There was a famine in the days of David for three years, year after year; and David sought the face of Yahweh. Yahweh said, “It is for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he put the Gibeonites to death.”
The king called the Gibeonites, and said to them (now the Gibeonites were not of the children of Israel, but of the remnant of the Amorites, and the children of Israel had sworn to them; and Saul sought to kill them in his zeal for the children of Israel and Judah);
and David said to the Gibeonites, “What should I do for you? And with what should I make atonement, that you may bless Yahweh’s inheritance?”
The Gibeonites said to him, “It is no matter of silver or gold between us and Saul, or his house; neither is it for us to put any man to death in Israel.”
He said, “Whatever you say, that I will do for you.”
They said to the king, “The man who consumed us, and who devised against us, that we should be destroyed from remaining in any of the borders of Israel,
let seven men of his sons be delivered to us, and we will hang them up to Yahweh in Gibeah of Saul, the chosen of Yahweh.”
The king said, “I will give them.”
But the king spared Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan the son of Saul, because of Yahweh’s oath that was between them, between David and Jonathan the son of Saul.
But the king took the two sons of Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, whom she bore to Saul, Armoni and Mephibosheth; and the five sons of Michal the daughter of Saul, whom she bore to Adriel the son of Barzillai the Meholathite.
He delivered them into the hands of the Gibeonites, and they hanged them on the mountain before Yahweh, and all seven of them fell together. They were put to death in the days of harvest, in the first days, at the beginning of barley harvest.
Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for herself on the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water poured on them from the sky. She allowed neither the birds of the sky to rest on them by day, nor the animals of the field by night.
David was told what Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, the concubine of Saul, had done.
2 SAMUEL 21:1-11
David delivers Saul's sons to the Gibeonites
See the humility of the young king as Solomon asks God for wisdom rather than wealth to rule his people justly.
DAVID
979 views · Last view: 24 hrs ago
See the humility of the young king as Solomon asks God for wisdom rather than wealth to rule his people justly.
DAVID
979 views · Last view: 24 hrs ago
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Saul
DAVID
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Who was Saul?Saul was a monarch of ancient Israel and Judah and, according to the Hebrew Bible and Old Testament, the first king of the United Monarchy. His reign, traditionally placed in the late eleventh century BC, marked the transition of the Israelites from a scattered tribal society ruled by various judges to organized statehood. The historicity of Saul and the United Kingdom of Israel is not universally accepted, as what is known of both comes largely from the Hebrew Bible. According to the text, he was anointed as king of the Israelites by Samuel, and reigned from Gibeah. Saul is said to have committed suicide when he fell on his sword during a battle with the Philistines at Mount Gilboa, in which three of his sons were also killed. Saul's son Ish-bosheth succeeded him to the throne, reigning for only two years before being murdered by his own military leaders. Saul's son-in-law David then became king.
