So they hired thirty and two thousand chariots, and the king of Maachah and his people. — The account which the chronicler has followed here did not state the relative strength of the contingents, yet its estimate of the total number of the allied forces is in substantial accord with that of Samuel. The chronicler puts the total at 32,000 + the Maachathite contingent; Samuel at 32,000 + 1,000 Maachathites. The expression “32,000 chariotry” (rèkeb) is not to be pressed. The writer wished to lay proper stress on the chariots and cavalry as the chief arm of the Aramæan states, and at the same time to be as concise as possible. That he was not thinking of 32,000 chariots in the literal sense is clear, (1) because he must have known that an army would not consist of chariots only; (2) in 1 Chronicles 18:4 he had already assigned to the army of Zobah its natural proportions of chariots, cavalry, and infantry. (Comp. 1 Chronicles 19:18, below.) The present text of Samuel can hardly be right, as it makes the whole army consist of infantry. (Comp. 2 Samuel 8:4.) The great plains of Aram were a natural training-ground for horsemen and charioteers.
Who came and pitched (their camp) before Medeba. — Another detail peculiar to the Chronicles. Medeba, the meeting-place of the Aramæan forces, lay south-east of Heshbon, on a site now known as Madibiya.
And the children of Ammon gathered themselves ... — The muster of the Ammonites is not mentioned in Samuel.