The Fallible · Synthetic · Study Bible
2 Samuel16:5–14
Shimei Curses David
2 Samuel 16:5–14 — Shimei Curses David. Each verse below carries the full apparatus: the Berean Standard Bible, the vocalized original (tap any word), and a parsed breakdown of every term transcribed from the interlinear. Synthesized commentary, canonical threads, and the reading of Christ gather at the end, over the whole unit.
5“As King David approached Bahurim, a man from the family of the h…”+
5As King David approached Bahurim, a man from the family of the house of Saul was just coming out. His name was Shimei son of Gera, and as he approached, he kept yelling out curses.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ham·me·leḵ dā·wiḏ ū·ḇā ‘aḏ- ba·ḥū·rîm ’îš mim·miš·pa·ḥaṯ bêṯ- šā·’ūl wə·hin·nêh miš·šām yō·w·ṣê ū·šə·mōw šim·‘î ḇen- gê·rā yō·ṣê yā·ṣō·w ū·mə·qal·lêl
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-the-king David came as-far-as Bahurim, and-behold! from-there a-man coming-out of-the-family of-the-house of-Saul, and-his-name Shimei son-of-Gera — coming-out, coming-out and-cursing.
Where the English smooths the original
- וּבָ֛א וּבָ֛א (ū·ḇā, H935) is a conjunctive perfect, not a simple past. BSB's “approached” smooths a form that keeps the arrival hanging — David has come only as far as (עַד־) Bahurim, not into it. Poole and Gill both press this: “i.e. to the territory of it, for to the city he came not till 2 Samuel 16:14.”
- מִמִּשְׁפַּ֣חַת מִמִּשְׁפַּ֣חַת (mim·miš·pa·ḥaṯ, H4940) is the mishpachah, the clan-sized division between tribe and household. BSB's “from the family of the house of Saul” can sound like kinship; Ellicott corrects it to “‘of the family,’ in the larger sense of tribe,” and Pulpit says flatly the words “do not mean that he was a near relative of Saul.”
- יֹצֵ֥א יָצ֖וֹא יֹצֵ֥א יָצ֖וֹא (yō·ṣê yā·ṣō·w, H3318) is participle + infinitive absolute — the Hebrew idiom of unbroken continuance, “coming out, coming out.” BSB's “as he approached” loses the drumbeat; the grammar says the man did not stop.
- וּמְקַלֵּֽל וּמְקַלֵּֽל (ū·mə·qal·lêl, H7043) is a Piel participle — intensive and durative, “and cursing, and cursing.” BSB's “he kept yelling out curses” catches the aspect but not the root: qālal is “to make light,” to belittle. Shimei is not swearing at David so much as publicly stripping him of weight.
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Many of the Benjamites naturally felt aggrieved when the royal house passed away from their tribe; and, although under restraint while David’s government was strong, were ever ready to show their opposition and hatred when opportunity offered
It seems to have lain off the road, on a ridge 2 Samuel 16:13 , separated from it by a narrow ravine, so that Shimei was out of easy reach though within hearingBarnes reconstructs the terrain from vv. 6, 9 and 13 rather than from any external source; it is inference from the text, and he presents it as such.
6“He threw stones at David and at all the servants of the king, th…”+
6He threw stones at David and at all the servants of the king, though the troops and all the mighty men were on David’s right and left.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·saq·qêl bā·’ă·ḇā·nîm ’eṯ- dā·wiḏ wə·’eṯ- kāl- ‘aḇ·ḏê ham·me·leḵ hā·‘ām wə·ḵāl hag·gib·bō·rîm dā·wiḏ wə·ḵāl mî·mî·nōw ū·miś·śə·mō·lōw
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-he-pelted with-the-stones David and-all the-servants of-the-king — and-all the-people and-all the-mighty-men at-his-right and-at-his-left.
Where the English smooths the original
- וַיְסַקֵּ֤ל וַיְסַקֵּ֤ל (way·saq·qêl, H5619) is a Piel of a root whose base meaning Strong's gives as “to be weighty” — and whose ordinary use is judicial stoning. BSB's neutral “threw stones” hides the legal shape of the act. Gill sees it: he did this “to intimate that they deserved to be stoned.” The verb is the sentence, not the missile.
- הָעָם֙ וְכָל־הַגִּבֹּרִ֔ים הָעָם֙ and הַגִּבֹּרִ֔ים (hā·‘ām H5971, hag·gib·bō·rîm H1368) — BSB's “troops … mighty men” renders what K&D identify concretely as “the household troops and body-guard: 2 Samuel 15:17-18.” The clause has no verb: K&D call it “a circumstantial clause,” a camera pan held while the stones fly.
- מִימִינ֖וֹ וּמִשְּׂמֹאלֽוֹ מִימִינ֖וֹ / וּמִשְּׂמֹאלֽוֹ (H3225 / H8040) is a merism — right hand and left, meaning entirely surrounded. Geneva glosses it exactly: “That is, round about him.” BSB's “on David's right and left” reads as position; the Hebrew idiom means total cover, which is the whole point of the verse's irony.
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which is noted to show the prodigious madness of the man; though rage (which is truly said to be a short madness) and the height of malice hath oft transported men to the most hazardous and desperate speeches and actions.
The scene is described with an exactness which bespeaks an eye-witness.A judgement about sources, not a datum: Cambridge infers an eyewitness from the topographic precision. The precision is in the text; the eyewitness is the commentator's inference.
7“And as he yelled curses, Shimei said, “Get out, get out, you wor…”+
7And as he yelled curses, Shimei said, “Get out, get out, you worthless man of bloodshed!
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
wə·ḵōh- bə·qal·lōw šim·‘î ’ā·mar ṣê ṣê hab·bə·lî·yā·‘al ’îš had·dā·mîm wə·’îš
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-thus, in-his-cursing, said Shimei: “Go-out, go-out, man of-bloods and-man of-Belial!”
