⁴The woman from Tekoa went to the king. She bowed down with her face toward the ground. She did it to show him respect. She said, “King David, please help me!”

⁵The king asked her, “What’s bothering you?”

She said, “I’m a widow. My husband is dead. ⁶I had two sons. They got into a fight with each other in the field. No one was there to separate them. One of my sons struck the other one down and killed him.

⁷“Now my whole family group has risen up against me. They say, ‘Hand over the one who struck his brother down. Then we can put him to death for killing his brother. That will also get rid of the one who will receive the family property.’ They want to kill the only living son I have left, just as someone would put out a burning coal. That would leave my husband without any son on the face of the earth to carry on his name.”

⁸The king said to the woman, “Go home. I’ll give an order to make sure you are taken care of.”

⁹But the woman from Tekoa said to him, “You are my king and master. No matter what you do, I and my family will take the blame for it. You and your royal family won’t be guilty of doing anything wrong.”

¹⁰The king replied, “If people give you any trouble, bring them to me. They won’t bother you again.”

¹¹She said, “Please pray to the Lord your God. Pray that he will keep our nearest male relative from killing my other son. Then my son won’t be destroyed.”

“You can be sure that the Lord lives,” the king said. “And you can be just as sure that not one hair of your son’s head will fall to the ground.”

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