2 Samuel 3:29

3:29 May his blood whirl over ¹  the head of Joab and the entire house of his father! ²  May the males of Joab’s house ³  never cease to have ⁴  someone with a running sore or a skin disease or one who works at the spindle ⁵  or one who falls by the sword or one who lacks food!”

2 Samuel 4:10

4:10 when someone told me that Saul was dead – even though he thought he was bringing good news ⁶  – I seized him and killed him in Ziklag. That was the good news I gave to him!

2 Samuel 7:19

7:19 And you didn’t stop there, O Lord God! You have also spoken about the future of your servant’s family. ⁷  Is this your usual way of dealing with men, ⁸  O Lord God?

2 Samuel 12:9

12:9 Why have you shown contempt for the word of the Lord by doing evil in my ⁹  sight? You have struck down Uriah the Hittite with the sword and you have taken his wife as your own! ¹⁰  You have killed him with the sword of the Ammonites.

2 Samuel 13:32

13:32 Jonadab, the son of David’s brother Shimeah, said, “My lord should not say, ‘They have killed all the young men who are the king’s sons.’ For only Amnon is dead. This is what Absalom has talked about ¹¹  from the day that Amnon ¹²  humiliated his sister Tamar.

2 Samuel 14:13

14:13 The woman said, “Why have you devised something like this against God’s people? When the king speaks in this fashion, he makes himself guilty, for the king has not brought back the one he has banished.

2 Samuel 15:2

15:2 Now Absalom used to get up early and stand beside the road that led to the city gate. Whenever anyone came by who had a complaint to bring to the king for arbitration, Absalom would call out to him, “What city are you from?” The person would answer, “I, your servant, ¹³  am from one of the tribes of Israel.”

2 Samuel 24:16-17

24:16 When the angel ¹⁴  extended his hand to destroy Jerusalem, the Lord relented from his judgment. ¹⁵  He told the angel who was killing the people, “That’s enough! Stop now!” ¹⁶  (Now the Lord’s angel was near the threshing floor of Araunah the Jebusite.)

24:17 When he saw the angel who was destroying the people, David said to the Lord, “Look, it is I who have sinned and done this evil thing! As for these sheep – what have they done? Attack me and my family.” ¹⁷ 

[3:29]  ¹ tn Heb “and may they whirl over.” In the Hebrew text the subject of the plural verb is unexpressed. The most likely subject is Abner’s “shed blood” (v. 28), which is a masculine plural form in Hebrew. The verb חוּל (khul, “whirl”) is used with the preposition עַל (’al) only here and in Jer 23:19; 30:23.

[3:29]  ² tc 4QSam^a has “of Joab” rather than “of his father” read by the MT.

[3:29]  ³ tn Heb “the house of Joab.” However, it is necessary to specify that David’s curse is aimed at Joab’s male descendants; otherwise it would not be clear that “one who works at the spindle” refers to a man doing woman’s work rather than a woman.

[3:29]  ⁴ tn Heb “and may there not be cut off from the house of Joab.”

[3:29]  ⁵ tn The expression used here is difficult. The translation “one who works at the spindle” follows a suggestion of S. R. Driver that the expression pejoratively describes an effeminate man who, rather than being a mighty warrior, is occupied with tasks that are normally fulfilled by women (S. R. Driver, Notes on the Hebrew Text and the Topography of the Books of Samuel, 250-51; cf. NAB “one unmanly”; TEV “fit only to do a woman’s work”; CEV “cowards”). But P. K. McCarter, following an alleged Phoenician usage of the noun to refer to “crutches,” adopts a different view. He translates the phrase “clings to a crutch,” seeing here a further description of physical lameness (II Samuel [AB], 118). Such an idea fits the present context well and is followed by NIV, NCV, and NLT, although the evidence for this meaning is questionable. According to DNWSI 2:915-16, the noun consistently refers to a spindle in Phoenician, as it does in Ugaritic (see UT 468).

[4:10]  ⁶ tn Heb “and he was like a bearer of good news in his eyes.”

[7:19]  ⁷ tn Heb “and this was small in your eyes, O Lord God, so you spoke concerning the house of your servant for a distance.”

[7:19]  ⁸ tn Heb “and this [is] the law of man”; KJV “is this the manner of man, O Lord God?”; NAB “this too you have shown to man”; NRSV “May this be instruction for the people, O Lord God!” This part of the verse is very enigmatic; no completely satisfying solution has yet been suggested. The present translation tries to make sense of the MT by understanding the phrase as a question that underscores the uniqueness of God’s dealings with David as described here. The parallel passage in 1 Chr 17:17 reads differently (see the note there).

[12:9]  ⁹ tc So the Qere; the Kethib has “his.”

[12:9]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “to you for a wife.” This expression also occurs at the end of v. 10.

[13:32]  ¹¹ tn Heb “it was placed on the mouth of Absalom.”

[13:32]  ¹² tn Heb “he”; the referent (Amnon) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[15:2]  ¹³ tn Heb “your servant.” So also in vv. 8, 15, 21.

[24:16]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “messenger.”

[24:16]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “concerning the calamity.”

[24:16]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “Now, drop your hand.”

[24:17]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “let your hand be against me and against the house of my father.”