Kejadian 19:38

19:38 The younger daughter also gave birth to a son and named him Ben-Ammi. ¹  He is the ancestor of the Ammonites of today.

Kejadian 19:2

19:2 He said, “Here, my lords, please turn aside to your servant’s house. Stay the night ²  and wash your feet. Then you can be on your way early in the morning.” ³  “No,” they replied, “we’ll spend the night in the town square.” ⁴ 

1 Samuel 10:1-19

Samuel Anoints Saul

10:1 Then Samuel took a small container of olive oil and poured it on Saul’s ⁵  head. Samuel ⁶  kissed him and said, “The Lord has chosen you ⁷  to lead his people Israel! You will rule over the Lord’s people and you will deliver them from the power of the enemies who surround them. This will be your sign that the Lord has chosen ⁸  you as leader over his inheritance. ⁹  10:2 When you leave me today, you will find two men near Rachel’s tomb at Zelzah on Benjamin’s border. They will say to you, ‘The donkeys you have gone looking for have been found. Your father is no longer concerned about the donkeys but has become anxious about you two! ¹⁰  He is asking, “What should I do about my son?”’

10:3 “As you continue on from there, you will come to the tall tree of Tabor. At that point three men who are going up to God at Bethel ¹¹  will meet you. One of them will be carrying three young goats, one of them will be carrying three round loaves of bread, and one of them will be carrying a container of wine. 10:4 They will ask you how you’re doing and will give you two loaves of bread. You will accept them. 10:5 Afterward you will go to Gibeah of God, where there are Philistine officials. ¹²  When you enter the town, you will meet a company of prophets coming down from the high place. They will have harps, tambourines, flutes, and lyres, and they will be prophesying. 10:6 Then the spirit of the Lord will rush upon you and you will prophesy with them. You will be changed into a different person.

10:7 “When these signs have taken place, do whatever your hand finds to do, for God will be with you. ¹³  10:8 You will go down to Gilgal before me. I am going to join you there to offer burnt offerings and to make peace offerings. You should wait for seven days, until I arrive and tell you what to do.”

Saul Becomes King

10:9 As Saul ¹⁴  turned ¹⁵  to leave Samuel, God changed his inmost person. ¹⁶  All these signs happened on that very day. 10:10 When Saul and his servant ¹⁷  arrived at Gibeah, a company of prophets was coming out to meet him. Then the spirit of God rushed upon Saul ¹⁸  and he prophesied among them. 10:11 When everyone who had known him previously saw him prophesying with the prophets, the people all asked one another, “What on earth has happened to the son of Kish? Does even Saul belong with the prophets?”

10:12 A man who was from there replied, “And who is their father?” Therefore this became a proverb: “Is even Saul among the prophets?” 10:13 When Saul ¹⁹  had finished prophesying, he went to the high place.

10:14 Saul’s uncle asked him and his servant, “Where did you go?” Saul ²⁰  replied, “To look for the donkeys. But when we realized they were lost, ²¹  we went to Samuel.” 10:15 Saul’s uncle said, “Tell me what Samuel said to you.” ²²  10:16 Saul said to his uncle, “He assured us that the donkeys had been found.” But Saul ²³  did not tell him what Samuel had said about the matter of kingship.

10:17 Then Samuel called the people together before the Lord at Mizpah. 10:18 He said to the Israelites, “This is what the Lord God of Israel says, ‘I brought Israel up from Egypt and I delivered you from the power ²⁴  of the Egyptians and from the power of all the kingdoms that oppressed you. 10:19 But today you have rejected your God who saves you from all your trouble and distress. You have said, “No! ²⁵  Appoint a king over us.” Now take your positions before the Lord by your tribes and by your clans.’”