Where the English smooths the original
- צֵ֥א צֵ֛א צֵ֥א צֵ֛א (ṣê ṣê, H3318, Qal imperative doubled) — BSB's “Get out, get out” is close, but Ellicott, Poole, Barnes and Gill in one voice insist on “Go out,” i.e. out of the land, into exile. Barnes: “namely, of the land, into banishment. Compare Jeremiah 29:16.” It is a sentence of banishment shouted by a private man, and it uses the very verb (H3318) the narrator used twice of Shimei himself in v. 5.
- אִ֥ישׁ הַדָּמִ֖ים אִ֥ישׁ הַדָּמִ֖ים (’îš had·dā·mîm, H376 + H1818) — BSB's “man of bloodshed.” The Hebrew has blood in the plural. K&D render it with unnerving literalness: “a man of drops of blood, i.e., one who has shed blood or committed murder.” The plural is the idiom for bloodguilt, and it is the charge David will never be cleared of in Shimei's mouth.
- הַבְּלִיָּֽעַל הַבְּלִיָּֽעַל (hab·bə·lî·yā·‘al, H1100) is literally “without-profit,” worthlessness — and it is articular: not “a worthless man” but the worthlessness. BSB folds it into the adjective “worthless.” The noun is the same one Scripture uses of Eli's sons and of Nabal; Cambridge simply glosses “Thou wicked man.”
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Shimei could scarcely have referred to the murders of Ishbosheth and Abner, which were too remote to have so rankled in his memory; but as ch. 21. is not in its chronological order, what probably called forth his anger was the surrender of Saul's sons and grandsons into the hands of the Gibeonites.Pulpit's reconstruction depends on dating 2 Samuel 21 before this chapter — a chronological judgement, not a datum of the text; Cambridge and Barnes hold it only as a possibility.
was one of the severest trials of patience that ever human magnanimity endured. The accusation was notoriously false, and the king could, for that reason, bear it the betterBenson is quoting Patrick Delaney, an eighteenth-century biographer of David, not offering his own exegesis; the sympathy is Delaney's.
8“The LORD has paid you back for all the blood of the house of Sau…”+
8The LORD has paid you back for all the blood of the house of Saul, in whose place you have reigned, and the LORD has delivered the kingdom into the hand of your son Absalom. See, you have come to ruin because you are a man of bloodshed!”
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
Yah·weh hê·šîḇ ‘ā·le·ḵā kōl də·mê ḇêṯ- šā·’ūl ’ă·šer taḥ·tō mā·laḵ·tā Yah·weh way·yit·tên ’eṯ- ham·mə·lū·ḵāh bə·yaḏ bə·ne·ḵā ’aḇ·šā·lō·wm wə·hin·nə·ḵā bə·rā·‘ā·ṯe·ḵā kî ’āt·tāh ’îš dā·mîm
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“Returned-upon-thee hath-YHWH all the-bloods of-the-house-of-Saul, in-whose-place thou-hast-reigned; and-YHWH hath-given the-kingship into-the-hand of-Absalom thy-son. And-behold-thee in-thy-evil — for a-man of-bloods art-thou!”
Where the English smooths the original
- הֵשִׁיב֩ הֵשִׁיב֩ (hê·šîḇ, H7725, Hifil of šûb) — “has caused to return.” BSB's “has paid you back” is an accurate idiom but buries the verb David will pick up and turn around in v. 12: וְהֵשִׁ֨יב, the same Hifil, “and the LORD will cause to return to me good.” Shimei's verb becomes David's prayer.
- תַּחְתּוֹ תַּחְתּוֹ (taḥ·tō, H8478) — “in his place, underneath him.” BSB's “in whose place you have reigned” is right, but the word recurs at v. 12 (תַּ֥חַת, “in place of his cursing”). Shimei uses it of a stolen throne; David uses it of an exchanged verdict. K&D reads the first: “whose throne thou hast forcibly usurped.”
- הַמְּלוּכָ֔ה הַמְּלוּכָ֔ה (ham·mə·lū·ḵāh, H4410) is not melek (king) but the abstract noun — the kingship, the thing ruled. BSB's “the kingdom” is fair; the Hebrew stresses the office itself as a transferable possession, which is precisely Shimei's theology: a crown God moves from hand to hand.
- בְּרָ֣עָתֶ֔ךָ בְּרָ֣עָתֶ֔ךָ (bə·rā·‘ā·ṯe·ḵā, H7451) is simply “in-thy-evil” — the noun covering both moral evil and calamity. BSB's “you have come to ruin” chooses calamity; Cambridge argues for “behold, thou art in thy calamity,” noting the KJV's “to thy mischief” was an 1629 alteration of the 1611 “to.” K&D takes it as punishment: “it is for this that punishment hath overtaken thee now.” The Hebrew leaves both senses live, and that ambiguity is the verse's cruelty.
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Reproaching him, as though by his means Ishbosheth and Abner were slain.
in this he seems to contradict himself; for if David had got the kingdom by usurpation, it would rather have, been delivered by the Lord into the hand of one of Saul's family
He may possibly have attributed to David the murder of Ishbosheth and Abner, notwithstanding the fact that David was innocent of the death of both
9“Then Abishai son of Zeruiah said to the king, “Why should this d…”+
9Then Abishai son of Zeruiah said to the king, “Why should this dead dog curse my lord the king? Let me go over and cut off his head!”
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ă·ḇî·šay ben- ṣə·rū·yāh way·yō·mer ’el- ham·me·leḵ lām·māh haz·zeh ’eṯ- ham·mêṯ hak·ke·leḇ yə·qal·lêl ’ă·ḏō·nî ham·me·leḵ ’e‘·bə·rāh- nā rō·šōw wə·’ā·sî·rāh ’eṯ-
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-said Abishai son-of-Zeruiah unto the-king: “Why should-he-curse — this dead dog — my-lord the-king? Let-me-cross-over, I-pray, and-let-me-take-away his-head!”
