Discovery Box2 Samuel 23:1-17
Context23:1 These are the final words of David:
“The oracle of David son of Jesse,
the oracle of the man raised up as
the ruler chosen by the God of Jacob, 1
Israel’s beloved 2 singer of songs:
23:2 The Lord’s spirit spoke through me;
his word was on my tongue.
23:3 The God of Israel spoke,
the protector 3 of Israel spoke to me.
The one who rules fairly among men,
the one who rules in the fear of God,
23:4 is like the light of morning when the sun comes up,
a morning in which there are no clouds.
He is like the brightness after rain
that produces grass from the earth.
23:5 My dynasty is approved by God, 4
for he has made a perpetual covenant with me,
arranged in all its particulars and secured.
He always delivers me,
and brings all I desire to fruition. 5
23:6 But evil people are like thorns –
all of them are tossed away,
for they cannot be held in the hand.
23:7 The one who touches them
must use an iron instrument
or the wooden shaft of a spear.
They are completely burned up right where they lie!” 6
23:8 These are the names of David’s warriors:
Josheb-Basshebeth, a Tahkemonite, was head of the officers. 7 He killed eight hundred men with his spear in one battle. 8 23:9 Next in command 9 was Eleazar son of Dodo, 10 the son of Ahohi. He was one of the three warriors who were with David when they defied the Philistines who were assembled there for battle. When the men of Israel retreated, 11 23:10 he stood his ground 12 and fought the Philistines until his hand grew so tired that it 13 seemed stuck to his sword. The Lord gave a great victory on that day. When the army returned to him, the only thing left to do was to plunder the corpses.
23:11 Next in command 14 was Shammah son of Agee the Hararite. When the Philistines assembled at Lehi, 15 where there happened to be an area of a field that was full of lentils, the army retreated before the Philistines. 23:12 But he made a stand in the middle of that area. He defended 16 it and defeated the Philistines; the Lord gave them a great victory.
23:13 At the time of 17 the harvest three 18 of the thirty leaders went down to 19 David at the cave of Adullam. A band of Philistines was camped in the valley of Rephaim. 23:14 David was in the stronghold at the time, while a Philistine garrison was in Bethlehem. 20 23:15 David was thirsty and said, “How I wish someone would give me some water to drink from the cistern in Bethlehem near the gate!” 23:16 So the three elite warriors broke through the Philistine forces and drew some water from the cistern in Bethlehem near the gate. They carried it back to David, but he refused to drink it. He poured it out as a drink offering to the Lord 23:17 and said, “O Lord, I will not do this! 21 It is equivalent to the blood of the men who risked their lives by going.” 22 So he refused to drink it. Such were the exploits of the three elite warriors. 23
[23:1] 1 tn Heb “the anointed one of the God of Jacob.”
[23:3] 3 tn Heb “rock,” used as a metaphor of divine protection.
[23:5] 4 tn Heb “For not thus [is] my house with God?”
[23:5] 5 tn Heb “for all my deliverance and every desire, surely does he not make [it] grow?”
[23:7] 6 tn Heb “and with fire they are completely burned up in [the place where they] remain.” The infinitive absolute is used before the finite verb to emphasize that they are completely consumed by the fire.
[23:8] 7 tn The Hebrew word is sometimes rendered as “the three,” but BDB is probably correct in taking it to refer to military officers (BDB 1026 s.v. שְׁלִישִׁי). In that case the etymological connection of this word to the Hebrew numerical adjective for “three” can be explained as originating with a designation for the third warrior in a chariot.
[23:8] 8 tc The translation follows some LXX
[23:9] 10 tc This follows the Qere and many medieval Hebrew
[23:11] 14 tn Heb “after him.”
[23:11] 15 tn The Hebrew text is difficult here. The MT reads לַחַיָּה (lachayyah), which implies a rare use of the word חַיָּה (chayyah). The word normally refers to an animal, but if the MT is accepted it would here have the sense of a troop or community of people. BDB 312 s.v. II. חַיָּה, for example, understands the similar reference in v. 13 to be to “a group of allied families, making a raid together.” But this works better in v. 13 than it does in v. 11, where the context seems to suggest a particular staging location for a military operation. (See 1 Chr 11:15.) It therefore seems best to understand the word in v. 11 as a place name with ה (he) directive. In that case the Masoretes mistook the word for the common term for an animal and then tried to make sense of it in this context.
[23:12] 16 tn Heb “delivered.”
[23:13] 17 tn The meaning of Hebrew אֶל־קָצִיר (’el qatsir) seems here to be “at the time of harvest,” although this is an unusual use of the phrase. As S. R. Driver points out, this preposition does not normally have the temporal sense of “in” or “during” (S. R. Driver, Notes on the Hebrew Text and the Topography of the Books of Samuel, 366).
[23:13] 18 tc The translation follows the Qere and many medieval Hebrew
[23:13] 19 tn Heb “went down…and approached.”
[23:14] 20 map For location see Map5 B1; Map7 E2; Map8 E2; Map10 B4.
[23:17] 21 tn Heb “Far be it to me, O
[23:17] 22 tn Heb “[Is it not] the blood of the men who were going with their lives?”
