⁷ They replied, “If today you will be a servant to these people and serve them and give them a favorable answer,^(A) they will always be your servants.”

⁴³ Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant,^{(A) 44} and whoever wants to be first must be slave of all.

¹³ So the Lord spoke^(A) kind and comforting words^(B) to the angel who talked with me.^(C)

⁶ Then King Rehoboam consulted the elders^(A) who had served his father Solomon during his lifetime. “How would you advise me to answer these people?” he asked.

⁷ They replied, “If you will be kind to these people and please them and give them a favorable answer,^(B) they will always be your servants.”

¹³ The king answered the people harshly. Rejecting the advice given him by the elders,

³ Then Absalom would say to him, “Look, your claims are valid and proper, but there is no representative of the king to hear you.”^{(A) 4} And Absalom would add, “If only I were appointed judge in the land!^(B) Then everyone who has a complaint or case could come to me and I would see that they receive justice.”

⁵ Also, whenever anyone approached him to bow down before him, Absalom would reach out his hand, take hold of him and kiss him. ⁶ Absalom behaved in this way toward all the Israelites who came to the king asking for justice, and so he stole the hearts^(C) of the people of Israel.