Abishai

Saul was lying within the encampment while the army was encamped around him.

Then David said to Ahimelech the Hittite and to Joab's brother Abishai the son of Zeruiah, Who will go down with me into the camp to Saul? And Abishai said, I will go down with you.

So David and Abishai went to the army by night.

And there lay Saul, sleeping within the encampment, with his spear stuck in the ground at his head, and Abner and the army lay around him.

Then Abishai said to David, God has given your enemy into your hand this day.

Now please let me pin him to the earth with one stroke of the spear, and I will not strike him twice.

But David said to Abishai, Do not destroy him, for who can put out his hand against the Lord's anointed and be guiltless? And David said, As the Lord lives, the Lord will strike him, or his day will come to die, or he will go down into battle and perish.

The Lord forbid that I should put out my hand against the Lord's anointed.

And David numbered the people who were with him, and he set captains of thousands and captains of hundreds over them.

Then David sent out one third of the people under the hand of Joab, one third under the hand of Abishai, the son of Zeruiah, Joab's brother, and one third under the hand of Ittai the Gittite.

And the king said to the people, I also will surely go out with you myself.

But the people answered,

I will do.

So the king stood beside the gate and all the people went out by hundreds and by thousands.

Now the king had commanded Joab, Abishai and Ittai saying, deal gently for my sake with the young man Absalom.

So here again, we have Absalom.

or who holds a spindle, or who falls by the sword, or who lacks bread.

So Joab and Abishai his brother killed Abner, because he had put their brother Asahel to death in the battle at Gibeon.

Then David said to Joab and to all the people who were with him, Tear your clothes, and put on sackcloth, and mourn before Abner.

And King David followed the buyer.

And the battle was very fierce that day, and Abner and the men of Israel were beaten before the servants of David.

And the three sons of Zeruiah were there, Joab, Abishai, and Asahel.

Now Asahel was as swift of foot as a wild gazelle.

And Asahel pursued Abner, and as he went, he turned neither to the right hand nor to the left from following Abner.

Therefore Abner struck him in the stomach with the butt of his spear, so that the spear came out at his back, and he fell there and died where he was.

And all who came to the place where Asahel had fallen and died stood still.

But Joab and Abishai pursued Abner, and as the sun was going down they came to the hill of Amah, which lies before Giah on the way to the wilderness of Gibeon.

And the people of Benjamin gathered themselves together behind Abner and became one group and took their stand on the top of a hill.

And Ishbi Benab, one of the descendants of the giants, whose spear weighed three hundred shekels of bronze, and who was armed with a new sword, thought to kill David.

But Abishai, the son of Zariah, came to his aid and attacked the Philistine and killed him.

Then David's men swore to him, You shall no longer go out with us to battle, lest you quench the lamp of Israel.

After this, there was again war with the Philistines at Gob.

Shall I drink the blood of the men who went at the risk of their lives? Therefore he would not drink it.

These things the three mighty men did.

Now Abishai, the brother of Joab, the son of Zeruiah, was chief of the thirty, and he wielded his spear against three hundred men and killed them and won a name beside the three.

He was the most renowned of the thirty and became their commander, but he did not attain to the three.

But from those distressed, financially unstable, discontented people, there emerged this elite fighting squadron that we know later in Scripture as the mighty men.

It's men like Jashobeam who killed 800 people in one battle or Eliezer who stood in a barley field fighting until he could no longer hold his sword up or Abishai who took a spear and somehow killed 300 men in one battle or a guy by the name of Benaiah who chased a lion into a pit on a snowy day and killed it.

We read their names in 1 Samuel 23 and 1 Chronicles 11.

And in 1 Chronicles 11, 10, it specifically said these were David's chiefs.

to the Lord's anointed.

In chapter 26, when Abishai offers to end Saul's life because they come across Saul asleep with a spear by his head, he's like, I'll end it just with one spear thrust, I won't even need to do it twice, just one will do, you know? And it's like, you know, oh man, could have easily, David's answer...

It's almost like packing the whole theology of Psalm 27 into this answer where he says, as the Lord lives, the Lord will strike him, or his day will come to die and he'll go down into battle and perish.

The Lord forbid that I should put out my hand against the Lord's anointed.