And in a little while: In Hebrew this verse actually begins with the verbal transition meaning “And it happened.” This is followed by a Hebrew idiom that occurs only here in the Old Testament and that may be literally rendered “until here and until here” or “until now and until now.” The idiom may express either location or time. Most translations give a temporal meaning, for example, “Meanwhile” (New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh, Revised English Bible) and “A few minutes later” (Contemporary English Version). De Vries takes the idiom as an expression of location by translating “And it did happen that here and there….”

The heavens grew black with clouds and wind: Since the clouds caused the sky to become dark and not the wind, it may be necessary in some languages to have two verbs here; for example, Good News Translation has “the sky was covered with dark clouds, the wind began to blow” (similarly NET Bible), and Die Bibel im heutigen Deutsch says “the sky became darkened as the wind brought dark clouds along.” Another possible model is “the sky became dark because of the clouds and the wind began to blow.”

Ahab rode and went to Jezreel: The two verbs here express a single idea and may be translated by a single verb in the receptor language. But the first of these two verbs clearly indicates that Ahab used his chariot to get back to Jezreel. For this reason it may be better to translate “Ahab mounted his chariot and drove off to Jezreel” (New Jewish Publication Society’s Tanakh). Since Ahab was in Jezreel previously, it may be more natural in some languages to say “Ahab got in his chariot and started back to Jezreel” (Good News Translation, New Century Version).

Jezreel was a city located at the foot of Mount Gilboa about 27 kilometers (17 miles) from Mount Carmel. According to 1 Kgs 21.1, Ahab had a palace there.

Quoted with permission from Omanson, Roger L. and Ellington, John E. A Handbook on 1-2 Kings, Volume 1. (UBS Helps for Translators). New York: UBS, 2008. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .