1 Samuel 31
31
1And the Philistines are fighting against Israel, and the men of Israel flee from the face of the Philistines, and fall wounded in mount Gilboa,
2and the Philistines follow Saul and his sons, and the Philistines smite Jonathan, and Abinadab, and Malchishua, sons of Saul.
3And the battle is hard against Saul, and the archers find him — men with bow — and he is pained greatly by the archers;
4and Saul saith to the bearer of his weapons, ‘Draw thy sword, and pierce me with it, lest they come — these uncircumcised — and have pierced me, and rolled themselves on me;’ and the bearer of his weapons hath not been willing, for he is greatly afraid, and Saul taketh the sword, and falleth upon it.
5And the bearer of his weapons seeth that Saul [is] dead, and he falleth — he also — on his sword, and dieth with him;
6and Saul dieth, and three of his sons, and the bearer of his weapons, also all his men, on that day together.
7And they see — the men of Israel, who [are] beyond the valley, and who [are] beyond the Jordan — that the men of Israel have fled, and that Saul and his sons have died, and they forsake the cities and flee, and Philistines come in, and dwell in them.
8And it cometh to pass on the morrow, that the Philistines come to strip the wounded, and they find Saul and his three sons fallen on mount Gilboa,
9and they cut off his head, and strip off his weapons, and send into the land of the Philistines round about, to proclaim tidings [in] the house of their idols, and [among] the people;
10and they place his weapons [in] the house of Ashtaroth, and his body they have fixed on the wall of Beth-Shan.
11And they hear regarding it — the inhabitants of Jabesh-Gilead — that which the Philistines have done to Saul,
12and all the men of valour arise, and go all the night, and take the body of Saul, and the bodies of his sons, from the wall of Beth-Shan, and come in to Jabesh, and burn them there,
13and they take their bones, and bury [them] under the tamarisk in Jabesh, and fast seven days.
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1 Samuel 31: YLT98
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maintained by the British and Foreign Bible Society
1 Samuel 31
31
Saul and his sons die in battle against the Philistines
1Meanwhile, the Philistines were fighting Israel at Mount Gilboa. Israel's soldiers ran from the Philistines, and many of them were killed. 2The Philistines closed in on Saul and his sons, and they killed his sons Jonathan, Abinadab, and Malchishua. 3The fighting was fierce around Saul, and he was badly wounded by enemy arrows.
4Saul told the soldier who carried his weapons, “Kill me with your sword! I don't want those worthless Philistines to torture me and make fun of me.” But the soldier was afraid to kill him.
Saul then took out his own sword; he stuck the blade into his stomach, and fell on it. 5When the soldier knew that Saul was dead, he killed himself in the same way.
6Saul was dead, his three sons were dead, and the soldier who carried his weapons was dead. They and all his soldiers died on that same day. 7The Israelites on the other side of Jezreel Valley#31.7 Jezreel Valley: Hebrew “valley”. Shunem (see 28.4) and Gilboa (see verse 1) were across the Jezreel Valley from each other. and the other side of the Jordan learnt that Saul and his sons were dead. They saw that the Israelite army had run away. So they ran away too, and the Philistines moved into the towns the Israelites had left behind.
8The day after the battle, when the Philistines returned to the battlefield to take the weapons of the dead Israelite soldiers, they found Saul and his three sons lying dead on Mount Gilboa. 9-10The Philistines cut off Saul's head and pulled off his armour. Then they put his armour in the temple of the goddess Astarte, and they nailed his body to the city wall of Beth-Shan. They also sent messengers everywhere in Philistia to spread the good news in the temples of their idols and among their people.
11The people who lived in Jabesh in Gilead heard what the Philistines had done to Saul's body. 12So one night, some brave men from Jabesh went to Beth-Shan. They took down the bodies of Saul and his sons, then brought them back to Jabesh and burnt them. 13They buried the bones under a small tree in Jabesh, and for seven days, they went without eating to show their sorrow.
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