2 Samuel17:15–29

The rare groats: camouflage in Bahurim, folly in the mortar verbal / quotation: confirmed

The רִפוֹת (rîyphâh, H7383) the woman scatters over the cistern mouth is one of the rarest nouns in the Hebrew Bible: the Verifier finds it in two verses only. The other is Proverbs 27:22, where a fool may be brayed in a mortar among the groats and his folly will still not depart from him. Ellicott, Cambridge, K&D and Pulpit each independently send the reader from this verse to that one for the meaning of the word. ⚙ The resonance is ours and is offered as such: in Bahurim the pounded grain hides wisdom from a hunt, and four verses later the wisest man in Israel proves Proverbs right about himself. We claim a verbal link on the shared rare lexeme, and nothing more; there is no quotation in either direction.

Proverbs 27:22

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexeme H7383 rîyphâh, attested in only 2 verses of the canon (this one and Proverbs 27:22). A rare-lexeme verbal link, not a citation; all four commentators who gloss the word cross-refer to Proverbs 27:22.

Strangled: the only other place the verb occurs verbal / quotation: confirmed

וַיֵּחָנַק (chânaq, H2614, “to be narrow, to strangle”) is Niphal here, and the Verifier records the root in only two verses of Scripture. The other is Nahum 2:12, of the lion that strangles prey for its lionesses and fills its dens with torn flesh. Pulpit records the old alternative that Ahithophel died of a quinsy, since the word can mean choked, and dismisses it with Thenius as a curiosity of interpretation; Gill reports the same rabbinic reading and rejects it. ⚙ Taking the ordinary sense, the canon's two uses of this verb set a predator and a self-destroyer side by side, the counsellor who planned to fall on a weary king (v. 2) dying by the one verb Scripture otherwise gives to a lion's kill.

Nahum 2:12

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexeme H2614 chânaq, attested in only 2 verses of the canon (2 Samuel 17:23 and Nahum 2:12). Rare-lexeme verbal link within Hebrew; no quotation is claimed in either direction.

Bread returned: Machir of Lo-debar, who once kept Jonathan's son structural / thematic: confirmed

Three names in v. 27, מָכִיר, עַמִּיאֵל and לֹא דְבָר, all belong to the household that sheltered Mephibosheth in 2 Samuel 9:4-5 before David sent for him. Ellicott states the connection plainly: David now reaps a reward for his kindness to the crippled son of Jonathan. Cambridge sharpens it: the man who had entertained Jonathan's son now shows hospitality to Jonathan's friend. ⚙ The link is one of persons and pattern rather than of language, since the shared lexemes are proper names; we tier it structural for that reason, though Lo-debar (4 verses) and Ammiel (6 verses) are rare enough that the identification itself is beyond doubt.

2 Samuel 9:4 · 2 Samuel 9:5

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H4353 Mâkîyr (in 20 vv), H3810 Lôʼ Dᵉbar (in 4 vv), H5988 ʻAmmîyʼêl (in 6 vv). The shared items are proper names, which establish identity of persons and place but not a verbal allusion, so the tier is structural rather than verbal.

Wheat, barley, beans and lentils: the same four in a besieged city structural / thematic: confirmed

The relief ration of v. 28 (חִטִּים wheat, שְׂעֹרִים barley, פוֹל beans, עֲדָשִׁים lentils) is the same commodity list God commands Ezekiel to bake into siege bread in Ezekiel 4:9, and ʻâdâsh (H5742, lentils) occurs in only four verses of the whole canon. ⚙ The two lists sit at opposite ends of one idea: in Ezekiel the mixed pulse is famine rationed by measure under a siege, and at Mahanaim the same mixture is abundance carried in by three chieftains to a king who has just been called hungry, weary and thirsty in the wilderness. We could claim a verbal tier on the rarity of the lentil lexeme; we decline it, because a shared list of staple foods is not an allusion, and the honest description of this link is a shared pattern.

Ezekiel 4:9

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H5742 ʻâdâsh (in 4 vv), H8184 sᵉʻôrâh (in 32 vv), H3627 kᵉlîy (in 276 vv). The verbal tier is deliberately declined: the shared vocabulary is a staple-food list, not a quotation or allusion, so the recorded basis supports a thematic link only.

