Otherwise I should have wrought falsehood against my own life: for there is no matter hid from the king, and thou thyself wouldst have set thyself against me.

"There's no reason to wait for you!" Joab retorted. Then he took three spears in his hand and stabbed Absalom in the heart while he was still alive, dangling from the branches of the oak tree.

Then Ahimaaz the son of Zadok again said to Joab, "{Come what may}, please let me also run after the Cushite." Joab asked, "Why [are] you wanting to run, my son, when for you there is no {messenger's reward}?"

Meanwhile, David was sitting between the inner and outer gates of the city. The watchman was up on the roof of the gateway near the walls, looking around, and there was a man running by himself!

And the watchman called, and told the king. And the king said, If he is alone there is tidings in his mouth. And he came apace, and drew near.

Then the watchman saw another man running. The watchman called out to the gatekeeper, "There is another man running by himself." The king said, "This one also is bringing good news."

The king replied, "Stand here at attention and wait." So he stepped to the side and stood there waiting.

By loving your enemies and hating those who love you, you have declared today that there are neither commanders nor servants to you. For I know that today if Absalom had lived and all of us had died today, then it would have pleased you very much!

Now therefore arise, go forth, and speak comfortably to thy servants: for I swear by the LORD, if thou shalt not go forth, there will not tarry one with thee this night: and that will be worse to thee than all the evil that hath befallen thee from thy youth until now.

So the king came back, and came as far as Jordan. And Judah came to Gilgal, meeting the king there, to take him back with them over Jordan.

And there were a thousand men of Benjamin with him, and Ziba the servant of the house of Saul, and his fifteen sons and his twenty servants with him; and they went over Jordan before the king.

And there went over a ferry-boat to carry over the king's household, and to do what he thought good. And Shimei the son of Gera fell down before the king, as he came over Jordan;

And David said, What have I to do with you, ye sons of Zeruiah, that ye should this day be adversaries to me? shall there any man be put to death this day in Israel? for do not I know that I am this day king over Israel?

For there [was no one] in all the house of my father {who were not doomed to death} before my lord the king, but you set your servant among those who eat at your table. Do I have any righteousness any longer except to cry out to the king?"

And the king said, Say nothing more about these things. I say, Let there be a division of the land between Ziba and you.

Now when Barzillai the Gileadite had come down from Rogelim, he crossed the Jordan with the king so he could send him on his way from there.

So the king invited Barzillai, "Cross the Jordan River with me, live with me in Jerusalem, and I'll provide for you there."

And there happened to be there a man of Belial, whose name was Sheba, the son of Bichri, a Benjaminite: and he blew a trumpet, and said, We have no part in David, neither have we inheritance in the son of Jesse: every man to his tents, O Israel.

And there went out after him Joab's men, and the Cherethites, and the Pelethites, and all the mighty men: and they went out of Jerusalem, to pursue after Sheba the son of Bichri.

Amasa did not protect himself from the knife in Joab's other hand, and Joab stabbed him in the abdomen, causing Amasa's intestines to spill out on the ground. There was no need to stab him again; the first blow was fatal. Then Joab and his brother Abishai pursued Sheba son of Bicri.

And there stood by him one of Joab's young men, and said, He that favoreth Joab, and he that is for David, let him follow Joab.

Now Amasa [was] wallowing in the blood in the middle of the highway; when the man saw that all the people stood [there], he turned Amasa over from the highway into the field, and he threw a garment over him because he had seen that all who had come by him had stopped.

Then she said, In the old days, there was a saying, Let them put the question in Abel and in Dan, saying, Has what was ordered by men of good faith in Israel ever come to an end?

That's not the way things are. There is a man from the hill country of Ephraim named Sheba son of Bicri. He has rebelled against King David. Give me just this one man, and I will leave the city." The woman said to Joab, "This very minute his head will be thrown over the wall to you!"

Then there was a famine in the days of David three years, year after year; and David inquired of the LORD. And the LORD answered, It is for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he slew the Gibeonites.

let there be delivered up to us - seven men of his sons, and we will crucify them unto Yahweh in Gibeah of Saul, the chosen of Yahweh. And the king said, I, will deliver them up.

he went and took the bones of Saul and of his son Jonathan from the leaders of Jabesh Gilead. (They had secretly taken them from the plaza at Beth Shan. It was there that Philistines publicly exposed their corpses after they had killed Saul at Gilboa.)

He brought up the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son from there, and they gathered the bones of the executed.

There [was] war again for [the] Philistines with Israel, and David and his servants with him went down, and they fought [the] Philistines, and David grew weary.

And there came against David one of the offspring of the Rephaim, whose spear was three hundred shekels of brass in weight, and having a new sword, he made an attempt to put David to death.

And it came to pass after this, that there was again a battle with the Philistines at Gob: then Sibbechai the Hushathite slew Saph, who was of the sons of the giant.

And there was again a battle in Gob with the Philistines, where Elhanan the son of Jaareoregim, a Beth-lehemite, slew the brother of Goliath the Gittite, the staff of whose spear was like a weaver's beam.

And there was yet a battle in Gath, where was a man of great stature, that had on every hand six fingers, and on every foot six toes, four and twenty in number; and he also was born to the giant.

There went up a smoke out of his nostrils, and fire out of his mouth devoured: coals were kindled by it.

They looked, but there was none to save; even to the LORD, but he answered them not.

is like the light of morning when the sun comes up, a morning in which there are no clouds. He is like the brightness after rain that produces grass from the earth.

And after him was Eleazar the son of Dodo the Ahohite, one of the three mighty men with David, when they defied the Philistines that were there assembled to battle, and the men of Israel had gone away:

Next to him [was] Shamma, the son of Agee the Hararite. When [the] Philistines assembled at Lehi, a plot of the field was there filled with lentils, and the army fled there from the presence of [the] Philistines.

and Uriah the Hittite. Altogether there were thirty-seven.

But Joab said to the king, “May the Lord your God add to the people a hundred times as many as there are, and let the eyes of my lord the king see it; but why does my lord the king want to do this thing?”

And Joab presented the sum of the number of the people to the king: and there were in Israel eight hundred thousand valiant men that drew the sword; and the men of Judah were five hundred thousand men.

So Gad came to David, and told him, and said to him, Shall seven years of famine come upon thee in thy land? or wilt thou flee three months before thy enemies, while they pursue thee? or that there be three days' pestilence in thy land? Now consider, and see what answer I shall return to him that sent me.

So the LORD sent a pestilence upon Israel from the morning even to the time appointed: and there died of the people from Dan even to Beer-sheba seventy thousand men.

Araunah said, “Why has my lord the king come to his servant?” And David said, “To buy the threshing floor from you, to build an altar to the Lord, so that the plague may be held back from the people.”

And David built there an altar to the LORD, and offered burnt-offerings and peace-offerings. So the LORD was entreated for the land, and the plague was stayed from Israel.