And there was a famine in the days of David three years, year after year; and David inquired of Jehovah. And Jehovah said, It is for Saul, and for [his] house of blood, because he slew the Gibeonites.
Three years of famine pass before David asks the Lord why. The answer reaches back into the previous reign: the land is suffering for blood Saul shed. So why did God wait, and why did He care so much about a small group of foreigners who had once tricked Israel?
One bad year was not enough. Three years of it drove David to ask God for the cause, and the answer cleared David's own house at the same time.
The famine rages for three straight years: blow upon blow falls on the congregation of God. This trial brings David's conscience to search out the cause. He inquired of the Lord. This was his only resource, and God answered him at once: the famine was for Saul, and for his house of blood, because he killed the Gibeonites. His house of blood! Once a man of Saul's house chased a humbled David and shouted after him, calling him a man of blood. God kept a record of those insults. Now the time had come for Him to say what He thought of that insult: God calls Saul's house "bloody," and clears the house of David.
(Older translations say "house of blood"; the ESV says "bloodguilt on Saul and on his house.")
The famine ran year after year before David sought the Lord. One writer weighs what that delay reveals.
After the famine had returned year after year, for three years, David inquired of the Lord. Why did he not inquire in the first year? It is evidence of the low spiritual state that prevailed at that time.
Saul committed the crime, yet the famine struck long after his death, under a different king. One commentator explains the timing: God wanted a king who would ask Him, and a people who would own a wrong they had let pass unconfessed.
If the blow had fallen in the days of Saul, no one would have inquired of the Lord like this. Here was a king who felt for the honour of Jehovah. Suppose David had felt the sin, the people had confessed it, and they had cleared Jehovah's name over it. Then the famine might not have come on them as it did. Granted, neither David nor the people were responsible for the acts of the guilty man. But they were responsible to feel and confess the wrong. King Saul did it publicly in Israel. Had they mourned the deed as staining Jehovah's glory? There is no sign of any such confession.
The Gibeonites had won their place in Israel by deception. Israel had still sworn to spare them, and God defends that oath.
What a solemn lesson! God will not allow anyone to wrong the people He loves — and He will not allow anyone to wrong even the enemies who deceived them. "The righteous Jehovah loves righteousness." His dealing with Israel over the oath given to the Gibeonites is the clearest proof of how carefully and how firmly God holds to righteousness. Everyone can understand how He must feel about Israel or about David. But God was jealous over a wrong done to the Gibeonites, in such circumstances, and so long ago. To my mind that is a most healthy lesson about the God we have to do with. In truth the question was not who His name was pledged to, but that His name was sworn.
Saul killed the Gibeonites out of zeal for Israel. One writer draws a line between two kinds of zeal.
Saul's zeal was formal and merely human. It was zeal for God, yet he did not act in the fear of God. That is what marks off godly zeal from zeal for the outward interests of His kingdom. Saul forgets the oaths that Israel made to the Gibeonites. God remembers, and does not despise the poor Gibeonites.
Israel made peace with Gibeon long before Saul, and made it without asking God. One writer traces the famine back to that one omission.
Act faithfully, and the Lord will add more light at every faithful step. Only we must take counsel of the Lord at every step. Peace with Gibeon only robs us of victory and brings other wars and troubles on us. The presence of what is not of God always opens the door to Satan. We may not feel this much while the soul is strong; but when there is decline, then the evil and its results show up. In the days of David the famine came, because Saul had killed the Gibeonites. All this came from the small act of not taking counsel with God.
- Famine speaks. Three years of blows on the nation drove David's conscience to search out the cause.
- Delay exposes. David only asked in the third year, which showed how low the spiritual state had sunk.
- Timing teaches. The blow fell in David's reign, not Saul's. God wanted a king who would inquire of Him, and a people who would own the wrong they had let pass.
- God remembers. An oath sworn in His name to deceivers still bound Israel, and He was jealous over that old wrong.
- Zeal misleads. Saul's energy was for Israel's interests, not in the fear of God. And the whole story began with a peace made without taking counsel of the Lord.
And the king called the Gibeonites, and spoke to them. (Now the Gibeonites were not of the children of Israel, but of the remainder of the Amorites; and the children of Israel had sworn to them; and Saul sought to smite them in his zeal for the children of Israel and Judah.)
A famine in David's reign has its cause buried in the past. Israel had once sworn to spare the Gibeonites, Saul tried to wipe them out anyway, and God's own name was at stake.
The story starts generations earlier, in the days of Joshua. One writer sets out the background:
Joshua and the elders of Israel had allowed the Gibeonites to live in the land, though they were Amorites. They had deceived Joshua into thinking they came from another territory, and Joshua swore by the Lord when he made a treaty with them (Joshua 9). Once this was done, it could not be changed. But Saul was zealous for Israel and Judah, and decided he could kill off these people who were not Israelites. This was not zeal for God, because it meant breaking an oath of God. God delayed the punishment, but Israel still had to feel the responsibility for it when the famine came.
The oath came at a cost to the Gibeonites. They kept their lives but lost their freedom, and became woodcutters and water carriers for the house of God (Morrish Bible Dictionary). When the king now calls them in, one writer says what the meeting had to settle: "their consciences must be satisfied, their hearts comforted and at rest over the wrong done to them" (William Kelly).
The verse gives Saul a motive that sounds admirable: he acted for Israel and Judah. Commentators accept the motive and still condemn the zeal.
Saul's zeal was formal and merely human. It was zeal for God, yet he did not act in the fear of God. That is what marks off godly zeal from zeal for the outward interests of His kingdom. Saul forgets the oaths Israel made to the Gibeonites. God remembers it, and does not despise the poor Gibeonites.
That zeal is not ancient history. One writer traces it from Saul to another Saul in the New Testament, and then to us:
Saul was still full of "zeal for the people of Israel and Judah" (v. 2). Sadly, that zeal was tied far too closely to hatred against the Lord's anointed. Saul of Tarsus was also full of zeal, and it made him a persecutor of Christ in His church. In our days we also may be zealous for our own nation or for our church without God having any part in the matter.
The verse is careful to say these people were outsiders, not Israelites. That detail does not excuse Saul. It sharpens the point.
The Spirit of God deliberately points to their origin and race. They were "of the remnant of the Amorites"… Zeal for the people of God is an excellent thing, is it not? But zeal only for God's people, or zeal for God Himself in name only, can never sanctify disrespect to His name. That holds even if His name was pledged to His worst enemies only because they used trickery. For in truth the question was not who received the pledge. It was His own name, sworn to them.
