21 Otherwise it will happen, when my lord the king shall sleep with his fathers, that I and my son Solomon shall be counted offenders."
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
Shall sleep - This euphemism for death, rare in the early Scriptures - being found only once in the Pentateuch (margin reference.), and once also in the historical books before Kings 2-Samuel 7:12 - becomes in Kings and Chronicles the ordinary mode of speech (see 1-Kings 2:10; 1-Kings 11:43, etc.; 2-Chronicles 9:31; 2-Chronicles 12:16, etc.). David uses the metaphor in one psalm Psalm 13:3. In the later Scriptures it is, of course, common. (Jeremiah 51:39; Daniel 12:2; Matthew 9:24; John 11:11; 1-Corinthians 11:30; 1-Corinthians 15:51; 1-Thessalonians 4:14, etc.)
Shall be counted offenders - When Adonijah and his party shall find that I and my son have had this promise from thee by oath, he will slay us both.
Otherwise it shall come to pass, when my lord the king shall sleep with his fathers, that I and my son Solomon shall be (k) counted offenders.
(k) And so put to death as wicked transgressors.
Otherwise it shall come to pass, when my lord the king shall sleep with his fathers,.... That is, shall die, and be buried in the sepulchre of his ancestors, where he shall lie till he awakes in the morning of the resurrection:
that I and my son Solomon shall be counted offenders; or "sinners" (g); not as if she would be reckoned an adulteress, and her son as illegitimate, as some think, and so be branded and treated as such; but as being traitors, making pretensions to the throne, she on the behalf of her son, and he for himself, when he had no right to it, being the younger son, and not declared successor by his father.
(g) "peccatores", V. L. Pagninus, Montanus, &c.
I and my son . . . shall be counted offenders--that is, slain, according to the barbarous usage of the East towards all who are rivals to the throne.
*More commentary available at chapter level.