1 Samuel 20:4

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

Then said Jonathan to David, Whatever your soul desires, I will even do it for you.

World English Bible · Public Domain

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יְהוֹנָתָ֖ן

Yᵉhôwnâthân

H3083

“Jonathan”

Noun, Proper

Appears 79× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears at 1 Samuel 14:6

Full BDB Definition

Origin: from H3068 and H5414

TWOT: None

Jonathan or Jehonathan = "Jehovah has given" - a son of king Saul and a friend of David - a son of the high priest Abiathar and the last descendant of Eli of whom we hear - a nephew of David who like David slew a giant of Gath - an uncle of David - one of David's mighty warriors - one of David's treasurers - a scribe in the time of Jeremiah - a Levite and father of Zechariah, a priest who blew the trumpet at the dedication of the wall - a son or descendant of Gershom, the son of Moses, and a priest to the tribe of Dan - a son of Kareah and a brother of Johanan; a Judaite captain after the fall of Jerusalem - another Judaite father of Peleth - father of Ebed in the time of Ezra - son of Asahel in the time of Ezra - a priest of the family of Melicu in the time of Nehemiah - son of Joiada and his successor to the high priesthood in the time of Nehemiah

About this verse

These counts appear in no published source. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged text and Lemma’s own curated glosses. What Lemma adds →

9: words
7: distinct lemmas
Historical: section

Grammatical profile

3 verbs
3 nouns
2 prepositions
1 particle

Verb forms

וַיֹּ֥אמֶר Qal · Sequential Imperfect
תֹּאמַ֥ר Qal · Imperfect
וְאֶֽעֱשֶׂה Qal · Imperfect

Repetition

A word recurs within this verse — often emphatic in Hebrew:

וַיֹּ֥אמֶר to say H559 ×2

Hebrew & Septuagint length

In English translation the verse runs 16 words from the Hebrew and 17 from the Septuagint (LXX English) — closely comparable.

A rough comparison of the two English renderings, which tokenize alike — not a word-level alignment.

Word counts can differ between the Hebrew and the Greek without any difference in meaning — e.g. the Hebrew direct-object marker אֵת has no separate Greek word, and Greek often adds the article ὁ.

In the original languages it is 9 Hebrew tokens and 14 Greek tokens — but the two are counted differently (Hebrew bundles its prefixes and suffixes into one token; the Greek is in lemma form), so that isn’t a like-for-like length.

Hebrew and Greek witnesses Masoretic Hebrew ↔ Greek Septuagint

The same verse in the two great witnesses to the Old Testament, shown verse-for-verse.

These are two independent witnesses, not word-aligned to each other, and the Septuagint is shown in lemma (dictionary) form.

Hebrew 1 Samuel 20:4 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

וַיֹּ֥אמֶר יְהוֹנָתָ֖ן אֶל דָּוִ֑ד מַה תֹּאמַ֥ר נַפְשְׁךָ֖ וְאֶֽעֱשֶׂה לָּֽךְ

Then said Jonathan to David, Whatever your soul desires, I will even do it for you.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Greek LXX 1 Samuel 20:4 Septuagint · lemma form

καί εἶπον ιωναθαν πρός δαυίδ τίς ἐπιθυμέω ὁ ψυχή σύ καί τίς ποιέω σύ

And Jonathan said to David, What does your soul desire, and what shall I do for you.

LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) · Public Domain

Hebrew: Westminster Leningrad Codex (CC BY 4.0). Greek: Septuagint (public domain); English from LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) (Public Domain). How the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew →

Targum (Aramaic paraphrase)

The Targum is the ancient Jewish Aramaic paraphrase of the Hebrew Scriptures — an interpretive translation, not the Hebrew text itself. Onkelos (literal) and Pseudo-Jonathan (expansive) render the Torah, and Jonathan the Prophets. Coverage is partial: where no permissively-licensed English translation exists for a verse, only the Aramaic is shown. This is verse-level text, not a word-by-word alignment to the Hebrew.

