If we say we will enter into the city
Contrary to the law which forbid them:
then the famine is in the city, and we shall die there;
not being able to obtain food to preserve life:
and if we sit here, we die also;
having nothing to eat to support nature:
now therefore let us come, and fall unto the host of the Syrians;
put ourselves into their hands, and lie at their mercy:
if they save us alive, we shall live;
if they do not put us to death, but give us bread to eat, our lives will be preserved:
and if they kill us, we shall but die;
which we must inevitably do, whether we stay here, or go into the city.