¹⁹ Abner also spoke to [the men of] Benjamin. Then [he] went to Hebron to tell David all that seemed good to Israel and the whole house of Benjamin to do.

²⁰ So Abner came to David at Hebron, and twenty men along with him. And David made Abner and the men with him a feast.

²¹ Abner said to David, I will go and gather all Israel to my lord the king, that they may make a league with you, and that you may reign over all that your heart desires. So David sent Abner away in peace.

²² Then the servants of David came with Joab from pursuing a troop and brought much spoil with them. But Abner was not with David in Hebron, for he had sent him away, and he had gone in peace.

²³ When Joab and all the army with him had come, it was told to Joab, Abner son of Ner came to the king, and he has sent him away, and he is gone in peace.

²⁴ Then Joab came to the king and said, What have you done? Behold, Abner came to you. Why is it you have sent him away and he is quite gone?

²⁵ You know that Abner son of Ner came to deceive you and to know your going out and coming in and all you are doing.

²⁶ When Joab came from seeing David, he sent messengers after Abner, and they brought him back from the well of Sirah; but David did not know it.

²⁷ And when Abner returned to Hebron, Joab took him aside to the center of the gate to speak to him privately, and there he smote Abner in the abdomen, so that he died to avenge the blood of Asahel, Joab’s brother.

²⁸ When David heard of it, he said, I and my kingdom are guiltless before the Lord forever of the blood of Abner son of Ner.

²⁹ Let it fall on the head of Joab and on all his father’s house; and let the house of Joab never be without one who has a discharge or is a leper or walks with a crutch or is a distaff holder [unfit for war] or who falls by the sword or lacks food!

³⁰ So Joab and Abishai his brother slew Abner because he had slain their brother Asahel at Gibeon in the battle.

³¹ And David said to Joab and to all the people with him, Rend your clothes, gird yourselves with sackcloth, and mourn before Abner. And King David followed the bier.

³² They buried Abner in Hebron. And the king lifted up his voice and wept at the grave of Abner, and all the people wept.

³³ And the king lamented over Abner and said, Should Abner die as a fool dies?

³⁴ Your hands were not bound or your feet put into fetters; as a man falls before wicked men, so you fell. And all the people wept again over him.

³⁵ All the people came to urge David to eat food while it was yet day; but David took an oath, saying, May God do so to me, and more also, if I taste bread or anything else, till the sun is down.

³⁶ And all the people took notice of it, and it pleased them, as whatever the king did pleased all the people.

³⁷ For all the people and all Israel understood that day that it was not the king’s will to slay Abner son of Ner.

³⁸ King David said to his servants, Do you not know that a prince and a great man has fallen this day in Israel?

³⁹ And I am this day weak, though anointed [but not crowned] king; these sons of Zeruiah are too hard for me. May the Lord repay the evildoer according to his wickedness!

4 When Ish-bosheth, Saul’s son [king over Israel], heard that Abner was dead in Hebron, his courage failed, and all the Israelites were troubled and dismayed.

² Saul’s son had two men who were captains of raiding bands. One was named Baanah and the other Rechab, sons of Rimmon the Beerothite of Benjamin—for Beeroth also was reckoned to Benjamin,

³ And the Beerothites fled to Gittaim and have been sojourners there to this day.

⁴ Jonathan, Saul’s son, had a son who was a cripple in his feet. He was five years old when the news came out of Jezreel [of the deaths] of Saul and Jonathan. And the boy’s nurse took him up and fled; and in her haste, he fell and became lame. His name was Mephibosheth.

⁵ Now the sons of Rimmon the Beerothite, Rechab and Baanah, went about in the heat of the day to the house of Ish-bosheth, who lay resting on his bed at noon.

⁶ And they came into the interior of the house as though they were delivering wheat, and they smote him in the body; and Rechab and Baanah his brother escaped.

⁷ Now when they had come into the house and he lay on his bed in his bedroom, they [not only] smote and slew him, [but] beheaded him and took his head and went by the way of the plain all night.

⁸ And they brought the head of Ish-bosheth to David at Hebron and said to the king, Behold, the head of Ish-bosheth son of Saul, your enemy, who sought your life; and the Lord has avenged my lord the king this day on Saul and on his offspring.