The same writer sees here a lesson about God's own character: He "will not allow wrong to be done to the people He loves — or even to the enemies who deceived them" (William Kelly).
The pledge was old. Saul's crime was old too. The chastening came anyway, long after.
A long time had passed since the name of Jehovah was pledged. But does God ever forget? A long time had also passed since Saul did the bloody deed, and still no chastening came from Jehovah. The chastening did not follow until much later. Such patience puts souls to the test.
David did not kill the Gibeonites. Neither did most of the people who went hungry. Yet the famine falls on the whole nation:
So a deed of the past reign is charged against the present, the deed of a former king laid on the whole people of Israel. As the people of God they were responsible. They had allowed the wrong, they may even have profited from it, and at the very least they had gone on without admitting it or repenting of it.
Commentators differ on what David did next. One praises him for keeping the oath he had sworn to Jonathan while he satisfied the Gibeonites (William Kelly). Another faults him for asking the Lord the cause of the famine, then asking the Gibeonites for the cure (Numerical Bible Notes).
- Oath. Joshua's leaders swore by the Lord to spare the Gibeonites. Nothing could undo that pledge.
- Zeal. Saul's motive was zeal for Israel and Judah. Zeal for God's people never excuses dishonouring His name.
- Name. The wrong was not about who the Gibeonites were. It was about whose name stood behind the promise.
- Delay. God's silence was patience, not forgetfulness. The reckoning fell in David's reign, not Saul's.
- Responsibility. A whole nation felt the famine because it had lived with an unconfessed wrong done in its name.
And David said to the Gibeonites, What shall I do for you? and with what shall I make atonement, that ye may bless the inheritance of Jehovah?
Commentary for this verse has not been generated yet.
And the Gibeonites said to him, As to Saul and his house, it is with us no question of receiving silver or gold, neither is it for us to have any man put to death in Israel. And he said, What ye say will I do for you.
Three years of famine drove David to ask the Lord why, and the answer pointed back to Saul's killing of the Gibeonites. Israel had sworn by God's name to spare them, and now the king asks the wronged people how to put it right.
The Gibeonites were not Israelites. Saul attacked them out of zeal for his own people.
There is no disguise about the people in question. The Gibeonites were not of the children of Israel. The Spirit of God deliberately calls our attention to their origin and race. They were part of the remnant of the Amorites. Israel had sworn an oath to them, and Saul sought to kill them in his zeal for the people of Israel and Judah. An excellent thing, is it not — zeal for the people of God? But zeal only for God's people, or in name only for God Himself, can never make it right to treat His name with contempt. That stays true even if His name had been pledged to His worst enemies through trickery. For in truth it was not a question of those to whom the name was pledged, but of His name that was sworn. If Jehovah's name was given as a shield to anyone, Jehovah would be the unswerving and most righteous guardian of its sanctity.
The Gibeonites' refusal of silver and gold matches a rule already written into Israel's law.
When David inquired of the Lord he learned the reason for the famine, and quickly found the way to stop it. The execution of Saul's children and grandchildren by the Gibeonites atoned for that king's breaking faith with the Hivites and killing them, and God answered prayer for the land. This was a special case. Yet it fits exactly with the law's provision for cleansing the land from blood when people knew who the murderer was. In such circumstances there could be no atonement for the land except by the blood of the one who shed it. (Num. 35:33.)
The Gibeonites wanted no payment, and no right to execute anyone. What they did ask for is the surprising part.
At least the Gibeonites were not greedy for gain, unlike many present-day lawyers who sue for millions of dollars over matters like this. But neither did they ask for the death of those who had actually killed the men of Gibeon. David promised to do whatever they asked before he knew what it would be.
David had just taken his question to God. His next question went somewhere else.
But here again David seems sadly to forget the privilege he has just used. He turned to the Lord to learn the cause of the judgment. Now he turns to the Gibeonites to learn the method of atonement. Surely that was not, after all, the first thing to consider. Putting himself into the hands of the wronged Gibeonites was not really the way to put it right. Was there then no law in Israel that would apply to such a case? And if there were none, how much more did they need to seek help from the highest Wisdom in a matter so exceptional as this?
David let the Gibeonites set the terms. The ESV reads his words here as a question; older translations read them as a promise — "What you shall say, that I will do for you."
Instead of that he makes an absolute promise: "What you shall say, that I will do for you." Then they demand seven of Saul's sons, to hang them up to Jehovah in Gibeah. He still answers, "I will give them." There is no sign of any fresh appeal to God in the matter. And indeed he needed no such appeal to refuse what the Gibeonites asked. Israel's law book had already said it plainly: "Fathers shall not be put to death because of their children, nor shall children be put to death because of their fathers. Each one shall be put to death for his own sin." (Deut. 24:16.)
One oath bound David to the Gibeonites. Another oath bound him to Jonathan's family.
We must look carefully to this, and we shall always find God with us in it. We should never sacrifice one duty while doing another... And so if we find the Gibeonites' oath from Jehovah on one side, there was no less the oath to Jonathan, Saul's son, and his seed on the other. No doubt a hasty spirit would have sacrificed one for the other; the wisdom of God enables us to maintain both.
- Oath. God's name, once pledged, guarded a foreign people who had tricked Israel. Saul's zeal for his own nation did not cancel it.
- Blood. Silver and gold could not clear the land. The law knew one cleansing for shed blood: the blood of the one who shed it.
- Question. David asked the Lord for the cause, then asked the injured party for the cure — and put himself into their hands.
- Promise. David promised before he heard the terms. Back came a demand the written law had already refused.
- Wisdom. Two oaths stood at once. God's wisdom keeps both instead of sacrificing one for the other.
And they said to the king, The man that consumed us, and that devised against us that we should be destroyed from remaining in all the borders of Israel,
Three years of famine drove David to ask the Lord what was wrong, and the answer pointed to a crime by the previous king. Now the people Saul wronged speak for themselves, and the question is what justice should look like.
The speakers here are not Israelites. Their history goes back to a treaty won by a lie, and to a killing Israel forgot.
They deceived Joshua into making a treaty with them, and so they became woodcutters and water carriers for the house of God. Saul later killed some of the Gibeonites, at a time Scripture does not record. It seems the crime was passed over and forgotten. But God could not let His people break their oath, so He brought a famine on the land.
Saul had a motive that sounded admirable. He was acting for Israel's good. The problem was what he set aside to do it.
