10. When a certain man saw it, he told Joab and said, "Behold, I saw Absalom hanging in an oak."
11. Then Joab said to the man who had told him, "Now behold, you saw him! Why then did you not strike him there to the ground? And I would have given you ten pieces of silver and a belt."
12. The man said to Joab, "Even if I should receive a thousand pieces of silver in my hand, I would not put out my hand against the king's son; for in our hearing the king charged you and Abishai and Ittai, saying, 'Protect for me the young man Absalom!'
13. Otherwise, if I had dealt treacherously against his life (and there is nothing hidden from the king), then you yourself would have stood aloof."
14. Then Joab said, "I will not waste time here with you." So he took three spears in his hand and thrust them through the heart of Absalom while he was yet alive in the midst of the oak.
15. And ten young men who carried Joab's armor gathered around and struck Absalom and killed him.
16. Then Joab blew the trumpet, and the people returned from pursuing Israel, for Joab restrained the people.
17. They took Absalom and cast him into a deep pit in the forest and erected over him a very great heap of stones. And all Israel fled, each to his tent.
18. Now Absalom in his lifetime had taken and set up for himself a pillar which is in the King's Valley, for he said, "I have no son to preserve my name." So he named the pillar after his own name, and it is called Absalom's Monument to this day.
19. Then Ahimaaz the son of Zadok said, "Please let me run and bring the king news that the Lord has freed him from the hand of his enemies."
20. But Joab said to him, "You are not the man to carry news this day, but you shall carry news another day; however, you shall carry no news today because the king's son is dead."