2:8 “Note well, you still have to contend with Shimei son of Gera, the Benjaminite from Bahurim, 1 who tried to call down upon me a horrible judgment when I went to Mahanaim. 2 He came down and met me at the Jordan, and I solemnly promised 3 him by the Lord, ‘I will not strike you down 4 with the sword.’ 2:9 But now 5 don’t treat him as if he were innocent. You are a wise man and you know how to handle him; 6 make sure he has a bloody death.” 7
16:6 When they arrived, Samuel 9 noticed 10 Eliab and said to himself, 11 “Surely, here before the Lord stands his chosen king!” 12 16:7 But the Lord said to Samuel, “Don’t be impressed by 13 his appearance or his height, for I have rejected him. God does not view things the way men do. 14 People look on the outward appearance, 15 but the Lord looks at the heart.”
16:8 Then Jesse called Abinadab and presented him to Samuel. 16 But Samuel 17 said, “The Lord has not chosen this one, either.” 16:9 Then Jesse presented 18 Shammah. But Samuel said, “The Lord has not chosen this one either.”
20:8 A king sitting on the throne to judge 19
separates out 20 all evil with his eyes. 21
20:26 A wise king separates out 22 the wicked;
he turns the threshing wheel over them. 23
1 tn Heb “Look, with you is Shimei….”
2 tn Heb “and he cursed me with a horrible curse on the day I went to Mahanaim.”
3 tn Or “swore an oath to.”
4 tn Heb “kill you.”
5 tc The Lucianic recension of the Old Greek and the Vulgate have here “you” rather than “now.” The two words are homonyms in Hebrew.
6 tn Heb “what you should do to him.”
7 tn Heb “bring his grey hair down in blood [to] Sheol.”
8 tn Heb “going the way of all the earth.”
9 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Samuel) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
10 tn Heb “saw.”
11 tn Heb “said”; the words “to himself” are implied, given the secrecy surrounding Samuel’s mission to Bethlehem (v. 2).
12 tn Heb “his anointed one.”
13 tn Heb “don’t look toward.”
14 tn Heb “for not that which the man sees.” The translation follows the LXX, which reads, “for not as man sees does God see.” The MT has suffered from homoioteleuton or homoioarcton. See P. K. McCarter, I Samuel (AB), 274.
15 tn Heb “to the eyes.”
16 tn Heb “and caused him to pass before.”
17 tn Heb “he” (also in v. 9); the referent (Samuel) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
18 tn Heb “caused to pass by.”
19 tn The infinitive construct is דִּין; it indicates purpose, “to judge” (so NIV, NCV) even though it does not have the preposition with it.
20 tn The second line uses the image of winnowing (cf. NIV, NRSV) to state that the king’s judgment removes evil from the realm. The verb form is מִזָרֶה (mÿzareh), the Piel participle. It has been translated “to sift; to winnow; to scatter” and “to separate” – i.e., separate out evil from the land. The text is saying that a just government roots out evil (cf. NAB “dispels all evil”), but few governments have been consistently just.
21 sn The phrase with his eyes indicates that the king will closely examine or look into all the cases that come before him.
22 tn Heb “winnows” (so NAB, NASB, NRSV). The sage draws on the process of winnowing to explain how the king uncovers and removes wickedness. The verb from which the participle מְזָרֶה (mÿzareh) is derived means “to separate; to winnow; to scatter”; the implied comparison means that the king will separate good people from bad people like wheat is separated from chaff. The image of winnowing is also used in divine judgment. The second line of the verse uses a detail of the process to make the point. Driving a wheel over the wheat represents the threshing process; the sharp iron wheels of the cart would easily serve the purpose (e.g., Isa 28:27-28).
23 tn The king has the wisdom/ability to destroy evil from his kingdom. See also D. W. Thomas, “Proverbs 20:26,” JTS 15 (1964): 155-56.