Where the English smooths the original
- הַכֶּ֤לֶב הַמֵּת֙ הַמֵּת֙ הַכֶּ֤לֶב (ham·mêṯ hak·ke·leḇ, H4191 + H3611) — both nouns articular: “the dead, the dog.” BSB's “this dead dog” is idiomatic English; the Hebrew stacks two definite insults. Gill unpacks both: “a dog, because of his vileness … and a dead dog, as being useless, detestable, and abominable.”
- אֶעְבְּרָה־נָּ֖א אֶעְבְּרָה־נָּ֖א (’e‘·bə·rāh nā, H5674 cohortative + H4994) — BSB's flat “Let me go over” loses two things: the cohortative is a request for permission, and נָּ֖א is the particle of entreaty. Abishai is asking, not announcing. Barnes and Pulpit both note that “go over” means across the ravine — the terrain is the reason David's guard has not already killed the man.
- וְאָסִ֥ירָה וְאָסִ֥ירָה (wə·’ā·sî·rāh, H5493, Hifil cohortative) is the verb “to turn aside / remove,” not “to cut.” BSB's “cut off his head” is the sense; the Hebrew is euphemistic and administrative — let me remove his head. K&D glosses it bluntly: “take away his head,” i.e. chop off his head.
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His fiery zeal reminds us of the Sons of Thunder ( Luke 9:54 ), and David’s answer recalls Christ’s answer to PeterCambridge is drawing a figural parallel, not a textual link; no shared vocabulary connects the Hebrew here with Luke 9 or John 18.
Abishai, therefore, asked permission to cross over to Shimei's side of the steep ravine with a few men, who would seize him and put him to death.
10“But the king replied, “What have I to do with you, O sons of Zer…”+
10But the king replied, “What have I to do with you, O sons of Zeruiah? If he curses me because the LORD told him, ‘Curse David,’ who can ask, ‘Why did you do this?’”
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ham·me·leḵ way·yō·mer mah- lî wə·lā·ḵem bə·nê ṣə·ru·yāh kī yə·qal·lêl wə·ḵī Yah·weh ’ā·mar lōw qal·lêl ’eṯ- dā·wiḏ ū·mî yō·mar mad·dū·a‘ ‘ā·śî·ṯāh kên
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-said the-king: “What to-me and-to-you, sons of-Zeruiah? If he-curses, and-if YHWH hath-said to-him ‘Curse David’ — then-who shall-say, ‘Why hast-thou-done so?’”
Where the English smooths the original
- מַה־לִּ֥י וְלָכֶ֖ם מַה־לִּ֥י וְלָכֶ֖ם (mah-lî wə·lā·ḵem) is not a question about business but a formula of dissociation: literally “what to me and to you?” Cambridge: “The phrase is used to repel an unwelcome suggestion, and repudiate participation in the thoughts and feelings of another.” K&D lists its other appearances — 1 Kings 17:18, Joshua 22:24 — and the Greek equivalent τὶ ἐμοὶ καὶ σοί at John 2:4.
- כִּי יְקַלֵּ֗ל וְכִי כִּי … וְכִי (H3588 twice) — BSB's “If he curses me because the LORD told him” follows the Qere. K&D defends the written consonantal text: “kî signifies if, quando, in this passage, and the waw before the following ûmî introduces the apodosis” — i.e. “If he curses, and if the LORD has said to him…, then who shall say…?” Cambridge lays the same two options side by side. BSB's causal “because” picks one branch of a genuinely open text.
- קַלֵּ֣ל קַלֵּ֣ל (qal·lêl, H7043, Piel imperative) — an actual command form placed in the LORD's mouth by David. BSB's quoted “‘Curse David’” is exact, and every commentator here feels the weight of it: Poole and Gill both insist it means “not by the word of his precept … but by the word of his providence,” Exodus 22:28 forbidding the act itself.
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David, throughout, recognises that all his sufferings were from the Lord’s hand, and he wishes to submit himself entirely to His will. He does not, of course, mean to justify Shimei’s wrong; but only to say that, as far as his sin bears upon himself, it is of Divine appointment and he cannot resent it.
God did not put any wickedness into Shimei’s heart, for he had of himself a heart full of malignity and venom against David; but only left him to his own wickedness
David felt that this was the judgment of God for his sin, and therefore humbles himself to his rod.
11“Then David said to Abishai and to all his servants, “Behold, my …”+
11Then David said to Abishai and to all his servants, “Behold, my own son, my own flesh and blood, seeks my life. How much more, then, this Benjamite! Leave him alone and let him curse me, for the LORD has told him so.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
dā·wiḏ way·yō·mer ’el- ’ă·ḇî·šay wə·’el- kāl- ‘ă·ḇā·ḏāw hin·nêh ḇə·nî ’ă·šer- yā·ṣā mim·mê·‘ay mə·ḇaq·qêš ’eṯ- nap̄·šî wə·’ap̄ kî- ‘at·tāh ben- hay·mî·nî han·ni·ḥū lōw wî·qal·lêl Yah·weh ’ā·mar- lōw kî
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-said David unto Abishai and-unto all his-servants: “Behold, my-son who came-forth from-my-inward-parts is-seeking my-life; and-how-much-more now this son-of-the-right-hand! Set-him-down, and-let-him-curse — for YHWH hath-said to-him.”
Where the English smooths the original
- מִמֵּעַ֖י מִמֵּעַ֖י (mim·mê·‘ay, H4578) is literally “from my bowels” — the intestines, and by extension the seat of compassion. BSB's “my own flesh and blood” is a modern equivalence that loses the visceral noun; the older versions kept “which came forth of my bowels.” The verb with it is יָצָ֥א (H3318) — the same root Shimei shouted at David in v. 7.
