1 Samuel / David Recovers His Family and Defeats the Amalekites

David Recovers His Family and Defeats the Amalekites

1 Samuel 30:1-31

Chapter 30

¹ And it happened when David and his men came to Ziklag on the third day, that the Amalekites had raided the Negeb and Ziklag and struck Ziklag and burned it with fire. ² And they returned the women who were in it, from small to great; they did not put any man to death, and they led them away and went on their way. ³ And David and his men came to the city, and behold, it was burned with fire, and their wives and their sons and their daughters had been taken captive. ⁴ And David and the people who were with him lifted up their voices and wept until they had no more strength to weep. ⁵ And David's two wives were taken captive: Ahinoam the Jezreelite and Abigail the wife of Nabal the Carmelite. ⁶ It was very tight for David, for the people said to stone him, for the nephesh of all the people had rebelled, man over his sons and over his daughters. David strengthened himself in the LORD his God. ⁷ David said to Abiathar the priest, son of Ahimelech, "Please bring the ephod to me." Abiathar brought the ephod to David. ⁸ David asked the LORD, saying, "Shall I pursue after this band? Will I overtake them?" He said to him, "Pursue, for you will surely overtake and you will surely rescue." ⁹ And David went, he and the six hundred men who were with him, and they came to the Brook of Besor, where the rest stayed behind. ¹⁰ And David pursued—he and four hundred men—and two hundred men stood still, who were exhausted from crossing the Besor Ravine. ¹¹ They found an Egyptian man in the field. They took him to David, gave him bread, and he ate. They made him drink water. ¹² They gave him a piece of pressed fig cake and two clusters of raisins, and he ate. His spirit returned to him, for he had not eaten bread or drunk water for three days and three nights. ¹³ David said to him, "Who are you, and where are you from?" He said, "I am an Egyptian youth, servant to an Amalekite man, and my lord abandoned me because I became ill three days ago." ¹⁴ We raided the Negeb of the Kerethites and the land belonging to Judah and the Negeb of Caleb, and we burned Ziklag with fire. ¹⁵ And David said to him, the Egyptian, to this band, and he said, "You have sworn to me by God, if you kill me or if you deliver me into the hand of my lord, and I will guide you to this band." ¹⁶ And he led him down, and there were the raiding parties spread out over the face of all the land, eating and drinking and celebrating because of all the great spoil they had taken from the land of the Philistines and from the land of Judah. ¹⁷ And David struck them from the twilight until the evening of the next day, and no man escaped from them except four hundred young men who rode on the camels and fled. ¹⁸ And David rescued all that the Amalekites had taken, and David rescued his two wives. ¹⁹ Nothing was missing, from small to great, sons and daughters, booty, or anything else they had taken. David recovered everything. ²⁰ David took all the sheep and cattle. They drove them ahead of the other livestock and said, "This is David's spoil." ²¹ And David came to the two hundred men who had become exhausted and unable to follow David, and whom he had left at the Brook of Besor. And they went out to meet David and the people who were with him. And David greeted the people and asked them how they were. ²² And every wicked and worthless man from the men who had gone with David answered and said, “Because they did not go with us, he shall not give to them from the spoil that we rescued, except each man his wife and his sons, that they may lead them away and go.” ²³ And David said, "You must not do so, my brothers. What the LORD has given us, and he has kept us safe and given the band that came against us into our hand." ²⁴ And who will listen to you in this matter? For as the share of the one who went down into the battle, and as the share of the one who stayed by the supplies, they will divide it together. ²⁵ And it was so from that day forward, and he made it a statute and an ordinance for Israel to this day. ²⁶ David came to Ziklag and sent from the spoil to the elders of Judah, to his friends, saying, "Behold, a blessing for you from the spoil of the LORD's enemies." ²⁷ To those in Bethel, those in Ramoth of the Negeb, and those in Jattir. ²⁸ and to the one in Aroer and to the one in Shaphamoth and to the one in Eshtemoa ²⁹ to those in Racal, to those in the cities of the Jerahmeelites, and to those in the cities of the Kenites. ³⁰ and to those in Hormah, and to those in Bor-ashan, and to those in Athach. ³¹ And to those in Hebron and to all the places where David and his men had roamed.