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2 Samuel 14 New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"><html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" /><meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width; initial-scale=1.0; maximum-scale=1.0; user-scalable=0;"/><title>2 Samuel 14 New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="/chapnew2.css" type="text/css" media="Screen" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="../spec.css" type="text/css" media="Screen" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="/print.css" type="text/css" media="Print" /></head><body><div id="fx"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" id="fx2"><tr><td><iframe width="100%" height="30" scrolling="no" src="../cmenus/2_samuel/14.htm" align="left" frameborder="0"></iframe></td></tr></table></div><div id="blnk"></div><div align="center"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" class="maintable"><tr><td><div id="fx5"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" id="fx6"><tr><td><iframe width="100%" height="245" scrolling="no" src="/bmcc/2_samuel/14-1.htm" frameborder="0"></iframe></td></tr></table></div></td></tr></table></div><div align="center"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" class="maintable3"><tr><td><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="center" id="announce"><tr><td><div id="l1"><div id="breadcrumbs"><a href="http://biblehub.com/catholic">Bible</a> > <a href="../">NRSVCE</a> > 2 Samuel 14</div><div id="anc"><iframe src="/anc.htm" width="100%" height="27" scrolling="no" frameborder="0"></iframe></div><div id="anc2"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="center"><tr><td><iframe src="/anc2.htm" width="100%" height="27" scrolling="no" frameborder="0"></iframe></td></tr></table></div></div></td></tr></table><div id="movebox2"><table border="0" align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr><td><div id="topheading"><a href="../2_samuel/13.htm" title="2 Samuel 13">◄</a> 2 Samuel 14 <a href="../2_samuel/15.htm" title="2 Samuel 15">►</a></div></td></tr></table></div><div align="center" class="maintable2"><table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="center"><tr><td><div id="leftbox"><div class="padleft"><div class="vheading"><table width="100%"><tr><td width="99%" valign="top">New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition</td><td width="1%" valign="top"></td></tr></table></div><div class="chap"><div class="text-html"> <h3><span id="en" class="text">Absalom Returns to Jerusalem</span></h3><p class="chapter-2"><span class="text"><span class="versenum">1</span>Now Joab son of Zeruiah perceived that the king’s mind was on Absalom. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">2</span>Joab sent to Tekoa and brought from there a wise woman. He said to her, “Pretend to be a mourner; put on mourning garments, do not anoint yourself with oil, but behave like a woman who has been mourning many days for the dead. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">3</span>Go to the king and speak to him as follows.” And Joab put the words into her mouth.</span></p> <p><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">4</span>When the woman of Tekoa came to the king, she fell on her face to the ground and did obeisance, and said, “Help, O king!” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">5</span>The king asked her, “What is your trouble?” She answered, “Alas, I am a widow; my husband is dead. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">6</span>Your servant had two sons, and they fought with one another in the field; there was no one to part them, and one struck the other and killed him. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">7</span>Now the whole family has risen against your servant. They say, ‘Give up the man who struck his brother, so that we may kill him for the life of his brother whom he murdered, even if we destroy the heir as well.’ Thus they would quench my one remaining ember, and leave to my husband neither name nor remnant on the face of the earth.”</span></p> <p><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">8</span>Then the king said to the woman, “Go to your house, and I will give orders concerning you.” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">9</span>The woman of Tekoa said to the king, “On me be the guilt, my lord the king, and on my father’s house; let the king and his throne be guiltless.” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">10</span>The king said, “If anyone says anything to you, bring him to me, and he shall never touch you again.” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">11</span>Then she said, “Please, may the king keep the <span style="font-variant: small-caps" class="small-caps">Lord</span> your God in mind, so that the avenger of blood may kill no more, and my son not be destroyed.” He said, “As the <span style="font-variant: small-caps" class="small-caps">Lord</span> lives, not one hair of your son shall fall to the ground.”</span></p> <p><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">12</span>Then the woman said, “Please let your servant speak a word to my lord the king.” He said, “Speak.” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">13</span>The woman said, “Why then have you planned such a thing against the people of God? For in giving this decision the king convicts himself, inasmuch as the king does not bring his banished one home again. