1 Samuel 4:16
4:16 The man said to Eli, “I am the one who came from the battle lines! Just today I fled from the battle lines!” Eli 1 asked, “How did things go, my son?”
1 Samuel 9:9
9:9 (Now it used to be in Israel that whenever someone went to inquire of God he would say, “Come on, let’s go to the seer.” For today’s prophet used to be called a seer.)
1 Samuel 10:19
10:19 But today you have rejected your God who saves you from all your trouble and distress. You have said, “No! 2 Appoint a king over us.” Now take your positions before the Lord by your tribes and by your clans.’”
1 Samuel 14:28
14:28 Then someone from the army informed him, “Your father put the army under a strict oath 3 saying, ‘Cursed be the man who eats food today!’ That is why the army is tired.”
1 Samuel 20:27
20:27 But the next morning, the second day of the new moon, David’s place was still vacant. So Saul said to his son Jonathan, “Why has Jesse’s son not come to the meal yesterday or today?”
1 Samuel 26:8
26:8 Abishai said to David, “Today God has delivered your enemy into your hands. Now let me drive the spear 4 right through him into the ground with one swift jab! 5 A second jab won’t be necessary!”
1 Samuel 26:23
26:23 The Lord rewards each man for his integrity and loyalty. 6 Even though today the Lord delivered you into my hand, I was not willing to extend my hand against the Lord’s chosen one.
1 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Eli) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
2 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.’”).
3 tn Heb “your father surely put the army under an oath.” The infinitive absolute is used before the finite verb to emphasize the solemn nature of the oath.
4 tn Here “the spear” almost certainly refers to Saul’s own spear, which according to the previous verse was stuck into the ground beside him as he slept. This is reflected in a number of English versions: TEV, CEV “his own spear”; NLT “that spear.” Cf. NIV, NCV “my spear,” in which case Abishai refers to his own spear rather than Saul’s, but this is unlikely since (1) Abishai would probably not have carried a spear along since such a weapon would be unwieldy when sneaking into the enemy camp; and (2) this would not explain the mention of Saul’s own spear stuck in the ground beside him in the previous verse.
5 tn Heb “let me strike him with the spear and into the ground one time.”
6 tn Heb “and the Lord returns to the man his righteousness and his faithfulness.”