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All Israel heard this message,[a] “Saul has attacked the Philistine outpost, and now Israel is repulsive[b] to the Philistines!” So the people were summoned to join[c] Saul at Gilgal.

Meanwhile the Philistines gathered to battle with Israel. Then they went up against Israel[d] with 3,000 chariots,[e] 6,000 horsemen, and an army as numerous as the sand on the seashore. They went up and camped at Micmash, east of Beth Aven. The men of Israel realized they had a problem because their army was hard pressed. So the army hid in caves, thickets, cliffs, strongholds,[f] and cisterns.

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Footnotes

  1. 1 Samuel 13:4 tn The words “this message” are supplied in the translation for stylistic reasons.
  2. 1 Samuel 13:4 tn Heb “stinks.” The figurative language indicates that Israel had become repulsive to the Philistines.
  3. 1 Samuel 13:4 tn Heb “were summoned after.”
  4. 1 Samuel 13:5 tc The MT omits “they went up against Israel” in a case of homoioteleuton, but these words are preserved in LXX.
  5. 1 Samuel 13:5 tc The translation follows the Lucianic Greek rescension and the Syriac. Many English versions follow the MT (e.g., KJV, NASB, NRSV, TEV) reading “30,000” here. One expects there to be more horsemen than chariots, cf. 2 Kgs 13:7; 2 Chr 12:3.
  6. 1 Samuel 13:6 tn Or perhaps “vaults.” This rare term also occurs in Judg 9:46, 49. Cf. KJV “high places”; ASV “coverts”; NAB “caverns”; NASB “cellars”; NIV, NCV, TEV “pits”; NRSV, NLT “tombs.”