Bible Strands
2 Samuel 11:25
Then David told the messenger, “Say this to Joab: ‘Do not let this matter upset you, for the sword devours one as well as another. Strengthen your attack against the city and demolish it.’ Encourage him with these words.”
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — David addresses a royal messenger who has just delivered the casualty report from the siege of Rabbah. The command is relayed to the commander Joab immediately after the messenger confirms Uriah’s death.
The words — וַ/יֹּ֨אמֶר (va/i.Yo.mer) translates literally as "and he said," and כֹּֽה־ תֹאמַ֤ר (koh- to.Mar) means "thus you will say."
The thread — The order to intensify the siege directly precedes the account in 2 Samuel 12:26 where Joab captures the royal fortress.
Why it lands — The text states David instructs Joab to disregard the loss of soldiers and finish the city's destruction. The reader observes the sequence: a death report, a calculated command to continue the attack, and the immediate aftermath of Uriah’s widow mourning.
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
Then David said unto the messenger, Thus shalt thou say unto Joab, Let not this thing displease thee, for the sword devoureth one as well as another: make thy battle more strong against the city, and overthrow it: and encourage thou him.
Cross-references
- Joshua 7:8 O Lord, what can I say, now that Israel has turned its back and run from its enemies?
- 1 Samuel 6:9 but keep watching it. If it goes up the road to its homeland, toward Beth-shemesh, it is the LORD who has brought on us this great disaster. But if it does not, then we will know that it was not His hand that punished us and that it happened by chance.”
- 2 Samuel 12:26 Meanwhile, Joab fought against Rabbah of the Ammonites and captured the royal fortress.
- Ecclesiastes 9:1 So I took all this to heart and concluded that the righteous and the wise, as well as their deeds, are in God’s hands. Man does not know what lies ahead, whether love or hate.
- Ecclesiastes 9:11 I saw something else under the sun: The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong; neither is the bread to the wise, nor the wealth to the intelligent, nor the favor to the skillful. For time and chance happen to all.