2 Samuel 17

¹And Ahithophel said to Absalom, 'Let me choose, please, twelve thousand men, and let me arise and pursue after David tonight.'

²And I will come against him while he is weary and weak of hands, and I will throw him into a panic, and all the people who are with him will flee; and I will strike the king alone.

³I will bring back all the people to you — as when everything returns when the one man you are seeking is gone — and all the people will be at peace.

⁴And the word was pleasing in the eyes of Absalom and in the eyes of all the elders of Israel.

⁵And Absalom said, Call now also Hushai the Archite, and let us hear what is in his mouth, even from him as well.

⁶And Hushai came to Absalom, and Absalom spoke to him saying, 'According to this word Ahithophel has spoken — shall we do what he says? If not, you speak.'

⁷And Hushai said to Absalom, 'The counsel that Ahithophel has given is not good at this time.'

⁸And Hushai said, You know your father and his men, that they are mighty warriors, and they are bitter of soul. They are like a bear bereaved of her cubs in the field. And your father is a man of war; he will not spend the night with the people.

⁹Behold, now he is hiding in one of the pits or in one of the places, and it will be, when some of them fall at the first encounter, that whoever hears it will say, 'There has been a slaughter among the people who follow Absalom.'

¹⁰Even he who is a valiant man, whose heart is like the heart of a lion, will utterly melt, for all Israel knows that your father is a mighty warrior and that those with him are men of valor.

¹¹Rather, I counsel that all Israel be gathered to you, from Dan to Beersheba, like the sand that is upon the sea, in abundance; and that you yourself go into the battle.

¹²And we will come to him in one of the places where he is found, and we will settle on him as the dew falls on the ground, so that not one of him or of all the men who are with him will be left.

¹³And if he withdraws into a city, then all Israel will bring ropes to that city and we will drag it to the wadi, until not even a pebble is found there.

¹⁴And Absalom and all the men of Israel said, 'The counsel of Hushai the Archite is better than the counsel of Ahithophel.' For the LORD had purposed to frustrate the good counsel of Ahithophel, in order to bring disaster upon Absalom.

¹⁵And Hushai said to Zadok and to Abiathar the priests, Thus and so Ahithophel counseled Absalom and the elders of Israel, and thus and so I counseled.

¹⁶And now send quickly and tell David saying, 'Do not lodge tonight in the wilderness plains; but you must certainly cross over, lest the king and all the people with him be swallowed up.'

¹⁷Now Jonathan and Ahimaaz were standing at En-rogel, and a maidservant would go and tell them, and they would go and tell King David, for they could not be seen entering the city.

¹⁸But a young man saw them and told Absalom; so the two of them went quickly and came to the house of a man in Bahurim, who had a well in his courtyard, and they went down into it.

¹⁹And the woman took and spread the covering over the mouth of the well and spread groats upon it, and nothing was known.

²⁰And Absalom's servants came to the woman at the house and said, 'Where are Ahimaaz and Jonathan?' And the woman said to them, 'They crossed over the brook.' They searched and did not find them, and they returned to Jerusalem.

²¹And it came about after they had left that Ahimaaz and Jonathan came up out of the well and went and told King David, and they said to David, 'Arise and cross the water quickly, for thus Ahithophel has counseled against you.'

²²And David arose, and all the people who were with him, and they crossed the Jordan. By the light of morning not one was missing who had not crossed the Jordan.

²³And Ahithophel, when he saw that his counsel was not followed, saddled his donkey and arose and went to his house, to his city. He set his household in order and hanged himself, and he died and was buried in his father's tomb.

²⁴And David came to Mahanaim, and Absalom crossed the Jordan, he and all the men of Israel with him.

²⁵And Absalom had appointed Amasa over the army in place of Joab. Now Amasa was the son of a man whose name was Jithra the Israelite, who had married Abigail daughter of Nahash, sister of Zeruiah, Joab's mother.

²⁶And Israel and Absalom encamped in the land of Gilead.

²⁷And it came to pass when David came to Mahanaim, that Shobi son of Nahash from Rabbah of the Ammonites, and Machir son of Ammiel from Lo-debar, and Barzillai the Gileadite from Rogelim

²⁸brought beds, basins, and earthen vessels, and wheat, barley, flour, roasted grain, beans, lentils,

²⁹and honey and curds and sheep and cheese from the herd — they brought these to David and to the people who were with him to eat, for they said, 'The people are hungry and weary and thirsty in the wilderness.'