1 Samuel 25:8

25:8 Ask your own servants; they can tell you! May my servants find favor in your sight, for we have come ¹  at the time of a holiday. Please provide us – your servants ²  and your son David – with whatever you can spare.” ³ 

1 Samuel 28:1

The Witch of Endor

28:1 In those days the Philistines gathered their troops ⁴  for war in order to fight Israel. Achish said to David, “You should fully understand that you and your men must go with me into the battle.” ⁵ 

[25:8]  ¹ tc The translation follows many medieval Hebrew mss in reading בָּאנוּ (ba’nu, “we have come”) rather than the MT’s בָּנוּ (banu, “we have built”).

[25:8]  ² tn This refers to the ten servants sent by David.

[25:8]  ³ tn Heb “whatever your hand will find.”

[28:1]  ⁴ tn Heb “their camps.”

[28:1]  ⁵ tc The translation follows the LXX (εἰς πόλεμον, eis polemon) and a Qumran ms מלחמה במלחמה ([m]lkhmh) bammilkhamah (“in the battle”) rather than the MT’s בַמַּחֲנֶה (bammakhaneh, “in the camp”; cf. NASB). While the MT reading is not impossible here, and although admittedly it is the harder reading, the variant fits the context better. The MT can be explained as a scribal error caused in part by the earlier occurrence of “camp” in this verse.