The king said to him, “Do as he has said, strike him down and bury him, and thus take away from me and my father’s house the guilt for the blood Joab shed without cause.
Moreover, Manasseh shed innocent blood very much, until he had filled Jerusalem from one end to the other; besides his sin he caused Judah to sin by doing evil in the sight of the Lord.
Their feet run to evil, and they make haste to shed innocent blood; their thoughts are thoughts of iniquity; devastation and destruction are in their paths.
Egypt will become a desolation, and Edom a desolate wasteland, because of the violence done to the people of Judah— they shed innocent blood in their land.
Then they cried to the Lord and said, “Please, Lord, do not let us perish for this man’s life, and do not make us guilty for innocent blood, for You, Lord, have done as it pleased You.”
So you will not defile the land which you are in, because blood defiles the land, and the land cannot be cleansed of the blood that is shed in it, except by the blood of him that shed it.
Furthermore, the Lord was angry with me because of you and swore that I should not cross over the Jordan, and that I would not go into that good land which the Lord your God is giving you for an inheritance.
For he took his life in his hand and struck down the Philistine, and the Lord made a great salvation for all Israel. You saw it and rejoiced. Now why then would you sin against innocent blood, to kill David without cause?”