Who were the Gibeonites?

The leading city of the four which beguiled Joshua into making a league with them, on the plea of their being far distant. Joshua 9:3-17. When the Amorites attacked Gibeon, because they had made peace with Israel, Joshua hastened to their deliverance, and to lengthen the daylight he said, "Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon." Joshua 10:1-41. The city was afterwards given to Benjamin and made a Levitical city. Joshua 18:25; Joshua 21:17. In the days of Solomon, before the temple was built, the tabernacle was pitched at Gibeon, and thither Solomon went and offered a thousand sacrifices, and there God appeared to him in a dream, and gave him the desire of his heart — wisdom and understanding. 1 Kings 3:4-5; 1 Chr. 16:39; 1 Chr. 21:29; 2 Chr. 1:3, 13. It was near 'the great stone' in Gibeon that Joab treacherously slew Amasa; and in retribution it was to the same city he fled to lay hold on the horns of the altar for protection, but where he was put to death. 2 Sam. 20:8-10; 1 Kings 2:29-34. Identified with el Jib, 31 51' N, 35 11' E, a village of scattered houses on a hill. On one side of the hill is a copious spring, and lower down the remains of a large reservoir, which is thought to be the 'pool' of Gibeon and its 'great waters.' 2 Sam. 2:13; Jer. 41:12, 16. In 1 Chr. 14:16 we read that David smote the Philistines 'from Gibeon even to Gazer;' but in the parallel passage in 2 Sam. 5:25 it says, David smote them 'from Geba' to Gazer. Keil and others think Gibeon is the place intended.

The people of Gibeon and perhaps of the three confederate cities — Chephirah, Beeroth, and Kirjath-jearim. Joshua 9:17. They were Hivites, and 'mighty' men. Having deceived Joshua into making a treaty with them, they were made hewers of wood and drawers of water for the house of God. Joshua 9:23. Saul, upon an occasion not recorded, had slain some of the Gibeonites, and it apparently had been passed over and forgotten; but God could not allow the oath of His people to be violated; He therefore brought a famine on the land. On David inquiring of the Lord, it was revealed that the famine was because of the slaying of the Gibeonites. They were appealed to, and reparation offered them. They claimed that as it was Saul who had sought to destroy them from remaining in any of the coasts of Israel, seven of his descendants should be given to them. These they hanged in the hill before the Lord, and God was entreated for the land. 2 Sam. 21:1-14. In this passage the Gibeonites are called 'Amorites,' a common designation of the Canaanites, which does not clash with their being called Hivites in Joshua 9:7. Ismaiah, one of David's thirty mighty men, was a Gibeonite.1 Chr. 12:4. Some of them returned from exile and helped to build the wall of Jerusalem. Neh. 3:7; Neh. 7:25.

The Gibeonites were Hivites. They came with deceptions, knowing well what was their lot. The deceptions were inspired by the father of lies.

One of the races found early in Palestine: they were descendants of Ham through Canaan. Gen. 10:17. Jacob, on his return to Palestine, found Shechem occupied by the Hivites. Gen. 34:2. They also possessed Gibeon, and found means to deceive Joshua into making a league with them. Joshua 9:3, 7. They seemed to be more a commercial than a warlike people. We also find the Hivites in the north in mount Lebanon, and Israel was beguiled into making marriage contracts with them. Judges 3:3, 5, 6. In the days of Solomon they were still in the land, and were made tributary to Israel. 1 Kings 9:20. Israel suffered through not carrying out the directions of God to cast out these and other inhabitants of the land. They were by them led into idolatry.

A people descended from Canaan, son of Ham. Gen. 10:16, They dwelt in the mountains, as their name signifies, and were apparently at times in the mountains both east and west of the Jordan. Num. 13:29; Joshua 5:1; Judges 1:34-36; Judges 10:8; 1 Kings 4:19. Being the most dominant and the most corrupt people or tribe they sometimes represent the Canaanites generally. Gen. 15:16; 1 Kings 21:26. When Abraham was at Hebron some confederated with him. Gen. 14:13. A remnant out of the Gentile nations was thus associated with the heir of promise, though Lot (a type of Israel after the flesh) had separated from him.

When Israel approached the promised land, they were in the east, and refused to let Israel pass; but they were overcome, their cities taken, and the people slain, with Sihon their king. Num. 21:21-26; Deut. 2:24; Amos 2:9-10. Some must have escaped, for we read of them later, and one of the controversies Jehovah had with Israel was for worshipping their gods. Ezra 9:1-2. Solomon made them tributary. 1 Kings 9:20-21; 2 Chr. 8:7-8. The Gibeonites were a remnant of the Amorites. 2 Sam. 21:2. After this nothing is heard of them. The low state of Jerusalem (Judah) by nature is described by stating her origin, her father being an Amorite and her mother a Hittite, but God in grace had compassion upon her in her degradation, and raised her into great glory; though, alas, she was shamefully unfaithful. Ezek. 16:3-43.

What a solemn lesson that God will not only not suffer unrighteousness to be done to the people that He loves, but even to the enemies that deceived them! "The righteous Jehovah loves righteousness." It would be hard to see or ask a more patent proof of the delicacy and also the tenacity of God's holding to righteousness than His dealing in this very case with Israel for the oath passed to the Gibeonites. Every one can understand how He must feel about Israel or about David; but that God should be jealous for a wrong done under such circumstances, and so long ago, to the Gibeonites, is to my mind a most wholesome lesson of the God with whom we have to do.

