First Kings 2:13-27

¹³Then Adonijah son of Haggith came to Bathsheba the mother of Solomon. She said, “Do you come peacefully?” He replied, “Peacefully.”

¹⁴Then he said, “I have something to say to you.” So she replied, “Speak.”

¹⁵Adonijah said, “You know that the kingdom was mine, and that all Israel expected me to be king. But things changed, and the kingdom was given to my brother, for it was his from Yahweh.

¹⁶Now I have one request of you, and do not turn away from my face.” Bathsheba said to him, “Speak.”

¹⁷He said, “Please speak to Solomon the king, for he will not turn away from your face, so that he may give me Abishag the Shunammite as my wife.”

¹⁸Bathsheba said, “Very well, I will speak to the king.”

¹⁹Bathsheba therefore went to King Solomon to speak to him for Adonijah. The king rose to meet her and bowed down to her. Then he sat down on his throne and had a throne brought for the king's mother. She sat at his right hand.

²⁰Then she said, “I wish to ask one small request of you, for you will not turn away from my face.” The king answered her, “Ask, my mother, for I will not turn away from your face.”

²¹She said, “Let Abishag the Shunammite be given to Adonijah your brother as his wife.”

²²King Solomon answered and said to his mother, “Why do you ask Abishag the Shunammite for Adonijah? Why do you not ask the kingdom for him also, for he is my elder brother—for him, for Abiathar the priest, and for Joab son of Zeruiah?”

²³Then King Solomon swore by Yahweh, saying, “May God do so to me, and more also, if Adonijah has not spoken this word against his own life.

²⁴Now therefore as Yahweh lives, who has established me and set me on the throne of David my father, and who has made me a house as he promised, surely Adonijah will be put to death today.”

²⁵So King Solomon sent Benaiah son of Jehoiada, and Benaiah found Adonijah and put him to death.

²⁶Then to Abiathar the priest the king said, “Go to Anathoth, to your own fields. You are worthy of death, but I will not at this time put you to death, because you carried the ark of the Lord Yahweh before David my father and suffered in every way my father suffered.”

²⁷So Solomon dismissed Abiathar from being priest to Yahweh, that he might fulfill the word of Yahweh, which he had spoken concerning the house of Eli at Shiloh.