2 Samuel 20:6

20:6 Then David said to Abishai, “Now Sheba son of Bicri will cause greater disaster for us than Absalom did! Take your lord’s servants and pursue him. Otherwise he will secure ¹  fortified cities for himself and get away from us.”

Jeremiah 8:14

Jeremiah Laments over the Coming Destruction

8:14 The people say, ² 

“Why are we just sitting here?

Let us gather together inside the fortified cities. ³ 

Let us at least die there fighting, ⁴ 

since the Lord our God has condemned us to die.

He has condemned us to drink the poison waters of judgment ⁵ 

because we have sinned against him. ⁶ 

[20:6]  ¹ tn Heb “find.” The perfect verbal form is unexpected with the preceding word “otherwise.” We should probably read instead the imperfect. Although it is possible to understand the perfect here as indicating that the feared result is thought of as already having taken place (cf. BDB 814 s.v. פֶּן 2), it is more likely that the perfect is simply the result of scribal error. In this context the imperfect would be more consistent with the following verb וְהִצִּיל (vÿhitsil, “and he will get away”).

[8:14]  ² tn The words “The people say” are not in the text but are implicit in the shift of speakers between vv. 4-13 and vv. 14-16. They are supplied in the translation for clarity.

[8:14]  ³ tn Heb “Gather together and let us enter into the fortified cities.”

[8:14]  ⁴ tn Heb “Let us die there.” The words “at least” and “fighting” are intended to bring out the contrast of passive surrender to death in the open country and active resistance to the death implicit in the context.

[8:14]  ⁵ tn The words “of judgment” are not in the text but are intended to show that “poison water” is not literal but figurative of judgment at the hands of God through the agency of the enemy mentioned in v. 16.

[8:14]  ⁶ tn Heb “against the Lord.” The switch is for the sake of smoothness in English.