2016 King James For Today (KJVfT)
1 Moreover Ahithophel said to Absalom, Let me now choose twelve thousand men, and I will arise and pursue after David this night:
2 And I will come upon him while he is weary and weak, and will make him afraid: and all the people that are with him shall flee; and I will strike the king only:
3 And I will bring back all the people to you: for the one man’s life whom you seek will bring the return of safety and peace to all.
4 And the saying pleased Absalom well, and all the elders of Israel.
5 Then Absalom said, Call now Hushai the Archite also, and let us hear what he has to say.
6 And when Hushai had come to Absalom, Absalom spoke to him, saying, Ahithophel has spoken after this manner: shall we do what he says? if not; speak up.
7 And Hushai said to Absalom, The counsel that Ahithophel has given is not good this time.
Hushai said, for you know your father and his men, that they are mighty men, and they are embittered in heart, as a bear robbed of her cubs in the wild: and your father is a man of war, and will not spend the night with the people.
9 Be sure, he is even now hidden in some cave, or some place else: and from there he will pounce, and whoever hears of that first attack will say, There is a slaughter among the followers of Absalom.
10 Even he that is valiant, whose heart is as the heart of a lion, shall utterly melt: for all Israel knows that your father is a mighty man, and they who are with him are valiant men.
11 Therefore I counsel, that all Israel be wholly gathered to you, from Dan even to Beersheba, even in numbers even as vast as the sand that is by the sea; and that you go to battle in your own person.
12 So shall we come upon him wherever we shall find him, and we will lay on him as the dew falls on the ground: and of him and of all the men that are with him there shall not be left so much as one.
13 Moreover, if he reaches a city, then shall all Israel bring ropes to that city, and we will draw that city into the river, until not even one little stone will be found there.
14 So Absalom and all the men of Israel said, The counsel of Hushai the Archite is better than the counsel of Ahithophel. For the Lord had ordered to defeat the good counsel of Ahithophel, with the intent that the Lord might bring evil upon Absalom.
15 Then said Hushai to Zadok and to Abiathar the priests, Such and such has Ahithophel counseled Absalom and the elders of Israel; but I have counseled after this manner.
16 Now therefore send quickly, and tell David, saying, Do not stay this night in the plains of the wilderness, but quickly pass over; lest the king be swallowed up, and all the people that are with him.
17 Now Jonathan and Ahimaaz stayed by Enrogel; and so they would not be seen coming into the city a maidservant went and told them; and they went and told king David.
18 Yet still, a lad saw them, and told Absalom: but both of them went away quickly, and came to a man’s house in Bahurim, which had a well in his court; and down into this, they went.
19 And the woman took and spread a covering over the well’s mouth, and spread ground corn on top; and was well hidden and not known.
20 And when Absalom’s servants came to the woman to the house, they said, Where is Ahimaaz and Jonathan? And the woman said to them, They’ve gone over the water brook. And when they had sought and could not find them, they returned to Jerusalem.
21 And after they had departed, they came up out of the well, and went and told king David, and said to David, Arise, and pass quickly over the water: for thus has Ahithophel counseled against you.
22 Then David arose, and all the people that were with him, and they passed over the Jordan: by the morning light not one of them had not crossed over the Jordan.
23 And when Ahithophel saw that his counsel was not followed, he saddled his donkey, and arose, and went to his own home in his city, and put his household in order, and there, hanged himself, died, and was buried in the sepulchre of his father.
24 Then David came to Mahanaim. And Absalom passed over the Jordan, he and all the men of Israel with him.
25 And Absalom made Amasa captain of the host in place of Joab: Amasa was the son of a man whose name was Ithra an Israelite, who went into Abigail the daughter of Nahash, and sister of Zeruiah, mother of Joab.
26 So Israel and Absalom camped in the land of Gilead.
27 Then, when David came as far as Mahanaim, that Shobi the son of Nahash of Rabbah of the children of Ammon, and Machir the son of Ammiel of Lodebar, and Barzillai the Gileadite of Rogelim,
28 Brought blankets, and bowls, pots, pans, and wheat, barley, flour, and roasted grain, beans, and lentiles,
29 And honey, and butter, and sheep, and cheese of cow’s milk, for David, and for the people that were with him to eat: for they said, The people are hungry, and weary, and thirsty, in the wilderness.
