1 Samuel 4:13

4:13 When he arrived in Shiloh, Eli was sitting in his chair watching by the side of ¹  the road, for he was very worried ²  about the ark of God. As the man entered the city to give his report, ³  the whole city cried out.

1 Samuel 7:7

7:7 When the Philistines heard that the Israelites had gathered at Mizpah, the leaders of the Philistines went up against Israel. When the Israelites heard about this, they were afraid of the Philistines.

1 Samuel 9:2

9:2 He had a son named Saul, a handsome young man. There was no one among the Israelites more handsome than he was; he stood head and shoulders above all the people.

1 Samuel 11:7

11:7 He took a pair ⁴  of oxen and cut them up. Then he sent the pieces throughout the territory of Israel by the hand of messengers, who said, “Whoever does not go out after Saul and after Samuel should expect this to be done to his oxen!” Then the terror of the Lord fell on the people, and they went out as one army. ⁵ 

1 Samuel 12:17

12:17 Is this not the time of the wheat harvest? I will call on the Lord so that he makes it thunder and rain. Realize and see what a great sin you have committed before the Lord by asking for a king for yourselves.”

1 Samuel 13:3

13:3 Jonathan attacked the Philistine outpost ⁶  that was at Geba and the Philistines heard about it. Then Saul alerted ⁷  all the land saying, “Let the Hebrews pay attention!”

1 Samuel 13:6

13:6 The men of Israel realized they had a problem because their army was hard pressed. So the army hid in caves, thickets, cliffs, strongholds, ⁸  and cisterns.

1 Samuel 14:24

Jonathan Violates Saul’s Oath

14:24 Now the men of Israel were hard pressed that day, for Saul had made the army agree to this oath: “Cursed be the man who eats food before evening! I will get my vengeance on my enemies!” So no one in the army ate anything.

1 Samuel 15:30

15:30 Saul ⁹  again replied, “I have sinned. But please honor me before the elders of my people and before Israel. Go back with me so I may worship the Lord your God.”

1 Samuel 16:13

16:13 So Samuel took the horn full of olive oil and anointed him in the presence of his brothers. The Spirit of the Lord rushed upon David from that day onward. Then Samuel got up and went to Ramah.

1 Samuel 20:30

20:30 Saul became angry with Jonathan ¹⁰  and said to him, “You stupid traitor! ¹¹  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 21:2

21:2 David replied to Ahimelech the priest, “The king instructed me to do something, but he said to me, ‘Don’t let anyone know the reason I am sending you or the instructions I have given you.’ ¹²  I have told my soldiers ¹³  to wait at a certain place. ¹⁴ 

[4:13]  ¹ tc Read with many medieval Hebrew mss, the Qere, and much versional evidence יַד (yad, “hand”) rather than MT יַךְ (yakh).

[4:13]  ² tn Heb “his heart was trembling.”

[4:13]  ³ tn Heb “and the man came to report in the city.”

[11:7]  ⁴ tn Heb “yoke.”

[11:7]  ⁵ tn Heb “like one man.”

[13:3]  ⁶ tn Or perhaps “struck down the Philistine official.” See the note at 1 Sam 10:5. Cf. TEV “killed the Philistine commander.”

[13:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “blew the ram’s horn in.”

[13:6]  ⁸ tn Or perhaps “vaults.” This rare term also occurs in Judg 9:46, 49. Cf. KJV “high places”; ASV “coverts”; NAB “caverns”; NASB “cellars”; NIV, NCV, TEV “pits”; NRSV, NLT “tombs.”

[15:30]  ⁹ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Saul) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[20:30]  ¹⁰ tc Many medieval Hebrew mss include the words “his son” here.

[20:30]  ¹¹ 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.

[21:2]  ¹² tn Heb “let not a man know anything about the matter [for] which I am sending you and [about] which I commanded you.”

[21:2]  ¹³ tn Heb “servants.”

[21:2]  ¹⁴ tn The Hebrew expression here refers to a particular, but unnamed, place. It occurs in the OT only here, in 2 Kgs 6:8, and in Ruth 4:1, where Boaz uses it to refer to Naomi’s unnamed kinsman-redeemer. A contracted form of the expression appears in Dan 8:13.