14. For we must certainly die, and we are as the waters spilled to the ground which cannot be gathered. God will not take a life but devises plans for a banished person not to be cast out from him.
15. Now I have come to speak this word to my lord the king, because the people made me afraid, and your servant thought, ‘I will speak to the king, perhaps the king will grant the request of his servant.
16. For the king will listen, to deliver his servant from the hand of the man who seeks to destroy me and my son together from the inheritance of God.’
17. Your servant also thought, ‘May the word of my lord the king bring rest, for as an angel of God, so is my lord the king, to sense what is good and what is bad.’ May Yahweh your God be with you.”
18. The king answered and said to the woman, “Please do not withhold from me a thing which I am about to ask you.” The woman said, “Please let my lord the king speak.”
19. The king asked, “Was the hand of Joab with you in all of this?” The woman answered and said, “As your soul lives, my lord the king, surely one cannot go to the right or to the left from all that my lord the king has spoken. Yes, your servant Joab himself commanded me, and he put all of these words in the mouth of your servant.
20. In order to change the situation, your servant Joab did this thing. But my lord has wisdom, as the wisdom of an angel of God, to know all that is on the earth.”
21. Then the king said to Joab, “Look, please, I will grant this thing. Go and bring back the young man Absalom.”
22. Joab fell with his face to the ground and did obeisance. And he blessed the king, and he said, “Today your servant knows that I have found favor in your eyes, my lord the king, in that the king has granted the request of his servant.”
23. Then Joab got up and went to Geshur and brought Absalom to Jerusalem.
24. The king said, “Let him go over to his house, and he may not see my face.” So Absalom went over to his house, and did not see the face of the king.
25. As far as Absalom, there was not a more handsome man in all of Israel to admire so much; from the sole of his foot up to his crown, there was no physical defect on him.
26. When he shaved his head, it would happen every year, which he did because it was heavy on him, he would shave it off and weigh the hair of his head: two hundred shekels by the king’s weight.
27. Three sons were born to Absalom and one daughter, whose name was Tamar. She was a woman beautiful of appearance.
28. Absalom lived in Jerusalem two full years, but he did not see the face of the king.
29. So Absalom sent for Joab, in order that he send him to the king, but he was not willing to go to him. He sent again a second time, but he was not willing to go.