23:11 Next in command 3 was Shammah son of Agee the Hararite. When the Philistines assembled at Lehi, 4 where there happened to be an area of a field that was full of lentils, the army retreated before the Philistines.
1 tn Heb “and they grabbed each one the head of his neighbor with his sword in the side of his neighbor and they fell together.”
2 tn 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.”
3 tn Heb “after him.”
4 tn The Hebrew text is difficult here. The MT reads לַחַיָּה (lachayyah), which implies a rare use of the word חַיָּה (chayyah). The word normally refers to an animal, but if the MT is accepted it would here have the sense of a troop or community of people. BDB 312 s.v. II. חַיָּה, for example, understands the similar reference in v. 13 to be to “a group of allied families, making a raid together.” But this works better in v. 13 than it does in v. 11, where the context seems to suggest a particular staging location for a military operation. (See 1 Chr 11:15.) It therefore seems best to understand the word in v. 11 as a place name with ה (he) directive. In that case the Masoretes mistook the word for the common term for an animal and then tried to make sense of it in this context.
5 tc The LXX adds here the following words: “And the servants of Absalom burned them up. And the servants of Joab came to him, rending their garments. They said….”
6 tn The word “Joab’s” is not in the Hebrew text, but has been supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.