.” The expression is a verbal hendiadys.


text: Heb “and they removed his head.” The Syriac Peshitta and Vulgate lack these words.


text: The Lucianic Greek recension lacks the words “his head.”


text: Heb “from.”


text: Heb “and he was like a bearer of good news in his eyes.”


text: Heb “on his bed.”


text: See HALOT 146 s.v. II בער . Some derive the verb from a homonym meaning “to burn; to consume.”


text: The antecedent of the pronoun “them” (which is not present in the Hebrew text, but implied) is not entirely clear. Presumably it is the corpses that were hung and not merely the detached hands and feet; cf. NIV “hung the (their NRSV, NLT) bodies”; the alternative is represented by TEV “cut off their hands and feet, which they hung up.”


text: mistakenly reads “Mephibosheth” here.


text: The LXX adds “the son of Ner” by conformity with common phraseology elsewhere.


text: Some mss of the LXX lack the phrase “in Hebron.”