1 Samuel

30* And when David and his men came to Siklag on the third day, the ʽAmalekites had raided the South and Siklag, and had sacked Siklag and burned it down, 2* and carried off the women and everybody in it, great and small; they did not kill anybody; and they herded them up and went on their way. 3 And David and his men came to the city and found it burned down and their wives and children carried off; 4 and David and the people he had with him raised their voices and wept till there was no longer any power to weep in them. 5 And David’s two wives were carried off, Ahinoʽam the Jezreʽelite and Abigail the widow of Nabal the Carmelite.

6 And David was in a very hard case, because the people were proposing to stone him, because all the people were furious over their children. But David took courage in his God Jehovah. 7* And David said to Priest Abiathar the son of Ahimelec “Bring the ephod for me.” 8 And David put the question to Jehovah “Shall I pursue these raiders? should I catch them?” and he said to him “Do: catch you shall and rescue you shall.” 9* And David went, he and six hundred men who were with him, and they came to Besor Arroyo; and he left two hundred men there, 10* and he pressed on the pursuit, he and four hundred men; and two hundred men stayed, who were too dead to cross Besor Arroyo.

11 And they found an Egyptian out on the range and took him to David, and gave him food, which he ate, and water to drink; 12* and they gave him a cake of figs and two or three clusters of raisins, and he ate and his spirit came back to him—for he had not eaten food nor drunk water for three days and three nights. 13 And David said to him “Whom do you belong to, and where are you from?” and he said “I am an Egyptian boy, slave to an ʽAmalekite man, and my master left me behind because I was taken sick three days ago. 14 We had raided the Cretan South and the Judahite and the Calebite, and Siklag we had burned down.” 15 And David said to him “Will you take me down to these raiders?” and he said “Swear to me by God that you will not put me to death nor give me up to my master, and I will take you down to these raiders.” 16 And so he did; and they found them all over the ground at random, eating and drinking and holidaying with all the immense booty that they had taken from the Philistine country and the country of Judah. 17 And David killed them from twilight to dark and gave no quarter: not a man of them escaped except four hundred young men who mounted camels and made off. 18 And David rescued everything that the ʽAmalekites had taken; and David rescued his two wives; 19* and nothing of theirs was gone, from the smallest thing to the greatest and to sons and daughters, and from booty to everything that had been taken from them: David recovered everything. 20 And he took all the sheep and cows, and they drove them before him and said “This is David’s booty.”

21 And David came to the two hundred men that had been too dead to follow David, and whom he had had stay at Besor Arroyo; and they came out to meet David and the people he had with him, and came up to the people and asked how they had got on. 22 And all the good-for-nothing reprobates among the men who had gone with David answered “Since they did not go with us, we will not give them any of the booty we have recovered except each man’s wife and children: they may take that drove along and go.” 23 But David said “You shall not do so, brothers, with what Jehovah has given to us and kept us safe and given into our hands the raiders that had come against us. 24 And who would listen to you on this proposition? for the share of the one who goes down to the fight is equal to the share of the one who stays with the things: they are to share together.” 25 And thenceforth he made it a usage and a law for Israel to this day.

26 And David, coming to Siklag, sent parts of the booty to his friends the elders of Judah, with the message “Here is a token for you out of the booty from Jehovah’s enemies”: 27 to those in Bethul and those in Ramoth-Negeb and those in Jattir 28 and those in ʽArʽarah and those in Siphmoth and those in Eshtemoaʽ 29* and those in Racal and those in the Jerahmeelite cities and those in the Cainite cities 30 and those in Hormah and those in BorʽAshan and those in ʽAthac 31 and those in Hebron and to all the places where David had roved, he and his men.