2 Samuel 3:28-39

3:28 When David later heard about this, he said, “I and my kingdom are forever innocent before the Lord of the shed blood of Abner son of Ner! 3:29 May his blood whirl over ¹  the head of Joab and the entire house of his father! ²  May the males of Joab’s house ³  never cease to have ⁴  someone with a running sore or a skin disease or one who works at the spindle ⁵  or one who falls by the sword or one who lacks food!”

3:30 So Joab and his brother Abishai killed Abner, because he had killed their brother Asahel in Gibeon during the battle.

3:31 David instructed Joab and all the people who were with him, “Tear your clothes! Put on sackcloth! Lament before Abner!” Now King David followed ⁶  behind the funeral bier. 3:32 So they buried Abner in Hebron. The king cried loudly ⁷  over Abner’s grave and all the people wept too. 3:33 The king chanted the following lament for Abner:

“Should Abner have died like a fool?

3:34 Your hands ⁸  were not bound,

and your feet were not put into irons.

You fell the way one falls before criminals.”

All the people ⁹  wept over him again. 3:35 Then all the people came and encouraged David to eat food while it was still day. But David took an oath saying, “God will punish me severely ¹⁰  if I taste bread or anything whatsoever before the sun sets!”

3:36 All the people noticed this and it pleased them. ¹¹  In fact, everything the king did pleased all the people. 3:37 All the people and all Israel realized on that day that the killing of Abner son of Ner was not done at the king’s instigation. ¹² 

3:38 Then the king said to his servants, “Do you not realize that a great leader ¹³  has fallen this day in Israel? 3:39 Today I am weak, even though I am anointed as king. These men, the sons of Zeruiah, are too much for me to bear! ¹⁴  May the Lord punish appropriately the one who has done this evil thing!” ¹⁵ 

[3:29]  ¹ tn Heb “and may they whirl over.” In the Hebrew text the subject of the plural verb is unexpressed. The most likely subject is Abner’s “shed blood” (v. 28), which is a masculine plural form in Hebrew. The verb חוּל (khul, “whirl”) is used with the preposition עַל (’al) only here and in Jer 23:19; 30:23.

[3:29]  ² tc 4QSam^a has “of Joab” rather than “of his father” read by the MT.

[3:29]  ³ tn Heb “the house of Joab.” However, it is necessary to specify that David’s curse is aimed at Joab’s male descendants; otherwise it would not be clear that “one who works at the spindle” refers to a man doing woman’s work rather than a woman.

[3:29]  ⁴ tn Heb “and may there not be cut off from the house of Joab.”

[3:29]  ⁵ tn The expression used here is difficult. The translation “one who works at the spindle” follows a suggestion of S. R. Driver that the expression pejoratively describes an effeminate man who, rather than being a mighty warrior, is occupied with tasks that are normally fulfilled by women (S. R. Driver, Notes on the Hebrew Text and the Topography of the Books of Samuel, 250-51; cf. NAB “one unmanly”; TEV “fit only to do a woman’s work”; CEV “cowards”). But P. K. McCarter, following an alleged Phoenician usage of the noun to refer to “crutches,” adopts a different view. He translates the phrase “clings to a crutch,” seeing here a further description of physical lameness (II Samuel [AB], 118). Such an idea fits the present context well and is followed by NIV, NCV, and NLT, although the evidence for this meaning is questionable. According to DNWSI 2:915-16, the noun consistently refers to a spindle in Phoenician, as it does in Ugaritic (see UT 468).

[3:31]  ⁶ tn Heb “was walking.”

[3:32]  ⁷ tn Heb “lifted up his voice and wept.” The expression is a verbal hendiadys.

[3:34]  ⁸ tc The translation follows many medieval Hebrew manuscripts and several ancient versions in reading “your hands,” rather than “your hand.”

[3:34]  ⁹ tc 4QSam^a lacks the words “all the people.”

[3:35]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “Thus God will do to me and thus he will add.”

[3:36]  ¹¹ tn Heb “it was good in their eyes.”

[3:37]  ¹² tn Heb “from the king.”

[3:38]  ¹³ tn Heb “a leader and a great one.” The expression is a hendiadys.

[3:39]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “are hard from me.”

[3:39]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “May the Lord repay the doer of the evil according to his evil” (NASB similar).