- בֶּן־הַיְמִינִ֗י בֶּן־הַיְמִינִ֗י (ben-hay·mî·nî, H1145) — BSB's “this Benjamite” is correct but flattens a pun the verse is making: the gentilic means literally son of the right hand, and the previous clause has just spoken of David's own son. David sets son against son-of-the-right-hand. Ellicott hears the contrast as dynastic: the Benjamite “represents the adherent of another and rival dynasty.”
- הַנִּ֤חוּ הַנִּ֤חוּ (han·ni·ḥū, H5117, Hifil imperative plural) is from nûaḥ, “to rest” — causative, “give him rest, set him down, let him be.” BSB's “Leave him alone” is right in force. The root's other appearance in this unit's orbit is the Sabbath verb; David's order to his bodyguard is, at the level of the lexicon, a command to let the curser rest.
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But Shimei’s cursing was on his part sinful, and God commands no man to sin. God makes use of the evil passions of men to work out His purposes, but those evil passions are not thereby excused or justified.
Although David had committed no murder upon the house of Saul, and therefore Shimei's cursing was nothing but malicious blasphemy, he felt that it came upon him because of his sins, though not for the sin imputed to him.
12“Perhaps the LORD will see my affliction and repay me with good f…”+
12Perhaps the LORD will see my affliction and repay me with good for the cursing I receive today.”
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ū·lay Yah·weh yir·’eh bə·ʿă·wō·nī wə·hê·šîḇ Yah·weh lî ṭō·w·ḇāh ta·ḥaṯ qil·lā·ṯōw hay·yō·wm haz·zeh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“Perhaps YHWH will-look upon-my-iniquity, and-YHWH will-cause-to-return to-me good in-place-of his-cursing this day.”
Where the English smooths the original
- אוּלַ֛י אוּלַ֛י (’ū·lay, H194) — “perhaps, if not.” BSB's “Perhaps” is exact, and the word is the theological centre of David's answer. Poole names why it is there: “he speaks doubtfully, because he was conscious that by his sins he had forfeited all his claim to God's promises.” This is hope without entitlement.
- בְּעֲוֹנִי בְּעֲוֹנִי (bə·ʿă·wō·nî, H5771) — the written text says “upon my iniquity,” not “my affliction.” BSB follows the Septuagint and Vulgate reading. K&D insists: “bĕʻăwōnî does not mean ‘upon my misery,’ for ʻāwōn never has this meaning, but upon the guilt which really belongs to me, in contrast with that with which Shimei charges me.” The Masoretic Qere offers a third reading, “mine eye.” Three live options; BSB shows one.
- וְהֵשִׁ֨יב וְהֵשִׁ֨יב (wə·hê·šîḇ, H7725, Hifil) is the identical verb and stem Shimei used in v. 8 (הֵשִׁיב֩). BSB renders the first “has paid you back” and the second “repay,” which is good English and hides the deliberate echo. Shimei says God returns blood; David asks God to return good.
- תַּ֥חַת קִלְלָת֖וֹ תַּ֥חַת (H8478) + קִלְלָת֖וֹ (H7045) — “in place of his cursing.” BSB's “for the cursing” reads as compensation; taḥat is the preposition of substitution, and it is the same word Shimei used in v. 8 of David reigning “in Saul's place.” Cambridge also flags that the written text may read “my cursing,” i.e. the curse invoked upon me.
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This reading is supported by the Sept. and Vulg. and is probably right. Cp. Psalm 25:18 . The Qrî has mine eye , which is explained to mean my grief , but the expression is unparalleled.Cambridge here argues against the reading K&D defends. Both are preserved; the unit does not resolve the crux.
He means that, although this was a chastisement from God upon him, yet if he bore it as became him, it might become a means of mercy to him. His humble submission and resignation might call down the divine commiseration upon his patience and penitence.
13“So David and his men proceeded along the road as Shimei went alo…”+
13So David and his men proceeded along the road as Shimei went along the ridge of the hill opposite him. As Shimei went, he yelled curses, threw stones, and flung dust at David.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
dā·wiḏ wa·’ă·nā·šāw way·yê·leḵ bad·då̄·rɛḵs wə·šim·‘î hō·lêḵ bə·ṣê·la‘ hā·hār lə·‘um·mā·ṯōw hā·lō·wḵ way·qal·lêl way·saq·qêl bā·’ă·ḇā·nîm wə·‘ip·par be·‘ā·p̄ār lə·‘um·mā·ṯōw
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-went David and-his-men on-the-road; and-Shimei going on-the-rib of-the-hill over-against-him — going and-cursing, and-he-pelted with-the-stones over-against-him, and-he-dusted with-the-dust.
Where the English smooths the original
- בְּצֵ֨לַע הָהָ֜ר בְּצֵ֨לַע (bə·ṣê·la‘, H6763) is the word for a rib — the curved bone, used figuratively of a hillside. BSB's “along the ridge of the hill” is the sense; JFB keeps the image: “literally, ‘the rib of the hill.’” It is the same noun used of Adam's rib and of the side-chambers of the temple.
- הָלוֹךְ֙ וַיְקַלֵּ֔ל הָלוֹךְ֙ (hā·lō·wḵ, H1980, infinitive absolute) + finite verbs — the Hebrew construction for continuous accompanying action, “going and cursing … and stoning … and dusting.” BSB's “As Shimei went, he yelled curses, threw stones, and flung dust” lists the acts; the Hebrew fuses them into one unbroken motion. K&D: “cursing continually, and pelted with stones over against him, and with earth.”
- וְעִפַּ֖ר בֶּעָפָֽר וְעִפַּ֖ר בֶּעָפָֽר (wə·‘ip·par be·‘ā·p̄ār, H6080 + H6083) is a cognate accusative — a denominative Piel verb “to dust” with its own noun “dust.” English has no verb for it; BSB must write “flung dust.” Hebrew says he dusted with dust. K&D notes that the text does not even say at David — “this is implied in the context.”
