³¹ “So let him take all,” Mephibosheth replied to the king, “as long as my lord the king has come back to his own home in shalom.”

³² Then Barzillai the Gileadite came down from Rogelim, and he approached the Jordan with the king to escort him over the Jordan. ³³ Now Barzillai was a very aged man—80 years old—and he had provided for the king during his residence at Mahanaim, for he was a very wealthy man. ³⁴ The king said to Barzillai, “Cross over with me, and I will provide for you with me in Jerusalem.” ³⁵ But Barzillai said to the king, “How many years are left of my life that I should go up with the king to Jerusalem? ³⁶ I am now 80 years old. Can I distinguish between good and bad? Can your servant taste what I eat or what I drink? Can I listen any more to the voice of singing men and women? Why then should your servant be yet a burden to my lord the king? ³⁷ Your servant would merely cross over the Jordan with the king. But why should the king reward me with such a reward? ³⁸ Please let your servant go back, and let me die in my own hometown, near the grave of my father and my mother. But look, here is your servant Chimham—let him cross over with my lord the king, and do for him what seems good in your eyes.”

³⁹ The king answered, “Chimham will cross over with me, and I will do for him what seems good in your eyes. Whatever you ask of me, I will do for you.” ⁴⁰ When all the people had crossed over the Jordan and as the king was about to cross over, the king kissed Barzillai and blessed him, so he returned to his own place.

⁴¹ Then the king crossed over to Gilgal, and Chimham and all the people of Judah crossed over with him, and also half the people of Israel escorted the king over. ⁴² Then all the men of Israel came to the king and said to him, “Why did our brothers, the men of Judah, steal you away by escorting the king and his household over the Jordan, along with all David’s men that were with him?”

⁴³ Then all the men of Judah answered the men of Israel, “Because the king is our close relative. So why are you angry over this matter? Have we eaten at all at the king’s cost? Or has he given us any gifts?”

⁴⁴ Then the men of Israel answered the men of Judah and said, “We have ten shares in the king, so in David we have even more than you. Why then did you despise us? Weren’t we the first to speak of restoring our king?” Yet the words of the men of Judah were harsher than the words of the men of Israel.

Joab the Terminator

20 Now a worthless fellow happened to be there, a Benjamite named Sheba son of Bichri. He blew the shofar and said, “We have no portion in David, no inheritance in the son of Jesse! Every man to his tents, O Israel!” ² So all the men of Israel withdrew from following David and followed Sheba son of Bichri, but the men of Judah kept close to their king from the Jordan to Jerusalem.

³ Now when David arrived at his palace in Jerusalem, the king took the ten women, the concubines whom he had left to take care of the palace, and put them in a guarded house. He provided for them but he did not cohabit with them. So they were confined until the day they died, living in widowhood.

⁴ Then the king said to Amasa, “Summon to me the men of Judah within three days and be here yourself.” ⁵ So Amasa went to summon Judah but he took longer than the set time that he had allotted him.

⁶ Then David said to Abishai, “Now Sheba son of Bichri will do us more harm than Absalom. So take your lord’s servants and pursue him lest he find for himself fortified cities and escape from our sight.” ⁷ So Joab’s men went after him, along with the Cherethites, the Pelethites, and all the mighty men, and set out from Jerusalem to pursue Sheba son of Bichri. ⁸ When they were at the great stone that is in Gibeon, Amasa came to meet them. Now Joab was dressed in his military uniform, and over it was a belt with a sword in its sheath fastened on his waist; and as he stepped forward, it fell out. ⁹ Then Joab said to Amasa, “Is it well with you my brother?” With his right hand Joab took Amasa by the beard to kiss him. ¹⁰ But Amasa took no heed to the sword that was in Joab’s other hand. So he stabbed him with it in the groin and poured out his entrails to the ground, and did not strike him again, for he died.

Then Joab and his brother Abishai pursued Sheba son of Bichri. ¹¹ Meanwhile, one of Joab’s young men stood over Amasa and said, “Whoever favors Joab and whoever is for David, let him follow Joab!” ¹² Yet Amasa lay wallowing in his blood in the midst of the highway. So when the man saw that all the people stood still, he dragged Amasa from the highway into the field and threw a garment over him because he saw that everyone passing by him paused.  ¹³ Once he removed him from the highway, everyone passed on, following Joab to pursue Sheba son of Bichri.

¹⁴ Now he went through all the tribes of Israel, to Abel and Beth-Maacah. All the Berites gathered together and indeed followed him. ¹⁵ They came and besieged him in Abel of Beth-Maacah and cast up a siege ramp against the city. It stood against the outer fortification and all the people with Joab battered the wall in order to topple it.

¹⁶ Then a wise woman cried out from the city, “Listen! Listen! Please tell Joab to come over here that I may speak with him.” ¹⁷ When he approached her, the woman asked, “Are you Joab?”

“I am,” he answered.

Then she said to him, “Listen to the words of your handmaid.”

“I’m listening,” he answered.

¹⁸ Then she spoke up saying, “They used to say in old time, ‘They shall surely seek counsel at Abel and that’s how they settled any dispute. ¹⁹ I am of those who are peaceable and faithful in Israel. Are you seeking to destroy a mother city in Israel? Why would you devour Adonai’s inheritance?”

