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A Monument of Stones, June 27
2 Samuel 18:1-18
And they took Absalom, and cast him into a great pit in the wood, and
laid a very great heap of stones upon him.
2 Samuel 18:17
.
David and all his company—warriors and statesmen, old men and youth,
the women and the little children—in the darkness of night crossed the deep
and swift-flowing river.... Hushai’s counsel had achieved its object, gaining for
David opportunity for escape; but the rash and impetuous prince could not be
long restrained, and he soon set out in pursuit of his father....
The place of battle was a wood near the Jordan, in which the great numbers
of Absalom’s army were only a disadvantage to him. Among the thickets
and marshes of the forest these undisciplined troops became confused and
unmanageable.... Absalom, seeing that the day was lost, had turned to flee,
when his head was caught between the branches of a widespreading tree, and his
mule going out from under him, he was left helplessly suspended, a prey to his
enemies. In this condition he was found by a soldier, who, for fear of displeasing
the king, spared Absalom, but reported to Joab what he had seen. Joab was
restrained by no scruples. He had befriended Absalom, having twice secured his
reconciliation with David, and the trust had been shamelessly betrayed. But for
the advantages gained by Absalom through Joab’s intercession, this rebellion,
with all its horrors, could never have occurred. Now it was in Joab’s power at
one blow to destroy the instigator of all this evil. “And he took three darts in his
hand, and thrust them through the heart of Absalom....”
Thus perished the instigators of rebellion in Israel. Ahithophel had died by
his own hand. The princely Absalom, whose glorious beauty had been the pride
of Israel, had been cut down in the vigor of his youth, his dead body thrust into a
pit, and covered with a heap of stones, in token of everlasting reproach. During
his lifetime Absalom had reared for himself a costly monument in the king’s
dale, but the only memorial which marked his grave was that heap of stones in
the wilderness
[185]
49
Ibid., 742-744
.
190