Catholic Public Domain Version

2 Samuel 4:6-12 Catholic Public Domain Version (CPDV)

6. Then they entered the house secretly, taking the ears of grain. And Rechab and his brother Baanah stabbed him in the groin, and they fled away.

7. For when they had entered the house, he was sleeping on his bed in a closed room. And striking him, they killed him. And taking his head, they departed by the way of the desert, walking throughout the night.

8. And they brought the head of Ishbosheth to David in Hebron. And they said to the king: "Behold, the head of Ishbosheth, the son of Saul, your enemy, who was seeking your life. And so, the Lord has avenged my lord the king, this day, from Saul and from his offspring."

9. But David, responding to Rechab and his brother Baanah, the sons of Rimmon the Beerothite, said to them: "As the Lord lives who has rescued my soul from all distress,

10. the one who reported to me and said, 'Saul is dead,' who was thinking that he announced good news, I apprehended. And at Ziklag I killed him who ought to have been given a reward for the news.

11. How much more so now, when impious men have put to death an innocent man in his own house, upon his bed, shall I not require his blood from your hand, and take you away from the earth?"

12. And so, David commanded his servants, and they put them to death. And cutting off their hands and feet, they suspended them up over the pool in Hebron. But the head of Ishbosheth they took and buried in the sepulcher of Abner at Hebron.