And you have declared this day how you have dealt well with me, in that you did not kill me when the Lord put me into your hands.
For if a man finds his enemy, will he let him go away safe? So may the Lord reward you with good for what you have done to me this day.
And now, behold, I know that you shall surely be king, and that the kingdom of Israel shall be established in your hand.
Swear to me therefore by the Lord that you will not cut off my offspring after me, and that you will not destroy my name out of my father's house.”
And David swore this to Saul. Then Saul went home, but David and his men went up to the stronghold.
Now Samuel died. And all Israel assembled and mourned for him, and they buried him in his house at Ramah. Then David rose and went down to the wilderness of Paran.
And there was a man in Maon whose business was in Carmel. The man was very rich; he had three thousand sheep and a thousand goats. He was shearing his sheep in Carmel.
Now the name of the man was Nabal, and the name of his wife Abigail. The woman was discerning and beautiful, but the man was harsh and badly behaved; he was a Calebite.
David heard in the wilderness that Nabal was shearing his sheep.
So David sent ten young men. And David said to the young men, “Go up to Carmel, and go to Nabal and greet him in my name.
I hear that you have shearers. Now your shepherds have been with us, and we did them no harm, and they missed nothing all the time they were in Carmel.
When David's young men came, they said all this to Nabal in the name of David, and then they waited.
And Nabal answered David's servants, “Who is David? Who is the son of Jesse? There are many servants these days who are breaking away from their masters.
And David said to his men, “Every man strap on his sword!” And every man of them strapped on his sword. David also strapped on his sword. And about four hundred men went up after David, while two hundred remained with the baggage.
But one of the young men told Abigail, Nabal's wife, “Behold, David sent messengers out of the wilderness to greet our master, and he railed at them.
Yet the men were very good to us, and we suffered no harm, and we did not miss anything when we were in the fields, as long as we went with them.
They were a wall to us both by night and by day, all the while we were with them keeping the sheep.
And as she rode on the donkey and came down under cover of the mountain, behold, David and his men came down toward her, and she met them.
Now David had said, “Surely in vain have I guarded all that this fellow has in the wilderness, so that nothing was missed of all that belonged to him, and he has returned me evil for good.
God do so to the enemies of David and more also, if by morning I leave so much as one male of all who belong to him.”
When Abigail saw David, she hurried and got down from the donkey and fell before David on her face and bowed to the ground.
She fell at his feet and said, “On me alone, my lord, be the guilt. Please let your servant speak in your ears, and hear the words of your servant.
Let not my lord regard this worthless fellow, Nabal, for as his name is, so is he. Nabal is his name, and folly is with him. But I your servant did not see the young men of my lord, whom you sent.
Now then, my lord, as the Lord lives, and as your soul lives, because the Lord has restrained you from bloodguilt and from saving with your own hand, now then let your enemies and those who seek to do evil to my lord be as Nabal.
And now let this present that your servant has brought to my lord be given to the young men who follow my lord.
Please forgive the trespass of your servant. For the Lord will certainly make my lord a sure house, because my lord is fighting the battles of the Lord, and evil shall not be found in you so long as you live.
If men rise up to pursue you and to seek your life, the life of my lord shall be bound in the bundle of the living in the care of the Lord your God. And the lives of your enemies he shall sling out as from the hollow of a sling.
And when the Lord has done to my lord according to all the good that he has spoken concerning you and has appointed you prince over Israel,
my lord shall have no cause of grief or pangs of conscience for having shed blood without cause or for my lord working salvation himself. And when the Lord has dealt well with my lord, then remember your servant.”
And David said to Abigail, “Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, who sent you this day to meet me!
For as surely as the Lord, the God of Israel, lives, who has restrained me from hurting you, unless you had hurried and come to meet me, truly by morning there had not been left to Nabal so much as one male.”
And Abigail came to Nabal, and behold, he was holding a feast in his house, like the feast of a king. And Nabal's heart was merry within him, for he was very drunk. So she told him nothing at all until the morning light.
In the morning, when the wine had gone out of Nabal, his wife told him these things, and his heart died within him, and he became as a stone.
And about ten days later the Lord struck Nabal, and he died.
When David heard that Nabal was dead, he said, “Blessed be the Lord who has avenged the insult I received at the hand of Nabal, and has kept back his servant from wrongdoing. The Lord has returned the evil of Nabal on his own head.” Then David sent and spoke to Abigail, to take her as his wife.
When the servants of David came to Abigail at Carmel, they said to her, “David has sent us to you to take you to him as his wife.”
And she rose and bowed with her face to the ground and said, “Behold, your handmaid is a servant to wash the feet of the servants of my lord.”
And Abigail hurried and rose and mounted a donkey, and her five young women attended her. She followed the messengers of David and became his wife.
Saul had given Michal his daughter, David's wife, to Palti the son of Laish, who was of Gallim.
Then the Ziphites came to Saul at Gibeah, saying, “Is not David hiding himself on the hill of Hachilah, which is on the east of Jeshimon?”
So Saul arose and went down to the wilderness of Ziph with three thousand chosen men of Israel to seek David in the wilderness of Ziph.
And Saul encamped on the hill of Hachilah, which is beside the road on the east of Jeshimon. But David remained in the wilderness. When he saw that Saul came after him into the wilderness,
Then David rose and came to the place where Saul had encamped. And David saw the place where Saul lay, with Abner the son of Ner, the commander of his army. Saul was lying within the encampment, while the army was encamped around him.
Then David said to Ahimelech the Hittite, and to Joab's brother Abishai the son of Zeruiah, “Who will go down with me into the camp to Saul?” And Abishai said, “I will go down with you.”
So David and Abishai went to the army by night. And there lay Saul sleeping within the encampment, with his spear stuck in the ground at his head, and Abner and the army lay around him.
Then Abishai said to David, “God has given your enemy into your hand this day. Now please let me pin him to the earth with one stroke of the spear, and I will not strike him twice.”
But David said to Abishai, “Do not destroy him, for who can put out his hand against the Lord's anointed and be guiltless?”
And David said, “As the Lord lives, the Lord will strike him, or his day will come to die, or he will go down into battle and perish.
The Lord forbid that I should put out my hand against the Lord's anointed. But take now the spear that is at his head and the jar of water, and let us go.”
So David took the spear and the jar of water from Saul's head, and they went away. No man saw it or knew it, nor did any awake, for they were all asleep, because a deep sleep from the Lord had fallen upon them.
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