²⁰ Joab replied saying, “Never! Far be it from me that I would devour up or ruin. ²¹ The matter is not so; but a fellow from the hill country of Ephraim, Sheba son of Bichri his name, has lifted up his hand against King David. Give him up alone and I will withdraw from the city.”

So the woman replied to Joab, “Look here, his head will be thrown to you over the wall.” ²² Then the woman approached all the people wisely. So they cut off the head of Sheba son of Bichri and threw it over to Joab. He then blew the shofar and they were dismissed from the city, each to his tent. Then Joab returned to Jerusalem to the king.

²³ Now Joab remained over all the army of Israel; Benaiah son of Jehoiada was over the Cherethites and the Pelethites; ²⁴ Adoram was over the forced labor; Jehoshaphat son of Ahilud was the recorder; ²⁵ Sheba was scribe; Zadok and Abiathar were kohanim; ²⁶ and Ira the Jairite also was a kohen to David.

Adonai Magen

Psalm 7

Justice for the Gibeonites

21 Now there was a famine in the days of David for three years, year after year, so David sought the face of Adonai. Adonai replied, “It is because of Saul and his bloody house, for he put the Gibeonites to death.” ² So the king summoned the Gibeonites and spoke to them. (Now the Gibeonites were not of Bnei-Yisrael but a remnant of the Amorites; however, Bnei-Yisrael had sworn a covenant with them. Yet Saul had tried to eradicate them in his zeal for Bnei-Yisrael and Judah.) ³ David asked the Gibeonites, “What should I do for you? How may I make atonement so that you would bless the inheritance of Adonai?”

⁴ The Gibeonites said to him, “It is not a matter of silver or gold between us and Saul or his house; nor is it our right to put any man to death in Israel.”

“Whatever you say, I will do for you,” he said.

⁵ Then they said to the king, “The man who consumed us and plotted against us to annihilate us from remaining in any of Israel’s territory, ⁶ let seven men of his sons be given over to us and we will hang them up before Adonai at Gibeah of Saul, Adonai’s chosen.”

“I will give them over,” the king said. ⁷ Now the king spared Mephibosheth, son of Jonathan son of Saul, because of Adonai’s oath that was between them, between David and Jonathan son of Saul. ⁸ But the king took the two sons of Rizpah daughter of Aiah, whom she bore to Saul—Armoni and Mephibosheth; also the five sons of Michal^[a] daughter of Saul, whom she bore to Adriel son of Barzillai the Meholathite, ⁹ and he gave them into the hands of the Gibeonites. So they hanged them on the hill before Adonai, so that all seven fell together. They were put to death during the days of harvest, at the beginning of barley harvest.

¹⁰ Then Rizpah daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and spread it on the rock for herself, from the beginning of harvest until the rain poured on them from the sky. She did not let the birds of the sky rest on them by day nor the beasts of the field by night. ¹¹ David was told what Rizpah daughter of Aiah, the concubine of Saul, had done. ¹² So David went and took the bones of Saul and the bones of his son Jonathan from the men of Jabesh-gilead, who had stolen them from the open square of Beth-shan, where the Philistines had hanged them on the day that the Philistines killed Saul in Gilboa. ¹³ He had the bones of Saul and the bones of his son Jonathan brought up from there, and they gathered the bones of those who were hanged. ¹⁴ So they buried the bones of Saul and his son Jonathan in the country of Benjamin in Zela, in the tomb of his father Kish. They did all of what the king commanded. Afterward, God was moved by prayer for the land.

¹⁵ Once again the Philistines made war with Israel, so David went down with his servants and fought against the Philistines. But David became weary. ¹⁶ So Ishbi-benob—who was a descendant of the Raphah, whose spear weighed 300 shekels of bronze, who was girded with new armor—thought to kill David. ¹⁷ But Abishai son of Zeruiah came to his aid, struck the Philistine and killed him. Then the men of David swore to him, saying, “You must not go out with us to battle anymore. You must not quench the lamp of Israel!”

¹⁸ Now it came to pass after this that there was war again with the Philistines at Gob, and Sibbecai the Hushathite killed Saph, a descendant of the Rapha. ¹⁹ Then there was war again with the Philistines at Gob, and Elhanan son of Jaare-oregim the Beth-lehemite killed Goliath the Gittite—his spear had a shaft like a weaver’s beam. ²⁰ Once again there was war at Gath, where there was a champion that had on every hand six fingers and on every foot six toes—a total of 24, and he also was a descendant of the Rapha. ²¹ When he taunted Israel, Jonathan son of David’s brother Shimea killed him. ²² These four were born to the Rapha in Gath, and they fell by the hand of David and by the hand of his servants.

⁴ Now it came about after this, that war broke out with the Philistines at Gezer. Then Sibbecai the Hushathite struck down Sippai, one of the descendants of the Rephaim, and they were subdued. ⁵ Again there was war with the Philistines, and Elhanan the son of Jair killed Lahmi, the brother of Goliath the Gittite, whose spear had a shaft like a weaver’s beam. ⁶ Once again there was a battle at Gath, where there was a man of great stature who had 24 fingers and toes, six on each hand and six on each foot. He too also descended from the giants. ⁷ When he taunted Israel, Jonathan son of Shimea, David’s brother, struck him down.

⁸ These were descendants of the giants in Gath; they fell by the hand of David and his servants.