1 Samuel 2:27

The Lord Judges the House of Eli

2:27 A man of God came to Eli and said to him, “This is what the Lord says: ‘Did I not plainly ¹  reveal myself to your ancestor’s ²  house when they were in Egypt in the house of Pharaoh?

1 Samuel 4:17

4:17 The messenger replied, “Israel has fled from ³  the Philistines! The army has suffered a great defeat! Your two sons, Hophni and Phineas, are dead! The ark of God has been captured!”

1 Samuel 18:21

18:21 Saul said, “I will give her to him so that she may become a snare to him and the hand of the Philistines may be against him.” So Saul said to David, “Today is the second time for you to become my son-in-law.” ⁴ 

1 Samuel 18:25

18:25 Saul replied, “Here is what you should say to David: ‘There is nothing that the king wants as a price for the bride except a hundred Philistine foreskins, so that he can be avenged of his ⁵  enemies.’” (Now Saul was thinking that he could kill David by the hand of the Philistines.)

1 Samuel 20:30

20:30 Saul became angry with Jonathan ⁶  and said to him, “You stupid traitor! ⁷  Don’t I realize that to your own disgrace and to the disgrace of your mother’s nakedness you have chosen this son of Jesse?

1 Samuel 22:7

22:7 Saul said to his servants who were stationed around him, “Listen up, you Benjaminites! Is Jesse’s son giving fields and vineyards to all of you? Or is he making all of you ⁸  commanders and officers? ⁹ 

1 Samuel 22:13

22:13 Saul said to him, “Why have you conspired against me, you and this son of Jesse? You gave ¹⁰  him bread and a sword and inquired of God on his behalf, so that he opposes ¹¹  me and waits in ambush, as is the case today!”

[2:27]  ¹ tn The infinitive absolute appears before the finite verb for emphasis.

[2:27]  ² tn Heb “to your father’s” (also in vv. 28, 30).

[4:17]  ³ tn Heb “before.”

[18:21]  ⁴ tc The final sentence of v. 21 is absent in most LXX mss.

[18:25]  ⁵ tn Heb “the king’s.”

[20:30]  ⁶ tc Many medieval Hebrew mss include the words “his son” here.

[20:30]  ⁷ tn Heb “son of a perverse woman of rebelliousness.” But such an overly literal and domesticated translation of the Hebrew expression fails to capture the force of Saul’s unrestrained reaction. Saul, now incensed and enraged over Jonathan’s liaison with David, is actually hurling very coarse and emotionally charged words at his son. The translation of this phrase suggested by Koehler and Baumgartner is “bastard of a wayward woman” (HALOT 796 s.v. עוה), but this is not an expression commonly used in English. A better English approximation of the sentiments expressed here by the Hebrew phrase would be “You stupid son of a bitch!” However, sensitivity to the various public formats in which the Bible is read aloud has led to a less startling English rendering which focuses on the semantic value of Saul’s utterance (i.e., the behavior of his own son Jonathan, which he viewed as both a personal and a political betrayal [= “traitor”]). But this concession should not obscure the fact that Saul is full of bitterness and frustration. That he would address his son Jonathan with such language, not to mention his apparent readiness even to kill his own son over this friendship with David (v. 33), indicates something of the extreme depth of Saul’s jealousy and hatred of David.

[22:7]  ⁸ tc The MT has “to all of you.” If this reading is correct, we have here an example of a prepositional phrase functioning as the equivalent of a dative of advantage, which is not impossible from a grammatical point of view. However, the LXX, the Syriac Peshitta, and Vulgate all have “and.” A conjunction rather than a preposition should probably be read on the front of this phrase.

[22:7]  ⁹ tn Heb “officers of a thousand and officers of a hundred.”

[22:13]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “by giving.”

[22:13]  ¹¹ tn Heb “rises up against.”