2 Samuel 2:8-12

David’s Army Clashes with the Army of Saul

2:8 Now Abner son of Ner, the general in command of Saul’s army, had taken Saul’s son Ish-bosheth ¹  and had brought him to Mahanaim. 2:9 He appointed him king over Gilead, the Geshurites, ²  Jezreel, Ephraim, Benjamin, and all Israel. 2:10 Ish-bosheth son of Saul was forty years old when he began to rule over Israel. He ruled two years. However, the people ³  of Judah followed David. 2:11 David was king in Hebron over the people of Judah for seven and a half years. ⁴ 

2:12 Then Abner son of Ner and the servants of Ish-bosheth son of Saul went out from Mahanaim to Gibeon.

[2:8]  ¹ sn The name Ish-bosheth means in Hebrew “man of shame.” It presupposes an earlier form such as Ish-baal (“man of the Lord”), with the word “baal” being used of Israel’s God. But because the Canaanite storm god was named “Baal,” that part of the name was later replaced with the word “shame.”

[2:9]  ² tc The MT here reads “the Ashurite,” but this is problematic if it is taken to mean “the Assyrian.” Ish-bosheth’s kingdom obviously was not of such proportions as to extend to Assyria. The Syriac Peshitta renders the word as “the Geshurite,” while the Targum has “of the house of Ashur.” We should probably emend the Hebrew text to read “the Geshurite.” The Geshurites lived in the northeastern part of the land of Palestine.

[2:10]  ³ tn Heb “house.”

[2:11]  ⁴ tn Heb “And the number of the days in which David was king in Hebron over the house of Judah was seven years and six months.”