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Patriarchs and Prophets
than his kingdom, dearer even than the subjects faithful to his throne,
only increased the indignation of the soldiers against the unnatural
son.
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. And “the people of Israel
were slain before the servants of David, and there was there a great
slaughter that day of twenty thousand men.” 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
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the instigator of all this evil. “And he took three darts in his hand, and
thrust them through the heart of Absalom.... And they took Absalom,
and cast him into a great pit in the wood, and laid a very great heap of
stones upon him.”
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.
The leader of the rebellion being slain, Joab by the sound of the
trumpet recalled his army from the pursuit of the fleeing host, and
messengers were at once dispatched to bear the tidings to the king.
The watchman upon the city wall, looking out toward the battle-
field, discovered a man running alone. Soon a second came in sight.
As the first drew nearer, the watchman said to the king, who was
waiting beside the gate, “Me thinketh the running of the foremost is