Bible Strands
1 Chronicles 19:7
So they hired for themselves thirty-two thousand chariots, as well as the king of Maacah with his troops, who came and camped near Medeba while the Ammonites were mustered from their cities and marched out for battle.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The narrator reports the mobilization of the Ammonite coalition after Hanun's advisers urged him to prepare for David's response. The allied forces establish a camp near Medeba while the Ammonite army gathers from its cities to engage in battle.
The words — וַיִּשְׂכְּרוּ (va.yis.kə.ru) translates as "they hired" [H7936], and רֶכֶב (re.khev) denotes "chariots" [H7393]. The text explicitly quantifies the force as thirty-two thousand chariots (שְׁנַיִם וְשָׁלֹשִׁים אֶלֶף) alongside the king of Maacah.
The thread — The geographic focus on Medeba and the surrounding valley regions corresponds to the territorial descriptions in Joshua 13:9 and 13:16, while the coalition's defeat aligns with the conquest account in Numbers 21:30.
Why it lands — The passage states the numerical and geographic reality of the opposing army without commentary or moral evaluation. It asks the reader to observe the concrete scale of the threat before David's military response in 1 Chronicles 19:8.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
So they hired thirty and two thousand chariots, and the king of Maachah and his people; who came and pitched before Medeba. And the children of Ammon gathered themselves together from their cities, and came to battle.
Cross-references
- Numbers 21:30 But we have overthrown them; Heshbon is destroyed as far as Dibon. We demolished them as far as Nophah, which reaches to Medeba.”
- Joshua 13:9 The area from Aroer on the rim of the Arnon Valley, along with the city in the middle of the valley, the whole plateau of Medeba as far as Dibon,
- Joshua 13:16 The territory from Aroer on the rim of the Arnon Valley, along with the city in the middle of the valley, to the whole plateau beyond Medeba,
- Exodus 14:9 The Egyptians—all Pharaoh’s horses and chariots, horsemen and troops—pursued the Israelites and overtook them as they camped by the sea near Pi-hahiroth, opposite Baal-zephon.
- Judges 4:3 Then the Israelites cried out to the LORD, because Jabin had nine hundred chariots of iron, and he had harshly oppressed the Israelites for twenty years.
- 1 Samuel 13:5 Now the Philistines assembled to fight against Israel with three thousand chariots, six thousand horsemen, and troops as numerous as the sand on the seashore. They went up and camped at Michmash, east of Beth-aven.
- 2 Samuel 10:6 When the Ammonites realized that they had become a stench to David, they hired twenty thousand Aramean foot soldiers from Beth-rehob and Zoba, as well as a thousand men from the king of Maacah and twelve thousand men from Tob.
- 1 Chronicles 18:4 David captured from him a thousand chariots, seven thousand charioteers, and twenty thousand foot soldiers, and he hamstrung all the horses except a hundred he kept for the chariots.
- 2 Chronicles 14:9 Then Zerah the Cushite came against them with an army of 1,000,000 men and 300 chariots, and they advanced as far as Mareshah.
- Psalms 20:7 Some trust in chariots and others in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God.