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As if to add insult to injury, clouds of dust were thrown by this disloyal subject in the path of his unfortunate sovereign.
See how patient David was under this abuse. Let this remind us of Christ, who prayed for those who reviled and crucified him. A humble spirit will turn reproaches into reproofs, and get good from them, instead of being provoked by them.
How far he was, in this instance, an emblem of his suffering Son, is not hard to discern, or adventurous to assert.Again Delaney, whom Benson is quoting; the christological reading is offered as self-evident rather than argued.
14“Finally, the king and all the people with him arrived, exhausted…”+
14Finally, the king and all the people with him arrived, exhausted. And there he refreshed himself.
Berean Standard Bible · CC0
Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ham·me·leḵ wə·ḵāl hā·‘ām ’ă·šer- ’it·tōw way·yā·ḇō ‘ă·yê·p̄îm šām way·yin·nā·p̄êš
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-came the-king and-all the-people who-were-with-him weary — and-he-took-breath there.
Where the English smooths the original
- עֲיֵפִ֑ים עֲיֵפִ֑ים (‘ă·yê·p̄îm, H5889) — an adjective, “languid, faint,” rendered by BSB as “exhausted.” But the verse ends “and he refreshed himself there,” and there is no place named. Ellicott, Cambridge, Pulpit and K&D all conclude the word is functioning as a proper name, Ayephim, probably a caravansary. Cambridge: “No such place is known, but it would be an appropriate name for a caravansary.” BSB's “exhausted” silently takes the other side of an unresolved question.
- שָֽׁם שָֽׁם (šām, H8033) — “there.” A single adverb creates the whole problem: it demands an antecedent the verse does not supply. JFB and Gill supply Bahurim; K&D refuses, arguing from 2 Samuel 17:18 that the resting place lay a considerable distance beyond Bahurim toward the Jordan.
- וַיִּנָּפֵ֖שׁ וַיִּנָּפֵ֖שׁ (way·yin·nā·p̄êš, H5314, Nifal) is a denominative of nephesh — literally “and he was re-souled,” or as the idiom runs, took breath. BSB's “refreshed himself” is accurate but colourless. Gill catches the sense: it “put as it were new life and soul into them, as the word used signifies.” The verb occurs in only three verses in the entire Hebrew Bible.
Word by word9 · parsed+
The Voices✦ public domain+
The context requires that Ayephim should be taken as the name of a place. If it were an appellative, signifying weary, there would be no information as to the place to which David came
that is, at Bahurim, with food and rest; which revived their spirits, and put as it were new life and soul into them, as the word used signifies.Gill takes the position K&D explicitly rejects; both are preserved so the reader can weigh the disagreement rather than receive a settled answer.
We must suppose that the name of the place has fallen out of the text, or that the word for weary should be taken as a proper name
The verse-by-verse work is done. What follows gathers the whole unit. All three layers below are machine-generated (⚙). Weigh them; they have no authority.
⚙Grand Commentary — the unit, read whole
synthesis · verify+
AI synthesis — woven from the public-domain voices above and the original text; generated and fallible.
i. The man who comes out, and the king told to go out — 16:5–7
⚙ The narrator builds the scene out of one verb. Three times in v. 5 he uses יָצָא (yâtsâʼ, H3318) of Shimei — coming out, coming out, coming out — and then puts the same root in Shimei's mouth as a doubled imperative in v. 7: צֵא צֵא, go out, go out. Ellicott, Poole, Barnes and Gill all agree the sense is banishment, not simply departure; Barnes points to Jeremiah 29:16 and glosses “namely, of the land, into banishment.” Where Shimei comes from is not incidental either: Ellicott reads him as the voice of a tribe, “many of the Benjamites naturally felt aggrieved when the royal house passed away from their tribe,” and Cambridge says his clan connection “accounts for the virulence of his hatred.” Pulpit and K&D add the physical arrangement — a road, a parallel ridge, a ravine between — which is why a lone man can sentence a king to exile from a stone's throw away and live. The insults themselves are precise Hebrew nouns rather than mere abuse: אִישׁ הַדָּמִים, which K&D renders with unnerving literalness as “a man of drops of blood,” and הַבְּלִיָּעַל, worthlessness itself, carrying the article.
ii. A false indictment with a true sentence inside it — 16:8
⚙ Shimei's charge sheet is wrong in its particulars and the commentators say so without hedging. K&D: David “was innocent of the death of both” Ishbosheth and Abner. JFB: “David was guiltless of the crime of which Shimei accused him.” Gill notices the speech contradicting itself — if David were a usurper, the crown would revert to Saul's house, not pass to David's own son. Barnes catalogues the deaths Shimei is probably totting up; Pulpit and Cambridge both suspect the Gibeonite executions of 2 Samuel 21, though Cambridge is careful that this requires dating that chapter before this one. And yet Cambridge adds the sentence that makes the verse bearable: “Shimei would not intend to refer to Uriah, though David would feel that it was for his death that the curse was not undeserved.” The accusation is false and the accused is not innocent — two things the text holds at once. The verse also plants the two words David will reclaim four verses later: הֵשִׁיב (šûb, Hifil, H7725) and תַּחַת (H8478).
iii. “What to me and to you?” — the refusal of the sword — 16:9–11
⚙ Abishai's request is grammatically a request: אֶעְבְּרָה־נָּא, cohortative plus the particle of entreaty, and the verb וְאָסִירָה is the administrative “remove,” not the butcher's “cut.” Cambridge reads Abishai consistently across the book — he wanted Saul's life at 1 Samuel 26:8 and would refuse Shimei's pardon at 2 Samuel 19:21 — and calls his zeal a cousin to the Sons of Thunder. David's reply is a formula of dissociation, which K&D traces to 1 Kings 17:18 and Joshua 22:24. Then comes the unit's hardest word: a Piel imperative, קַלֵּל, “Curse!”, ascribed to YHWH. Poole, Gill, Benson and Cambridge converge on the same limit and none of them flinches from it. Poole: “God did not put any wickedness into Shimei's heart, for he had of himself a heart full of malignity and venom against David; but only left him to his own wickedness.” Cambridge draws the line flatly — “God commands no man to sin” — and sends the reader to Genesis 45:5 and Acts 2:23, where human malice and divine purpose inhabit one act without the malice being excused. JFB observes the political irony: David “acted more independently of the sons of Zeruiah in this season of great distress than he could often muster courage to do in the days of his prosperity and power.”
