Chapter 18

David's men march out to do battle with Absalom's men.  David asks them to be gentle with Absalom.  I think he means to capture Absalom but not to kill him.  Everyone hears David make this request.  Battle is joined, and 20,000 men die.  This is civil war.  There is this verse:

8 The battle spread over the face of all the country, and the forest devoured more people that day than the sword. [2Sa 18:8 ESV]  I am not sure what this means.  It must have been a pretty terrifying forest...or a pretty terrible place to have a pitched battle.  MSB indicates it was a very dense forest, but that doesn't really explain it.

Absalom is spotted by David's men and flees on his donkey.  His hair is caught in tree branches, and he is hanging there, helpless.  Joab is informed.

Joab puts three javelins into Absalom.  Seems he makes sure none of these is a mortal wound.  They were just to cause Absalom pain.  Then Joab's 10 armor bearers surround Absalom and kill him.  It says they struck him, so this could have been done with clubs or some other kind of painful, drawn out death.  A bad end by any reckoning.  (MSB says the javelins of Joab killed Absalom, and the armor bearers hit Absalom to make sure he was dead.  So it was Joab that disobeyed the king.)  Then Joab recalls his men, stopping the battle.  Absalom's body is thrown into a pit and covered with stones.  This symbolized that a criminal or enemy was buried there. 

Two runners from Joab go to inform David.  Joab doesn't want the second to go, because Absalom is dead and the King will surely ask.  But he finally consents.  The second runner, Joab's son?, gets there first.  He tells David the battle is won, but feigns ignorance as to Absalom's fate.  The second runner tells David the battle is won AND that Absalom is dead.  David weeps bitterly for his son.  I don't know why he would, but that's what it says.  David even says he'd have preferred to die instead of Absalom.

All these events - David leaving Jerusalem, Absalom entering, the blessing of Ziba and the cursing of Shimei, and the battle of David and Absalom's armies - seem to be in a pretty compressed time period.  I somehow had the idea this was dragged out over years, but now it seems like only days.  Absalom waited two years before killing his brother, hid for three years from David, came home for like 5 years gaining allies and plotting against David, and then a very short time period after he acted, he died.  Our prayers can be like that.  Seems we pray them forever, and never see any progress, and then in a day sometimes, all is answered.