Yeremia 25:21

25:21 all the people of Edom, ²⁶  Moab, ²⁷  Ammon; ²⁸ 

Yeremia 41:10

41:10 Then Ishmael took captive all the people who were still left alive in Mizpah. This included the royal princesses ²⁹  and all the rest of the people in Mizpah that Nebuzaradan, the captain of the royal guard, had put under the authority of Gedaliah son of Ahikam. Ishmael son of Nethaniah took all these people captive and set out to cross over to the Ammonites.

Yeremia 49:1

Judgment Against Ammon

49:1 The Lord spoke about the Ammonites. ³⁰ 

“Do you think there are not any people of the nation of Israel remaining?

Do you think there are not any of them remaining to reinherit their land?

Is that why you people who worship the god Milcom ³¹ 

have taken possession of the territory of Gad and live in his cities? ³² 

[19:38]  ¹ sn The name Ben-Ammi means “son of my people.” Like the account of Moab’s birth, this story is probably included in the narrative to portray the Ammonites, another perennial enemy of Israel, in a negative light.

[19:2]  ² tn The imperatives have the force of invitation.

[19:2]  ³ tn These two verbs form a verbal hendiadys: “you can rise up early and go” means “you can go early.”

[19:2]  ⁴ sn The town square refers to the wide street area at the gate complex of the city.

[10:1]  ⁵ tn Heb “his”; the referent (Saul) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[10:1]  ⁶ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Samuel) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[10:1]  ⁷ tn Heb “Is it not that the Lord has anointed you?” The question draws attention to the fact and is a rhetorical way of affirming the Lord’s choice of Saul. The translation reflects the rhetorical force of the question.

[10:1]  ⁸ tn That is, “anointed.”

[10:1]  ⁹ tc The MT reads simply “Is it not that the Lord has anointed you over his inheritance for a leader?” The translation follows the LXX. The MT apparently suffers from parablepsis, whereby a scribe’s eye jumped from the first occurrence of the expression “the Lord has anointed you” to the second occurrence of this expression at the end of v. 1. This mistake caused the accidental omission of the intervening material in the LXX, which appears to preserve the original Hebrew text here.

[10:2]  ¹⁰ sn In the Hebrew text the pronoun you is plural, suggesting that Saul’s father was concerned about his son and the servant who accompanied him.

[10:3]  ¹¹ map For location see Map4 G4; Map5 C1; Map6 E3; Map7 D1; Map8 G3.

[10:5]  ¹² tn Or “sentries.” Some translate “outpost” (NIV) or “garrison” (NAB, NRSV, NLT) here (see 1 Sam 13:3). The noun is plural in the Hebrew text, but the LXX and other ancient witnesses read a singular noun here.

[10:7]  ¹³ sn In light of Saul’s commission to be Israel’s deliverer (see v. 1), it is likely that some type of military action against the Philistines (see v.5) is implied.

[10:9]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Saul) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[10:9]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “turned his shoulder.”

[10:9]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “God turned for him another heart”; NAB, NRSV “gave him another heart”; NIV, NCV “changed Saul’s heart”; TEV “gave Saul a new nature”; CEV “made Saul feel like a different person.”

[10:10]  ¹⁷ tc Two medieval Hebrew mss, the LXX, and the Syriac Peshitta have the singular “he” (in which case the referent would be Saul alone).

[10:10]  tn Heb “they”; the referents (Saul and his servant) have been specified in the translation for clarity.

[10:10]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “him”; the referent (Saul) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[10:13]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Saul) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[10:14]  ²⁰ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Saul) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[10:14]  ²¹ tn Heb “And we saw that they were not.”

[10:15]  ²² tc In the LXX and Vulgate the pronoun “you” is singular, referring specifically to Saul. In the MT it is plural, including Saul’s servant as well.

[10:16]  ²³ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Saul) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[10:18]  ²⁴ tn Heb “hand” (also later in this verse).

[10:19]  ²⁵ tc The translation follows many medieval Hebrew mss, the LXX, the Syriac Peshitta, and Vulgate in reading לֹא (lo’, “not”) rather than the MT לוֹ (lo; “to him”). Some witnesses combine the variants, resulting in a conflated text. For example, a few medieval Hebrew mss have לֹא לוֹ (lo lo’; “to him, ‘No.’”). A few others have לֹא לִי (li lo’; “to me, ‘No.’”).

