7. The forces of Israel were defeated by David’s servants, and the casualties there that day were heavy—twenty thousand men.
8. The battle spread out over that entire region, and the forest consumed more combatants that day than did the sword.
9. Absalom unexpectedly came up against David’s servants. He was mounted on a mule, and, as the mule passed under the branches of a large oak tree, his hair caught fast in the tree. He hung between heaven and earth while the mule under him kept going.
10. Someone saw this and reported to Joab, “I saw Absalom hanging from an oak tree.”
11. Joab said to the man who told him this: “If you saw him, why did you not strike him to the ground on the spot? Then it would have been my duty to give you fifty pieces of silver and a belt.”
12. But the man replied to Joab: “Even if I already held a thousand pieces of silver in my two hands, I would not lay a hand on the king’s son, for in our hearing the king gave you and Abishai and Ittai a command: ‘Protect the youth Absalom for my sake.’
13. Had I been disloyal and killed him, it would all have come out before the king, and you would stand aloof.”