1 Samuel 1:9

1:9 On one occasion in Shiloh, after they had finished eating and drinking, Hannah got up. ¹  (Now at the time Eli the priest was sitting in his chair ²  by the doorpost of the Lord’s temple.)

1 Samuel 2:33

2:33 Any one of you that I do not cut off from my altar, I will cause your ³  eyes to fail ⁴  and will cause you grief. ⁵  All of those born to your family ⁶  will die in the prime of life. ⁷ 

1 Samuel 3:13

3:13 You ⁸  should tell him that I am about to judge his house forever because of ⁹  the sin that he knew about. For his sons were cursing God, ¹⁰  and he did not rebuke them.

1 Samuel 7:2

Further Conflict with the Philistines

7:2 It was quite a long time – some twenty years in all – that the ark stayed at Kiriath Jearim. All the people ¹¹  of Israel longed for ¹²  the Lord.

1 Samuel 22:1

David Goes to Adullam and Mizpah

22:1 So David left there and escaped to the cave of Adullam. When his brothers and the rest of his father’s family ¹³  learned about it, they went down there to him.

1 Samuel 24:21

24:21 So now swear to me in the Lord’s name ¹⁴  that you will not kill ¹⁵  my descendants after me or destroy my name from the house of my father.”

1 Samuel 25:28

25:28 Please forgive the sin of your servant, for the Lord will certainly establish the house of my lord, because my lord fights the battles of the Lord. May no evil be found in you all your days!

1 Samuel 31:9

31:9 They cut off Saul’s ¹⁶  head and stripped him of his armor. They sent messengers to announce the news in the temple of their idols and among their people throughout the surrounding land of the Philistines.

[1:9]  ¹ tc The LXX adds “and stood before the Lord,” but this is probably a textual expansion due to the terseness of the statement in the Hebrew text.

[1:9]  ² tn Or perhaps, “on his throne.” See Joüon 2:506-7 §137.f.

[2:33]  ³ tc The LXX, a Qumran ms, and a few old Latin mss have the third person pronominal suffix “his” here.

[2:33]  ⁴ tn Heb “to cause your eyes to fail.” Elsewhere this verb, when used of eyes, refers to bloodshot eyes resulting from weeping, prolonged staring, or illness (see Lev 26:16; Pss 69:3; 119:82; Lam 2:11; 4:17).

[2:33]  ⁵ tn Heb “and to cause your soul grief.”

[2:33]  ⁶ tn Heb “and all the increase of your house.”

[2:33]  ⁷ tc The text is difficult. The MT literally says “they will die [as] men.” Apparently the meaning is that they will be cut off in the prime of their life without reaching old age. The LXX and a Qumran ms, however, have the additional word “sword” (“they will die by the sword of men”). This is an easier reading (cf. NAB, NRSV, TEV, CEV, NLT), but that fact is not in favor of its originality.

[3:13]  ⁸ tc The MT has וְהִגַּדְתִּי לוֹ (vÿhiggadti lo). The verb is Hiphil perfect 1st person common singular, and apparently the conjunction should be understood as vav consecutive (“I will say to him”). But the future reference makes more sense if Samuel is the subject. This would require dropping the final י (yod) and reading the 2nd person masculine singular וְהִגַּדְתָּ (vÿhiggadta). Although there is no external evidence to support it, this reading has been adopted in the present translation. The alternative is to understand the MT to mean “I said to him,” but for this we would expect the preterite with vav consecutive.

[3:13]  ⁹ tn The translation understands the preposition to have a causal sense. However, the preposition could also be understood as the beth pretii, indicating in a broad sense the price attached to this action. So GKC 380 §119.p.

[3:13]  ¹⁰ tc The translation follows the LXX θεόν (qeon, “God”) rather than the MT לָהֶם (lahem, “to them”). The MT seems to mean “they were bringing a curse on themselves” (cf. ASV, NASB). But this meaning is problematic in part because the verb qll means “to curse,” not “to bring a curse on,” and in part because it takes an accusative object rather than the equivalent of a dative. This is one of the so-called tiqqune sopherim, or “emendations of the scribes.” Why would the ancient copyists alter the original statement about Eli’s sons cursing God to the less objectionable statement that they brought a curse on themselves? Some argue that the scribes were concerned that such a direct and blasphemous affront against God could occur without an immediate response of judgment from God. Therefore they changed the text by deleting two letters א and י (alef and yod) from the word for “God,” with the result that the text then read “to them.” If this ancient scribal claim is accepted as accurate, it implies that the MT here is secondary. The present translation follows the LXX (κακολογοῦντες θεόν, kakologounte" qeon) and a few mss of the Old Latin in reading “God” rather than the MT “to them.” Cf. also NAB, NRSV, NLT.

[7:2]  ¹¹ tn Heb “house” (also in the following verse).

[7:2]  ¹² tn Heb “mourned after”; NIV “mourned and sought after”; KJV, NRSV “lamented after”; NAB “turned to”; NCV “began to follow…again.”

[22:1]  ¹³ tn Heb “house.”

[24:21]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “by the Lord.”

[24:21]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “cut off.”

[31:9]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “his”; the referent (Saul) has been specified in the translation for clarity (likewise in the following verse).