Famine and the Gibeonites' Demand; Saul's Descendants Executed
21
Chapter 21
1There was a famine in the days of David for three years, year after year, and David sought the face of the LORD. And the LORD said, "It is on account of Saul and the house of blood, because he put the Gibeonites to death."2And the king called the Gibeonites and said to them, "The Gibeonites are not from the sons of Israel; rather, they are remnants of the Amorites, and the sons of Israel swore to them, and Saul sought to exterminate them in his zeal for the sons of Israel and Judah."3David said to the Gibeonites, "What shall I do for you? And with what shall I make atonement, that you will bless the inheritance of the LORD?"4And the Gibeonites said to him, "We have no silver or gold with Saul or with his house, and we have no man to put to death in Israel." And he said, "What are you saying? What will I do for you?"5And they said to the king, "The men who consumed us and planned to destroy us from remaining anywhere in the territory of Israel—6Let seven of his sons be given to us, and we will impale them to the LORD at Gibeah of Saul, the one chosen by the LORD. And the king said, "I will give them."7And the king spared Mephibosheth son of Jonathan son of Saul on account of the oath of the LORD which was between them, between David and Jonathan son of Saul.8And the king took the two sons of Rizpah daughter of Aiah, whom she bore to Saul—Armoni and Mephibosheth—and the five sons of Michal daughter of Saul, whom she bore to Adriel son of Barzillai the Meholathite.9And he gave them into the hand of the Gibeonites, and they impaled them on the mountain before the LORD. And the seven of them fell together and died in the days of harvest, in the beginning of barley harvest.10And Rizpah daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and stretched it out for herself on the rock from the beginning of the harvest until water poured on them from the heavens. And she did not allow the birds of the heavens to rest on them by day or the beasts of the field by night.11And David was told what Rizpah daughter of Aiah, Saul's concubine, had done.12And David went and took the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son from the lords of Jabesh-gilead, who stole them from the square of Beth-shan, where the Philistines had hung them there on the day the Philistines struck Saul at Gilboa.13He brought up from there the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son, and they gathered the bones of the hanged ones.14They buried the bones of Saul and Jonathan his son in the land of Benjamin at Zela, in the grave of Kish his father. And they did all that the king had commanded, and God relented for the land after that.