2 Samuel 1:9

1:9 He said to me, ‘Stand over me and finish me off! 1  I’m very dizzy, 2  even though I’m still alive.’ 3 

2 Samuel 15:16

15:16 So the king and all the members of his royal court 4  set out on foot, though the king left behind ten concubines 5  to attend to the palace.

2 Samuel 23:19

23:19 From 6  the three he was given honor and he became their officer, even though he was not one of the three.

2 Samuel 23:23

23:23 He received honor from 7  the thirty warriors, though he was not one of the three elite warriors. David put him in charge of his bodyguard.

1 tn As P. K. McCarter (II Samuel [AB], 59) points out, the Polel of the verb מוּת (mut, “to die”) “refers to dispatching or ‘finishing off’ someone already wounded and near death.” Cf. NLT “put me out of my misery.”

2 tn Heb “the dizziness has seized me.” On the meaning of the Hebrew noun translated “dizziness,” see P. K. McCarter, II Samuel (AB), 59-60. The point seems to be that he is unable to kill himself because he is weak and disoriented.

3 tn The Hebrew text here is grammatically very awkward (Heb “because all still my life in me”). Whether the broken construct phrase is due to the fact that the alleged speaker is in a confused state of mind as he is on the verge of dying, or whether the MT has sustained corruption in the transmission process, is not entirely clear. The former seems likely, although P. K. McCarter understands the MT to be the result of conflation of two shorter forms of text (P. K. McCarter, II Samuel [AB], 57, n. 9). Early translators also struggled with the verse, apparently choosing to leave part of the Hebrew text untranslated. For example, the Lucianic recension of the LXX lacks “all,” while other witnesses (namely, one medieval Hebrew ms, codices A and B of the LXX, and the Syriac Peshitta) lack “still.”

4 tn Heb “and all his house.”

5 tn Heb “women, concubines.”

6 tn Or “more than.”

7 tn Or “more than.”