Then said Joab, I may not tarry thus with thee. And 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.
Ver. 14. And thrust them through the heart of Absalom.] In which execution of this arch-rebel, contrary to David's charge, whether Joab did well or ill, the doctors are divided. I think he did well for the main; though he might have some mixed motives in it. Absalom was incorrigible, a great murderer, and a parricide, whom though he had now escaped, yet vengeance would not have suffered long to have lived. Selymus, the great Turk, struck with a most loathsome and incurable disease, ended his days at Chiurbus with an untimely and tormenting death, where he had joined battle with his own father, Bajazet, A.D. 1511; God in the same place with revenging hand taking just punishment for his detestable disloyalty towards his aged father. a
a Turk. Hist.