Yoel, could you tell us if this is an accurate translation of the verse?
Some translations have rendered this verse to mean only that David put the
people to work with saws, harrows, and axes, and made them work making
bricks. The NIV, for example, translated it like this: "He took a great
quantity of plunder from the city and brought out the people who were there,
consigning them to labor with saws and with iron picks and axes, and he made
them work at brickmaking. He did this to all the Ammonite towns. Then
David and his entire army returned to Jerusalem."
This translation seems unlikely to me, because (1) the general policy of the
Israelites was to massacre civilian populations, and (2) the last part of
the verse says that David did this to all the Ammonite towns, then he and
his entire army or all the people returned to Jerusalem. How likely is it
that David put the people to work for a period of time (under supervision, I
suppose), then went on to another Ammonite city, destroyed it, and put the
people to work with saws, picks, and axes and making bricks, and then went
on to another city, etc.? The idea was to destroy the cities, so why would
he have the captives make bricks and do other tasks with saws, picks, and
axes? This would imply that he had the captives do work toward rebuilding
the cities, but this is inconsistent with the scorched-earth method of
warfare that the Israelites used.
Hendrickson's Interlinear literal translation renders the verse like this:
"And he brought out the people in it and put them to the saw, and to sharp
tools of iron, and to axes of iron, and he caused them to go over into the
brickkiln. And so he did to all the cities of the sons of Ammon. And David
and all the people returned to Jerusalem."
This is the marginal translation in Hendrickson's. The word-for-word
translation under the text itself reads like this: "And the people who
[were] in it he brought out and put [them] to the saw and to tools of sharp
iron and to axes of iron and caused to go over to them into the brickkiln
and so he did to all the cities of the sons of Ammon. And returned David
and all the people to Jerusalem." Young's Literal Translation is similar.
It sounds to me as if David wasn't the kind of leader one would want to be
captured by. The Bible described him as a man after Yahweh's own heart (1
Sam. 13:14; Acts 13:22), and he certainly seemed to be, didn't he?
yoel
It's hard to understand exactly what is being said. The language is very
obscure and many of the words could have double meanings.
2 Sam 12:31
ve'et ha'am asher ba hotsi vayasem
and the people that (were) in her he took out and he put
bamegerah uveharitzei** habarzel uvemagzerot habarzel
in/at the saw and in/at grooves/slices of iron and in/at axes of iron
vehe'evir otam bamalben**** (there are a number of probabilities)
and he made them pass*** in/at the brick (kiln is not in the text at all)
vekhen ya'aseh lekhol arei benei amon
and so he did to all (of) cities (of) sons (of) amon
*(The word means both drawer or saw)
** that's what this word means. It means something that is incised or
sliced. I guess they took it to mean something that makes incisions or
slices)
*** I can see what the NIV did here and it is either extremely dishonest or
the translatords did not know Hebrew... OR they took a translation from
another text. What they did is translate he'evir as he'evid (the former
means "to cause to pass" the latter means "to cause to work"). To someone
not used to reading Hebrew, the letters reysh and daled would look the
same.
**** The word Malben is misspelled (as malcan [which means their (f) king]
which makes no sense) in the text of the masoretic, the word "malben" has
been added to the margin. The word means "brick". It also means rectangle.
The word kiln doesn't appear in the text at all.
The "in" can also be translated "on" "at" or "by", "by way of" "on account
of". It can also be just a connector prefix between the verb and the
object.
The sentence is poorly put together. Why? Because the meaning is not
clear.Like I said- if any Israeli child were to write an essay like this-
it would get an F and his parents would be called into the office.
If I were to come across this and just read it without the above
interpretations, I would surmise that what is being described is this: that
the people of the cities are being forced by David to disassemble their
cities. Some were put to work with saws, some with axes, and some were
forced to pass bricks from the buildings as they were being disassembled
"thus he did TO THE CITIES of the sons of Amon". But this would be my
putting a puzzle together. I would guess that this is what is being
discribed.
Of course, you must realize- these were primitive people writing millenia
ago. The rules of grammar and language just hadn't developed or
standardized as much as they later did. There were no elementary schools or
school libraries or report cards. So, considering this, the shortcomings of
the language of the Bible is understandable. Much of the Bible is very
clear in its meaning, and is relatively lucid, but in this passage it is
very difficult to discern the exact intended meaning. But I it seems to me
that my interpretation is right. But who knows?
yoel