2 Nahash the Ammonite said to them, "On this condition I will make it with you, that all your right eyes be put out; and I will lay it for a reproach on all Israel."
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
I may thrust out all your right eves - This cruel condition would serve at once as a badge of their slavery, and a means of incapacitating them from being effective warriors. Theodoret observes, "He who opposes his shield to the enemy with his left hand, thereby hides his left eye, and looks at his enemy with his right eye; he therefore who plucks out that right eye makes men useless in war." Josephus gives the same reason.
And Nahash the Ammonite answered them, On this [condition] will I make [a covenant] with you, that I may thrust out all your (b) right eyes, and lay it [for] a reproach upon all Israel.
(b) This declares that the closer the tyrants are to their destruction, the more cruel they are.
And Nahash the Ammonite answered them,.... In a very haughty and scornful manner:
on this condition will I make a covenant with you, that I may thrust out all your right eyes; some Jewish writers go into a mystical and allegorical sense of these words, as that Nahash ordered the book of the law to be brought, which was their right eye, that he might erase out of it these words:
an Ammonite or Moabite shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord; others understand it of the sanhedrim, which were the eyes of Israel; and others, which come a little nearer to the sense, of the slingers and archers, the desire of the eyes of Israel; and who, by having their right eyes thrust out, would be in a great measure spoiled for taking aim; for the words are to be understood literally; the intention of Nahash was to disable them for war, and that they might become quite unfit for it, as Josephus observes (r); the left eye being under the shield, as it usually was in war, and the right eye plucked out, they would be as blind men: he did not choose to have both their eyes thrust out, for then they could have been of no use and service to him as slaves or tributaries:
and lay it for a reproach upon all Israel; that they did not come up to the relief of their brethren, and defend them, and signifying that they must all expect the same treatment from him.
(r) Antiqu. l. 6. c. 5. sect. 1.
thrust out all your right eyes--literally, "scoop" or "hollow out" the ball. This barbarous mutilation is the usual punishment of usurpers in the East, inflicted on chiefs; sometimes, also, even in modern history, on the whole male population of a town. Nahash meant to keep the Jabeshites useful as tributaries, whence he did not wish to render them wholly blind, but only to deprive them of their right eye, which would disqualify them for war. Besides, his object was, through the people of Jabesh-gilead, to insult the Israelitish nation.
But Nahash replied, "On this condition (בּזאת, lit. at this price, בּ pretii) will I make a covenant with you, that I may put out all your right eyes, and so bring a reproach upon all Israel." From the fact that the infinitive נקור is continued with ושׂמתּי, it is evident that the subject to נקור is Nahash, and not the Israelites, as the Syriac, Arabic, and others have rendered it. The suffix to שׂמתּיה is neuter, and refers to the previous clause: "it," i.e., the putting out of the right eye. This answer on the part of Nahash shows unmistakeably that he sought to avenge upon the people of Israel the shame of the defeat which Jephthah had inflicted upon the Ammonites.
Thrust out, &c. - Partly for a reproach, as it here follows; and partly, to disable them. He leaves them one eye, that they might be fit to serve in any mean and base office.
*More commentary available at chapter level.