2 Samuel 16:11

16:11 Then David said to Abishai and to all his servants, “My own son, my very own flesh and blood, ¹  is trying to take my life. So also now this Benjaminite! Leave him alone so that he can curse, for the Lord has spoken to him.

2 Samuel 17:9

17:9 At this very moment he is hiding out in one of the caves or in some other similar place. If it should turn out that he attacks our troops first, ²  whoever hears about it will say, ‘Absalom’s army has been slaughtered!’

2 Samuel 20:6

20:6 Then David said to Abishai, “Now Sheba son of Bicri will cause greater disaster for us than Absalom did! Take your lord’s servants and pursue him. Otherwise he will secure ³  fortified cities for himself and get away from us.”

2 Samuel 24:16

24:16 When the angel ⁴  extended his hand to destroy Jerusalem, the Lord relented from his judgment. ⁵  He told the angel who was killing the people, “That’s enough! Stop now!” ⁶  (Now the Lord’s angel was near the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.)

2 Samuel 18:3

18:3 But the soldiers replied, ⁷  “You should not do this! ⁸  For if we should have to make a rapid retreat, they won’t be too concerned about us. ⁹  Even if half of us should die, they won’t be too concerned about us. But you ¹⁰  are like ten thousand of us! So it is better if you remain in the city for support.”

2 Samuel 19:7

19:7 So get up now and go out and give some encouragement to ¹¹  your servants. For I swear by the Lord that if you don’t go out there, not a single man will stay here with you tonight! This disaster will be worse for you than any disaster that has overtaken you from your youth right to the present time!”

2 Samuel 24:13

24:13 Gad went to David and told him, “Shall seven ¹²  years of famine come upon your land? Or shall you flee for three months from your enemy with him in hot pursuit? Or shall there be three days of plague in your land? Now decide ¹³  what I should tell the one who sent me.”

¹ tn Heb “who came out from my entrails.” David’s point is that is his own son, his child whom he himself had fathered, was now wanting to kill him.

² tn Heb “that he falls on them [i.e., Absalom’s troops] at the first [encounter]; or “that some of them [i.e., Absalom’s troops] fall at the first [encounter].”

³ tn Heb “find.” The perfect verbal form is unexpected with the preceding word “otherwise.” We should probably read instead the imperfect. Although it is possible to understand the perfect here as indicating that the feared result is thought of as already having taken place (cf. BDB 814 s.v. פֶּן 2), it is more likely that the perfect is simply the result of scribal error. In this context the imperfect would be more consistent with the following verb וְהִצִּיל (vÿhitsil, “and he will get away”).

⁴ tn Heb “messenger.”

⁵ tn Heb “concerning the calamity.”

⁶ tn Heb “Now, drop your hand.”

⁵ tn Heb “the people said.”

⁶ tn Heb “march out.”

⁷ tn Heb “they will not place to us heart.”

⁸ tc The translation follows the LXX (except for the Lucianic recension), Symmachus, and Vulgate in reading אָתָּה (’atta, “you”) rather than MT עָתָּה (’atta, “now”).

⁶ tn Heb “and speak to the heart of.”

⁷ tc The LXX has here “three” rather than “seven,” and is followed by NAB, NIV, NCV, NRSV, TEV, NLT. See 1 Chr 21:12.

⁸ tn Heb “now know and see.”