Absalom put Amasa in command of the army instead of Joab. Now Amasa was the son of a man named Ithra the Israelite, who had married Abigail the daughter of Nahash, [the half sister of David and] the sister of Zeruiah, Joab’s mother.

And it came to pass, when David had come to Mahanaim, that Shobi the son of Nahash of Rabbah of the children of Ammon, and Machir the son of Ammiel of Lo-debar, and Barzillai the Gileadite of Rogelim,

brought bedding, basins, and pottery utensils. They also brought food for David and all who were with him, including wheat, barley, flour, roasted grain, beans, lentils,

And honey, and butter, and sheep, and cheese of cows, for David, and for the people that were with him, to eat: for they said, The people are hungry, and weary, and thirsty, in the wilderness.

And David numbered the people that were with him, and set over them captains of thousands and captains of hundreds.

And David sent forth a third part of the people under the hand of Joab, and a third part under the hand of Abishai the son of Zeruiah, Joab's brother, and a third part under the hand of Ittai the Gittite. And the king said to the people, I will surely go forth with you myself also.

So David responded, "I'll do what you think best." Then he stood alongside the city gate as the army went out in battle array by hundreds and thousands.

Then David’s forces marched into the field to engage Israel in battle, which took place in the forest of Ephraim.

Where the people of Israel were slain before the servants of David, and there was there a great slaughter that day of twenty thousand men.

And Absalom met the servants of David. And Absalom rode upon a mule, and the mule went under the thick boughs of a great oak, and his head caught hold of the oak, and he was suspended between the heaven and the earth; and the mule that was under him went away.

Zadok's son Ahimaaz told Joab, "Let me run over to King David and take him the news. I'll mention that the LORD has delivered him from his enemies."

So Joab ordered a man from Ethiopia, "Go tell the king what you've seen." So the Ethiopian saluted Joab and then ran to tell David.

And David sat between the two gates: and the watchman went up to the roof over the gate to the wall, and lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold a man running alone.

And king David sent to Zadok and to Abiathar the priests, saying, Speak to the elders of Judah, saying, Why are ye the last to bring the king back to his house? seeing the speech of all Israel is come to the king, even to his house.

So David returned and came to the Jordan. And [supporters from] Judah came to Gilgal to meet the king, to escort him across the Jordan.

And Shimei the son of Gera, a Benjaminite, who was of Bahurim, hasted and came down with the men of Judah to meet king David.

Then they [repeatedly] crossed the ford to bring over the king’s household (family), and to do what pleased him. And Shimei the son of Gera fell down before the king as he was about to cross the Jordan,

and said to the king, “Let not my lord consider me guilty, nor remember what your servant did wrong on the day my lord the king left Jerusalem, so that the king would take it to heart.

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?

And when he came to Jerusalem to meet the king, the king said to him, “Why did you not go with me, Mephibosheth?”

Now Barzillai was a very old man at the age of 80 years. A very wealthy man, Barzillai had provided for king David during his sojourn in Mahanaim.

And behold, all the men of Israel came to the king, and said to him, Why have our brethren the men of Judah stolen thee away, and have brought the king, and his household, and all David's men with him, over Jordan?

And the men of Israel answered the men of Judah, and said, We have ten parts in the king, and we have also more right in David than ye: why then did ye despise us, that our advice should not be first had in bringing back our king? And the words of the men of Judah were fiercer than the words of the men of Israel.

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.

So every man of Israel, withdrawing from David, followed Sheba the son of Bichri: but the men of Judah adhered to their king, from Jordan even to Jerusalem.

And David came to his house at Jerusalem; and the king took the ten women his concubines, whom he had left to keep the house, and put them in custody, and fed them, but went not in to them. So they were shut up to the day of their death, living in widowhood.

Meanwhile, David ordered Amasa, "Muster the army of Judah here within three days, and be here yourself!"

So Amasa went to get all the men of Judah together, but he took longer than the time David had given him.

And David said to Abishai, Now shall Sheba the son of Bichri do us more harm than did Absalom: take thou thy lord's servants, and pursue him, lest he get for himself fortified cities, and escape us.

So Joab's men, the special forces and mercenaries, and all of David's elite forces left Jerusalem in pursuit of Bichri's son Sheba.

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

The matter is not so: but a man of mount Ephraim, Sheba the son of Bichri by name, hath lifted up his hand against the king, even against David: deliver him only, and I will depart from the city. And the woman said to Joab, Behold, his head shall be thrown to thee over the wall.

And Ira also the Jairite was a chief ruler about David.

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.

The Gibeonites were not Israelites but rather a remnant of the Amorites. The Israelites had taken an oath concerning them, but Saul had tried to kill them in his zeal for the Israelites and Judah. So David summoned the Gibeonites and spoke to them.

Wherefore David said to the Gibeonites, What shall I do for you? and with what shall I make the atonement, that ye may bless the inheritance of the LORD?

