1 Samuel 23-24

Living Bible

23 One day news came to David that the Philistines were at Keilah robbing the threshing floors.

² David asked the Lord, “Shall I go and attack them?”

“Yes, go and save Keilah,” the Lord told him.

³ But David’s men said, “We’re afraid even here in Judah; we certainly don’t want to go to Keilah to fight the whole Philistine army!”

⁴ David asked the Lord again, and the Lord again replied, “Go down to Keilah, for I will help you conquer the Philistines.”

⁵ They went to Keilah and slaughtered the Philistines and confiscated their cattle, and so the people of Keilah were saved. ⁶ (Abiathar the priest went to Keilah with David, taking his ephod with him to get answers for David from the Lord.) ⁷ Saul soon learned that David was at Keilah.

“Good!” he exclaimed. “We’ve got him now! God has delivered him to me, for he has trapped himself in a walled city!”

⁸ So Saul mobilized his entire army to march to Keilah and besiege David and his men. ⁹ But David learned of Saul’s plan and told Abiathar the priest to bring the ephod and to ask the Lord what he should do.

¹⁰ “O Lord God of Israel,” David said, “I have heard that Saul is planning to come and destroy Keilah because I am here. ¹¹ Will the men of Keilah surrender me to him? And will Saul actually come, as I have heard? O Lord God of Israel, please tell me.”

And the Lord said, “He will come.”

¹² “And will these men of Keilah betray me to Saul?” David persisted.

And the Lord replied, “Yes, they will betray you.”

¹³ So David and his men—about six hundred of them now—left Keilah and began roaming the countryside. Word soon reached Saul that David had escaped, so he didn’t go there after all. ^14-15 David now lived in the wilderness caves in the hill country of Ziph. One day near Horesh he received the news that Saul was on the way to Ziph to search for him and kill him. Saul hunted him day after day, but the Lord didn’t let him find him.

¹⁶ (Prince Jonathan now went to find David; he met him at Horesh and encouraged him in his faith in God.

¹⁷ “Don’t be afraid,” Jonathan reassured him. “My father will never find you! You are going to be the king of Israel and I will be next to you, as my father is well aware.” ¹⁸ So the two of them renewed their pact of friendship; and David stayed at Horesh while Jonathan returned home.)

¹⁹ But now the men of Ziph went to Saul in Gibeah and betrayed David to him.

“We know where he is hiding,” they said. “He is in the caves of Horesh on Hachilah Hill, down in the southern part of the wilderness. ²⁰ Come on down, sir, and we will catch him for you and your fondest wish will be fulfilled!”

²¹ “Well, praise the Lord!” Saul said. “At last someone has had pity on me! ²² Go and check again to be sure of where he is staying and who has seen him there, for I know that he is very crafty. ²³ Discover his hiding places and then come back and give me a more definite report. Then I’ll go with you. And if he is in the area at all, I’ll find him if I have to search every inch of the entire land!”

^24-25 So the men of Ziph returned home. But when David heard that Saul was on his way to Ziph, he and his men went even further into the wilderness of Maon in the south of the desert. But Saul followed them there. ²⁶ He and David were now on opposite sides of a mountain. As Saul and his men began to close in, David tried his best to escape, but it was no use. ²⁷ But just then a message reached Saul that the Philistines were raiding Israel again, ²⁸ so Saul quit the chase and returned to fight the Philistines. Ever since that time the place where David was camped has been called, “The Rock of Escape.” ²⁹ David then went to live in the caves of Engedi.

24 After Saul’s return from his battle with the Philistines, he was told that David had gone into the wilderness of Engedi; ² so he took three thousand special troops and went to search for him among the rocks and wild goats of the desert. ³ At the place where the road passes some sheepfolds, Saul went into a cave to go to the bathroom, but as it happened, David and his men were hiding in the cave!

⁴ “Now’s your time!” David’s men whispered to him. “Today is the day the Lord was talking about when he said, ‘I will certainly put Saul into your power, to do with as you wish’!” Then David crept forward and quietly slit off the bottom of Saul’s robe! ⁵ But then his conscience began bothering him.

⁶ “I shouldn’t have done it,” he said to his men. “It is a serious sin to attack God’s chosen king in any way.”

^7-8 These words of David persuaded his men not to kill Saul.

After Saul had left the cave and gone on his way, David came out and shouted after him, “My lord the king!” And when Saul looked around, David bowed low before him.

^9-10 Then he shouted to Saul, “Why do you listen to the people who say I am trying to harm you? This very day you have seen it isn’t true. For the Lord placed you at my mercy back there in the cave, and some of my men told me to kill you, but I spared you. For I said, ‘I will never harm him—he is the Lord’s chosen king.’ ¹¹ See what I have in my hand? It is the hem of your robe! I cut it off, but I didn’t kill you! Doesn’t this convince you that I am not trying to harm you and that I have not sinned against you, even though you have been hunting for my life?

¹² “The Lord will decide between us. Perhaps he will kill you for what you are trying to do to me, but I will never harm you. ¹³ As that old proverb says, ‘Wicked is as wicked does,’ but despite your wickedness, I’ll not touch you. ¹⁴ And who is the king of Israel trying to catch, anyway? Should he spend his time chasing one who is as worthless as a dead dog or a flea? ¹⁵ May the Lord judge as to which of us is right and punish whichever one of us is guilty. He is my lawyer and defender, and he will rescue me from your power!”

¹⁶ Saul called back, “Is it really you, my son David?” Then he began to cry. ¹⁷ And he said to David, “You are a better man than I am, for you have repaid me good for evil. ¹⁸ Yes, you have been wonderfully kind to me today, for when the Lord delivered me into your hand, you didn’t kill me. ¹⁹ Who else in all the world would let his enemy get away when he had him in his power? May the Lord reward you well for the kindness you have shown me today. ²⁰ And now I realize that you are surely going to be king, and Israel shall be yours to rule. ²¹ Oh, swear to me by the Lord that when that happens you will not kill my family and destroy my line of descendants!”

²² So David promised, and Saul went home, but David and his men went back to their cave.