1 Samuel 17:1

Footnotes

1. 1 The content of 1 Sam 17–18, which includes the David and Goliath story, differs considerably in the as compared to the , suggesting that this story circulated in ancient times in more than one form. The for chs. 17–18 is much shorter than the , lacking almost half of the material (39 of a total of 88 verses). Many scholars (e.g., McCarter, Klein) think that the shorter text of the is preferable to the , which in their view has been expanded by incorporation of later material. Other scholars (e.g., Wellhausen, Driver) conclude that the shorter Greek text (or the Hebrew text that underlies it) reflects an attempt to harmonize certain alleged inconsistencies that appear in the longer version of the story. Given the translation characteristics of the elsewhere in this section, it does not seem likely that these differences are due to deliberate omission of these verses on the part of the translator. It seems more likely that the Greek translator has faithfully rendered here a Hebrew text that itself was much shorter than the in these chapters. Whether or not the shorter text represented by the is to be preferred over the in 1 Sam 17–18 is a matter over which textual scholars are divided. For a helpful discussion of the major textual issues in this unit see D. Barthélemy, D. W. Gooding, J. Lust, and E. Tov, The Story of David and Goliath (). Overall it seems preferable to stay with the , at least for the most part. However, the major textual differences between the and the will be mentioned in the notes that accompany the translation so that the reader may be alert to the major problem passages.
2. 2 Heb “camps.”