Discovery Box2 Samuel 1:9
Context1:9 He said to me, ‘Stand over me and finish me off! 1 I’m very dizzy, 2 even though I’m still alive.’ 3
2 Samuel 18:13
Context18:13 If I had acted at risk of my own life 4 – and nothing is hidden from the king! – you would have abandoned me.” 5
2 Samuel 23:17
Context23:17 and said, “O Lord, I will not do this! 6 It is equivalent to the blood of the men who risked their lives by going.” 7 So he refused to drink it. Such were the exploits of the three elite warriors. 8
[1:9] 1 tn As P. K. McCarter (II Samuel [AB], 59) points out, the Polel of the verb מוּת (mut, “to die”) “refers to dispatching or ‘finishing off’ someone already wounded and near death.” Cf. NLT “put me out of my misery.”
[1:9] 2 tn Heb “the dizziness has seized me.” On the meaning of the Hebrew noun translated “dizziness,” see P. K. McCarter, II Samuel (AB), 59-60. The point seems to be that he is unable to kill himself because he is weak and disoriented.
[1:9] 3 tn The Hebrew text here is grammatically very awkward (Heb “because all still my life in me”). Whether the broken construct phrase is due to the fact that the alleged speaker is in a confused state of mind as he is on the verge of dying, or whether the MT has sustained corruption in the transmission process, is not entirely clear. The former seems likely, although P. K. McCarter understands the MT to be the result of conflation of two shorter forms of text (P. K. McCarter, II Samuel [AB], 57, n. 9). Early translators also struggled with the verse, apparently choosing to leave part of the Hebrew text untranslated. For example, the Lucianic recension of the LXX lacks “all,” while other witnesses (namely, one medieval Hebrew
[18:13] 4 tc The translation follows the Qere, many medieval Hebrew
[18:13] 5 tn Heb “stood aloof.”
[23:17] 7 tn Heb “Far be it to me, O
[23:17] 8 tn Heb “[Is it not] the blood of the men who were going with their lives?”
