2 Samuel 2:18

2:18 The three sons of Zeruiah were there – Joab, Abishai, and Asahel. (Now Asahel was as quick on his feet as one of the gazelles in the field.)

2 Samuel 10:8

10:8 The Ammonites marched out and were deployed for battle at the entrance of the city gate, while the men from Aram Zobah, Rehob, Ish-tob, and Maacah were by themselves in the field.

2 Samuel 11:23

11:23 The messenger said to David, “The men overpowered us and attacked us ¹  in the field. But we forced them to retreat all the way ²  to the door of the city gate.

2 Samuel 14:6

14:6 Your servant ³  has two sons. When the two of them got into a fight in the field, there was no one present who could intervene. One of them struck the other and killed him.

2 Samuel 19:29

19:29 Then the king replied to him, “Why should you continue speaking like this? You and Ziba will inherit the field together.”

2 Samuel 23:11

23:11 Next in command ⁴  was Shammah son of Agee the Hararite. When the Philistines assembled at Lehi, ⁵  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 came out to us.”

² tn Heb “but we were on them.”

¹ tn Here and elsewhere (vv. 7, 12, 15a, 17, 19) the woman uses a term which suggests a lower level female servant. She uses the term to express her humility before the king. However, she uses a different term in vv. 15b-16. See the note at v. 15 for a discussion of the rhetorical purpose of this switch in terminology.

¹ tn Heb “after him.”

² 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.