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¹ And there happened to be a man of worthlessness there, and his name [is] Sheba, son of Bichri, a Benjamite, and he blows with a horn and says, "We have no portion in David, and we have no inheritance in the son of Jesse; each [goes] to his tents, O Israel."² And every man of Israel goes up from after David, after Sheba son of Bichri, and the men of Judah have cleaved to their king, from the Jordan even to Jerusalem.³ And David comes to his house at Jerusalem. And the king takes the ten women-concubines whom he had left to keep the house, and puts them in a house of ward and sustains them, and he has not gone in to them, and they are shut up to the day of their death, living in widowhood.

⁴ And the king says to Amasa, "Call the men of Judah for me [within] three days, and you, stand here,"⁵ and Amasa goes to call Judah, and tarries beyond the appointed time that he had appointed him;⁶ and David says to Abishai, "Now Sheba son of Bichri does evil to us more than Absalom; you, take the servants of your lord, and pursue after him, lest he has found fortified cities for himself, and delivered himself [from] our eye."⁷ And the men of Joab go out after him, and the Cherethite, and the Pelethite, and all the mighty men, and they go out from Jerusalem to pursue after Sheba son of Bichri;⁸ they [are] near the great stone that [is] in Gibeon, and Amasa has gone before them, and Joab [is] girded; he has put his long robe on him, and on it a girdle—a sword [is] fastened on his loins in its sheath; and he has gone out, and it falls.⁹ And Joab says to Amasa, "Are you [in] peace, my brother?" And the right hand of Joab lays hold on the beard of Amasa to give a kiss to him;¹⁰ and Amasa has not been watchful of the sword that [is] in the hand of Joab, and he strikes him with it to the fifth [rib], and sheds out his bowels to the earth, and he has not repeated [it] to him, and he dies; and Joab and his brother Abishai have pursued after Sheba son of Bichri.¹¹ And a man has stood by him, of the young men of Joab, and says, "He who has delight in Joab, and he who [is] for David—after Joab!"¹² And Amasa is rolling himself in blood, in the midst of the highway, and the man sees that all the people have stood still, and he brings around Amasa out of the highway to the field, and casts a garment over him when he has seen that everyone who has come by him has stood still.¹³ When he has been removed out of the highway, every man has passed on after Joab, to pursue after Sheba son of Bichri.

¹⁴ And he passes over through all the tribes of Israel to Abel, and to Beth-Maachah, and to all the Berites, and they are assembled, and also go in after him,¹⁵ and they go in and lay siege against him, in Abel of Beth-Maachah, and cast up a mound against the city, and it stands in a trench, and all the people who are [are] with Joab are destroying, to cause the wall to fall.¹⁶ And a wise woman calls out of the city, "Hear! Hear! Please say to Joab, Come near here, and I speak to you."¹⁷ And he comes near to her, and the woman says, "Are you Joab?" And he says, "I [am]." And she says to him, "Hear the words of your handmaid"; and he says, "I am hearing."¹⁸ And she speaks, saying, "They spoke often in former times, saying, Let them diligently inquire at Abel, and so they finished.¹⁹ I [am] of the peaceable, faithful ones of Israel; you are seeking to destroy a city and mother in Israel; why do you swallow up the inheritance of YHWH?"²⁰ And Joab answers and says, "Far be it—far be it from me; I do not swallow up nor destroy.²¹ The matter [is] not so; for a man of the hill-country of Ephraim—Sheba son of Bichri [is] his name—has lifted up his hand against the king, against David; give him up by himself, and I go away from the city." And the woman says to Joab, "Behold, his head is cast to you over the wall."²² And the woman comes to all the people in her wisdom, and they cut off the head of Sheba son of Bichri, and cast [it] to Joab, and he blows with a horn, and they are scattered from the city, each [goes] to his tents, and Joab has turned back to Jerusalem to the king.

²³ And Joab [is] over all the host of Israel, and Benaiah son of Jehoiada [is] over the Cherethite, and over the Pelethite,²⁴ and Adoram [is] over the tribute, and Jehoshaphat son of Ahilud [is] the remembrancer,²⁵ and Sheva [is] scribe, and Zadok and Abiathar [are] priests,²⁶ and also, Ira the Jairite has been minister to David.