iv. Perhaps — the prayer that trades the verb back — 16:12
⚙ The reply turns on a particle: אוּלַי, perhaps. Poole gives the reason for the doubt — “he speaks doubtfully, because he was conscious that by his sins he had forfeited all his claim to God's promises.” What David then asks is exactly what Shimei claimed has already happened, with the same Hifil of šûb and the same substitution preposition taḥat: not that the curse be voided, but that its return address be honoured and its cargo exchanged for טוֹבָה. The object of God's looking is textually unsettled and honestly so: the consonants read my iniquity, the Septuagint and Vulgate my affliction, the Qere my eye. K&D argues hard for guilt — “ʻāwōn never has this meaning” — while Cambridge answers that the versional reading “is probably right” and that “mine eye … is unparalleled.” Both are kept here. On K&D's reading the verse does what no other reading quite manages: it lets David deny the indictment and confess the guilt in the same breath.
v. Dust on the road, breath at the end of it — 16:13–14
⚙ The narrative shrinks to a string of continuous forms — infinitive absolute הָלוֹךְ with finite verbs — so the whole march becomes one act: going, cursing, pelting, dusting. Benson notes that patience only fed the insolence. The last verb of the unit, וַיִּנָּפֵשׁ (nâphash, H5314), is a Nifal denominative of nephesh: he was re-souled, he took breath. Gill hears it: it “put as it were new life and soul into them, as the word used signifies.” Where this happened the commentators will not agree — JFB, Poole, Gill and Geneva say Bahurim; Ellicott, Cambridge, Pulpit and K&D read עֲיֵפִים as a place-name, Ayephim, K&D arguing from 2 Samuel 17:18 that the halt lay well beyond Bahurim. We leave the question open. What is not in question is the lexicon: nâphash occurs in three verses in the whole Hebrew Bible, and the other two are Sabbath texts.
Read under Sola Scriptura — this tool’s own fallible reading (⚙)
⚙ Offered as this tool's own fallible reading, to be tested against the text. The unit is built on a single exchange of vocabulary that the English versions, reasonably, obscure. Shimei preaches a sermon in v. 8 with two key words — YHWH has caused to return (הֵשִׁיב, H7725) the bloods upon David, who reigns in the place of (תַּחַת, H8478) Saul. In v. 12 David takes both words back: perhaps YHWH will cause to return good to me in the place of his cursing. David does not argue with Shimei's theology of retribution; he accepts the machinery and asks God to run it the other way. That is not resignation and it is not self-defence. It is a third thing, and the text gives it a particle: אוּלַי, perhaps — hope with no claim attached, which Poole says is exactly what a man has left when he knows he has forfeited his claims.
⚙ Two further observations are offered more tentatively. First, if K&D is right that v. 12 reads “my guilt,” then David is doing something the accusers in this chapter cannot do and the sons of Zeruiah will not let him do: he distinguishes the charge that is false (the blood of Saul's house) from the guilt that is real (Uriah's), and asks God to look at the second while declining to litigate the first. The sword is refused not because the accusation is true but because the accused has stopped needing to be found innocent. Second, the unit's last verb is a Sabbath verb. Nâphash appears in only three verses in the canon, and the other two are Exodus 23:12 and 31:17. We make no claim that the narrator intended an allusion — the lexical fact is certain, the intention is not — but the shape is striking: a king who would not stone his stoner is the one who at the end of the road takes breath.
David does not dispute Shimei's arithmetic; he asks God to reverse the sign.
⚙Canonical Threads — out to the whole of Scripture
cross-refs · verify+
AI-generated connections. Each carries a verification badge with a recorded basis; contested links are flagged.
Bahurim, twice: the place of the curse and the place of the charge verbal / quotation — confirmed
The cursing at Bahurim is not closed in this unit. At 1 Kings 2:8 David on his deathbed names Shimei son of Gera of Bahurim and recalls that “he cursed me with a grievous curse” — the same three lexemes that anchor this scene: בַּחוּרִים (H980, in 5 verses), גֵּרָא (H1617, in 9 verses), קָלַל (H7043). The Verifier confirms all three as shared. ⚙ The link matters theologically as well as lexically: the king who said “let him curse” did not, in the end, say “let him go,” and the canon records both without harmonizing them. Pulpit notes the same tension, observing that David “finally condemned him to death for it (1 Kings 2:8, 9), having probably found that, even after his pardon, he was an implacable enemy.”
1 Kings 2:8
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H980 Bachurîym (in 5 vv — rare), H1617 Gêrâʼ (in 9 vv — rare), H7043 qâlal (in 79 vv). Two rare proper-noun lexemes plus the unit's leitwort; 1 Kings 2:8 verbally recalls this episode.
The same man on the same ground, begging verbal / quotation — confirmed
At 2 Samuel 19:16 Shimei son of Gera the Benjamite of Bahurim hurries down to meet David at the Jordan; at 19:21 Abishai son of Zeruiah again asks for his death, and again with the verb קָלַל. The Verifier records H980 (5 vv), H1617 (9 vv) and H8096 Shimʻî (40 vv) shared with 19:16, and H7043 with H8096 shared with 19:21. ⚙ The narrator has built a deliberate chiasm of persons: same curser, same advocate for the sword, same king, one journey out and one back. Cambridge points to the pairing directly when explaining Abishai's character.
