¹⁶ They marched out at noon while Ben-hadad and the thirty-two kings^(A) who were helping him were getting drunk in their quarters. ¹⁷ The young men of the provincial leaders marched out first. Then Ben-hadad sent out scouts, and they reported to him, saying, “Men are marching out of Samaria.”^(B)

¹⁸ So he said, “If they have marched out in peace,^(C) take them alive, and if they have marched out for battle, take them alive.”

¹⁹ The young men of the provincial leaders and the army behind them marched out from the city, ²⁰ and each one struck down his opponent.^(D) So the Arameans fled and Israel pursued them,^(E) but King Ben-hadad of Aram escaped on a horse with the cavalry. ²¹ Then the king of Israel marched out and attacked the cavalry and the chariots. He inflicted a severe slaughter on Aram.

⁴ They drank the wine and praised their gods made of gold and silver, bronze, iron, wood, and stone.^(A)

The Handwriting on the Wall

⁵ At that moment the fingers of a man’s hand appeared and began writing on the plaster of the king’s palace wall next to the lampstand. As the king watched the hand^[a] that was writing, ⁶ his face turned pale,^[b] and his thoughts so terrified him that he soiled himself^[c] and his knees knocked together.

³⁰ That very night Belshazzar the king of the Chaldeans was killed,