Misinterpretations often treat this as a biblical endorsement of genocidal tactics or total war, detached from its context as Ahithophel's failed human plot against David—which God sovereignly overturned—leading some to wrongly apply it as divine strategy for modern conflicts or to overlook how it exemplifies the peril of counsel opposing God's anointed, rather than a timeless principle of conquest.
II Samuel 17:12
King James Version (1769)
12 So shall we come upon him in some place where he shall be found, and we will light upon him as the dew falleth on the ground: and of him and of all the men that are with him there shall not be left so much as one.
This verse captures Ahithophel's strategic counsel to Absalom, vividly illustrating the proposed overwhelming assault on David and his forces as inescapable and total, like dew that blankets every inch of the ground at dawn, ensuring no survivors among them and underscoring the counselor's confidence in a swift, comprehensive victory through numerical superiority.