Provisions to a fugitive king, a second time structural / thematic: confirmed

When David was in flight from Saul, Abigail met him with loaves, wine, sheep and קָלִי (qâlîy, H7039, parched grain), riding on a donkey (1 Samuel 25:18). At Mahanaim the parched grain comes again, twice over in v. 28, to a king in flight from his son, and an Abigail stands three verses earlier in the genealogy of v. 25, though the brief's own data make clear she is a different woman, the mother of Amasa. ⚙ The pattern is the same twice in one life: the anointed but dispossessed king is fed by people who owe him nothing. We tier this structural, not verbal, because the shared lexemes are a common food, a common animal and a shared name borne by two different persons.

1 Samuel 25:18

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H7039 qâlîy (in 5 vv), H2543 chămôwr (in 93 vv), H26 ʼĂbîygayil (in 17 vv). The name Abigail is shared but denotes different women in the two passages, so no verbal allusion is claimed; the recorded basis supports a repeated narrative pattern only.

Barzillai and the Jordan, going and coming back structural / thematic: confirmed

Barzillai of Rogelim enters the canon in v. 27 feeding a king who has just fled across the Jordan; he leaves it in 2 Samuel 19:31, coming down to that same river to bring the king back over. The Verifier records the shared roots yârad (to go down) and Yardên (Jordan) across the two passages. Cambridge notes at v. 27 that Barzillai declined to go up to Jerusalem, that his sons were commended to Solomon (1 Kings 2:7), and that a priestly family still claimed descent from his daughter at the return from exile (Ezra 2:61-63). ⚙ The same two words that put David's messengers down a dry cistern (yârad, v. 18) bring Barzillai down to the ford; the river that is an escape route in this unit is a homecoming in that one.

2 Samuel 19:31

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H3381 yârad (in 345 vv) and H3383 Yardên (in 164 vv). Both are common words, so the link rests on the shared character and setting rather than on rare vocabulary; structural tier only.

The counsel of Ahithophel, from 2 Samuel 15 to its end structural / thematic: confirmed

This unit is the last act of a plot running from 2 Samuel 15:12, where Absalom sends for Ahithophel the counsellor, through 16:23, where his counsel is reckoned as if a man inquired of the word of God, to 17:14, where the LORD is said to have ordained the defeat of his good counsel. The Verifier confirms the shared lexemes across all three: Ahithophel (17 verses), Hushai (13 verses), and the verb yâʻats (73 verses). ⚙ Our unit never names God, but the sentence that explains it stands four verses earlier, outside our boundary, and K&D supplies the other bracket: with Ahithophel's death David's prayer of 2 Samuel 15:31 is fulfilled. Henry, whose note covers 17:1-21, makes the same point without the reference: Ahithophel's former counsel was followed because God intended to correct David, and his latter counsel was not, because God did not mean to destroy him.

2 Samuel 15:12 · 2 Samuel 16:23 · 2 Samuel 17:14

basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H302 ʼĂchîythôphel (in 17 vv), H2365 Chûwshay (in 13 vv), H3289 yâʻats (in 73 vv), H53 ʼĂbîyshâlôwm (in 92 vv). Same narrative arc rather than allusion; the two rare proper names confirm the identification but the link is compositional.

Across the Testaments: the counsellor who went out and hanged himself typological

Three of the brief's commentators make this link at v. 23 without prompting. JFB writes that Ahithophel had an imitator in Judas, who resembled him in his treason as well as in his infamous end; Cambridge glosses the verb itself with “Like Judas (Matthew 27:5)”; Pulpit says the parallel must strike everyone. ⚙ We record it here with its limits stated. A Greek text and a Hebrew one cannot share a Strong's number, so no verbal tier is available and none is claimed: the connection is figural, resting on the shape of the two accounts (the trusted intimate of the king, the counsel or the kiss, the setting of a house in order, the rope) and not on shared vocabulary. Two further cautions belong on the record. Matthew 27:5 and Acts 1:18 describe Judas's death differently, and the harmonisation of them is disputed ground we do not enter. And the New Testament itself never cites 2 Samuel 17; what it cites over the betrayer is Psalm 41:9 (John 13:18) and the Psalter generally (Acts 1:16-20). The type is old and widely held; it is not an apostolic exegesis of this chapter.

Matthew 27:5 · Acts 1:18 · Psalm 41:9

basis: Cross-Testament link (Hebrew to Greek), so no shared Strong's lexeme is possible and no verbal tier is claimed. Basis is figural correspondence, attested independently at this verse by JFB, Cambridge and Pulpit. The New Testament nowhere quotes 2 Samuel 17; the betrayal texts it does cite are from the Psalter.

