16:1 The Lord said to Samuel, “How long do you intend to mourn for Saul? I have rejected him as king over Israel. 4 Fill your horn with olive oil and go! I am sending you to Jesse in Bethlehem, 5 for I have selected a king for myself from among his sons.” 6
8:1 In his old age Samuel appointed his sons as judges over Israel.
29:1 The Philistines assembled all their troops 15 at Aphek, while Israel camped at the spring that is in Jezreel.
29:1 The Philistines assembled all their troops 16 at Aphek, while Israel camped at the spring that is in Jezreel.
23:7 for he is 17 like someone calculating the cost 18 in his mind. 19
“Eat and drink,” he says to you,
but his heart is not with you;
1 tn Heb “don’t look toward.”
2 tn Heb “for not that which the man sees.” The translation follows the LXX, which reads, “for not as man sees does God see.” The MT has suffered from homoioteleuton or homoioarcton. See P. K. McCarter, I Samuel (AB), 274.
3 tn Heb “to the eyes.”
4 tc The Lucianic recension of the Old Greek translation includes the following words: “And the Lord said to Samuel.”
5 map For location see Map5-B1; Map7-E2; Map8-E2; Map10-B4.
6 tn Heb “for I have seen among his sons for me a king.”
7 tn The Hebrew text adds “so that” here, formally connecting this clause with the next.
8 tn Or “fulfill.”
9 tc The MT has וְהִגַּדְתִּי לוֹ (vÿhiggadti lo). The verb is Hiphil perfect 1st person common singular, and apparently the conjunction should be understood as vav consecutive (“I will say to him”). But the future reference makes more sense if Samuel is the subject. This would require dropping the final י (yod) and reading the 2nd person masculine singular וְהִגַּדְתָּ (vÿhiggadta). Although there is no external evidence to support it, this reading has been adopted in the present translation. The alternative is to understand the MT to mean “I said to him,” but for this we would expect the preterite with vav consecutive.
10 tn The translation understands the preposition to have a causal sense. However, the preposition could also be understood as the beth pretii, indicating in a broad sense the price attached to this action. So GKC 380 §119.p.
11 tc The translation follows the LXX θεόν (qeon, “God”) rather than the MT לָהֶם (lahem, “to them”). The MT seems to mean “they were bringing a curse on themselves” (cf. ASV, NASB). But this meaning is problematic in part because the verb qll means “to curse,” not “to bring a curse on,” and in part because it takes an accusative object rather than the equivalent of a dative. This is one of the so-called tiqqune sopherim, or “emendations of the scribes.” Why would the ancient copyists alter the original statement about Eli’s sons cursing God to the less objectionable statement that they brought a curse on themselves? Some argue that the scribes were concerned that such a direct and blasphemous affront against God could occur without an immediate response of judgment from God. Therefore they changed the text by deleting two letters א and י (alef and yod) from the word for “God,” with the result that the text then read “to them.” If this ancient scribal claim is accepted as accurate, it implies that the MT here is secondary. The present translation follows the LXX (κακολογοῦντες θεόν, kakologounte" qeon) and a few
12 tc The LXX adds “because you have chosen for yourselves a king.”
13 tn Heb “the guardian for my head.”
14 tn Heb “all the days.”
15 tn Heb “camps.”
16 tn Heb “camps.”
17 tc The line is difficult; it appears to mean that the miser is the kind of person who has calculated the cost of everything in his mind as he offers the food. The LXX has: “Eating and drinking with him is as if one should swallow a hair; do not introduce him to your company nor eat bread with him.” The Hebrew verb “to calculate” (שָׁעַר, sha’ar) with a change of vocalization and of sibilant would yield “hair” (שֵׂעָר, se’ar) – “like a hair in the throat [נֶפֶשׁ, nefesh], so is he.” This would picture an irritating experience. The Instruction of Amenemope uses “blocking the throat” in a similar saying (chapt. 11, 14:7 [ANET 423]). The suggested change is plausible and is followed by NRSV; but the rare verb “to calculate” in the MT would be easier to defend on the basis of the canons of textual criticism because it is the more difficult reading.
18 tn The phrase “the cost” does not appear in the Hebrew but is implied by the verb; it is supplied in the translation for the sake of clarity.
19 tn Heb “soul.”
20 tn Grk “Remaining to you.”
21 tn The negative interrogative particle οὐχί (ouci) expects a positive reply to this question and the following one (“And when it was sold, was it not at your disposal?”).
22 tn Grk “it”; the referent of the pronoun (the money generated from the sale of the land) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
23 tn Grk “How is it that you have [or Why have you] placed this deed in your heart?” Both of these literal translations differ from the normal way of expressing the thought in English.
24 tn Grk “to men.” If Peter’s remark refers only to the apostles, the translation “to men” would be appropriate. But if (as is likely) the action was taken to impress the entire congregation (who would presumably have witnessed the donation or been aware of it) then the more general “to people” is more appropriate, since the audience would have included both men and women.