# 1 Kings 2

> Lumin Translation

Source: https://www.lumin.faith/read/1-kings/2

Lumin’s own translation, drafted with AI from the Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek, checked verse by verse against them, and approved by Lumin. Brackets mark verses not found in the earliest manuscripts.

How it was made: https://www.lumin.faith/lumin-translation.md

1. When the time drew near for David to die, he gave these instructions to his son Solomon:
2. “I am going the way of all the earth. So be strong, and prove yourself a man.
3. Keep the charge of Yahweh your God by walking in his ways and keeping his statutes, his commandments, his ordinances, and his decrees, as it is written in the law of Moses, so that you may succeed in all you do and wherever you turn,
4. and so that Yahweh may carry out the promise he made about me: ‘If your sons watch how they live, walking before me faithfully with all their heart and with all their soul, you will never fail to have a man on the throne of Israel.’
5. You yourself also know what Joab son of Zeruiah did to me—what he did to the two commanders of the armies of Israel, Abner son of Ner and Amasa son of Jether. He killed them, shedding the blood of war in peacetime, and he stained the belt around his waist and the sandals on his feet with the blood of war.
6. So act according to your wisdom, but do not let his gray head go down to Sheol in peace.
7. But show kindness to the sons of Barzillai the Gileadite, and let them be among those who eat at your table, for they stood by me in the same way when I fled from your brother Absalom.
8. Remember too that you have with you Shimei son of Gera, the Benjaminite from Bahurim. He cursed me with a bitter curse on the day I went to Mahanaim. But when he came down to meet me at the Jordan, I swore to him by Yahweh, ‘I will not put you to death with the sword.’
9. Now do not hold him guiltless, for you are a wise man. You will know what to do to him, and you will bring his gray head down to Sheol with blood.”
10. Then David rested with his ancestors and was buried in the City of David.
11. David reigned over Israel for forty years. He reigned seven years in Hebron and thirty-three years in Jerusalem.
12. So Solomon sat on the throne of his father David, and his kingdom was firmly established.
13. Now Adonijah son of Haggith came to Bathsheba, Solomon’s mother. She asked, “Do you come in peace?” He answered, “In peace.”
14. Then he said, “I have something to say to you.” She said, “Speak.”
15. He said, “You know that the kingdom was mine, and all Israel looked to me to be king. But the kingdom has turned around and gone to my brother, for it came to him from Yahweh.
16. Now I have one request to ask of you. Do not turn me down.” She said to him, “Speak.”
17. He said, “Please ask King Solomon—he will not turn you down—to give me Abishag the Shunammite as my wife.”
18. Bathsheba said, “Very well. I will speak to the king for you.”
19. So Bathsheba went to King Solomon to speak to him for Adonijah. The king rose to meet her and bowed down to her. Then he sat down on his throne and had a throne set for the king’s mother, and she sat at his right hand.
20. She said, “I have one small request to ask of you. Do not turn me down.” The king said to her, “Ask, my mother, for I will not turn you down.”
21. She said, “Let Abishag the Shunammite be given to your brother Adonijah as his wife.”
22. King Solomon answered his mother, “Why are you asking for Abishag the Shunammite for Adonijah? You might as well ask for the kingdom for him, since he is my older brother—for him, and for Abiathar the priest, and for Joab son of Zeruiah!”
23. Then King Solomon swore by Yahweh, “May God deal with me severely, and more so, if Adonijah has not made this request at the cost of his life!
24. Now, as surely as Yahweh lives, who has established me and seated me on the throne of my father David, and who has made me a dynasty as he promised, Adonijah will be put to death today!”
25. So King Solomon sent Benaiah son of Jehoiada, and he struck him down, and he died.
26. To Abiathar the priest the king said, “Go to Anathoth, to your fields, for you deserve to die. But I will not put you to death today, because you carried the ark of the Lord Yahweh before my father David, and because you shared in all the hardships my father endured.”
27. So Solomon removed Abiathar from being priest to Yahweh, fulfilling the word Yahweh had spoken at Shiloh concerning the house of Eli.
28. When the news reached Joab—for Joab had sided with Adonijah, though he had not sided with Absalom—Joab fled to the tent of Yahweh and took hold of the horns of the altar.
29. King Solomon was told, “Joab has fled to the tent of Yahweh, and he is there beside the altar.” Then Solomon sent Benaiah son of Jehoiada, saying, “Go, strike him down.”
30. Benaiah came to the tent of Yahweh and said to him, “This is what the king says: ‘Come out!’” But he said, “No, I will die here.” So Benaiah brought word back to the king: “This is what Joab said, and this is how he answered me.”
31. The king said to him, “Do as he has said. Strike him down and bury him, and so remove from me and from my father’s house the guilt for the blood that Joab shed without cause.
32. Yahweh will bring his blood back on his own head, because he struck down two men more righteous and better than he was and killed them with the sword, without my father David knowing it—Abner son of Ner, commander of the army of Israel, and Amasa son of Jether, commander of the army of Judah.
33. So their blood will come back on the head of Joab and on the head of his descendants forever. But for David and his descendants, for his house and his throne, there will be peace from Yahweh forever.”
34. So Benaiah son of Jehoiada went up, struck him down, and killed him. He was buried at his own home in the wilderness.
35. The king put Benaiah son of Jehoiada over the army in his place, and the king put Zadok the priest in the place of Abiathar.
36. Then the king sent for Shimei and said to him, “Build yourself a house in Jerusalem and live there. Do not go out from there anywhere at all.
37. On the day you go out and cross the Kidron Valley, know for certain that you will surely die. Your blood will be on your own head.”
38. Shimei said to the king, “What you say is good. Your servant will do just as my lord the king has said.” So Shimei lived in Jerusalem for a long time.
39. But at the end of three years, two of Shimei’s slaves ran away to Achish son of Maacah, king of Gath. When Shimei was told, “Your slaves are in Gath,”
40. Shimei got up, saddled his donkey, and went to Achish at Gath to look for his slaves. So Shimei went and brought his slaves back from Gath.
41. When Solomon was told that Shimei had gone from Jerusalem to Gath and had come back,
42. the king sent for Shimei and said to him, “Did I not make you swear by Yahweh and solemnly warn you, ‘On the day you go out and go anywhere at all, know for certain that you will surely die’? And you said to me, ‘What you say is good. I will obey.’
43. Why then have you not kept your oath to Yahweh and the command I gave you?”
44. The king also said to Shimei, “You know in your heart all the evil you did to my father David. So Yahweh will bring your evil back on your own head.
45. But King Solomon will be blessed, and the throne of David will be established before Yahweh forever.”
46. Then the king gave orders to Benaiah son of Jehoiada, and he went out and struck Shimei down, and he died. So the kingdom was firmly established in Solomon’s hand.

## Nearby chapters

[1 Kings 1](https://www.lumin.faith/read/1-kings/1.md)
[1 Kings 3](https://www.lumin.faith/read/1-kings/3.md)

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