Matthew Poole and continuators on 2 Samuel 8:13

13 And David gat him a name when he returned from smiting of the Syrians in the valley of salt , being eighteen thousand men .

i. e. Much increased his reputation.

Or, Edomites, as they are said to be, 1 Chron. 18. 12. It is likely these two people were confederates, and that divers of the Syrians whom David had defeated in Syria, fled to Edom, and there joyned with them against their common Enemy, and made up together a very great Army (as the number of the Men slain in it sheweth) consisting of the veterane Soldiers of both Countries. Although the slaughter here following may seem not to have been of the Syrians, as the words at first reading seem to intimate, but of the Edomites; (it not being probable that the Syrians would come so far from their own Country, as to the Valley of Salt, to fight) and this Verse may be [illegible: 1 word] thus, and that very agreeably to the Hebrew: And David gat him a name when he returned from smiting of the Syrians, in smiting (which is easily repeated out of the last Clause, according to the common usage of Scripture) in the Valley of Salt eighteen thousand men, who were Edomites, as is sufficiently implied here in the next Verse, and expressed 1 Chron. 18. 12.

A place in Edom so called, either from its Neighbourhood to the Salt Sea, or for some other cause now unknown.

As it is also 1 Chr. 18. 12. where also they are said to be smitten by Abishai; because he was then a chief Commander of the Army under David, and, it may be, began the fight; as, for the like reason, they are said to be smitten by Ioab, Psal. 60. title where also there are onely 12000 mentioned; which place, if it speak of this Battel, the state of it was this: Abishai begins the Combat, and kills 6000, after him comes in Ioab and kills 12000 more, which makes up this 18000. But why may not that be another History and Battel? So the Edomites and Syrians together did first fight with Abishai, and lost 18000 men, and afterwards recruited their Forces and fought with Ioab, and lost other 12000 men. Nor is it strange if two Battels were fought in one place; of which there are divers instances in Historians.

Marginal references: Heb. his smiting.; See Psal. 60. title.