AN "ONLY BELOVED" SON?
Hugo McCord
The first son born to David and Bathsheba died in infancy (2 Samuel 12:14-19). Solomon was their second son (2 Samuel 12:24). After Solomon, three other sons were born to David and Bathsheba: Shimea, Shobab, and Nathan (1 Chronicles 3:5).
As one reads Proverbs 4:3, it is unbelievable that Bathsheba would consider Solomon as her "only beloved" (KJV), or her "only beloved" (ASV), or her "only son" (NASV), or her "only child" (NIV), or that Solomon would say that he was "the only one before my mother" (NWT), or that he was "my mother’s favorite" (NRSV), or that he was "my mother’s favorite child" (CEV).
The translators of the ASV tell us in a marginal reading that the Hebrew word back of their rendering "only beloved" means "an only one." Apparently both the translators of the ASV and the KJV realized that Solomon was not an only son, and consequently they sought to retain the plurality of children by inserting the word "beloved." But their insertion of that word, though it retains the plurality of children, makes Bathsheba look bad as a mother who only loved one of her children.
The Hebrew word yachid normally does mean "an only one," as was Jephthah’s daughter: "she was his only [yechidah, feminine] child; besides her he had neither sons nor daughters" (Judges 11:34). Similarly, "an only one" is proper for yachid in Jeremiah 6:26; Amos 8:10; Zechariah 12:10.
But David and Bathsheba, besides Solomon, had three other sons, making "an only one" an impossible translation of yachid. Similarly, "an only one" is an impossible translation of yachid in regard to Isaac in Genesis 22:2, 12, 16, for Abraham had a son named Ishmael who was 14 years old when Isaac was born (Genesis 16:16; 17:21).
Similarly, though the comparable New Testament word, monogenes, at times can mean "an only one" (as in Luke 7:12; 8:42; 9:38), that translation is impossible about Isaac (Hebrews 11:17) and about Jesus (John 1:13; Romans 8:29).
Proverbs 4:3 does not mention the plurality of children. Is there a translation that (1) does not deny the plurality of children, and that (2) does not make Bathsheba an unworthy mother? I am hoping before I die to complete a translation of the book of Proverbs, and I need help. Criticize these renderings:
I was a son to my father, tender and special to my mother.
I was a son to my father, tender and unique to my mother.
Tentatively, my translation is:
I was a son to my father, tender and irreplaceable to my mother.