2 Samuel 14:1-8 ▼

1 Now Joab the son of Zeruiah knew that the king’s heart longed for Absalom.

2 So Joab sent word to Tekoa and had a wise woman brought from there and told her, “Please pretend to be a mourner, and put on mourning clothes, and do not anoint yourself with oil, but act like a woman who has for many days been in mourning for the dead.

3 Then go to the king and speak to him in this way.” So Joab told her what to say.

4 When the woman of Tekoa spoke to the king, she bowed with her face to the ground and lay herself down, and said, “Help, O king.”

5 The king asked her, “What is the matter?” She said, “Truly I am a widow; my husband is dead.

6 Your maidservant had two sons, but the two of them struggled and fought in the field. There was no one to separate them, so one struck the other and killed him.

7 Now behold, the entire family has risen against your maidservant, and they say, ‘Hand over the one who killed his brother, so that we may put him to death [to pay] for the life of his brother whom he killed and destroy the heir also.’ By doing this they will extinguish my coal that is left, leaving my husband without a name or a remnant (heir) on the face of the earth.”

8 Then David said to the woman, “Go to your home, and I will give orders concerning you.”