2 Samuel 19:16 · 2 Samuel 19:21
basis: Verifier: with 19:16 — H980 Bachurîym (in 5 vv), H1617 Gêrâʼ (in 9 vv), H8096 Shimʻîy (in 40 vv); with 19:21 — H7043 qâlal (in 79 vv), H8096 Shimʻîy (in 40 vv). The rare place- and patronym-lexemes carry the link; no quotation is claimed, only the same named actors in the same named place.
Gera the Benjamite — the other son of the right hand structural / thematic — confirmed
Judges 3:15 introduces “Ehud son of Gera, a Benjamite, a man left-handed.” The Verifier finds three shared lexemes with this unit: גֵּרָא (H1617, 9 vv), בֶּן־הַיְמִינִי (H1145, 9 vv) and יָמִין (H3225, 134 vv). ⚙ Two of the three are rare, and the coincidence of names is real; what we do not claim is that Shimei descends from Ehud's line or that the narrator is drawing the parallel. Barnes sends the reader to Judges 3:15 for Gera without asserting more than that. What the lexicon does hand us is the pun David makes in v. 11: he sets his own son against this son of the right hand, in a tribe whose most famous deliverer was left-handed.
Judges 3:15
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H1617 Gêrâʼ (in 9 vv — rare), H1145 Ben-yᵉmîynîy (in 9 vv — rare), H3225 yâmîyn (in 134 vv). Tiered structural rather than verbal because the shared rare lexemes are a name and a gentilic that recur independently; no quotation or allusion is claimed.
Re-souled: the rarest verb in the unit is a Sabbath verb verbal / quotation — confirmed
The unit's final word, וַיִּנָּפֵשׁ (nâphash, H5314), occurs in only three verses in the Hebrew Bible. The other two are Exodus 23:12 — the servant, the son of the handmaid and the alien shall take breath on the seventh day — and Exodus 31:17, where the LORD rested and took breath. Exodus 23:12 also shares נוּחַ (H5117), the root of David's order in v. 11, “let him be.” ⚙ We claim the lexical fact, not the authorial intention: a lexeme this rare makes the recurrence worth recording, but three occurrences are too few to establish an allusion, and the Exodus texts are legal-liturgical while this one is narrative. Read only as a resonance, it is a sharp one — the persecuted king's rest is spoken in the verb of God's own.
Exodus 23:12 · Exodus 31:17
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexeme H5314 nâphash (in 3 vv — exceptionally rare, the whole canonical set); Exodus 23:12 additionally shares H5117 nûwach (in 139 vv). Verbal in the strict sense of a rare shared lexeme; explicitly NOT a quotation or a claimed allusion.
“What have I to do with you?” — the formula, and the ravine of fire structural / thematic — confirmed
K&D records that David's dissociation formula stands behind the Greek τὶ ἐμοὶ καὶ σοί of John 2:4, and points “for the thing itself” to Luke 9:52-56, where James and John ask to call down fire on a Samaritan village and are rebuked. Barnes independently makes the same two links, adding Matthew 8:29 and 2 Samuel 3:39; Cambridge compares Abishai to the Sons of Thunder and David's answer to Christ's answer to Peter at John 18:10-11. ⚙ The pattern is identical in shape: a rejected lord, an armed follower asking permission to destroy the insulter, a refusal that appeals to the Father's will rather than to the follower's error of fact.
Luke 9:52-56 · John 18:10-11 · John 2:4
basis: Cross-Testament (Greek↔Hebrew): no shared Strong's numbers are possible, so no verbal tier can be claimed. The basis is a shared narrative structure — rejected lord, zealous follower requesting violence, refusal grounded in divine will — recorded independently by K&D (Luke 9:52-56; John 2:4), Barnes (Luke 9:52-56; Matthew 8:29) and Cambridge (Luke 9:54; John 18:10-11).
Psalm 7 and “Cush the Benjamite” — a link the sources do not agree on flagged — verify source
Barnes reports that in the title to Psalm 7 Shimei “is apparently called ‘Cush the Benjamite.’” Gill goes further and states that at this very moment “David composed and penned the seventh psalm.” ⚙ Neither claim can be established from the text before us. Psalm 7's superscription names Cush a Benjamite and says nothing of Shimei or Bahurim; the identification is an interpretive tradition, and Gill's dating of the psalm's composition to this scene is his own inference. We record the tradition, name its holders, and decline to treat it as a cross-reference of the same kind as the others in this unit.
Psalm 7:1
basis: Contested provenance. No shared-lexeme basis appears in the Verifier candidates. The link rests entirely on an identification of Shimei with the 'Cush the Benjamite' of Psalm 7's superscription (asserted by Barnes, with Gill adding that David composed the psalm here); the superscription itself names neither Shimei nor this episode.
⚙Christ in the Unittypology · verify+
AI-generated reading; weigh it against the text.
The king who goes out of the city, cursed, and does not answer ancient/widely-held
⚙ The redemptive-historical reading here is not a stretch imposed on the text; it is the reading the commentators in this brief reach for unprompted. Henry, writing on the whole unit: “Let this remind us of Christ, who prayed for those who reviled and crucified him.” Benson, quoting Delaney on v. 13: “How far he was, in this instance, an emblem of his suffering Son, is not hard to discern, or adventurous to assert.” K&D locates the scene geographically “on the other side of the Mount of Olives.” The elements line up without forcing: a king leaving Jerusalem over Olivet, a follower who wants to use a sword and is stopped, an accusation that is false in its particulars, revilings borne in silence, and a refusal to summon the force that is standing armed on the right hand and on the left. Peter's ἀντελοιδόρει οὐκ — “when he was reviled, he reviled not again; but committed his cause to him that judgeth righteously” — is the sentence Benson reaches for, and it is a description of v. 10 before it is a description of Calvary.
