Before the king - i. e., “to meet the king.” Compare 2 Samuel 20:8. The king was on the east bank, and they crossed over (by the ford) from the west bank to go to him.
Related Commentaries of 2 Samuel 19:17
2 Samuel 19:17
17 And there were a thousand men of Benjamin with him, and Ziba the servant of the house of Saul, and his fifteen sons and his twenty servants with him; and they went over Jordan before the king.