2 Samuel 22:48

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

Even the God who executes vengeance for me, Who brings down peoples under me,

World English Bible · Public Domain

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נְקָמֹ֖ת

nᵉqâmâh

H5360

“vengeance”

Noun, Common, Feminine, Plural, Absolute

Appears 27× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears at Numbers 31:2

Full BDB Definition

Origin: from H5359

TWOT: 1413b

vengeance - vengeance (by God, by Israel, by enemies of Israel)

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 →

7: words
6: distinct lemmas
Historical: section

Shared distinctive vocabulary

נְקָמֹ֖ת vengeance H5360 occurs in 22 verses of the Hebrew Bible. Also found in:

Grammatical profile

2 verbs
3 nouns
2 prepositions

Verb forms

הַנֹּתֵ֥ן Qal · Participle Active
וּמוֹרִ֥יד Hiphil · Participle Active

Hebrew & Septuagint length

In English translation the verse runs 14 words from the Hebrew and 12 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 7 Hebrew tokens and 10 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.

Cross-references

Topical passages linked to 2 Samuel 22:48 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — connected by theme and wording, ordered by reader-vote popularity; previews shown in the World English Bible.

Psalms 94:1 Yahweh, you God to whom vengeance belongs, You God to whom vengeance belongs, shine forth.
Psalms 144:2 My loving kindness, my fortress, My high tower, my deliverer, My shield, and he in whom I take refuge; Who subdues my people under me.
1 Samuel 25:30 It shall come to pass, when Yahweh shall have done to my lord according to all the good that he has spoken concerning you, and shall have appointed you prince over Israel,
1 Samuel 25:39 When David heard that Nabal was dead, he said, Blessed be Yahweh, who has pleaded the cause of my reproach from the hand of Nabal, and has kept back his servant from evil: and the evil-doing of Nabal has Yahweh returned on his own head. David sent and spoke concerning Abigail, to take her to him as wife.
2 Samuel 18:19 Then said Ahimaaz the son of Zadok, Let me now run, and bear the king news, how that Yahweh has avenged him of his enemies.
2 Samuel 18:31 Behold, the Cushite came; and the Cushite said, News for my lord the king; for Yahweh has avenged you this day of all those who rose up against you.
Psalms 110:1 Yahweh says to my Lord, "Sit at my right hand, Until I make your enemies your footstool for your feet."
1 Corinthians 15:25 For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet.

Cross-references courtesy of OpenBible.info (CC BY 4.0).

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 2 Samuel 22:48 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

הָאֵ֕ל הַנֹּתֵ֥ן נְקָמֹ֖ת לִ֑י וּמוֹרִ֥יד עַמִּ֖ים תַּחְתֵּֽנִי

Even the God who executes vengeance for me, Who brings down peoples under me,

World English Bible · Public Domain

Greek LXX 2 Samuel 22:48 Septuagint · lemma form

ἰσχυρός κύριος ὁ δίδωμι ἐκδίκησις ἐγώ παιδεύω λαός ὑποκάτω ἐγώ

The Lord who avenges me is strong, chastening the nations under me,

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)

אֱלָהָא דַעֲבַד פּוּרְעֲנוּתָא לִי וְתַבַּר עַמְמַיָא דְקַיְימִין לְאַבְאָשָׁא לִי תְּחוֹתָי:

(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 2 Samuel 22:48 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 →

The Biblical Illustrator

Joseph S. Exell

2Sa_22:48

The people under me.

Majesty of the people

The word people has, by the French, been long applied to the lowest order only; it was considered by many members of the first National Assembly as lowering the Deputies to denominate them Representans du Peuple Francais. Mirabeau, in one of his discourses, made the following energetic observation:--I give no weight to the signification of words, according to the absurd language of prejudice. I here speak the language of liberty, and am supported by the example of the English and of the Americans, who have always respected the name of the People, and have always adopted it in their declarations, in their laws, and in their politics. When Chatham compressed the charter of nations in a single expression, and pronounced the Majesty of the People; when the Americana opposed the natural rights of the People, to all the trash published against them; they showed that they understood the true signification and full energy of an expression, to which freedom gives so great a value. (Christian Weekly.)

The Biblical Illustrator, edited by Joseph S. Exell (c. 1880s–1900s) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne

48. avengeth me] For the wrongs inflicted by Saul (1Sa_24:12); for the insults of Nabal (1Sa_25:39); for the opposition of those who refused to acknowledge him as king (ch. 2Sa_4:8). Vengeance is the prerogative of God (Psa_94:1), and the visible execution of it was anxiously looked for as His vindication of the righteousness and innocence of His servants.

bringeth down the people under me] The reference seems to be, as in 2Sa_22:44, to his success in overcoming internal opposition to his rule. It is not the boast of a triumphant despot, but the thanksgiving of a ruler who recognised the vital importance of union for the prosperity of Israel, and the extreme difficulty of reconciling all the discordant elements in the nation, and knew that it was a task beyond his unaided powers. Cp. Psa_144:2. The Sept. reads “disciplineth.”

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Whedon's Commentary on the Bible

Daniel D. Whedon

48. Gives vengeance to me — Executes merited punishment on my enemies. Thus to Jehovah belongs vengeance. Deu_32:35; Rom_12:19.

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

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.

2 Samuel, in the Historical, opens this verse with 7 words (6 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is nᵉqâmâh (“vengeance”). A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

The word nᵉqâmâh carries the sense “vengeance.” How does it shape the verse?
How does Numbers 31:2, which shares the word «vengeance», read alongside this verse?
The translations on this page render this verse differently — a whole-verse word diff, not a word-by-word alignment. What might account for the different wordings?
«הַנֹּתֵ֥ן» is a Qal Participle Active verb. How does that grammatical form shape the action described?
Compare how The Biblical Illustrator and The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges read this verse. Where do they agree or differ?

Things to notice

This verse counts 7 Hebrew ↔ 10 Greek words.
These translations choose different wording for 11 words in this verse.
6 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 7 words in this verse.