Week 82, Day 3: Absalom is killed
Today’s Reading: 2 Samuel 18:1-33
Some thoughts from today’s reading…
We are not told how many men Absalom had in his army verses how many men David had in his. Absalom’s army is defeated and flees before David’s. We are told that the forest where they fought devoured more men than did the sword. This is interesting to me because I wonder what about the forest killed the men. Wild beast had been sent against God’s enemies before and will be in the future. Perhaps something abou the terrain inside the forest was so dangerous as well. 20,000 fell of Absalom’s army. So this was a pretty large battle.
We had been told in chapter 14 about Absalom’s hair. He cut his hair once a year because it had grown so much as to be heavy on him. This information now bears more in our understanding for we see Absalom getting caught in a tree. I can imagine him riding quickly to try to escape the slaughter and going through a thick part of the forest. And then he finds himself in a most embarrasing situation. Here is the man who was trying to be king, stuck in a tree by his hair. I have wondered at times whether Absalom didn’t carry some kind of weapon to try and cut himself free. But this situation becomes his doom as Joab kills him there.
Question: Was Joab right by disobeying the king and going ahead and killing Absalom?
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