And there was three sons of Zeruiah there: Joab, Abishai and Asahel - which Asahel was as swift of foot as a wild roe -

Then Abner looked behind him and said, "Art thou Asahel?" And he said, "Yea."

Then said Abner, "Turn thee either to the righthand or to the left and catch one of the young men and take thee his spoil." But Asahel would not depart from him.

And Abner said again to Asahel, "Turn from me! Why wilt thou that I smite thee to the ground? For then how should I hold up my face before Joab thy brother?"

Howbeit, he would in no wise depart. Then Abner with the hinder end of the spear smote him under the short ribs, that the spear came out behind him: that he fell down in the same place and died there. And as many as came to the place where Asahel fell down and died, stood still.

And Joab returned from after Abner and gathered all the people together. And there lacked, of David's servants, nineteen persons and Asahel.

And they took up Asahel and buried him in the sepulchre of his father in Bethlehem. And Joab and his men went all night, and came in the dawning to Hebron.

And when Abner was come again to Hebron, Joab took him aside in the gate, to speak with him guilefully, and there smote him under the short ribs that he died, for the blood of Asahel his brother.

And the cause why Joab and Abishai slew Abner was that Abner had slain their brother Asahel at Gibeon in battle.

Asahel the brother of Joab was one of the thirty. Then Elhanan, the son of Dodo of Bethlehem;