So I stood over him and killed him because I knew that after he had fallen he couldn’t survive. I took the crown that was on his head and the armband that was on his arm, and I’ve brought them here to my lord.”

Then David summoned one of his servants and said, “Come here and kill him!” The servant struck him, and he died.

David replied, “Good, I will make a covenant with you. However, there’s one thing I require of you: Do not appear before me unless you bring Saul’s daughter Michal here when you come to see me.”

Then David sent messengers to say to Ish-bosheth son of Saul, “Give me back my wife, Michal. I was engaged to her for the price of 100 Philistine foreskins.”

So Ish-bosheth sent someone to take her away from her husband, Paltiel son of Laish.

Her husband followed her, weeping all the way to Bahurim. Abner said to him, “Go back.” So he went back.

Joab went to the king and said, “What have you done? Look here, Abner came to you. Why did you dismiss him? Now he’s getting away.

They brought Ish-bosheth’s head to David at Hebron and said to the king, “Here’s the head of Ish-bosheth son of Saul, your enemy who intended to take your life. Today the Lord has granted vengeance to my lord the king against Saul and his offspring.”

All the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron and said, “Here we are, your own flesh and blood.

The king and his men marched to Jerusalem against the Jebusites who inhabited the land. The Jebusites had said to David: “You will never get in here. Even the blind and lame can repel you”; thinking, “David can’t get in here.”

As the ark of the Lord was entering the city of David, Saul’s daughter Michal looked down from the window and saw King David leaping and dancing before the Lord, and she despised him in her heart.

And Saul’s daughter Michal had no child to the day of her death.

So David sent someone to inquire about her, and he reported, “This is Bathsheba, daughter of Eliam and wife of Uriah the Hittite.”

David sent messengers to get her, and when she came to him, he slept with her. Now she had just been purifying herself from her uncleanness. Afterward, she returned home.

“Stay here today also,” David said to Uriah, “and tomorrow I will send you back.” So Uriah stayed in Jerusalem that day and the next.

When Uriah’s wife heard that her husband Uriah had died, she mourned for him.

When the time of mourning ended, David had her brought to his house. She became his wife and bore him a son. However, the Lord considered what David had done to be evil.

Then David comforted his wife Bathsheba; he went and slept with her. She gave birth to a son and named him Solomon. The Lord loved him,

Some time passed. David’s son Absalom had a beautiful sister named Tamar, and David’s son Amnon was infatuated with her.

Amnon was frustrated to the point of making himself sick over his sister Tamar because she was a virgin, but it seemed impossible to do anything to her.

Jonadab said to him, “Lie down on your bed and pretend you’re sick. When your father comes to see you, say to him, ‘Please let my sister Tamar come and give me something to eat. Let her prepare food in my presence so I can watch and eat from her hand.’”

So Amnon lay down and pretended to be sick. When the king came to see him, Amnon said to him, “Please let my sister Tamar come and make a couple of cakes in my presence so I can eat from her hand.”

“Bring the meal to the bedroom,” Amnon told Tamar, “so I can eat from your hand.” Tamar took the cakes she had made and went to her brother Amnon’s bedroom.

When she brought them to him to eat, he grabbed her and said, “Come sleep with me, my sister!”

But he refused to listen to her, and because he was stronger than she was, he raped her.

After this, Amnon hated Tamar with such intensity that the hatred he hated her with was greater than the love he had loved her with. “Get out of here!” he said.

“No,” she cried, “sending me away is much worse than the great wrong you’ve already done to me!” But he refused to listen to her.

Instead, he called to the servant who waited on him: “Throw this woman out and bolt the door behind her!”

Amnon’s servant threw her out and bolted the door behind her. Now Tamar was wearing a long-sleeved garment, because this is what the king’s virgin daughters wore.

Tamar put ashes on her head and tore the long-sleeved garment she was wearing. She put her hand on her head and went away crying out.

Her brother Absalom said to her: “Has your brother Amnon been with you? Be quiet for now, my sister. He is your brother. Don’t take this thing to heart.” So Tamar lived as a desolate woman in the house of her brother Absalom.

So Joab sent someone to Tekoa to bring a clever woman from there. He told her, “Pretend to be in mourning: dress in mourning clothes and don’t put on any oil. Act like a woman who has been mourning for the dead for a long time.

Go to the king and speak these words to him.” Then Joab told her exactly what to say.

When the woman from Tekoa came to the king, she fell with her face to the ground in homage and said, “Help me, my king!”

“What’s the matter?” the king asked her.

“To tell the truth, I am a widow; my husband died,” she said.

“Look,” Absalom explained to Joab, “I sent for you and said, ‘Come here. I want to send you to the king to ask: Why have I come back from Geshur? I’d be better off if I were still there.’ So now, let me see the king. If I am guilty, let him kill me.”

However, if He should say, ‘I do not delight in you,’ then here I am—He can do with me whatever pleases Him.”

Hushai continued, “You know your father and his men. They are warriors and are desperate like a wild bear robbed of her cubs. Your father is an experienced soldier who won’t spend the night with the people.

honey, curds, sheep, and cheese from the herd for David and the people with him to eat. They had reasoned, “The people must be hungry, exhausted, and thirsty in the desert.”

The king said, “Move aside and stand here.” So he stood to one side.

Please let your servant return so that I may die in my own city near the tomb of my father and mother. But here is your servant Chimham: let him cross over with my lord the king. Do for him what seems good to you.”

The king said to Amasa, “Summon the men of Judah to me within three days and be here yourself.”

a wise woman called out from the city, “Listen! Listen! Please tell Joab to come here and let me speak with him.”

When he had come near her, the woman asked, “Are you Joab?”

“I am,” he replied.

“Listen to the words of your servant,” she said to him.

He answered, “I’m listening.”

The woman went to all the people with her wise counsel, and they cut off the head of Sheba son of Bichri and threw it to Joab. So he blew the ram’s horn, and they dispersed from the city, each to his own tent. Joab returned to the king in Jerusalem.

Araunah said to David, “My lord the king may take whatever he wants and offer it. Here are the oxen for a burnt offering and the threshing sledges and ox yokes for the wood.

My king, Araunah gives everything here to the king.” Then he said to the king, “May the Lord your God accept you.”