2 Samuel 18:6-8

The battle between David’s and Absalom’s armies 18:6-8

The location of the forest of Ephraim is unknown, but it was probably in Gilead (cf. Judges 12:1-5). [Note: Cf. LaMoine DeVries, "The Forest of Ephraim," Biblical Illustrator 10:1 (1983):82-85.] As early as the Judges period, so many Ephraimites had settled in Gilead that the western Ephraimites called the Gileadites "fugitives of Ephraim" (Judges 12:4). [Note: George Adam Smith, The Historical Geography of the Holy Land, p. 335, n. 2.] How the forest devoured more of Absalom’s men than David’s soldiers did (2 Samuel 18:8) is not clear, but that it did suggests that Yahweh assisted David’s men by using the forest somehow to give him the victory.