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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - 1 Chronicles 17:17 - 17:17
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Instead of the words הָאָדָם תֹּורַת וְזֹאת (2Sa 7:19), the Chronicle has הַמַּעֲלָה הָאָדָם כְּתֹור וּרְאִיתַנִי, and sawest me (or, that thou sawest me) after the manner of men; תֹּור being a contraction of תֹּורֶה = תֹּורָה. רָאָה, to see, may denote to visit (cf. 2Sa 13:5; 2Ki 8:29), or look upon in the sense of regard, respicere. But the word הַמַּעֲלָה remains obscure in any case, for elsewhere it occurs only as a substantive, in the significations, “the act of going up” (or drawing up) (Ezr 7:9), “that which goes up” (Eze 11:5), “the step;” while for the signification “height” (locus superior) only this passage is adduced by Gesenius in Thes. But even had the word this signification, the word הַמַּעֲלָה could not signify in loco excelso = in coelis in its present connection; and further, even were this possible, the translation et me intuitus es more hominum in coelis gives no tolerable sense. But neither can המעלה be the vocative of address, and a predicate of God, “Thou height, Jahve God,” as Hgstb. Christol. i. p. 378 trans., takes it, with many older commentators. The passage Psa 92:9, “Thou art מָרֹום, height, sublimity for ever, Jahve,” is not sufficient to prove that in our verse הַמַּעֲלָה is predicated of God. Without doubt, הַמַּעֲלָה should go with וגו רְאִיתַנִי, and appears to correspond to the לְמֵרָחֹוק of the preceding clause, in the signification: as regards the elevation, in reference to the going upwards, i.e., the exaltation of my race (seed) on high. The thought would then be this: After the manner of men, so condescendingly and graciously, as men have intercourse with each other, hast Thou looked upon or visited me in reference to the elevation of myself or my race, - the text of the Chronicle giving an explanation of the parallel narrative.
(Note: This interpretation of this extremely difficult word corresponds in sense to the not less obscure words in 2nd Samuel, and gives us, with any alteration of the text, a more fitting thought than the alterations in the reading proposed by the moderns. Ewald and Berth. would alter וראיתני into וְהִרְאִיתַנִי (hiph.), and המעלה into לְמַעֲלָה, in order to get the meaning, “Thou hast caused me to see like the series of men upwards,” i.e., the line of men who stretch from David outward into the far future in unbroken series, which Thenius rightly calls a thoroughly modern idea. Böttcher's attempt at explanation is much more artificial. He proposes, in N. k. Aehrenlese, iii. S. 225, to read לְמַעֲלֶה...וּרְאִיתִנִי, and translates: “so that I saw myself, as the series of men who follow upwards shall see me, i.e., so that I could see myself as posterity will see me, at the head of a continuous family of rulers:” where the main idea has to be supplied.)
The divergence in 1Ch 17:18, אֶת־עַבְדֶּךָ לְכָבֹוד אֵלֶיךָ instead of אֵלֶיךָ לְדַבֵּר (2Sa 7:20), which cannot be an explanation or interpretation of Samuel's text, is less difficult of explanation. The words in Samuel, “What can David say more unto Thee?” have in this connection the very easily understood signification, What more can I say of the promise given me? and needed no explanation. When, instead of this, we read in the Chronicle, “What more can Thy servant add to Thee in regard to the honour to Thy servant?” an unprejudiced criticism must hold this text for the original, because it is the more difficult. It is the more difficult, not only on account of the omission of לְדַבֵּר, which indeed is not absolutely necessary, though serving to explain יֹוסִיף, but mainly on account of the unusual construction of the nomen כָבֹוד with אֶת־עַבְדְּךָ, honour towards Thy servant. The construction יהוה את דֵּעָה is not quite analogous, for כָבֹוד is not a nomen actionis like דֵּעָה; את־ כבד is rather connected with the practice which begins to obtain in the later language of employing אֵת as a general casus obliquus, instead of any more definite preposition (Ew. §277, d, S. 683f., der 7 Aufl.), and is to be translated: “honour concerning Thy servant.” The assertion that אֶת־עַבְדְּךָ is to be erased as a later gloss which has crept into the text, cuts the knots, but does not untie them. That the lxx have not these words, only proves that these translators did not know what to make of them, and so just omitted them, as they have omitted the first clause of 1Ch 17:19. In 1Ch 17:19 also there is no valid ground for altering the עַבְדְּךָ בַּעֲבוּר of the Chronicle to make it correspond to דְּבָֽרְךָ בַּעֲבוּר in Samuel; for the words, “for Thy servant's sake,” i.e., because Thou hast chosen Thy servant, give a quite suitable sense; cf. the discussion on 2Sa 7:21. In the second half of the verse, however, the more extended phrases of 2nd Samuel are greatly contracted.