2 Samuel 8 Footnotes

8:4 English versions of this passage, following variant translators’ judgments, disagree on whether David captured seventeen hundred, seven hundred, or seven thousand horsemen from Hadadezer. In the 1Ch 18:4 parallel passage, the total is seven thousand, with some additional factual differences. The KJV and NKJV apparently try to reconcile the discrepancy by stating that David captured one thousand chariots and seven hundred horsemen. The NIV rejects the MT here, following the reading of the LXX and Dead Sea Scrolls which agrees with 1Ch 18:4. A copyist’s error in pre-Christian times can be assumed for either this verse or 1Ch 18:4. Most probably of the alteration occurred in 2 Samuel after the writing of 1 Chronicles, which preserves the original wording.