An excellent thing, is it not — zeal for the people of God? But zeal for God's people, or zeal for God Himself in name only, can never make it right to disrespect His name. That stays true even if His worst enemies won that pledge by trickery. The real issue was not who received the pledge. It was His name, sworn in this way. If anyone received the Lord's name as a shield, the Lord would guard its holiness without wavering and in perfect righteousness.
Saul was dead and the crime was old. Neither fact changed God's view of it, and the famine's timing had its own purpose.
Time makes no difference, any more than place, in the things of God. What He looks to is His name... The chastening fell not in the days of Saul, but in those of David. Why? Because God wants everyone to ask Him. He will train His people in their shared and ongoing responsibility. He will make us feel and judge our forgetfulness of heart, our failure to look to Him.
The nation had not committed Saul's crime, but it had shrugged at it. That silence was its own failure.
Someone else did the evil, and he himself was guilty. True, neither David nor the people were responsible for his acts, but they were responsible to feel and confess the wrong. King Saul did it openly in Israel. Had they mourned the deed as tarnishing the Lord's glory?
Notice whose grievance God acted on. These were not His chosen people, and their claim rested on a lie.
What a solemn lesson! God will not allow any wrong against the people He loves — and He will not allow it even against the enemies who deceived them. "The righteous Lord loves righteousness." Could you ask for clearer proof of how carefully and how firmly God holds to righteousness? Look at how He dealt with Israel over the oath given to the Gibeonites.
The Gibeonites name the offender in this verse, then ask for seven of his descendants. That request cut across God's written law.
Their demand, though piously worded, was not according to the law of God. Children were not to be put to death for the sins of their fathers (Deuteronomy 24:16). Saul was the guilty one and he had died. Only the Lord could say how to make atonement for the broken covenant and the blood guilt. David, not asking direction from Him, but turning to the Gibeonites, had failed again.
Notice what the request leaves out. Nobody asks who in Saul's family shed the blood.
True, "the land cannot be cleansed of the blood shed in it, except by the blood of the one who shed it." But "the blood of the one who shed it" means the very opposite of the blood of his descendants... The Gibeonites demanded "seven of Saul's sons" — no matter which ones. David looks around and picks from among them.
One name is left off the list. David had sworn an oath to Jonathan, and he kept it while settling the debt of another oath.
If we find the Gibeonites' oath from the Lord on one side, there was no less the oath to Jonathan, Saul's son, and his offspring on the other. No doubt a hasty spirit would have sacrificed the one for the other; the wisdom of God enables us to maintain both.
- Name — Saul's crime was more than cruelty to foreigners. It treated the Lord's pledged name as worthless. God guards that name wherever His people pledge it.
- Delay — Years of silence were not forgetfulness. God waited so that a later generation would ask Him and take the wrong seriously.
- Share — Israel did not commit the crime, yet shared the famine. No one had mourned a public sin that dishonoured God.
- Reach — God's righteousness covered deceivers and outsiders too. That is the clearest proof of how far it goes.
- Limit — The demand for seven descendants did not match God's written law. Saul was the guilty one, and he had died. David still kept his oath to Jonathan, which shows what honouring an oath looks like.
let seven men of his sons be given up to us, and we will hang them up to Jehovah in Gibeah of Saul, the chosen of Jehovah. And the king said, I will give [them].
David asked the Gibeonites to name their price, and this verse is their answer: seven of Saul's sons, hanged "before the LORD" at Saul's own hometown. A broken oath and three years of famine lie behind the demand — but did God ask for this, or only allow it?
Saul's crime was old, and Saul himself was dead. One writer points to two long delays: the promise was ancient, and the punishment came long after the crime.
It was a long time since the name of Jehovah was pledged; but does God ever forget? Second, Saul had done the bloody deed long before, and still no chastening had come from Jehovah. The chastening came only much later. Such patience tests souls thoroughly. The chastening fell not in the days of Saul, but in those of David. Why? Because God will have all to inquire of Him.
The Gibeonites were not Israelites. They had won their treaty by a trick, and Saul killed them out of zeal for his own nation.
They were "of the remnant of the Amorites" — and you know what the Amorites were. An excellent thing, is it not — zeal for the people of God? But zeal only for God's people, or zeal that is for God in name only, can never make disrespect to His name holy. That holds even if His worst enemies won that pledge by a trick. For in truth the question was not who received the pledge. It was His name that was sworn this way. If Jehovah's name was given as a shield to anyone, He would guard its holiness without wavering and in perfect righteousness.
The verb here is rare. It appears in only one other place in the Hebrew Bible, and it may mean something harsher than hanging.
It appears that those who sinned at Baal-peor were first killed, and then hanged or impaled: Numbers 25:4-5. The word is yaqa. Used for hanging, it appears only in that passage and in 2 Samuel 21:6, 9, 13, where the seven descendants of Saul were "hung up to the LORD" — which may also mean being impaled.
The phrase "before the LORD" gives the demand a devout sound. One writer notes that God's own law already ruled it out.
Their demand, though piously worded, was not according to the law of God. Children were not to be put to death for the sins of their fathers (Deuteronomy 24:16). Saul was the guilty one and he had died. How atonement for the broken covenant and the blood guilt was to be made remained for the Lord to say. David, not asking direction from Him, but turning to the Gibeonites, had failed again.
Commentators differ on whether the executions really settled the matter. One reads them as a genuine, if exceptional, act of atonement for the land, in line with the law's rule about murder.
The Gibeonites executed Saul's children and grandchildren. That atoned for the king's broken faith with the Hivites, and for his slaughter of them, and God heard the plea for the land (2 Samuel 21). This was a special case. Yet it agreed perfectly with the law's provision for cleansing the land from blood when the murderer was known. In such circumstances there could be no atonement for the land except by the blood of him who shed it (Numbers 35:33).
Another writer reads Numbers 35:33 the opposite way. He says it rules the executions out.
True, no atonement can be made for the land for the blood shed in it, except by the blood of the one who shed it. But "the blood of the one who shed it" means the very opposite of the blood of his descendants. The word of God does not contradict itself in this way, and the Spirit of God emphatically disowns the principle.
One writer points to how the chapter ends. The drought did not lift when the seven died. It lifted after the burial.
By burying their bones, David openly identified himself with Saul and his family. He admitted that his kingdom was an extension of Saul's kingdom, so he took responsibility for Saul's earlier wrong actions. This action caused God to answer prayer and end the drought. The killing of the seven men had not only been useless, it was disobedience to God's word. This later action of David was of more real value in the eyes of God.
