Study Desk

I will attack him while he is tired and discouraged. He will be frightened, and all his men will run away. I will kill only the king

and then bring back all his men to you, like a bride returning to her husband. You want to kill only one man; the rest of the people will be safe."

You know that your father David and his men are hard fighters and that they are as fierce as a mother bear robbed of her cubs. Your father is an experienced soldier and does not stay with his men at night.

Then even the bravest men, as fearless as lions, will be afraid because everyone in Israel knows that your father is a great soldier and that his men are hard fighters.

We will find David wherever he is, and attack him before he knows what's happening. Neither he nor any of his men will survive.

Hushai added, "Quick, now! Send a message to David not to spend the night at the river crossings in the wilderness, but to cross the Jordan at once, so that he and his men won't all be caught and killed."

But one day a boy happened to see them, and he told Absalom; so they hurried off to hide in the house of a certain man in Bahurim. He had a well near his house, and they got down in it.

So David and his men started crossing the Jordan, and by daybreak they had all gone across.

When Ahithophel saw that his advice had not been followed, he saddled his donkey and went back to his hometown. After putting his affairs in order, he hanged himself. He was buried in the family grave.

(Absalom had put Amasa in command of the army in the place of Joab. Amasa was the son of Jether the Ishmaelite; his mother was Abigail, the daughter of Nahash and the sister of Joab's mother Zeruiah.)

Absalom and his men camped in the land of Gilead.

They brought bowls, clay pots, and bedding, and also food for David and his men: wheat, barley, meal, roasted grain, beans, peas, honey, cheese, cream, and some sheep. They knew that David and his men would get hungry, thirsty, and tired in the wilderness.

King David brought all his men together, divided them into units of a thousand and of a hundred, and placed officers in command of them.

Then he sent them out in three groups, with Joab and Joab's brother Abishai and Ittai from Gath, each in command of a group. And the king said to his men, "I will go with you myself."

"I will do whatever you think best," the king answered. Then he stood by the side of the gate as his men marched out in units of a thousand and of a hundred.

He gave orders to Joab, Abishai, and Ittai: "For my sake don't harm the young man Absalom." And all the troops heard David give this command to his officers.

Joab had the trumpet blown to stop the fighting, and his troops came back from pursuing the Israelites.

During his lifetime Absalom had built a monument for himself in King's Valley, because he had no son to keep his name alive. So he named it after himself, and to this day it is known as Absalom's Monument.

Then Ahimaaz son of Zadok said to Joab, "Let me run to the king with the good news that the Lord has saved him from his enemies."

Then he said to his Ethiopian slave, "Go and tell the king what you have seen." The slave bowed and ran off.