1 Kings 3:21-28

3:21 I got up in the morning to nurse my son, and there he was, ¹  dead! But when I examined him carefully in the morning, I realized it was not my baby.” ²  3:22 The other woman said, “No! My son is alive; your son is dead!” But the first woman replied, “No, your son is dead; my son is alive.” Each presented her case before the king. ³ 

3:23 The king said, “One says, ‘My son is alive; your son is dead,’ while the other says, ‘No, your son is dead; my son is alive.’” 3:24 The king ordered, “Get me a sword!” So they placed a sword before the king. 3:25 The king then said, “Cut the living child in two, and give half to one and half to the other!” 3:26 The real mother ⁴  spoke up to the king, for her motherly instincts were aroused. ⁵  She said, “My master, give her the living child! Whatever you do, don’t kill him!” ⁶  But the other woman said, “Neither one of us will have him! Let them cut him in two!” 3:27 The king responded, “Give the first woman the living child; don’t kill him. She is the mother.” 3:28 When all Israel heard about the judicial decision which the king had rendered, they respected ⁷  the king, for they realized ⁸  that he possessed supernatural wisdom ⁹  to make judicial decisions.

[3:21]  ¹ tn Heb “look.”

[3:21]  ² tn Heb “look, it was not my son to whom I had given birth.”

[3:22]  ³ tn Heb “they spoke before the king.” Another option is to translate, “they argued before the king.”

[3:26]  ⁴ tn Heb “the woman whose son was alive.”

[3:26]  ⁵ tn Heb “for her compassions grew warm for her son.”

[3:26]  ⁶ tn The infinitive absolute before the negated jussive emphasizes the main verb.

[3:28]  ⁷ tn Heb “feared,” perhaps in the sense, “stood in awe of.”

[3:28]  ⁸ tn Heb “saw.”

[3:28]  ⁹ tn Heb “the wisdom of God within him.”