Ephraim, Wood of

The Wood of Ephraim was the forested terrain in Transjordan where the decisive battle was fought between the forces of David and the army of Absalom during the civil war of Absalom's rebellion. Despite its name suggesting an Ephraimite connection—perhaps a forest named after an ancient settlement or battle involving Ephraim—the wood lay east of the Jordan in the territory of Gilead, in the vicinity of Mahanaim where David had established his temporary capital.

The battle in the wood of Ephraim was catastrophic for Absalom's forces: twenty thousand were slain, and the forest consumed more men than the sword, as soldiers fled into the dense woodland and were swallowed by it. It was there that Absalom's hair caught in the branches of an oak as his mule passed beneath, leaving him hanging helpless until Joab killed him against David's explicit orders. The wood thus became the unlikely instrument of the rebellion's end and the occasion of David's anguished lament for his son.