2 Kings 15:19-20

15:19 Pul ¹  king of Assyria invaded the land, and Menahem paid ²  him ³  a thousand talents ⁴  of silver to gain his support ⁵  and to solidify his control of the kingdom. ⁶  15:20 Menahem got this silver by taxing all the wealthy men in Israel; he took fifty shekels of silver from each one of them and paid it to the king of Assyria. ⁷  Then the king of Assyria left; he did not stay there in the land.

[15:19]  ¹ sn Pul was a nickname of Tiglath-pileser III (cf. 15:29). See M. Cogan and H. Tadmor, II Kings (AB), 171-72.

[15:19]  ² tn Heb “gave.”

[15:19]  ³ tn Heb “Pul.” The proper name has been replaced by the pronoun (“him”) in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[15:19]  ⁴ tn The Hebrew term כִּכָּר (kikkar, “circle”) refers generally to something that is round. When used of metals it can refer to a disk-shaped weight made of the metal or to a standard unit of weight, generally regarded as a talent. Since the accepted weight for a talent of metal is about 75 pounds, this would have amounted to about 75,000 pounds of silver (cf. NCV “about seventy-four thousand pounds”); NLT “thirty-seven tons”; CEV “over thirty tons”; TEV “34,000 kilogrammes.”

[15:19]  ⁵ tn Heb “so his hands would be with him.”

[15:19]  ⁶ tn Heb “to keep hold of the kingdom in his hand.”

[15:20]  ⁷ tn Heb “and Menahem brought out the silver over Israel, over the prominent men of means, to give to the king of Assyria, fifty shekels of silver for each man.”