⁹ Then Absalom happened to meet the servants of David. Now Absalom was riding on his mule, and the mule went under the thick branches of a great oak. And ^(A)his head caught fast in the oak, so he was ^[a]left hanging between heaven and earth, while the mule that was under him passed onward. ¹⁰ Then a certain man saw it, he told Joab and said, “Behold, I saw Absalom hanging in an oak.” ¹¹ Then Joab said to the man who had told him, “Now behold, you saw him! Why then did you not strike him there to the ground? And I would have given you ten pieces of silver and a belt.” ¹² So the man said to Joab, “Even if I should receive one thousand pieces of silver in my hand, I would not send forth my hand against the king’s son; for ^(B)in our hearing the king commanded you and Abishai and Ittai, saying, ‘^[b]Keep for me the young man Absalom!’ ¹³ Otherwise, if I had dealt treacherously against his life (and ^(C)there is nothing hidden from the king), then you yourself would have stood aloof.” ¹⁴ Then Joab said, “I will not wait around here before you.” ^(D)So he took three ^[c]spears in his hand and thrust them through the heart of Absalom while he was yet alive in the ^[d]midst of the oak. ¹⁵ And ten young men who carried Joab’s armor gathered around and struck Absalom and put him to death.

¹⁶ Then ^(E)Joab blew the trumpet, and the people returned from pursuing Israel, for Joab restrained the people. ¹⁷ And they took Absalom and cast him into ^[e]a deep pit in the forest and ^(F)set over him a very great heap of stones. And ^(G)all Israel fled, each to his tent. ¹⁸ Now Absalom in his lifetime had taken and ^(H)set up for himself a pillar which is in ^(I)the King’s Valley, for he had said, “^(J)I have no son ^[f]to preserve my name.” So he named the pillar after his own name, and it is called Absalom’s Monument to this day.