¹Then it came to pass, as David and his men were going to Ziklag on the third day, that the Amalekites invaded the south and Ziklag, and they attacked Ziklag and burned it with fire. ²And they took the women who were in it captive, both small and great. They did not kill anyone, but they drove them along as they went their way. ³And David and his men came to the city, and what they saw was that it had been burned with fire, and their women and their sons and their daughters had been taken captive. ⁴And David and the people who were with him raised their voices and wept until they didn't have any strength to weep. ⁵Now David's two wives had been taken captive, Ahinoam the Jezreelitess and Abigail who had been the wife of Nabal the Carmelite, ⁶and David was very distressed, for the people intended to stone him, for all the people were inwardly bitter – each man about his son and about his daughters – but David gathered strength through the Lord his God. ⁷And David said to Abiathar the priest, the son of Ahimelech, “Please bring the ephod up to me”, and Abiathar brought the ephod up to David. ⁸And David inquired of the Lord and said, “Should I pursue this troop? Will I catch up with them?” And he said to him, “Pursue, for you will certainly catch up with them and certainly bring deliverance.” ⁹So David and the six hundred men who were with him set out and came to the Besor stream, whereas the rest stayed behind. ¹⁰And David was in pursuit, he and four hundred men, whereas two hundred men who had become too exhausted to cross the Besor stream stayed behind. ¹¹And they found an Egyptian man in the field, and they took him to David, and they gave him bread, and he ate, and they gave him water to drink. ¹²And they gave him a slice of a cake of dried figs and two raisin cakes, and he ate, and his spirit returned to him, for he had not eaten bread and he had not drunk water for three days and three nights. ¹³And David said to him, “To whom do you belong? And where are you from?” And he said, “I am an Egyptian youth, the servant of an Amalekite man, but my master left me, because I became sick three days ago. ¹⁴We raided the south of the Cherethites' territory, and Judah's territory, and the south of Caleb's territory, and we burned Ziklag with fire.” ¹⁵And David said to him, “Will you lead me down to this troop?” And he said, “Swear to me by God that you definitely will not kill me, and that you definitely will not deliver me up into the hand of my master, and I will lead you down to this troop.” ¹⁶So he led him down, and he saw that there were people scattered over the whole expanse of the land, eating and drinking and celebrating all the great spoil which they had taken from the land of the Philistines and from the land of Judah. ¹⁷And David attacked them from dawn to evening the day after, and no-one escaped from them except four hundred young men who rode on camels and fled. ¹⁸So David recovered everything that the Amalekites had taken, and David recovered his two wives. ¹⁹And no-one whether small or great was missing from them, neither sons nor daughters, nor any spoil, nor anything which they had taken away. David recovered everything. ²⁰And David took all the sheep and oxen. They drove them in front of the other livestock, and they said, “This is David's spoil.” ²¹Then David went to the two hundred men who had become too exhausted to follow David, whom they had stationed at the Besor stream. And they went out to meet David and to meet the people with him, and David approached the people and asked them how they were. ²²And every evil or good-for-nothing man from the men who went with David answered and said, “Since they did not go with me, we will not give them any of the spoil which we have recovered, except for each man's wife and his sons, for them to take away and depart.” ²³But David said, “You shall not do this, my brothers, with what the Lord has given us, for he protected us, and he delivered the troop which came against us into our hands. ²⁴And who will heed you in this matter? For the share of him who went down to battle will be as the share of him who stayed with the equipment. They will share it out together.” ²⁵And it came to pass from that day on that he made it a statute and a regulation for Israel, as it is up to this day. ²⁶Then David came to Ziklag, and he sent some of the spoil to the elders of Judah, to his neighbour, and he said, “Here is a gift for you from the spoil of the Lord's enemies.” ²⁷He sent it to those in Beth-El, and to those in Ramoth of the south, and to those in Jattir, ²⁸and to those in Aroer, and to those in Siphmoth, and to those in Eshtemoa, ²⁹and to those in Rachal, and to those in the cities of the Jerahmeelites, and to those in the cities of the Kenites, ³⁰and to those in Hormah, and to those in Bor-Ashan, and to those in Athach, ³¹and to those in Hebron, and to all the places which David frequented – he and his men.