They encamped: They refers to the Syrian army and the Israelite army, as Good News Translation makes explicit. Another possible solution is to substitute an expression like “The armies” (New Century Version) or “the two armies” (Contemporary English Version, Parole de Vie) for the pronoun.

Seven days: Translators may consider it more natural in some languages to speak of “a week.” But since the battle is said to begin on the seventh day, this is not encouraged.

The battle was joined is literally “the war drew near.” The meaning of this expression is simply that the two armies engaged each other in battle. Languages will have a variety of ways of stating that “the fighting broke out” (Contemporary English Version), but there should be no attempt to imitate the English idiom used in Revised Standard Version and many other versions.

The people of Israel smote of the Syrians … foot soldiers: The archaic word smote is replaced by “killed” in New Revised Standard Version. And this is the meaning that should be translated in other languages.

The Syrians is literally “Aram,” as in verses 20 and 26. The Hebrew text states that these Syrians were foot soldiers, and this detail should be preserved in translation. Some languages may have a technical term such as “infantry” (Revised English Bible, Moffatt), which will be appropriate here.

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 .