- The oath. Israel pledged God's name to outsiders who won it by a trick, and He guarded it anyway.
- The forgetting. Saul's zeal for his own people made him treat that pledge as dead. Zeal for God's cause never excuses contempt for His name.
- The delay. Judgment fell not on Saul but on David's generation, because God means everyone to inquire of Him.
- The demand. "Hang them before the LORD" sounds devout. But the law had already said sons must not die for their fathers, and commentators differ on whether the act atoned or failed.
- The answer. The rain came after David buried the bones — which one writer reads as the act God truly valued.
But the king spared Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan the son of Saul, because of Jehovah's oath that was between them, between David and Jonathan the son of Saul.
A three-year famine drove David to ask God why. The answer reached back to Saul's killing of the Gibeonites, a people Israel had sworn to protect. Seven of Saul's descendants died for it. One name was left off the list, and the reason given is not his character but an old promise.
The seven who died were not charged with any crime of their own. Mephibosheth was Saul's grandson too, so blood did not save him — and one writer shows that innocence did not save him either.
Some of Saul's house might really have been accomplices in the killing. But then their guilt would be personal and specific, and we find no such charges brought. It is not likely that the children of Merab were accomplices. It seems very certain that Mephibosheth was not. And yet David spares him, not because of his innocence, but because of his sworn covenant with Jonathan his friend.
David had treated Mephibosheth harshly once before. Years of trouble lay between the old oath and this moment, yet one writer sees the king still carrying his friend's son in his heart.
David agrees to the Gibeonites' demand, because whatever his weakness might be, judgment was necessary. But he spares Mephibosheth. David, who had treated him earlier with apparent severity, here shows that he always carried him on his heart. David was not a man to forget his oaths. Had he not sworn to Jonathan: "The LORD shall be between me and you, and between my offspring and your offspring, forever"?
Jonathan asked for this himself, long before there was a throne to ask from.
But how little it could have looked, to outward eyes, that David — now a fugitive — would sit on a throne, and that the house of Saul would owe its survival to his mercy! ... David kept the covenant made that day. At the height of his glory and greatness he remembered it, and his kindness to Mephibosheth was a proof of it. And later, near the close of his reign, he acted on it again: he saved Jonathan's son from the Gibeonites, who would have hanged him for Saul's killing of the Hivites.
The verse calls this promise "the oath of the LORD" — God's own name stood behind it. Two such oaths met here: the one Israel swore to the Gibeonites, and the one David swore to Jonathan. A hasty man would have broken one to keep the other. David kept both, and one writer turns that into a rule for daily life.
We must carefully look to this, and we shall always find God with us in it. Never should we sacrifice one duty in doing another. It may be very important, for example, to honour God in public. Even so, we must never let go of God's honour at home in the family. It is a blessed thing to serve Him outside, but we keep His glory poorly outside the house if He is not honoured inside it. So if we find the Gibeonites' oath from the LORD on one side, there was just as truly the oath to Jonathan, Saul's son, and his descendants on the other. No doubt a hasty spirit would have sacrificed the one for the other; the wisdom of God enables us to maintain both.
Commentators differ here. Kelly reads David's conduct as wise. Another writer asks whether David was right at all, and names two things the king seems to have overlooked.
David did not stop to think of two matters that should have stopped him cold. First, Deuteronomy 24:16 clearly forbids putting children to death for their fathers' sins. Second, David himself had sworn to Saul that he would not cut off Saul's descendants. Had he completely forgotten this? He did spare Mephibosheth because of his oath to Jonathan, but was his oath to Saul not just as binding?
This verse closes Mephibosheth's story. One writer reads it as a picture of grace that holds all the way to the last judgment.
This closes the history of this child of grace. Long after this, Jesus will have returned and set up His kingdom. The Church of God will long have enjoyed the heavenly glory of Christ, and Israel the glory of the kingdom on earth. The great white throne will be set, and the fallen sons of Adam will stand before it. Even then, not one who was numbered in the family of grace, in the counsels of eternity — no, not even one — will be lost.
- Cause — the famine traced back to Saul's broken oath to the Gibeonites. An ignored promise still had to be answered.
- Ground — Mephibosheth lived "not because of his innocence, but because of David's sworn covenant." The reason lay outside the man.
- Reach — David swore the oath when he had nothing and kept it when he had everything. Time did not weaken it.
- Balance — David kept both oaths and sacrificed neither duty. Kelly presses the same wisdom onto service and home life.
- Result — where safety rests on another's word, not on one's own record, not one of that family is lost.
And the king took the two sons of Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, whom she had borne to Saul, Armoni and Mephibosheth; and the five sons of [the sister of] Michal the daughter of Saul, whom she had borne to Adriel the son of Barzillai the Meholathite;
This verse names the seven men handed to the Gibeonites: two sons of Saul by Rizpah, and five grandsons through Saul's daughter. Three hard questions stand behind the list: why a famine drove David to this, who the mother was, and whether children should die for a father's crime.
A famine had run three years before David asked God the reason. The answer, which the writer below quotes from an older translation, named a debt the nation had never settled.
The famine rages for three years running: blow after blow falls on the congregation of God. This trial stirred David's conscience to look for the cause: "David inquired of the Lord" (v. 1). This was his only resource, and God answered him at once: "It is for Saul, and for his house of blood, because he killed the Gibeonites" (v. 1)... God calls Saul's house "bloody," and justifies the house of David.
Saul had acted out of national zeal, but that zeal cost Israel an oath sworn in God's name.
They were among the original inhabitants of the land, and had escaped their doom by deceit. An oath in the Lord's name had promised them their lives, so the name of the Lord was pledged for their protection. Saul, however, "in his zeal for the children of Israel and Judah," had tried to destroy them, and had in fact killed some. The famine showed that, despite the time that had passed, He had not forgotten this and could not overlook it.
The ESV reads "the five sons of Merab." Older translations read "Michal." Commentators differ on how to resolve this. One treats the name as a copying slip:
These were no doubt the sons of Merab, not of Michal. Translators agree that the words should be translated "bore to Adriel," as the margin reads, and not "brought up." So it seems most likely that the name Michal here is the mistake of an early copyist. The passage should read, "the five sons of Merab the daughter of Saul, whom she bore to Adriel."
Another keeps both women in the story, with Merab as mother and Michal as the one who raised the boys.
David chose two sons of Saul born to him by Rizpah, Saul's concubine. He also chose five grandsons, born to Saul's daughter Merab after she was given to Adriel. Michal, though, had brought these children up for David. Merab must have died before she was able to bring her children up.
