2 Samuel 14:8-18

8 The king said to the woman, Go to your house, and I will give charge concerning you.

9 The woman of Tekoa said to the king, My lord, O king, the iniquity be on me, and on my father's house; and the king and his throne be guiltless.

10 The king said, Whoever says anything to you, bring him to me, and he shall not touch you any more.

11 Then said she, Please let the king remember the LORD your God, that the avenger of blood destroy not any more, lest they destroy my son. He said, As the LORD lives, there shall not one hair of your son fall to the eretz.

12 Then the woman said, Please let your handmaid speak a word to my lord the king. He said, Say on.

13 The woman said, Why then have you devised such a thing against the people of God? for in speaking this word the king is as one who is guilty, in that the king does not bring home again his banished one.

14 For we must needs die, and are as water split on the ground, which can't be gathered up again; neither does God take away life, but devises means, that he who is banished not be an outcast from him.

15 Now therefore seeing that I have come to speak this word to my lord the king, it is because the people have made me afraid: and your handmaid said, I will now speak to the king; it may be that the king will perform the request of his servant.

16 For the king will hear, to deliver his servant out of the hand of the man who would destroy me and my son together out of the inheritance of God.

17 Then your handmaid said, Please let the word of my lord the king be comfortable; for as an angel of God, so is my lord the king to discern good and bad: and the LORD your God be with you.

18 Then the king answered the woman, Please don't hide anything from me that I shall ask you. The woman said, Let my lord the king now speak.

2 Samuel 14:8-18 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO SECOND SAMUEL 14

This chapter relates that Joab, perceiving David's inclination to bring back Absalom, employed a wise woman of Tekoah to lay before him a feigned case of hers, drawn up by Joab, whereby this point was gained from the king, that murder might be dispensed with in her case, 2Sa 14:1-20; which being applied to the case of Absalom, and the king finding out that the hand of Joab was in this, sent for him, and ordered him to bring Absalom again, though as yet he would not see his face, 2Sa 14:21-24; and after some notice being taken of the beauty of Absalom's person, particularly of his head of hair, and of the number of his children, 2Sa 14:25-27; it is related, that after two full years Absalom was uneasy that he might not see the king's face, and sent for Joab, who refused to come to him, till he found means to oblige him to it, who, with the king's leave, introduced him to him, 2Sa 14:28-33.