Lyrics · 2 Samuel
Barefoot over the Brook Kidron
2 Samuel 15:13-17:29
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About this song
This song belongs to the 2 Samuel collection. One recording is available to play here, with the complete lyrics below.
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Named in this songDavidAbsalomJerusalemJordan
About the passage
2 Samuel 15: Hearts won at the gate, a king driven toward the wilderness
Absalom does not seize Jerusalem first; he works on Israel's imagination at the gate. He gives every petitioner the same flattering verdict, laments the justice they supposedly cannot reach, and turns personal warmth into political capital until the book says he has "stole the hearts" of Israel. David answers the resulting revolt by leaving Jerusalem rather than making the city absorb the first blow. The flight strips kingship down to loyalties that cannot be staged. Ittai, the recent foreign arrival, refuses permission to leave. David sends the ark back instead of carrying it as proof that God must restore him. He then prays that Ahithophel's counsel be defeated, and Hushai appears at the summit as a practical answer taking human form. By the time Absalom enters Jerusalem, David's crown is absent from the city, but his network of faithfulness is already inside it.
Study 2 Samuel 15 in depth2 Samuel 16: Gifts, curses, and counsel on a conquered roof
David's road out of Jerusalem is crowded with claims he cannot immediately verify. Ziba arrives with food, transport, and an accusation against the absent Mephibosheth, and David transfers the estate before hearing the other side. Shimei then pelts the king with stones and supplies his own theology of the crisis, calling it repayment for Saul's blood. David does not certify that explanation, but neither does he let Abishai answer the insult with a severed head. Inside Jerusalem, Hushai survives Absalom's suspicion by speaking in language that can be heard more than one way. Then Ahithophel gives counsel designed to make reconciliation publicly impossible: Absalom takes David's concubines on the palace roof. The act fulfills the shape of Nathan's earlier warning without becoming morally approved by it. The occupied palace now displays both political calculation and the human cost imposed on women who are treated as instruments of power.
Study 2 Samuel 16 in depth2 Samuel 17: The dangerous counsel loses, and the fugitives cross
Ahithophel understands David's weakest moment with frightening clarity: strike tonight, while the fugitives are exhausted, scatter the company, and kill the king. Hushai cannot merely offer a different tactic. He must make delay sound more impressive than urgency, so he fills Absalom's imagination with enraged warriors, all Israel gathered like sand, and a campaign led personally by the new claimant. The Book of 2 Samuel states why the persuasion succeeds: the LORD has appointed the defeat of Ahithophel's effective counsel. Yet divine purpose moves through a very human chain. Priests relay the plan, a young woman carries word, messengers hide in a well, and a household conceals them long enough for David's people to cross Jordan before dawn. Ahithophel dies after his counsel is rejected. At Mahanaim, the chapter ends not with grand strategy but with beds, grain, beans, honey, butter, sheep, and cheese for people who are hungry, weary, and thirsty.
Study 2 Samuel 17 in depth


