2 Samuel 20:16-22 ▼

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.