1 Peter 2:23 · Luke 22:49-51 · Matthew 26:53
“Let him curse, for the LORD has bidden him” — and the cup the Father gives ancient/widely-held
⚙ The theological centre of the unit is David's refusal to treat his suffering as an accident of Shimei's malice. Geneva states it as plainly as it can be stated: “David felt that this was the judgment of God for his sin, and therefore humbles himself to his rod.” Cambridge guards the doctrine on both sides — the cursing is sinful, God commands no man to sin, and yet “God makes use of the evil passions of men to work out His purposes,” with Acts 2:23 named as the governing case. Acts 2:23 is where the apostolic preaching applies exactly this logic to the cross: delivered up by the determinate counsel of God, and crucified by wicked hands. Cambridge makes the same move Peter makes. ⚙ The difference is the one this unit will not let us blur: David suffers as a guilty man being chastened — K&D, “he felt that it came upon him because of his sins, though not for the sin imputed to him” — while the Son of David, in the reading Cambridge invites at John 18:10-11, receives a cup he did not earn.
Acts 2:23 · John 18:11 · Isaiah 53:7
Good returned in place of a curse novel
⚙ Offered as a novel reading, not an attested one. David's petition in v. 12 uses the preposition of substitution, תַּחַת: good given in place of his cursing. Take that grammar seriously and it names a transaction rather than a consolation — the curse is not cancelled but exchanged, and something must stand where it stood. Paul uses a different Greek vocabulary at Galatians 3:13, but the shape is the same one: Christ became a curse for us so that the blessing might come. ⚙ We claim no verbal or allusive link; the lexemes are Hebrew and the epistle is Greek, and none of the commentators in this brief draws the line. What we claim is that David's taḥat asks a question the gospel later answers, and that Henry's closing sentence — “We may depend upon God to repay, not only our services, but our sufferings” — states the hope without yet naming its ground.
Galatians 3:13 · 1 Peter 3:9
Apparatus & Provenance
The biblical text is the Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain (CC0). Hebrew/Greek text, transliteration, morphology and Strong’s are transcribed from the Berean interlinear (CC0) + Strong’s lexicons (PD); the literal renderings, divergence notes, word notes and all synthesis are this tool’s own work (⚙) — fallible; verify them.
Named voices, quoted verbatim from public-domain works:
- Albert Barnes, Notes on the Bible (1834)
- Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges, — (1880s)
- Charles Ellicott, Commentary for English Readers (1878)
- Geneva Study Bible, Marginal Notes (1599)
- Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory (1871)
- John Gill, Exposition of the Entire Bible (1746–63)
- Joseph Benson, Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1810s)
- Keil & Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament (1860s)
- Matthew Henry, Concise Commentary on the Whole Bible (1706)
- Matthew Poole, Annotations upon the Holy Bible (1685)
- The Pulpit Commentary, Spence & Exell, eds. (1880s)
Text. This unit carries three separate Kethib/Qere situations and one probable textual loss, and the English versions must silently choose in each case. (1) At v. 10 the written text reads כִּי … וְכִי; the Masoretes offer כֹּה … כִּי, and the Septuagint and Vulgate expand further (LXX adds καὶ ἄφετε αὐτὸν καὶ). K&D defends the Kethib and calls both the Qere and the versional reading conjectural; Cambridge prints both renderings without deciding. BSB follows the Qere-adjacent sense. (2) At v. 12 the Kethib reads בַּעֲוֺנִי, “my iniquity”; the Qere reads “mine eye”; the Septuagint and Vulgate read “mine affliction,” which BSB follows. Ellicott and K&D argue for the Kethib, Cambridge and Pulpit for the versional reading. This unit's notes and sola-reading lean on K&D's reading while flagging that it is contested. (3) Also at v. 12 the Kethib has “my cursing” for “his cursing” (Cambridge). (4) At v. 14 the adverb שָׁם requires an antecedent the verse never gives. Ellicott, Cambridge, Pulpit and K&D read עֲיֵפִים as the place-name Ayephim; JFB, Poole, Gill and Geneva read the adjective “weary” and supply Bahurim. Cambridge concedes “no such place is known”; K&D argues from 2 Samuel 17:18 that Bahurim is impossible. We report the disagreement rather than resolving it.
Sources. Original-language data (surface, transliteration, parse, Strong's) is the Berean interlinear; the English base text is the BSB. All ✦ commentary is verbatim public-domain material quoted by anchor and expanded mechanically — nothing in a voice block has been retyped, modernized or stitched. Where two commentators contradict each other (Cambridge vs. K&D on v. 12; Gill vs. K&D on v. 14), both are preserved.
What is uncertain in the ⚙ layer. The nâphash / Sabbath resonance (v. 14, Exodus 23:12 and 31:17) is a certain lexical fact — three verses in the whole canon — and an uncertain authorial intention; it is recorded as the former and explicitly not claimed as the latter. The Judges 3:15 thread rests on two rare shared lexemes that are a name and a gentilic, which is why it is tiered structural rather than verbal. The Psalm 7 connection is flagged: the identification of Shimei with Psalm 7's “Cush the Benjamite,” and Gill's dating of the psalm's composition to this scene, are interpretive traditions with no textual basis in either passage. Every cross-Testament thread and every christological item here is tiered structural or typological; no verbal tier is or could be claimed across Greek and Hebrew. Pulpit's and Barnes's reconstructions of the topography, and Pulpit's dating of 2 Samuel 21 before this chapter, are inferences by those commentators, noted as such in the relevant editorial notes.
On the pullquote. The line “David does not dispute Shimei's arithmetic; he asks God to reverse the sign” is ⚙ editorial synthesis. It is not a verse, not a translation, and not a quotation from any commentator; it is this tool's one-sentence summary of vv. 8 and 12, offered to be tested.
✦ = human, public-domain source, quoted and named. ⚙ = machine synthesis, to be verified. Flagged cross-references are left visible on purpose — the verifier working in the open. “Search the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” (Acts 17:11)