⁹ And David answered Rechab and Baanah his brother, sons of Rimmon the Beerothite, As the Lord lives, Who redeemed my life out of all adversity,

¹⁰ When one told me, Behold, Saul is dead, thinking he was bringing good news, I seized and slew him in Ziklag who expected me to give him a reward for his news.

¹¹ How much more—when wicked men have slain a just man in his own house on his bed—shall I not now require his blood of your hand and remove you from the earth!

¹² David commanded his young men, and they slew them and cut off their hands and feet and hanged them over the pool in Hebron. But they took Ish-bosheth’s head and buried it in Hebron in the tomb of Abner [his relative and once chief supporter].

3 However, brethren, I could not talk to you as to spiritual [men], but as to nonspiritual [men of the flesh, in whom the carnal nature predominates], as to mere infants [in the new life] in Christ [^[a]unable to talk yet!]

² I fed you with milk, not solid food, for you were not yet strong enough [to be ready for it]; but even yet you are not strong enough [to be ready for it],

³ For you are still [unspiritual, having the nature] of the flesh [under the control of ordinary impulses]. For as long as [there are] envying and jealousy and wrangling and factions among you, are you not unspiritual and of the flesh, behaving yourselves after a human standard and like mere (unchanged) men?

⁴ For when one says, I belong to Paul, and another, I belong to Apollos, are you not [proving yourselves] ordinary (unchanged) men?

⁵ What then is Apollos? What is Paul? Ministering servants [not heads of parties] through whom you believed, even as the Lord appointed to each his task:

⁶ I planted, Apollos watered, but God [all the while] was making it grow and [He] gave the increase.

⁷ So neither he who plants is anything nor he who waters, but [only] God Who makes it grow and become greater.

⁸ He who plants and he who waters are equal (one in aim, of the same importance and esteem), yet each shall receive his own reward (wages), according to his own labor.

⁹ For we are fellow workmen (joint promoters, laborers together) with and for God; you are God’s ^[b]garden and vineyard and field under cultivation, [you are] God’s building.^(A)

¹⁰ According to the grace (the special endowment for my task) of God bestowed on me, like a skillful architect and master builder I laid [the] foundation, and now another [man] is building upon it. But let each [man] be careful how he builds upon it,

¹¹ For no other foundation can anyone lay than that which is [already] laid, which is Jesus Christ (the Messiah, the Anointed One).

¹² But if anyone builds upon the Foundation, whether it be with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw,

¹³ The work of each [one] will become [plainly, openly] known (shown for what it is); for the day [of Christ] will disclose and declare it, because it will be revealed with fire, and the fire will test and critically appraise the character and worth of the work each person has done.

¹⁴ If the work which any person has built on this Foundation [any product of his efforts whatever] survives [this test], he will get his reward.

¹⁵ But if any person’s work is burned up [under the test], he will suffer the loss [of it all, losing his reward], though he himself will be saved, but only as [one who has passed] through fire.^(A)

¹⁶ Do you not discern and understand that you [the whole church at Corinth] are God’s temple (His sanctuary), and that God’s Spirit has His permanent dwelling in you [to be at home in you, ^[a]collectively as a church and also individually]?

¹⁷ If anyone ^[b]does hurt to God’s temple or corrupts it [^[c]with false doctrines] or destroys it, God will ^[d]do hurt to him and bring him to the corruption of death and destroy him. For the temple of God is holy (sacred to Him) and that [temple] you [^[e]the believing church and its individual believers] are.

¹⁸ Let no person deceive himself. If anyone among you supposes that he is wise in this age, let him become a fool [let him discard his worldly discernment and recognize himself as dull, stupid, and foolish, without true learning and scholarship], that he may become [really] wise.^(B)

¹⁹ For this world’s wisdom is foolishness (absurdity and stupidity) with God, for it is written, He lays hold of the wise in their [own] craftiness;^(C)

²⁰ And again, The Lord knows the thoughts and reasonings of the [humanly] wise and recognizes how futile they are.^(D)

²¹ So let no one exult proudly concerning men [boasting of having this or that man as a leader], for all things are yours,

²² Whether Paul or Apollos or Cephas (Peter), or the universe or life or death, or the immediate and ^[f]threatening present or the [subsequent and uncertain] future—all are yours,

²³ And you are Christ’s, and Christ is God’s.