1 Samuel 31
31
Saul Takes His Own Life
1The Philistines fought against the Israelites. The Israelites ran away from them. But many Israelites were killed on Mount Gilboa. 2The Philistines kept chasing Saul and his sons. They killed his sons Jonathan, Abinadab and Malki-Shua. 3The fighting was heavy around Saul. Men who were armed with bows and arrows caught up with him. They shot their arrows at him and wounded him badly.
4Saul spoke to the man carrying his armor. He said, “Pull out your sword. Stick it through me. If you don’t, these fellows who aren’t circumcised will come. They’ll stick their swords through me and hurt me badly.”
But the man was terrified. He wouldn’t do it. So Saul took his own sword and fell on it. 5The man saw that Saul was dead. So he fell on his own sword and died with him. 6Saul and his three sons died together that same day. The man who carried his armor also died with them that day. So did all of Saul’s men.
7The Israelites who lived along the valley saw that their army had run away. So did those who lived across the Jordan River. They saw that Saul and his sons were dead. So they left their towns and ran away. Then the Philistines came and made their homes in them.
8The day after the Philistines had won the battle, they came to take what they wanted from the dead bodies. They found Saul and his three sons dead on Mount Gilboa. 9So they cut off Saul’s head. They took his armor from his body. Then they sent messengers through the whole land of the Philistines. They announced the news in the temple where they had set up statues of their gods. They also announced it among their people. 10They put Saul’s armor in the temple where they had set up statues of female gods that were named Ashtoreth. They hung his body up on the wall of Beth Shan.
11The people of Jabesh Gilead heard about what the Philistines had done to Saul. 12So all their brave men marched through the night to Beth Shan. They took down the bodies of Saul and his sons from the wall of Beth Shan. They brought them to Jabesh. There they burned them. 13Then they got the bones of Saul and his sons and buried them under a tamarisk tree at Jabesh. They didn’t eat anything for seven days.
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1 Samuel 31: NIrV
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Holy Bible, New International Reader’s Version®, NIrV®
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1 Samuel 31
31
The Death of Saul
(1 Chronicles 10:1–14)
1When the Philistines were fighting against Israel, the men of Israel fled from the Philistines and were killed in battle on Mount Gilboa. 2The Philistines caught up to Saul and his sons. They killed Jonathan, Abinadab, and Malchishua, Saul’s sons. 3The heaviest fighting was against Saul. When the archers got him in their range, he was badly wounded by them.
4Saul told his armorbearer, “Draw your sword! Stab me, or these godless men will come, stab me, and make fun of me.” But his armorbearer refused because he was terrified. So Saul took the sword and fell on it. 5When the armorbearer saw that Saul was dead, he also fell on his sword and died with him. 6So Saul, his three sons, his armorbearer, and all his men died together that day.
7When the people of Israel on the other side of the valley and across the Jordan River saw that the men of Israel had fled and that Saul and his sons were dead, they abandoned their cities. So the Philistines came to live in these cities.
8The next day, when the Philistines came to strip the dead, they found Saul and his three sons lying on Mount Gilboa. 9They cut off his head and stripped off his armor. Then they sent men throughout Philistine territory to tell the people this good news in their idols’ temples. 10They put his armor in the temple of their goddesses—the Asherahs—and fastened his corpse to the wall of Beth Shan.
11When the people living in Jabesh Gilead heard what the Philistines had done to Saul, 12all the fighting men marched all night and took the dead bodies of Saul and his sons from the wall of Beth Shan. They came back to Jabesh and burned the bodies there. 13They took the bones and buried them under the tamarisk tree in Jabesh. Then they fasted seven days.
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