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">14</span>We must all die; we are like water spilled on the ground, which cannot be gathered up. But God will not take away a life; he will devise plans so as not to keep an outcast banished forever from his presence.<span data-fn='#fen' class='footnote' data-link='[<a href="#fen-NRSVCE-8371a" title="See footnote a">a</a>]'>[<a href="#fen" xtitle="See footnote a">a</a>]</span> </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">15</span>Now I have come to say this to my lord the king because the people have made me afraid; your servant thought, ‘I will speak to the king; it may be that the king will perform the request of his servant. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">16</span>For the king will hear, and deliver his servant from the hand of the man who would cut both me and my son off from the heritage of God.’ </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">17</span>Your servant thought, ‘The word of my lord the king will set me at rest’; for my lord the king is like the angel of God, discerning good and evil. The <span style="font-variant: small-caps" class="small-caps">Lord</span> your God be with you!”</span></p> <p><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">18</span>Then the king answered the woman, “Do not withhold from me anything I ask you.” The woman said, “Let my lord the king speak.” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">19</span>The king said, “Is the hand of Joab with you in all this?” The woman answered and said, “As surely as you live, my lord the king, one cannot turn right or left from anything that my lord the king has said. For it was your servant Joab who commanded me; it was he who put all these words into the mouth of your servant. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">20</span>In order to change the course of affairs your servant Joab did this. But my lord has wisdom like the wisdom of the angel of God to know all things that are on the earth.”</span></p> <p><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">21</span>Then the king said to Joab, “Very well, I grant this; go, bring back the young man Absalom.” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">22</span>Joab prostrated himself with his face to the ground and did obeisance, and blessed the king; and Joab said, “Today your servant knows that I have found favor in your sight, my lord the king, in that the king has granted the request of his servant.” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">23</span>So Joab set off, went to Geshur, and brought Absalom to Jerusalem. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">24</span>The king said, “Let him go to his own house; he is not to come into my presence.” So Absalom went to his own house, and did not come into the king’s presence.</span></p> <h3><span id="en" class="text">David Forgives Absalom</span></h3><p><span class="text"><span class="versenum">25</span>Now in all Israel there was no one to be praised so much for his beauty as Absalom; from the sole of his foot to the crown of his head there was no blemish in him. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">26</span>When he cut the hair of his head (for at the end of every year he used to cut it; when it was heavy on him, he cut it), he weighed the hair of his head, two hundred shekels by the king’s weight. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">27</span>There were born to Absalom three sons, and one daughter whose name was Tamar; she was a beautiful woman.</span></p> <p><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">28</span>So Absalom lived two full years in Jerusalem, without coming into the king’s presence. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">29</span>Then Absalom sent for Joab to send him to the king; but Joab would not come to him. He sent a second time, but Joab would not come. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">30</span>Then he said to his servants, “Look, Joab’s field is next to mine, and he has barley there; go and set it on fire.” So Absalom’s servants set the field on fire. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">31</span>Then Joab rose and went to Absalom at his house, and said to him, “Why have your servants set my field on fire?” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">32</span>Absalom answered Joab, “Look, I sent word to you: Come here, that I may send you to the king with the question, ‘Why have I come from Geshur? It would be better for me to be there still.’ Now let me go into the king’s presence; if there is guilt in me, let him kill me!” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">33</span>Then Joab went to the king and told him; and he summoned Absalom. So he came to the king and prostrated himself with his face to the ground before the king; and the king kissed Absalom.</span></p> <A name="fen"></a><div class="footnotes"><h4>Footnotes</h4><ol><li id="fen"><a hlef="#en" xtitle="Go to 2 Samuel 14:14">2 Samuel 14:14</a> <span class='footnote-text'>Meaning of Heb uncertain</span></li></ol></div> <!--end of footnotes--></div></div></div></div></div> </div> </div><div id="botbox"><div class="padbot"><div align="center">Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. 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