Commentators differ over whether David should have agreed at all. One weighs the demand against the law, and against David's choice of whom to consult:
Their demand, though piously worded, was not according to the law of God. Children were not to be put to death for the sins of their fathers (Deut. 24:16). Saul was the guilty one, and he had died. Only the Lord could say how atonement for the broken covenant and the blood guilt should be made. David, not asking direction from Him but turning to the Gibeonites, had failed again.
David had also bound himself by promise to Saul, not only to Jonathan. The Mephibosheth he spared was Jonathan's son — a different man from the Mephibosheth named in this verse, who was Rizpah's son.
David himself had sworn to Saul that he would not cut off Saul's descendants (1 Samuel 24:21-22). Had he completely forgotten this? He did spare Mephibosheth because of his oath to Jonathan, but was his oath to Saul not just as binding?
Not every writer reads the outcome this way. One sees the executions as covering the guilt of Saul's attack on the Gibeonites, or Hivites, under the law about bloodshed in the land:
The Gibeonites executed Saul's children and grandchildren. This atoned for that king's breaking faith with the Hivites and killing them, and God answered prayer for the land. (2 Sam. 21.) This was a special case. Yet it fit the provision in the law for cleansing the land from blood when the murderer was known. In such circumstances there could be no atonement for the land except by the blood of the one who shed it. (Num. 35:33.)
Rizpah is named first in the verse. Her care reached past her own two sons.
Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, mother of two of them... does something so devoted that her name deserves to live on in the memory of believers. She makes herself guardian of the seven bodies. Her motive is not simply that two of the condemned are her own sons, for she watches over the other five as well... She guards their bodies from every violation. The sackcloth of mourning she spreads out is her only means of doing this painful task.
- Oath. God's name stood pledged to protect the Gibeonites. Saul's zeal broke that oath, and the debt went unpaid.
- Delay. Time did not cancel the debt. The famine showed God had not forgotten it.
- Inquiry. David asked God the cause, then asked the Gibeonites for the cure. Writers trace the tragedy here to that second question, never put to God.
- Names. The ESV reads "Merab." Commentators differ over whether "Michal" is a copyist's slip, or a note that she raised her sister's sons.
- Devotion. Rizpah guarded all seven bodies, not only her own two — the one act of faithfulness in a chapter of broken faith.
and he gave them into the hands of the Gibeonites, and they hanged them on the hill before Jehovah. And they fell all seven together, and were put to death in the first days of the harvest, in the beginning of barley harvest.
Three years of famine drove David to ask God why, and the answer reached back to Saul, who had killed the Gibeonites and broken Israel's word to them. This verse records the price: seven of Saul's descendants handed over and put to death as the barley harvest began.
The crime belonged to a dead king and a past generation, yet the nation paid for it. One writer explains why the passing of time did not cancel the debt.
Many years had passed since Saul's bloody deed. The record of his reign does not mention it. The people had perhaps forgotten it, and perhaps David never knew of it. But God had not forgotten it, and this deed still stood before His eyes… The people share the responsibility for Saul's act, because it took place on the land of the congregation of Israel.
The people wronged were not even Israelites. They had won their place in Israel by deception — which is what makes the case so striking.
What a solemn lesson! God will not allow anyone to wrong the people He loves — and He will not allow anyone to wrong even the enemies who deceived them… That God should care so strongly about a wrong done so long ago, and in such circumstances, to the Gibeonites, is to my mind a most healthy lesson about the God we have to deal with.
David asked the Lord why the famine came, then turned to men for the cure. One writer faults the Gibeonites' request, David's answer to it, and names who paid.
Their demand, though piously worded, was not according to the law of God. Children were not to be put to death for the sins of their fathers (Deuteronomy 24:16). Saul was the guilty one and he had died. It was for the Lord to say how atonement should be made for the broken covenant and the blood guilt. David did not ask Him for direction. He turned to the Gibeonites instead, and failed again… David carried out the terrible request. He spared Mephibosheth. The victims were two sons of Rizpah, one of Saul's concubines, and five sons of Merab, Saul's eldest daughter.
Another writer asks what David should have done instead.
Surely that was not the first thing to settle. Putting himself into the hands of the people who had been wronged was not really the way to put the wrong right. Was there no law in Israel that covered such a case? And if there was none, how much more did they need to seek help from the highest Wisdom in a matter as unusual as this?
Commentators differ here. Some read the deaths as a real, though exceptional, cleansing of land stained by blood.
When the Gibeonites executed Saul's children and grandchildren, it made atonement for that king's broken faith with the Hivites and for his killing of them, and God answered prayer for the land (2 Samuel 21). This was a special case. Yet it fits perfectly with the provision in the law for cleansing the land of blood when the murderer was known. In such a case there could be no atonement for the land except by the blood of the man who shed it (Numbers 35:33).
Others answer that the same law cannot stretch to cover sons and grandsons.
True, "the land cannot be cleansed of the blood shed in it, except by the blood of the man who shed it." But "the blood of the man who shed it" means the very opposite of the blood of his descendants. The word of God does not contradict itself like that, and the Spirit of God flatly rejects the principle.
The Gibeonites dressed their demand in religious language, but their handling of the bodies ignored Israel's law on execution.
What they did does not agree with the rule given in Deuteronomy — though we can hardly be surprised that they ignored the law's requirements: "If a man has committed a sin worthy of death and is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, his body shall not remain all night on the tree. You shall bury him that same day, for a hanged man is cursed by God. You shall not defile your land."
The verse dates the deaths to the first days of harvest. One writer refuses to let that season excuse the broken law.
The "barley harvest" might be an excuse for disobeying Scripture's commands in this way, but excuses do not justify disobedience.
- Remembered. God had not forgotten Saul's crime. The nation on whose soil it happened still carried the guilt, long after the guilty king was dead.
- Righteous. He defended even men who had joined Israel by deception, because Israel had made a covenant with them.
- Rushed. David asked God why the famine came, but asked the injured party how to end it.
- Disputed. Commentators differ on whether these deaths atoned for the land. Some call it a special cleansing. Others say the law required the blood of the murderer himself, not his descendants.
- Unexcused. The barley harvest gave the Gibeonites a reason to leave the bodies hanging, but excuses never justify disobedience.
Then Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for her upon the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water poured on them out of the heavens, and suffered neither the fowl of the heavens to rest on them by day, nor the beasts of the field by night.