Targum Jonathan Prophets (Joshua–Malachi)

וַאֲמַר יְהוֹנָתָן לְדָוִד מָא רַעֲוָא נַפְשָׁךְ וְאַעְבֵּד לָךְ:

(no public-domain English translation for this verse)

Targum Jonathan — Aramaic: “Mikraot Gedolot” (public domain). English: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “London "Chaldee Paraphrase," 1871” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.

Commentary

Notes on 1 Samuel 20:4 from classic Christian and Jewish commentators (each source and its license shown beneath its notes). The classic Christian expositions comment on the surrounding passage and are grouped to its opening verse, so a note may address several verses; the Jewish commentaries on the Tanakh (Rashi and others) are per-verse, so they appear only where the commentator wrote on this verse.

Lemma curates 59 commentaries, every one of them public domain or Creative Commons licensed, each selected and text-cleaned for this edition rather than reprinted as found. About our sources →

Trapp's Complete Commentary

John Trapp

1Sa 20:4 Then said Jonathan unto David, Whatsoever thy soul desireth, I will even do [it] for thee.

Ver. 4. Whatsoever thy soul desireth.] True love is easily persuadable to anything possible and lawful. The heathen promised his friend to stick to him usque ad aras; so far as stood with piety and honesty. The Hebrew here is, Quid dicit anima tua, et faciam tibi.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Joseph Benson's Commentary

1Sa 20:4-5. Whatsoever thou desirest — He does not say, that shall be lawful and honest; for he knew David too well to think he would ask anything that was otherwise. I will do it for thee — This is true friendship. Thus Christ testifies his love to us; Whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do. And we must testify ours to him by keeping his commandments. Behold, to-morrow is the new-moon — There were solemn sacrifices every new-moon, and then a feast upon them. And David being one of the king’s family, by marrying his daughter, used to eat with them at these festival times. That I may hide myself in the field till the third day — That is, unto the next day but one after the new-moon. His meaning is not, that he would hide himself in any certain place all the three days, but that he would secure himself, either at Beth-lehem with his friends, or in some other place till the third day.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Geneva Bible (1599)

Geneva Bible translators

Hebrew, saith.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

John Gill's Exposition

Then said Jonathan unto David,.... Now giving credit to what he had said, and in order to comfort and support him under the apprehensions he had of danger:

whatsoever thy soul desireth, I will even do it for thee; for the preservation of his life, by speaking to his father on his behalf, endeavouring to dissuade him from his evil intentions, or by hiding and concealing him in some obscure place, that he might not execute his evil designs upon him, or by any method he could point out to him.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary

Soul, is often put for desire, Psalm xxvi. 12. (Calmet)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Matthew Poole's English Annotations

To wit, for the discovery of the truth, and for the preservation of thy life.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Whedon's Commentary on the Bible

Daniel D. Whedon

4. Whatsoever thy soul desireth — Literally, Whatever thy soul shall say even I will do for thee. This conversation, up to 1Sa_20:11, took place in the city, and perhaps in or near Saul’s house.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

unfoldingWord translationNotes

Door43 World Missions Community

General Information:

David proposes a test against King Saul to Jonathan.

Tomorrow is the new moon

On the first of every month the people would celebrate and offer sacrifices to God.

until the third day at evening

"until the evening of the day after tomorrow"

translationWords

new moon

king

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

Lesson kit

Teaching starters — assembled from the data on this page, not authored interpretation. Every prompt links to the verse data it draws on. Edit before teaching.

1 Samuel, in the Historical, opens this verse with 9 words (7 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is Yᵉhôwnâthân (“Jonathan”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

The word Yᵉhôwnâthân carries the sense “Jonathan.” How does it shape the verse?
“to say” occurs 2× in this one verse. What is the effect of the repetition?
These translations render this verse differently. What is at stake in choosing one wording over another?
The verb «וַיֹּ֥אמֶר» is Qal Sequential Imperfect. How does its form color the action?
Reading how Trapp's Complete Commentary and Joseph Benson's Commentary read this verse, where do the two commentators agree and where do they part?

Things to notice

This verse counts 9 Hebrew ↔ 14 Greek words.
These translations choose different wording for 7 words in this verse.
“to say” occurs 2× in this single verse.
7 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 9 words in this verse.