Absalom answered Joab, “Behold, I sent word to you, ‘Come here, that I may send you to the king, to ask, “Why have I come from Geshur? It would be better for me to be there still.” Now therefore let me go into the presence of the king; and if there is guilt in me, let him kill me.’ ”
For your servant vowed a vow while I dwelt at Geshur in Aram, saying, ‘If the Lord will indeed bring me back to Jerusalem, then I will offer worship to the Lord.’ ”
Joab said, “I will not waste time like this with you.” And he took three darts in his hand, and thrust them into the heart of Absalom, while he was still alive in the oak.
Now Absalom in his lifetime had taken and set up for himself the pillar which is in the King's Valley, for he said, “I have no son to keep my name in remembrance”; he called the pillar after his own name, and it is called Absalom's monument to this day.
And the king was deeply moved, and went up to the chamber over the gate, and wept; and as he went, he said, “O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom! Would I had died instead of you, O Absalom, my son, my son!”
Now Adonijah the son of Haggith exalted himself, saying, “I will be king”; and he prepared for himself chariots and horsemen, and fifty men to run before him.
His father had never at any time displeased him by asking, “Why have you done thus and so?” He was also a very handsome man; and he was born next after Absalom.
King Solomon answered his mother, “And why do you ask Abishag the Shunammite for Adonijah? Ask for him the kingdom also; for he is my elder brother, and on his side are Abiathar the priest and Joab the son of Zeruiah.”
These are the sons of David that were born to him in Hebron: the first-born Amnon, by Ahino-am the Jezreelitess; the second Daniel, by Abigail the Carmelitess,