Passage

1 Kings 20.42

Book: 1 Kings · ASV

Immediate context (±2 verses)

ASV (ASV)

"40. And as thy servant was busy here and there, he was gone. And the king of Israel said unto him, So shall thy judgment be; thyself hast decided it. 41. And he hasted, and took the headband away from his eyes; and the king of Israel discerned him that he was of the prophets."

"42. And he said unto him, Thus saith Jehovah, Because thou hast let go out of thy hand the man whom I had devoted to destruction, therefore thy life shall go for his life, and thy people for his people."

"43. And the king of Israel went to his house heavy and displeased, and came to Samaria." (1 Kings 20:40-43, ASV)

WEB (WEB)

"40. As your servant was busy here and there, he was gone.” The king of Israel said to him, “So shall your judgment be. You yourself have decided it.” 41. He hurried, and took the headband away from his eyes; and the king of Israel recognized that he was one of the prophets."

"42. He said to him, “Yahweh says, ‘Because you have let go out of your hand the man whom I had devoted to destruction, therefore your life will take the place of his life, and your people take the place of his people.’”"

"43. The king of Israel went to his house sullen and angry, and came to Samaria." (1 Kings 20:40-43, WEB)

KJV (KJV)

"40. And as thy servant was busy here and there, he was gone. And the king of Israel said unto him, So shall thy judgment be; thyself hast decided it. ^{he was: Heb. he was not} 41. And he hasted, and took the ashes away from his face; and the king of Israel discerned him that he was of the prophets."

"42. And he said unto him, Thus saith the LORD, Because thou hast let go out of thy hand a man whom I appointed to utter destruction, therefore thy life shall go for his life, and thy people for his people."

"43. And the king of Israel went to his house heavy and displeased, and came to Samaria." (1 Kings 20:40-43, KJV)

YLT (YLT)

"40. and it cometh to pass, thy servant is working hither and thither, and he is not!' and the king of Israel saith unto him, Right [is] thy judgment; thou hast determined [it].' 41. And he hasteth and turneth aside the ashes from off his eyes, and the king of Israel discerneth him, that he [is] of the prophets,"

"42. and he saith unto him, 'Thus said Jehovah, Because thou hast sent away the man I devoted, out of [thy] hand, even thy life hath been for his life, and thy people for his people;'"

"43. and the king of Israel goeth unto his house, sulky and wroth, and cometh in to Samaria." (1 Kings 20:40-43, YLT)

Setting

Speaker: an anonymous prophet, transmitting YHWH's judgment to King Ahab
Audience: King Ahab of Israel; narratively, all covenant-Israel
Location: Samaria
Time period: reign of Ahab, c. 874-853 BC

Theological reading

The verse parallels 1 Sam 15 structurally: a king (here Ahab) fails to execute the [[H2763 - charam|charam]] commission and faces covenantal-judgment. Ahab has defeated Ben-hadad of Aram twice (1 Kgs 20), but rather than executing the charam on the defeated enemy (whom YHWH had marked for cherem), he negotiates a covenant of mutual-restoration and lets Ben-hadad go (1 Kgs 20:31-34). The anonymous prophet, deploying the same prophetic-disguise device as Nathan's parable to David (2 Sam 12), corners Ahab into pronouncing his own judgment. The construction ish-ḥermi ("the man of my devoting") names Ben-hadad explicitly as one YHWH had placed under cherem; Ahab's release becomes covenantal-violation, with the threatened "thy life for his life, thy people for his people" fulfilled at Ahab's death at Ramoth-gilead (1 Kgs 22:34-38) and Israel's eventual judgment at the hand of Aram (2 Kgs 10:32-33; 13:3-7). The pericope confirms that the conquest-charam commission applies symmetrically against the executing-king when violated, the same dynamic as Saul + Agag in 1 Sam 15. The framework is not Israelite-license but covenantal-jurisprudence applied symmetrically, and the executing-king's discretion-to-be-more-merciful is not a discretion he holds when the cherem is divinely-fixed.

Key words

H2763 - charam, ish-ḥermi (cognate-noun construction with the verb's semantic field), "the man whom I had devoted to destruction"; the load-bearing reference.
H2764 - cherem, the noun-counterpart.

Quoted in

Why these four translations

ris3n chose ASV, WEB, KJV, and YLT for two reasons together. They are the most literal English translations available (formal-equivalence: word-for-word renderings that preserve the Hebrew and Greek grammar rather than smoothing it into modern dynamic-equivalence idiom). And they are in the public domain in the United States, which means fair-use quotation at any length requires no publisher license. Modern licensed translations (NASB95, ESV, NIV) restrict volume of quotation under their copyright terms, so they are not used at stub-level coverage here. NASB95 appears only on hand-curated rich passage hubs under Lockman Foundation's fair-use allowance.

The four:

ASV (American Standard Version, 1901). The basis of the modern critical-text English tradition.
WEB (World English Bible, contemporary). Public-domain revision in the ASV line, in current English.
KJV (King James Version, 1611). Reformation-era, Textus Receptus base.
YLT (Young's Literal Translation, Robert Young, 1862). Hyper-literal preservation of Hebrew and Greek grammar; useful for word-study work even where English reads stiff.

See Bibles for the full per-translation history, translators, textual basis, strengths, and weaknesses.