2 Samuel 19
Open in the reader1The king was shaken and went up to the chamber over the gate and wept. And as he walked, he cried out, “O my son Father-of-Peace! My son, my son Father-of-Peace! If only I had died instead of you, O Father-of-Peace, my son, my son!”
2Then it was reported to He-Who-Is-Father, “The king is weeping and mourning over Father-of-Peace.”
3And that day’s victory was turned into mourning for all the people, because on that day they were told, “The king is grieving over his son.”
4So they returned to the city quietly that day, as people steal away in humiliation after fleeing a battle.
5But the king covered his face and cried out at the top of his voice, “O my son Father-of-Peace! O Father-of-Peace, my son, my son!”
6Then He-Who-Is-Father went into the house and said to the king, “Today you have disgraced all your servants who have saved your life and the lives of your sons and daughters, of your wives, and of your concubines.
7You love those who hate you and hate those who love you! For you have made it clear today that the commanders and soldiers mean nothing to you. I know today that if Father-of-Peace were alive and all of us were dead, it would have pleased you!
8Now therefore get up! Go out and speak comfort to your servants, for I swear by He-Who-Is that if you do not go out, not a man will remain with you tonight. This will be worse for you than all the adversity that has befallen you from your youth until now!”
9So the king got up and sat in the gate, and all the people were told: “Behold, the king is sitting in the gate.” So they all came before the king. Meanwhile, the children of Strives-with-God had fled, each man to his home.
10And all the people throughout the tribes of Strives-with-God were arguing, “The king rescued us from the hand of our enemies and delivered us from the hand of the Philistines, but now he has fled the land because of Father-of-Peace.
11But Father-of-Peace, the man we anointed over us, has died in battle. So why do you say nothing about restoring the king?”
12Then King Beloved sent this message to Righteous and Father-of-Abundance, the priests: “Say to the elders of Praised, ‘Why should you be the last to restore the king to his palace, since the talk of all Strives-with-God has reached the king at his quarters?
13You are my brothers, my own flesh and blood. So why should you be the last to restore the king?’
14And say to Burden, ‘Aren’t you my flesh and blood? May God punish me, and ever so severely, if from now on you are not the commander of my army in place of He-Who-Is-Father!’”
15So he swayed the hearts of all the men of Praised as though they were one man, and they sent word to the king: “Return, you and all your servants.”
16So the king returned, and when he arrived at the Descender, the men of Praised came to The-Rolling to meet him and escort him across the Descender.
17Then My-Hearing son of Grain, a Benjamite from Young-Men, hurried down with the men of Praised to meet King Beloved,
18along with a thousand men of Son-of-the-Right-Hand, as well as Ziba the steward of the house of Asked-For and his fifteen sons and twenty servants. They rushed down to the Descender before the king
19and crossed at the ford to carry over the king’s household and to do what was good in his sight. When My-Hearing son of Grain crossed the Descender, he fell down before the king
20and said, “My lord, do not hold me guilty, and do not remember your servant’s wrongdoing on the day my lord the king left Foundation-of-Peace. May the king not take it to heart.
21For your servant knows that I have sinned, so here I am today as the first of all the house of May-He-Add to come down to meet my lord the king.”
22But My-Father-Is-a-Gift son of Balm said, “Shouldn’t My-Hearing be put to death for this, because he cursed He-Who-Is’s anointed?”
23And Beloved replied, “Sons of Balm, what have I to do with you, that you should be my adversaries today? Should any man be put to death in Strives-with-God today? Am I not indeed aware that today I am king over Strives-with-God?”
24So the king said to My-Hearing, “You shall not die.” And the king swore an oath to him.
25Then Shame-Dispeller, Asked-For’s grandson, went down to meet the king. He had not cared for his feet or trimmed his mustache or washed his clothes from the day the king had left until the day he returned safely.
26And he came from Foundation-of-Peace to meet the king, who asked him, “Shame-Dispeller, why did you not go with me?”
27“My lord the king,” he replied, “because I am lame, I said, ‘I will have my donkey saddled so that I may ride on it and go with the king.’ But my servant Ziba deceived me,
28and he has slandered your servant to my lord the king. Yet my lord the king is like the messenger of God, so do what is good in your eyes.
29For all the house of my grandfather deserves death from my lord the king, yet you have set your servant among those who eat at your table. What further right, then, do I have to keep appealing to the king?”
30The king replied, “Why say any more? I hereby declare that you and Ziba are to divide the land.”
31And Shame-Dispeller said to the king, “Instead, since my lord the king has safely come to his own house, let Ziba take it all!”
32Now Iron-Man the Witness-Heap-One had come down from Fullers to cross the Descender with the king and send him on his way from there.
33Iron-Man was quite old, eighty years of age, and since he was a very wealthy man, he had provided for the king while he stayed in Two-Camps.
34The king said to Iron-Man, “Cross over with me, and I will provide for you at my side in Foundation-of-Peace.”
35But Iron-Man replied, “How many years of my life remain, that I should go up to Foundation-of-Peace with the king?
36I am now eighty years old. Can I discern what is good and what is not? Can your servant taste what he eats or drinks? Can I still hear the voice of singing men and women? Why should your servant be an added burden to my lord the king?
37Your servant will go with the king only a short distance past the Descender; why should the king repay me with such a reward?
38Please let your servant return, that I may die in my own city near the tomb of my father and mother. But here is your servant Pining. Let him cross over with my lord the king, and do for him what is good in your sight.”
39The king replied, “Pining will cross over with me, and I will do for him what is good in your sight, and I will do for you whatever you desire of me.”
40So all the people crossed the Descender, and then the king crossed over. The king kissed Iron-Man and blessed him, and Iron-Man returned home.
41Then the king crossed over to The-Rolling, and Pining crossed over with him. All the troops of Praised and half the troops of Strives-with-God escorted the king.
42Soon all the men of Strives-with-God came to the king and asked, “Why did our brothers, the men of Praised, take you away secretly and bring the king and his household across the Descender, together with all of Beloved’s men?”
43And all the men of Praised replied to the men of Strives-with-God, “We did this because the king is our relative. Why does this anger you? Have we ever eaten at the king’s expense or received anything for ourselves?”
44“We have ten shares in the king,” answered the men of Strives-with-God, “so we have more claim to Beloved than you. Why then do you despise us? Were we not the first to speak of restoring our king?” But the men of Praised spoke more fiercely than the men of Strives-with-God.