Verse 7
After forty years - There is no doubt that this reading is corrupt, though supported by the commonly printed Vulgate, the Septuagint, and the Chaldee. But the Syriac has arba shanin , Four years; the Arabic the same arba shinin , Four years; and Josephus has the same; so also the Sixtine edition of the Vulgate, and several MSS. of the same version. Theodoret also reads four, not forty; and most learned men are of opinion that ארבעים arbaim , Forty, is an error for אברע arba , Four; yet this reading is not supported by any Hebrew MS. yet discovered. But two of those collated by Dr. Kennicott have יום yom instead of שנה shanah , i.e., forty Days, instead of forty Years; and this is a reading more likely to be true than that in the commonly received text. We know that Absalom did stay Three years with his grandfather at Geshur, 2 Samuel 13:38 ; and this probably was a year after his return: the era, therefore, may be the time of his slaying his brother Amnon; and the four years include the time from his flight till the conspiracy mentioned here.
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