2 Samuel 18:9-18

⁹ Absalom happened to meet the servants of David. Absalom was riding on his mule, and the mule went under the thick boughs of a great oak, and his head caught hold of the oak, and he was taken up between the sky and earth; and the mule that was under him went on. ¹⁰ A certain man saw it, and told Joab, and said, “Behold, I saw Absalom hanging in an oak.” ¹¹ Joab said to the man who told him, “Behold, you saw it, and why didn’t you strike him there to the ground? I would have given you ten pieces of silver, and a sash.” ¹² The man said to Joab, “Though I should receive a thousand pieces of silver in my hand, I still wouldn’t put forth my hand against the king’s son; for in our hearing the king commanded you and Abishai and Ittai, saying, ‘Beware that none touch the young man Absalom.’ ¹³ Otherwise if I had dealt falsely against his life (and there is no matter hidden from the king), then you yourself would have set yourself against me.” ¹⁴ Then Joab said, “I’n not going to wait like this with you.” He took three darts in his hand, and thrust them through the heart of Absalom, while he was yet alive in the midst of the oak. ¹⁵ Ten young men who bore Joab’s armor surrounded and struck Absalom, and killed him. ¹⁶ Joab blew the trumpet, and the people returned from pursuing after Israel; for Joab held back the people. ¹⁷ They took Absalom, and cast him into the great pit in the forest, and raised over him a very great heap of stones. Then all Israel fled everyone to his tent. ¹⁸ Now Absalom in his lifetime had taken and reared up for himself the pillar, which is in the king’s dale; for he said, “I have no son to keep my name in memory.” He called the pillar after his own name; and it is called Absalom’s monument, to this day.