²On the third day a man came from Saul’s camp. His clothes were torn, and he had dirt on his head. When he came to David, he immediately bowed down with his face touching the ground.

³“Where did you come from?” David asked him.

“I escaped from the camp of Israel,” he answered.

⁴“What happened?” David asked him. “Please tell me.”

The man answered, “The army fled from the battle, and many of the soldiers died. Saul and his son Jonathan are dead too.”

⁵“How do you know Saul and his son Jonathan are dead?” David asked the young man who had brought him the news.

⁶The young man answered, “I happened to be on Mount Gilboa. Saul was there leaning on his spear, and the chariots and horsemen were catching up with him. ⁷When he looked back and saw me, he called to me, and I said, ‘Yes?’ ”

⁸“He asked me, ‘Who are you?’

“I said to him, ‘I’m an Amalekite.’

⁹“He said to me, ‘Please stand over me and kill me. I’m alive, but I’m suffering.’

¹⁰“So I stood over him and killed him, since I knew he couldn’t survive after he had been wounded. And I took the crown that was on his head and the band that was on his arm and brought them here to you, sir.”

¹¹Then David grabbed his own clothes and tore them ⸤in grief⸥. All the men with him did the same. ¹²They mourned, cried, and fasted until evening because Saul, his son Jonathan, the Lord’s army, and the nation of Israel had been defeated in battle.

¹³David asked the young man who had brought him the news, “Where are you from?”

And the young man answered, “I’m an Amalekite, the son of a foreign resident.”

¹⁴David asked, “Why weren’t you afraid to take it upon yourself to destroy the Lord’s anointed king?” ¹⁵Then David called one of ⸤his⸥ young men and told him, “Come here and attack him.” David’s young man executed him

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