2 Samuel 18:9

18:9 Then Absalom happened to come across David’s men. Now as Absalom was riding on his ¹  mule, it ²  went under the branches of a large oak tree. His head got caught in the oak and he was suspended in midair, ³  while the mule he had been riding kept going.

2 Samuel 18:11

18:11 Joab replied to the man who was telling him this, “What! You saw this? Why didn’t you strike him down right on the spot? ⁴  I would have given you ten pieces of silver ⁵  and a commemorative belt!” ⁶ 

2 Samuel 23:11

23:11 Next in command ⁷  was Shammah son of Agee the Hararite. When the Philistines assembled at Lehi, ⁸  where there happened to be an area of a field that was full of lentils, the army retreated before the Philistines.

2 Samuel 23:20

23:20 Benaiah son of Jehoida was a brave warrior ⁹  from Kabzeel who performed great exploits. He struck down the two sons of Ariel of Moab. ¹⁰  He also went down and killed a lion in a cistern on a snowy day.

[18:9]  ¹ tn Heb “the.”

[18:9]  ² tn Heb “the donkey.”

[18:9]  ³ tn Heb “between the sky and the ground.”

[18:11]  ⁴ tn Heb “Why did you not strike him down there to the ground.”

[18:11]  ⁵ tn Heb “ten [shekels] of silver.” This would have been about 4 ounces (114 grams) of silver by weight.

[18:11]  ⁶ tn Heb “and a girdle” (so KJV); NIV “a warrior’s belt”; CEV “a special belt”; NLT “a hero’s belt.”

[23:11]  ⁷ tn Heb “after him.”

[23:11]  ⁸ tn The Hebrew text is difficult here. The MT reads לַחַיָּה (lachayyah), which implies a rare use of the word חַיָּה (chayyah). The word normally refers to an animal, but if the MT is accepted it would here have the sense of a troop or community of people. BDB 312 s.v. II. חַיָּה, for example, understands the similar reference in v. 13 to be to “a group of allied families, making a raid together.” But this works better in v. 13 than it does in v. 11, where the context seems to suggest a particular staging location for a military operation. (See 1 Chr 11:15.) It therefore seems best to understand the word in v. 11 as a place name with ה (he) directive. In that case the Masoretes mistook the word for the common term for an animal and then tried to make sense of it in this context.

[23:20]  ⁹ tc The translation follows the Qere and many medieval Hebrew mss in reading חַיִל (khayil, “valor”) rather than the Kethib of the MT, חַי (khay, “life”).

[23:20]  ¹⁰ tc Heb “the two of Ariel, Moab.” The precise meaning of אריאל is uncertain; some read “warrior.” The present translation assumes that the word is a proper name and that בני, “sons of,” has accidentally dropped from the text by homoioarcton (note the preceding שׁני).