These people have been defeated and robbed. They are trapped in pits or locked up in prison. Like robbers, enemies have taken them away, and there is no one to save them. Enemies carried them off, and no one said, “Bring them back.”
Now the well where he had thrown all the bodies had been made by King Asa as a part of his defenses against Baasha king of Israel. But Ishmael son of Nethaniah put dead bodies in it until it was full.
“Say to them: ‘This is what the Lord God says: As surely as I live, those who are among the city ruins in Israel will be killed in war. I will cause those who live in the country to be eaten by wild animals. People hiding in the strongholds and caves will die of disease.
When the men of Ai looked back, they saw smoke rising from their city. At the same time the Israelites stopped running and turned against the men of Ai, who could not escape in any direction.
When both Jonathan and his officer let the Philistines see them, the Philistines said, “Look! The Hebrews are crawling out of the holes they were hiding in!”
When all the Israelites hidden in the mountains of Ephraim heard that the Philistine soldiers were running away, they also joined the battle and chased the Philistines.
The people from Ziph went to Saul at Gibeah and told him, “David is hiding in our land. He’s at the hideouts of Horesh, on the hill of Hakilah, south of Jeshimon.
Saul came to the sheep pens beside the road. A cave was there, and he went in to relieve himself. Now David and his men were hiding far back in the cave.
When the Israelites who lived across the Jezreel Valley and those who lived across the Jordan River saw how the Israelite army had run away, and that Saul and his sons were dead, they left their cities and ran away. Then the Philistines came and lived there.
The Philistines heard the Israelites were meeting at Mizpah, so the Philistine kings came up to attack them. When the Israelites heard they were coming, they were afraid.