Three years of famine open the chapter, and God's answer to David is that Saul's house had killed the Gibeonites. Seven of Saul's descendants are executed and left hanging on a hill, and into that scene steps one woman with a piece of sackcloth.
Joshua had sworn to spare the Gibeonites after they tricked Israel into a treaty. Saul decided the promise did not bind him.
Joshua and the elders of Israel had allowed the Gibeonites to live in the land, though they were Amorites. They had deceived Joshua into thinking they came from another territory, and Joshua swore by the Lord when he made a treaty with them (Joshua 9). Once the oath was sworn, no one could undo it. But Saul was zealous for Israel and Judah, and decided he could kill off these people who were not Israelites. This was not zeal for God, because it meant breaking an oath sworn in God's name. God delayed the punishment, but Israel still had to feel the responsibility for it when the famine came.
Leaving the bodies hanging broke a command God had given about executions.
What they did was against the law, and one can hardly be surprised that they cared so little for what the law required. Deuteronomy says that when a man is put to death and hanged on a tree, "his body shall not remain all night on the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is cursed by God" (Deut. 21:22-23).
Two of the seven were her own sons. She guarded all seven.
She is not devoted to this task only because two of her sons are among the condemned. She watches over the other five as well as over the bodies of her own sons. She cares about the descendants of the one who had been "the chosen of the LORD." She shows her piety toward her husband and master's house. What is more, Rizpah is a woman of faith. She guards their bodies from all defilement and keeps watch over them. The sackcloth of mourning that she spreads for herself is her only means of carrying out this painful task. At the very least, their burial must be honourable.
Her watch ran from harvest to the rains. That is months, not nights.
Rizpah, the concubine of Saul, kept watch beside her dead from April till autumn, when it began to rain again. Six months she stayed there. Her only resting place was the coarse sackcloth, and above her hung the decaying bodies of the seven men, including her two sons. Through the hot eastern summer she kept her terrible watch. By day she chased away the screeching birds of prey, and at night the hungry howls of wolves and jackals broke her rest. Could there be a more moving picture!
Sackcloth was the sign of mourning, and she used it in an unusual way.
She took sackcloth (the sign of mourning) and spread it on a rock, rather than wearing it herself. She meant to keep it there until the drought was over and the rain came.
One writer reads the line about water from heaven as what she was hoping for, not as what came while she watched:
So I think we must translate the words, not as the record of fact but of expectation. What happened did not match that expectation. The drought ceased only after the bones were buried with those of Saul and Jonathan. That was when, as the record says, "God responded to the plea for the land."
Kelly holds that the judgment was owed to the Gibeonites, and that her sorrow was something more than owed:
This was not a slight thing to David. No doubt God's name demanded vindication, and it was right. It was due to the Gibeonites that they should be satisfied. God was compelling them to judge the case so that the guilt might be atoned for. But her act was more than right. It was beautiful and fitting that Rizpah should spread the deep sorrow of her heart before God.
She could not undo anything. But word of her watch reached David.
This woman's deed deserved a place in the king's heart. In the middle of her mourning, what joy! She has found a heart that understands her and delights to reward her — grace answering to her desires. The bones of Saul's descendants are united with those of their fathers in the tomb of Kish. This woman was on God's path and obtained the answer her faith longed for.
- Cause. Saul broke an oath sworn in God's name to the Gibeonites. Years later the whole nation felt it in three years of famine.
- Watch. Her six months on the rock were more than a mother's grief. She guarded five bodies that were not her sons', out of loyalty to the house of the LORD's chosen king.
- Sackcloth. She spread her mourning under her instead of wearing it, and waited for rain from heaven. The drought broke only after the bones were buried.
- Reach. She could change nothing herself. Someone told the king what she had done, and grace met what her faith longed for — an honourable grave in the tomb of Kish.
- Result. God's name had to be vindicated and the Gibeonites satisfied; but the beautiful thing, one writer says, was a woman spreading the deep sorrow of her heart before God.
And it was told David what Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, the concubine of Saul, had done.
A report reaches the king: a woman has been guarding seven unburied bodies. This verse turns on what she did, and on how the news moved David.
She was Saul's concubine, and two of the seven executed men were her sons. Commentators note that her care reached further than her own children.
Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, the mother of two of these... performs an act of devotion that makes her name deserve to live on in the memory of believers. She makes herself guardian of the seven bodies. Her devotion is not because her two sons are among the condemned. She watches over the other five as well as over the bodies of her own sons. She cares about the descendants of the one who had been "the chosen of the LORD." She shows her loyalty to her husband and master's house. What is more, Rizpah is a woman of faith.
What she had done stretched over months.
Rizpah, the concubine of Saul, kept watch by her dead from April till fall, when the rain began again. She stayed there six months. Her only resting place was the coarse sackcloth, and above her lay the rotting bodies of the seven men, including her two sons. All through the hot Eastern summer she kept her terrible watch. By day she chased away the screeching birds of prey. By night the hungry howls of wolves and jackals disturbed her. Could there be a sadder picture!
She had to keep watch because no one had buried the bodies. Israel's law limited how long an executed man's body could hang.
What they did goes against the rule given in Deuteronomy — though it is no surprise that they ignored the law: "And if a man has committed a crime punishable by death and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, his body shall not remain all night on the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is cursed by God. You shall not defile your land that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance."
The phrase describing how long she stayed is read by one writer as her intention rather than as a record of what happened.
The thought... is easily gathered from Rizpah's action, who "spread sackcloth for her upon the rock until water should be poured upon them out of the heavens." So I think we must translate the words, not as the record of fact but of expectation. The fact does not seem to have answered to the expectation; for it was after the bones were buried, with those of Saul and Jonathan, that "God was entreated for the land," or, in other words, that the drought ceased.
Commentators differ over the executions themselves. They agree that the news about Rizpah moved David.
This was not a small thing to David. No doubt God's name demanded vindication, and it was right... God was forcing them to judge the case so that the guilt might be put away. But it was more than right — it was beautiful and fitting that Rizpah should spread the deep sorrow of her heart before God like this. Here David also shows what was lovely and becoming in the king of Israel. He was far from insulting the memory of the late king. The very one who had handed over Saul's sons to die went and took the bones of Saul.
Her waiting was not wasted.
Rizpah's faith is rewarded... This woman's deed deserves a place in the king's heart. In the middle of her mourning, what joy! She has found a heart that understands her and delights to reward her — grace answering her desires... This woman was on God's path, and she received the answer her faith longed for.
