⁸So you must show loyal love to your servant, for you have brought your servant into a covenant of Yahweh with you. But if there is guilt in me, then kill me yourself! But why should you bring me to your father?” ⁹Then Jonathan said, “Far be it from you! For if I know for certain that my father decided evil should come upon you,^j would I not have told it to you?” ¹⁰Then David said to Jonathan, “Who will tell me if what your father answers you is harsh?” ¹¹And Jonathan said to David, “Come, let us go out to the field.” So the two of them went out to the field.

¹²Then Jonathan said to David, “Yahweh the God of Israel is my witness^k that I will question my father by this time the day after tomorrow.^l And look, if he is well disposed toward you,^m will I not send word to you and disclose it to you?ⁿ ¹³So may Yahweh punish Jonathan and more^o if my father decides to do you harm^p and if I fail to disclose it to you^q and send word to you that you can go safely. And may Yahweh be with you, as he has been with my father. ¹⁴And not while I am still alive, will you not show the loyal love of Yahweh with me, that I may not die?^r ¹⁵And do not cut off your loyal love from my family^s forever, not even when Yahweh exterminates^t each of the enemies of David from the face of the earth.” ¹⁶So Jonathan made a covenant^u with the house of David, saying, “May Yahweh call the enemies of David to account.”^v ¹⁷And Jonathan again made David swear an oath, because he loved him; for with the love of his soul he loved him.

Read in Logos

Footnotes

jLiterally “the evil is determined from with my father to come over you”
kThe phrase “is my witness” is supplied based on the Syriac version
lLiterally “as the time tomorrow the third”
mLiterally “if he is good to David”
nLiterally “I will reveal it to your ear”
oLiterally “So may Yahweh do to Jonathan and so may he add”
pLiterally “the evil over you is regarded as good by my father”
qLiterally “I will reveal it to your ear”
rOr perhaps “and if I die, may you not …”
sLiterally “my house”
tLiterally “cuts off”
uLiterally “cut a covenant”
vLiterally “seek from the hand of the enemies of David”