The Gibeonites said to him, "We have no claim to silver or gold from Saul or from his family, nor would we be justified in putting to death anyone in Israel." David asked, "What then are you asking me to do for you?"

Let seven men of his sons be delivered unto us, that we may hang them up unto the LORD, in Gibeah of Saul the LORD's elect." And David said, "I will give them you."

But the king spared Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, because of the LORD'S oath that was between them, between David and Jonathan the son of Saul.

And it was told David what Rizpah the daughter of Aiah the concubine of Saul had done.

And David went and took the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son from the men of Jabesh-gilead, who had stolen them from the street of Beth-shan, where the Philistines had hanged them, when the Philistines had slain Saul in Gilboa:

David brought the bones of Saul and of Jonathan his son from there; they also gathered up the bones of those who had been executed.

Moreover, the Philistines had yet war again with Israel; and David went down, and his servants with him, and fought against the Philistines: and David became faint.

And Ishbi-benob, who was of the sons of the giant, the weight of whose spear was three hundred shekels of brass in weight, he being girded with a new sword, thought to have slain David.

But Abishai the son of Zeruiah succored him, and smote the Philistine, and killed him. Then the men of David swore to him, saying, Thou shalt go out no more with us to battle, that thou mayest not extinguish the light of Israel.

And when he defied Israel, Jonathan the son of Shimeah the brother of David slew him.

These four were born to the giant in Gath, and fell by the hand of David, and by the hand of his servants.

And David spoke to the LORD the words of this song in the day that the LORD had delivered him from the hand of all his enemies, and from the hand of Saul:

He is the tower of salvation for his king: and he showeth mercy to his anointed, to David, and to his seed for evermore.

Now these are the last words of David. David the son of Jesse said, and the man who was raised on high, the anointed of the God of Jacob, and the sweet psalmist of Israel, said,

These are the names of the mighty men whom David had: The Tachmonite that sat in the seat, chief among the captains; the same was Adino the Eznite: he lifted up his spear against eight hundred, whom he slew at one time.

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:

He was with David and went on fighting the Philistines till his hand became tired and stiff from gripping his sword: and that day the Lord gave a great salvation, and the people came back after him only to take the goods of the Philistines.

And three of the thirty chiefs went down, and came to David in the harvest time to the cave of Adullam: and the troop of the Philistines encamped in the valley of Rephaim.

And David was then in a hold, and the garrison of the Philistines was then in Beth-lehem.

And David longed, and said, Oh that one would give me drink of the water of the well of Beth-lehem, which is by the gate!

And the three mighty men broke through the host of the Philistines, and drew water out of the well of Beth-lehem, that was by the gate, and took it, and brought it to David: nevertheless he would not drink of it, but poured it out to the LORD.

David said, “Lord, I would never do such a thing! Is this not the blood of men who risked their lives?” So he refused to drink it. Such were the exploits of the three warriors.

He was more honorable than the thirty, but he attained not to the first three. And David set him over his guard.

And again the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel, and he moved David against them to say, Go number Israel and Judah.

But the king's order overruled Joab and the commanders of the special forces, so Joab and the commanders of the special forces left David's presence to take a census of the people of Israel.

And David's heart smote him after that he had numbered the people. And David said to the LORD, I have sinned greatly in what I have done: and now, I beseech thee, O LORD, take away the iniquity of thy servant; for I have done very foolishly.

For when David had risen in the morning, the word of the LORD came to the prophet Gad, David's seer, saying,

Go and say to David, Thus saith the LORD, I offer thee three things; choose thee one of them, that I may do it to thee.

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.

And David said to Gad, I am in a great strait: let us fall now into the hand of the LORD; for his mercies are great: and let me not fall into the hand of man.

So David made selection of the disease; and the time was the days of the grain-cutting, when the disease came among the people, causing the death of seventy thousand men from Dan as far as Beer-sheba.

And David spoke to the LORD when he saw the angel that smote the people, and said, Lo, I have sinned, and I have done wickedly: but these sheep, what have they done? let thy hand, I pray thee, be against me, and against my father's house.

And Gad came that day to David, and said to him, Go up, rear an altar to the LORD in the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite.

And David, according to the saying of Gad, went up as the LORD commanded.

And Araunah said, Why is my lord the king come to his servant? And David said, To buy the threshing-floor of thee, to build an altar to the LORD, that the plague may be stayed from the people.

And Araunah said to David, Let my lord the king take and offer up what seemeth good to him: behold, here are oxen for burnt-sacrifice, and threshing-instruments and other instruments of the oxen for wood.

And the king said to Araunah, No; but I will surely buy it of thee at a price: neither will I offer burnt-offerings to the LORD my God of that which doth cost me nothing. So David bought the threshing-floor and the oxen for fifty shekels of silver.

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.