One writer draws attention to the names in the verse — Rizpah means "live coal," and Aiah is a bird of prey — and places the moral advantage with her.
Rizpah even prepares the way for blessing. She touches David's heart to do what little justice can still be done to the dishonoured dead... The keen eye that sees things as they are, and the glow of living righteousness, are with this grieving woman, not with king David or the Gibeonites in this matter. And not until things are set right here can God respond to the plea for the land!
Her refusal to let birds or beasts touch the bodies is read as a picture of steady self-judgment.
The birds of prey stand for Satan's efforts to block true self-judgment by such violent means as devouring the prey... and the wild animals picture men who act like beasts and defeat the purpose of self-judgment, also by violence. Rizpah kept them away. That tells us not to let anything turn us aside from true self-judgment until God's government has achieved its purpose.
- Watch — Rizpah guarded all seven bodies, not only her own sons, out of loyalty to Saul's house and out of faith.
- Wrong — her watch was necessary because the bodies were left exposed, against the law that required burial the same day.
- Word — the news of what she had done reached the king, and it was no small thing to him.
- Welcome — she found a heart that understood her: grace answered her desire, and her faith got what it longed for.
- Watchfulness — the drought broke only when the wrong was put right, so hold to honest self-judgment until God's government has done its work.
And David went and took the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son from the men of Jabesh-Gilead, who had stolen them from the open place of Beth-shan, where the Philistines had hanged them, the day the Philistines had smitten Saul in Gilboa;
David had just given up seven men of Saul's line to die. His next move was not toward his own throne. He went for the bones of Saul and of Jonathan, kept by the men of Jabesh-gilead. Why does the account pause over old bones, and why does the land only get relief after the burial?
One writer traces the line from Saul's broken oath to this burial.
Saul, in his formal and fleshly zeal, though it was for God, had not acted in the fear of God. This is what especially marks off godly zeal from zeal for the outward interests of His kingdom. Saul forgets the oaths Israel made to the Gibeonites. God remembers it, and does not despise the poor Gibeonites. David also recognises the obligation... The whole house of Saul perishes, except the little remnant attached to David. As for that remnant, Rizpah's touching and faithful affection awakens in David's heart the memory of brighter moments in poor Saul's career. So he pays the last honours to his memory. After this God answered prayer for the land.
The man who handed Saul's descendants over is the one who now gathers Saul's remains.
At this point David shows on his part what was lovely and fitting in the king of Israel. He was far from insulting the memory of the late king. The very one who had given up his sons to die went and took the bones of Saul. That was the very moment he took them, showing the last honour to the departed king of Israel and his family.
The verse names Beth-shan, where the Philistines displayed the bodies. Its name carries a bitter irony.
At last, Saul and his sons are dead. Now on that shameful field of Gilboa we see the Philistine grave-robbers appear. They strip the bodies and expose them to every insult. They strip the armour from the poor dismembered body and carry it off as a trophy to the house of Ashtoreth, their goddess. The body itself they nail to the walls of Beth-shan, "the house of quiet" — what a quiet! Not the quiet that comes from Him who "gives to His beloved sleep."
The verse credits the men of Jabesh-gilead with taking the bodies away. One writer sees grace in the way God notices what they did.
This is beautiful, this is grace, that God should specially single out the deed of these men, even for a king with whom He was so deeply offended. How little we enter into the mind of God! Very likely we should have thought the men of Jabesh-Gilead were very foolish. Why should they interfere? No doubt many a follower of David would have blamed the men of Jabesh-Gilead. David did not. David understood the mind of God.
Burying Saul in the family tomb was a public act. Commentators differ over the hanging of the seven: one writer sees David submitting to an obligation he owed, another calls the act useless and disobedient.
In this way David publicly identified himself with Saul and his house. He acknowledged that his kingdom was an extension of Saul's kingdom. So he took responsibility for Saul's earlier wrongs. This would no doubt ease some of Rizpah's distress. More than that, it led God to answer prayer and end the drought. The killing of the seven men had not only been useless, it was disobedience to God's word. This later action of David was of more real value in the eyes of God.
Rizpah had guarded the exposed bodies through a long season. What she could not accomplish, the king did.
Rizpah's faith finds its reward. David is told what Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, the concubine of Saul, has done. This woman's deed is worth recording in the king's heart. In the middle of her mourning, what joy! She has found a heart that understands her and delights to reward her — grace answering her desires. The bones of Saul's descendants now join those of their fathers in the tomb of Kish. This woman was on God's path and obtained the answer her faith longed for.
That burial closes the account, and the rain returns.
From now on the Lord can be favourable to the land. Judgment has been carried out, but grace has also run its course. In His ways God never stops at judgment. Judgment prepares the way for the triumph of grace.
- Sin remembered. Saul broke Israel's oath to the Gibeonites and forgot it. God did not forget, and the reckoning fell on Saul's house.
- Grace remembered too. God singles out the men of Jabesh-gilead, who took Saul's body off a Philistine wall. Others would have called them foolish for interfering.
- Honour, not insult. The king who handed over Saul's sons is the one who gathers Saul's bones. He chose that exact moment to show Saul the last honour.
- Responsibility owned. David buried Saul in the tomb of Kish. He was taking Saul's house, and Saul's wrongs, into his own kingdom.
- Grace has the last word. David answers Rizpah's grief, the bones rest with their fathers, and rain returns to the land. With God, judgment clears the ground for grace.
and he brought up from thence the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son; and they gathered the bones of them that were hanged.
A famine lay on the land. It went back to a wrong done to the Gibeonites, and David had just given up seven of Saul's descendants to die for it. Then he goes to collect bones — Saul's, Jonathan's, and those of the seven — and carries them home.
The bodies had once hung on the walls of Bethshan. David could collect these bones only because other men had acted first:
One gleam of light shines in at the close of this dark story. It recalls the brightest page in poor Saul's life — his victory over Ammon, when he rescued the men of Jabesh Gilead (1 Sam. 11). They clearly remember it. So these men come by night and take the bodies of Saul and his sons from the walls of Bethshan. They bring them to Jabesh, burn them, and mourn for seven days. It was right that they should do this. It fits that spirit of loyalty which recognises whatever it can, even in the life of someone whose main course has been evil.
The timing is striking. The same David who handed Saul's descendants to the Gibeonites now goes after Saul's own bones.
This was no small matter to David. No doubt God's name required vindication, and that was right. The Gibeonites had a right to be satisfied. God was forcing them to judge the case so the guilt could be paid for. Here David shows what was lovely and becoming in the king of Israel. He was far from insulting the memory of the late king. The very man who had given up his sons to die went and took the bones of Saul. He took them at that very moment, paying the last honour to the dead king of Israel and his family.
