2 Kings 6:14

6:14 So he sent horses and chariots there, along with a good-sized army. ¹  They arrived during the night and surrounded the city.

2 Kings 8:21

8:21 Joram ²  crossed over to Zair with all his chariots. The Edomites, who had surrounded him, attacked at night and defeated him and his chariot officers. ³  The Israelite army retreated to their homeland. ⁴ 

2 Kings 7:12

7:12 The king got up in the night and said to his advisers, ⁵  “I will tell you what the Syrians have done to us. They know we are starving, so they left the camp and hid in the field, thinking, ‘When they come out of the city, we will capture them alive and enter the city.’”

[6:14]  ¹ tn Heb “heavy force.”

[8:21]  ² sn Joram is a short form of the name Jehoram.

[8:21]  ³ tn Heb “and he arose at night and defeated Edom, who had surrounded him, and the chariot officers.” The Hebrew text as it stands gives the impression that Joram was surrounded and launched a victorious night counterattack. It would then be quite natural to understand the last statement in the verse to refer to an Edomite retreat. Yet v. 22 goes on to state that the Edomite revolt was successful. Therefore, if the MT is retained, it may be better to understand the final statement in v. 21 as a reference to an Israelite retreat (made in spite of the success described in the preceding sentence). The translation above assumes an emendation of the Hebrew text. Adding a third masculine singular pronominal suffix to the accusative sign before Edom (reading אֶתוֹ [’eto], “him,” instead of just אֶת [’et]) and taking Edom as the subject of verbs allows one to translate the verse in a way that is more consistent with the context, which depicts an Israelite defeat, not victory. There is, however, no evidence for this emendation.

[8:21]  ⁴ tn Heb “and the people fled to their tents.”

[7:12]  ³ tn Heb “servants” (also in v. 13).