1 Samuel 25
1 Samuel died, and all Israel gathered to mourn for him and bury him at his home in Ramah. David got up and went down to the wilderness of Paran.
2 There was a man in Maon whose business was in Carmel. He was a very wealthy man: he had three thousand sheep and a thousand goats, and he was shearing his sheep in Carmel.
3 The man's name was Nabal, and his wife's name was Abigail. She was sensible and beautiful, but he was harsh and mean in his dealings; he was a Calebite.
4 In the wilderness, David heard that Nabal was shearing his sheep.
5 David sent ten young men and said to them, “Go up to Carmel, visit Nabal, and ask him how he is, in my name.
6 Say this: ‘Long life to you! Peace to you, peace to your household, and peace to everything that is yours!
7 Now I hear that you have shearers. Your shepherds have been with us; we did not mistreat them, and nothing of theirs was missing throughout the time they were in Carmel.
8 Ask your young men, and they will tell you. May these young men find favor in your eyes, because we have come on a feast day. Please give your servants and your son David whatever you can spare.’”
9 David's young men went and spoke to Nabal in David's name, saying all these things, and then waited.
10 Nabal answered David's servants, “Who is David? And who is the son of Jesse? These days there are many servants who run away from their masters.
11 Should I take my bread, my water, and the meat I slaughtered for my shearers, and give them to men whose origins I don't even know?”
12 David's young men turned back on their way, returned, and came to him. They told him all these things.
13 David said to his men, “Each of you strap on your sword!” Each man strapped on his sword, and David strapped on his too. About four hundred men went up after David, while two hundred stayed with the baggage.
14 One of the young men told Abigail, Nabal's wife: “David sent messengers from the wilderness to greet our master, but he shouted at them.
15 Those men were very good to us. We were not mistreated, and nothing of ours was missing throughout all the days we went about with them while we were out in the fields.
16 They were a wall around us, by night and by day, all the days we were with them tending the sheep.
17 Now understand and see what you can do, because disaster is already decided against our master and all his household. He is such a worthless man that no one can speak to him.”
18 Abigail hurried and took two hundred loaves of bread, two skins of wine, five sheep already prepared, five measures of roasted grain, a hundred clusters of raisins, and two hundred cakes of figs, and loaded them onto donkeys.
19 She said to her young men, “Go on ahead of me; I will follow you.” But she did not tell her husband Nabal.
20 As she rode her donkey down a hidden path on the mountain, David and his men were coming down toward her, and she met them.
21 David had said, “It was useless for me to guard everything this man had in the wilderness, so that nothing of his was missing. He has repaid me evil for good.
22 May God do so to David's enemies, and more besides, if by morning I leave alive even one man of all that belongs to him.”
23 When Abigail saw David, she quickly got down from her donkey, fell facedown before David, and bowed to the ground.
24 She fell at his feet and said, “My lord, let the guilt fall on me! Please let your servant speak in your hearing, and listen to the words of your servant.
25 Please, my lord, pay no attention to that worthless man, Nabal, for he is just like his name: Nabal is his name, and foolishness goes with him. I, your servant, did not see the young men my lord sent.
26 Now, my lord, as surely as the LORD lives and as you live, the LORD has kept you from bloodshed and from taking justice into your own hands. May your enemies and those who seek to harm my lord be like Nabal.
27 Now let this gift that your servant has brought to my lord be given to the young men who follow my lord.
28 Please forgive your servant's offense, for the LORD will certainly establish a lasting house for my lord, because my lord fights the LORD's battles. May no evil be found in you throughout all your days.
29 If anyone rises up to pursue you and seek your life, the life of my lord will be bound in the bundle of the living with the LORD your God. But the lives of your enemies he will sling away, as from the hollow of a sling.
30 When the LORD does for my lord all the good he has promised concerning you, and appoints you leader over Israel,
31 you will have no cause for stumbling or remorse in your heart, my lord, for having shed blood without cause or taken justice into your own hands. When the LORD has dealt well with my lord, remember your servant.”
32 David said to Abigail, “Blessed be the LORD, the God of Israel, who sent you to meet me today!
33 Blessed be your good judgment, and blessed are you, who have kept me today from bloodshed and from taking justice into my own hands.
34 “But as surely as the LORD, the God of Israel, lives—the one who kept me from harming you—if you had not hurried to meet me, by morning not one man would have been left alive in Nabal's household.”
35 David accepted from her what she had brought him and said to her, “Go up to your home in peace. See, I have listened to you and granted your request.”
36 Abigail returned to Nabal, and there he was, holding a feast in his house fit for a king. Nabal's heart was merry, and he was very drunk. So she told him nothing, great or small, until morning.
37 In the morning, when the wine had worn off, his wife told him these things. His heart failed within him, and he became like a stone.
38 About ten days later, the LORD struck Nabal, and he died.
39 When David heard that Nabal had died, he said, “Blessed be the LORD, who has defended my cause against the insult I suffered at Nabal's hand and kept his servant from doing evil. The LORD has brought Nabal's wickedness down on his own head.” David sent word to Abigail, asking her to become his wife.
40 David's servants went to Abigail at Carmel and spoke to her: “David has sent us to you to take you as his wife.”
41 She rose, bowed facedown to the ground, and said, “Here is your servant, ready to be a slave and wash the feet of my lord's servants.”
42 Abigail hurried and got up, mounted her donkey, and went with five young women attending her. She followed David's messengers and became his wife.
43 David had also taken Ahinoam of Jezreel, and both women became his wives.
44 Saul had given his daughter Michal, David's wife, to Palti son of Laish, who was from Gallim.
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