Flagged: Nahash, Jesse, and the root of the serpent flagged: verify source

Verse 25 calls Abigail the daughter of נָחָשׁ (Nahash, H5176), which no one can reconcile with 1 Chronicles 2:16 without a conjecture. Geneva's marginal note flatly identifies Nahash with Jesse. Pulpit reports the Jewish tradition behind that gloss, which reads Isaiah 14:29 (“out of the root of Nahash shall come forth the basilisk”) through the Chaldee paraphrase as “out of the root of Jesse shall come forth the Messiah,” and then dismisses it as a conceit that would not deserve mention had it not reached the margin of the Authorized Version. Cambridge calls the identification the Jewish tradition and says it is unsupported by evidence; Ellicott says flatly that it has no support. ⚙ We record the link because a reader will meet it in Geneva's margin, and we flag it: the messianic step depends on a Targumic reading of Isaiah 14:29, not on anything in 2 Samuel, and four of the brief's own commentators reject the premise.

Isaiah 14:29 · 1 Chronicles 2:16

basis: No shared Strong's lexeme was computed between 2 Samuel 17:25 and Isaiah 14:29 beyond the name H5176 Nâchâsh itself, and the two passages use it of different referents. The chain rests on a Targumic paraphrase reported second hand by Pulpit and endorsed only by Geneva's margin; Ellicott, Cambridge and Barnes reject the identification of Nahash with Jesse. Provenance disputed.

The counsellor at the king's table who went out and hanged himself ancient/widely-held

Ahithophel is the king's own counsellor (2 Samuel 15:12, 16:23), and he betrays David for the son who has taken the throne; when his counsel is refused he sets his house in order and is strangled, and he is buried in his father's tomb. JFB says he had an imitator in Judas, who resembled him in his treason as well as in his infamous end. Cambridge, glossing the very verb, writes “Like Judas (Matthew 27:5).” Pulpit says the parallel must strike everyone. ⚙ The New Testament makes the connection itself at one remove: at the supper the Lord applies Psalm 41:9, the familiar friend who ate bread with me and lifted up his heel against me, to his betrayer (John 13:18), and Peter reads the psalms over the vacant place (Acts 1:16-20). The link between this chapter and Matthew 27 cannot be verbal, since no Greek word can share a Strong's number with a Hebrew one; it is a figure, and it is an old one. What the type supplies is a shape rather than a prophecy: counsel that was taken as the word of God, refused; a rope; a field or a tomb; and a king who is still alive on the far side of a valley.

Matthew 27:5 · John 13:18 · Acts 1:16-20 · Psalm 41:9

Not one of them was missing novel

The narrator's interest in v. 22 is a count: נֶעְדָּר, Niphal of ʻădar, not one was lacking, and K&D renders the idiom “even to one there was not any one missed.” Gill, at that clause, writes that not one was lost in the passage nor any deserted, and sends the reader to John 17:12, where the Son says of those the Father gave him that none of them is lost. ⚙ We develop what Gill only points at. The two scenes rhyme in structure: a king going out at night over a brook with his household behind him, a company brought across whole, and a counsellor who is the one exception. The rhyme cannot be a verbal link across the Testaments, and we do not tier it as one. It is our reading, seeded by a single eighteenth-century cross-reference, and it should be weighed as such.

John 17:12 · John 18:1

A table prepared in the presence of enemies ancient/widely-held

The unit ends with beds, basins, wheat, barley, flour, parched grain, beans, lentils, honey, curds, sheep and cheese carried to a hungry, weary and thirsty king by an Ammonite, the man who had sheltered a cripple, and an old Gileadite, while an army gathers against him in the same land. Henry draws the application directly from this passage: God makes up to his people from strangers the comfort they are disappointed of in their own families, and then adds that what is done for the least of his brethren, who are sick, poor and destitute, is accepted and recompensed as if done to himself, which is the substance of Matthew 25:40. ⚙ The Psalter's own language for this scene is Psalm 23:5, a table prepared in the presence of enemies, and Psalm 63 is headed as David's in the wilderness. Our addition is only this: the verb הִגִּישׁוּ (nâgash, H5066) that finally arrives in v. 29 after a whole verse without one is the ordinary verb for bringing an offering near. The chapter's last act is three men bringing food to a rejected king, told in the vocabulary of approach.

Matthew 25:40 · Psalm 23:5 · Psalm 63:1