Rizpah had mourned beside the dead with no power to bury them. Her sorrow is what reached the king.
Rizpah's faith finds its reward. David heard what Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, Saul's concubine, had done. This woman's deed deserves a place in the king's heart. In the middle of her mourning, what joy! She has found a heart that understands her and delights to reward her — grace answering her desires. The bones of Saul's descendants are joined with those of their fathers in the tomb of Kish. This woman was on God's path, and she obtained the answer her faith longed for.
Gathering the bones was not sentiment only. It said something about David's throne.
When David heard of Rizpah's action, he went and brought the bones of Saul and of Jonathan from Jabesh Gilead. He then gathered the bones of the seven hanged men. They buried the bones of Saul and Jonathan in Zelah of Benjamin, in the tomb of Saul's father Kish. In this way David openly identified himself with Saul and his house. He acknowledged that his kingdom was an extension of Saul's kingdom. So he took responsibility for Saul's earlier wrong actions. This would no doubt ease some of Rizpah's distress. More than that, it moved God to answer prayer and end the drought. The killing of the seven men had not only been useless; it was disobedience to God's word. David's later action was of more real value in God's eyes.
Commentators differ on the hangings. Kelly sees in them a needed vindication of God's name. Leslie Grant calls them useless and disobedient to God's word, and values the burial instead. Another writer puts the clear sight with Rizpah, not the king:
Rizpah does prepare the way for blessing. She touches David's heart to do what poor justice can still be done for the dishonoured dead. Saul and Jonathan come back to mind with them. The keen eye that sees things as they are, and the glow of living righteousness, are with this stricken woman, not with king David or the Gibeonites in this matter. And until things are set right here, God will not answer prayer for the land.
The famine did not lift when the seven men died. It lifted after the burial.
From this point on the Lord can be favourable to the land. Judgment has been carried out, but grace has also run its course. In His ways God never stops at judgment. Judgment prepares the way for the triumph of grace.
- Loyalty kept. Men from Jabesh Gilead took Saul's body from the wall at Bethshan. They remembered the day Saul rescued them.
- Loyalty answered. Rizpah could not bury the dead. Her sorrow reached David, and she found a heart that understood her and delighted to reward her.
- Loyalty in the king. The man who gave up Saul's sons refused to insult his memory. He paid the last honours to the fallen king at that very moment.
- Loyalty owned publicly. By burying Saul and Jonathan in the tomb of Kish, David tied his throne to Saul's house and took on its guilt.
- Loyalty rewarded. God answered for the land only after the burial. Judgment had been carried out, and grace ran its course too.
And they buried [them] with the bones of Saul and Jonathan his son in the country of Benjamin in Zela, in the sepulchre of Kish his father; and they did all that the king had commanded. And afterwards God was propitious to the land.
A three-year famine had dried up the land, and God told David the reason: Saul had broken Israel's sworn word to the Gibeonites. Verse 14 ends that story: seven men die, the bones of Saul and Jonathan come home to the family tomb at Zelah, and God answers prayer for the land.
The chapter punishes a crime committed years before. Commentators see a pattern in that delay.
It is not at once or quickly that the Lord begins the discipline of His saints. At least it is not usually so. Our sin may find us out years and years after it is committed. The Lord may call our ways to remembrance long after we have left those ways and turned to better... He takes methods which are all His own in the exercise of His hand with His people. But "He is His own interpreter, and He will make it plain." We have to bow now — we shall justify Him for ever.
The Gibeonites were not Israelites, and trickery had won them their treaty with Israel. Saul killed them out of zeal for his own people.
The Gibeonites were not of the children of Israel. The Spirit of God makes a point of drawing our attention to their origin and race. They were "of the remnant of the Amorites"... and Saul sought to kill them in his zeal for the people of Israel and Judah. An excellent thing, is it not — zeal for the people of God? But zeal only for God's people, or in name only for God Himself, can never make it right to disrespect His name. That stays true even if His name had been pledged to His worst enemies only through trickery. For in truth it was not a question of those to whom the name was pledged, but of His name that was sworn in this way.
David laid the old king beside his own father. That burial said something about David's throne.
They then buried the bones of Saul and Jonathan in Zelah of Benjamin, in the tomb of Saul's father Kish. In this way David openly identified himself with Saul and his house. He was admitting that his kingdom was an extension of Saul's kingdom, so he took responsibility for Saul's earlier wrong actions.
Rizpah was Saul's concubine. She guarded the bodies of the dead men from the birds and beasts, and word of it reached the king.
Rizpah's faith is rewarded: "David was told what Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, the concubine of Saul, had done." This woman's deed deserves to be written on the king's heart. In the middle of her mourning, what joy! She has found a heart that understands her and delights to reward her — grace answering her desires. The bones of Saul's descendants join those of their fathers in the tomb of Kish. This woman was on God's path and received the answer her faith longed for.
Commentators differ on what lifted the famine. One treats the executions as a true atonement for bloodshed:
The Gibeonites executed Saul's children and grandchildren. That atoned for the king breaking faith with the Hivites and slaughtering them, and God answered prayer for the land. This was a special case. Yet it fully matched the law's provision for cleansing the land from bloodshed when the murderer was known.
Another gives the credit to Rizpah, whose grief moved the king:
Rizpah does prepare the way for blessing. She touches David's heart to do what little justice can still be done to the dishonoured dead, and Saul and Jonathan are remembered with them. The keen eye that sees things as they are, and the glow of living righteousness, belong to this stricken woman, not to King David or the Gibeonites here. Only when things are set right can God answer prayer for the land!
The verse ends a grim chapter, but not on a grim note.
From now on the Lord can be favourable to the land. Judgment has been carried out, but grace too has run its course. In His ways God never stops at judgment; judgment prepares the way for the triumph of grace.
- Remembered. Sin can find a person out years later. God's discipline is often slow, and our part is to bow under it now.
- Reverenced. God held Israel to its oath, even one won by deceit. Zeal for God's people never excuses treating His name lightly.
- Repaired. David buried Saul and Jonathan in Kish's tomb. That made the old king's house his own, guilt included.
- Rewarded. Rizpah's watch over the dead reached the king's heart, and her faith got the answer it longed for.
- Released. Commentators differ on what turned the famine: the executions or the burial. All agree blessing came only after matters were set right. God never stops at judgment; it opens the way for grace.