1 Samuel 23:6-9

David Eludes Saul Again

23:6 Now when Abiathar son of Ahimelech had fled to David at Keilah, he had brought with him an ephod. ¹  23:7 When Saul was told that David had come to Keilah, Saul said, “God has delivered ²  him into my hand, for he has boxed himself into a corner by entering a city with two barred gates.” ³  23:8 So Saul mustered all his army to go down to Keilah and besiege David and his men. ⁴ 

23:9 When David realized that Saul was planning to harm him, ⁵  he told Abiathar the priest, “Bring the ephod!”

[23:6]  ¹ tn Heb “an ephod went down in his hand.”

[23:7]  ² tn The MT reading (“God has alienated him into my hand”) in v. 7 is a difficult and uncommon idiom. The use of this verb in Jer 19:4 is somewhat parallel, but not entirely so. Many scholars have therefore suspected a textual problem here, emending the word נִכַּר (nikkar, “alienated”) to סִכַּר (sikkar, “he has shut up [i.e., delivered]”). This is the idea reflected in the translations of the Syriac Peshitta and Vulgate, although it is not entirely clear whether they are reading something different from the MT or are simply paraphrasing what for them too may have been a difficult text. The LXX has “God has sold him into my hands,” apparently reading מַכַר (makar, “sold”) for MT’s נִכַּר. The present translation is a rather free interpretation.

[23:7]  ³ tn Heb “with two gates and a bar.” Since in English “bar” could be understood as a saloon, it has been translated as an attributive: “two barred gates.”

[23:8]  ⁴ tn Heb “So Saul mustered all his army for battle to go down to Keilah to besiege against David and his men.”

[23:9]  ⁵ tn Heb “Saul was planning the evil against him.”