[25:21]  ²⁶ sn See further Jer 49:7-22 for the judgment against Edom. Edom, Moab, and Ammon were east of Judah.

[25:21]  ²⁷ sn See further Jer 48:1-47 for the judgment against Moab.

[25:21]  ²⁸ sn See further Jer 49:1-6 for the judgment against Ammon.

[41:10]  ²⁹ tn Heb “the daughters of the king.” Most commentators do not feel that this refers to the actual daughters of Zedekiah since they would have been too politically important to have escaped exile with their father. As noted in the translator’s note on 36:26 this need not refer to the actual daughters of the king but may refer to other royal daughters, i.e., the daughters of other royal princes.

[49:1]  ³⁰ sn Ammonites. Ammon was a small kingdom to the north and east of Moab which was in constant conflict with the Transjordanian tribes of Reuben, Gad, and Manasseh over territorial rights to the lands north and south of the Jabbok River. Ammon mainly centered on the city of Rabbah which is modern Amman. According to Judg 11:13 the Ammonites claimed the land between the Jabbok and the Arnon but this was land taken from them by Sihon and Og and land that the Israelites captured from the latter two kings. The Ammonites attempted to expand into the territory of Israel in the Transjordan in the time of Jephthah (Judg 10-11) and the time of Saul (1 Sam 11). Apparently when Tiglath Pileser carried away the Israelite tribes in Transjordan in 733 b.c., the Ammonites took over possession of their cities (Jer 49:1). Like Moab they appear to have been loyal to Nebuchadnezzar in the early part of his reign, forming part of the contingent that he sent to harass Judah when Jehoiakim rebelled in 598 b.c. (2 Kgs 24:2). But along with Moab and Edom they sent representatives to plot rebellion against Nebuchadnezzar in 594 b.c. (Jer 27:3). The Ammonites were evidently in rebellion against him in 588 b.c. when he had to decide whether to attack Rabbah or Jerusalem first (Ezek 21:18-23 [21:23-28 HT]). They appear to have remained in rebellion after the destruction of Jerusalem because their king Baalis was behind the plot to assassinate Gedaliah and offered refuge to Ishmael after he did it (Jer 40:13; 41:15). According to the Jewish historian Josephus they were conquered in 582 b.c. by Nebuchadnezzar.

[49:1]  ³¹ tc The reading here and in v. 3 follows the reading of the Greek, Syriac, and Latin versions and 1 Kgs 11:5, 33; 2 Kgs 23:13. The Hebrew reads “Malcom” both here, in v. 3, and Zeph 1:5. This god is to be identified with the god known elsewhere as Molech (cf. 1 Kgs 11:7).

[49:1]  ³² tn Heb “Does not Israel have any sons? Does not he have any heir [or “heirs” as a collective]? Why [then] has Malcom taken possession of Gad and [why] do his [Malcom’s] people live in his [Gad’s] land?” A literal translation here will not produce any meaning without major commentary. Hence the meaning that is generally agreed on is reflected in an admittedly paraphrastic translation. The reference is to the fact that the Ammonites had taken possession of the cities that had been deserted when the Assyrians carried off the Transjordanian tribes in 733 b.c. assuming that the Israelites would not return in sufficient numbers to regain control of it. The thought underlying the expression “Why has Milcom taken possession…” reflects the idea, common in the OT and the ancient Near East, that the god of a people drove out the previous inhabitants, gave their land to his worshipers to possess, and took up residence with them there (cf., e.g., Deut 1:21; Judg 11:24 and line 33-34 of the Moabite stone: “Chemosh said to me, ‘Go down, fight against Hauronen.’ And I went down [and I fought against the town and took it], and Chemosh dwelt there in my time.” [ANET 321]).