Nor this only. "And the king called the Gibeonites, and said to them, What shall I do for you? and wherewith shall I make an atonement, that ye may bless the inheritance of Jehovah?" This is another important point: their consciences must be satisfied, their hearts consoled and at rest for the wrong that had been done to them. Yet there is no disguise as to the people in question. Now the Gibeonites were not of the children of Israel. The Spirit of God expressly calls our attention to their origin and race. They were "of the remnant of the Amorites" — and you know what the Amorites were — "and the children of Israel had sworn to them, and Saul sought to slay them in his zeal to the children of Israel and Judah." An excellent thing, is it not — zeal for the people of God? But zeal only for God's people, or nominally for God Himself, can never sanctify disrespect to His name, even if through trickery only that name had been pledged to His worst enemies. For in truth it was not a question of those to whom the name was pledged, but of His name that was sworn thus. If Jehovah's name was given as a shield to any, Jehovah would be the unswerving and most righteous guardian of its sanctity.

Then of the Gibeonites when they come, David asks, "What shall I do for you? And wherewith shall I make the atonement, that ye may bless the inheritance of Jehovah? And the Gibeonites said to him, We will have no silver nor gold of Saul, nor of his house; neither for us shalt thou kill any man in Israel. And he said, What ye shall say, that will I do for you. And they answered the king, The man that consumed us, and that devised against us that we should be destroyed from remaining in any of the coasts of Israel, let seven men of his sons be delivered to us, and we will hang them up to Jehovah in Gibeah of Saul, whom Jehovah did choose. And the king said, I will give them. But the king spared Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan the son of Saul, because of Jehovah's oath that was between them." 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. However important it may be for instance to pay God homage outside, we must never let slip God's honour at home in the family. It is a blessed thing to serve Him abroad, but there will be a sorry maintenance of His glory outside the house if He is not honoured within. And if we find therefore the Gibeonite's 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 the one for the other; the wisdom of God enables us to maintain both. This is fairly seen in the conduct of David.

There is a famine for three years, year after year, which at last — for it takes three years to do it drives David to God to inquire the cause. He is answered that it is for Saul and for his bloody house, because he slew the Gibeonites." A deed of the past reign is thus charged against the present, the deed of a former king upon the whole people of Israel. They were responsible as the people of God for having suffered the iniquity, profited by it, perhaps, — gone on, at least, without any acknowledgment or repentance for it.

With the history of the Gibeonites we are well acquainted. They were of the original inhabitants of the land, and had gained, by deceit, exemption from the doom which these were under. An oath by Jehovah had been given them that they should live, and thus the name of the Lord was pledged for their preservation. Saul, however, "in his zeal for the children of Israel and Judah," had sought to destroy them, and had actually slain some.

But in 2 Samuel 21 an instructive scene is introduced to us to which we may turn our attention for a moment. Whatever may be the grace and faithfulness of God, for the very same reason God is jealous of His word, and deals righteously wherever His name is pledged. We are all familiar with the fact that in the days of Joshua the Gibeonites had deceived the heads of Israel. They had palmed themselves off on Joshua as coming from a far country, having for their own ends hidden the truth that they belonged to the accursed races of Canaan. The result was that Joshua and the other leaders of Israel committed the name of Jehovah, through the deceit of the Gibeonites, to sparing their lives, though in consequence of that deceit they were reduced to the condition of hewers of wood and drawers of water for the sanctuary. But Saul in his spurious zeal for God lost sight of what was so solemnly assured to the Gibeonites. Are you surprised that the king who would have taken away the life of his own son because of his rash oath, which Jonathan knew not, should feel lightly the oath that had been sworn by Joshua and the other leaders of Israel in the olden time? Wonder not; for the flesh, which here overstrains, there breaks down altogether.

It was no doubt long ago, and there are those who would ignore what is past for present ease. But time makes no difference, any more than place, in the things of God. What He looks to is His name, and by this are we also bound to keep His word and not deny His name. Saul forgot it. Can we not easily understand this? In him was no living faith whatever. There was only form, and this will sell the Lord when it suits for the price of a slave, though it may at the same time make the greatest show of devotedness. Doubtless Saul could vaunt his own superior zeal for the Lord in this — that he at least was not going to be carried away by a mere name, and an obligation so long ago as to be obsolete. If the Gibeonites were Canaanites, woe be to them from king Saul! And so it was that there was a famine, not immediately after, but now in the days of David for three years. Two things particularly may well arrest attention in this as a great moral truth. It was a long time since the name of Jehovah was pledged; but does God ever forget? Secondly, it was by no means a short time since Saul had done the bloody deed, and yet no chastening had yet come from Jehovah. The chastening did not follow till a considerable time after. 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 enquire of Him; He will exercise His people in their common and continuous responsibility; He will make us feel and judge our forgetfulness of heart, our lack of looking to Himself. The evil might have been dealt with personally on Saul; but the patience of God on the one hand, and the solidarity of the people on the other, was more impressively taught when the blow fell in the days of David. People and king were thus forced to review what had been soon forgotten because taken too lightly when done. He at least is occupied with our ways, and the discipline may tarry a long time. He would have His people learn the reason why His hand was upon them.

God answers David that the famine was His own governmental judgment because of Saul and his bloodthirsty house having killed some of the Gibeonites. The Gibeonites had been allowed by Joshua and the elders of Israel to live in the land, though they were Amorites. They had deceived Joshua into thinking they were from another territory, and Joshua swore by the Lord in making a league 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, for it involved breaking an oath of God, and though God delayed punishment for this, Israel had to feel the responsibility for it in the infliction of famine.

The reader knows the history of the Gibeonites. We can read it in Joshua 9. The Amorites had used trickery in order to be received by the congregation of Israel and thus escape the judgment of their people. God considered that which the congregation had bound as bound; they could not revoke their oath. No doubt by placing the Gibeonites in a relationship of slavery to the people God's grace had freed Israel from the consequences of a false step taken lightly and in ignorance, but the consequences of a decision made according to the flesh remained permanently. Saul judged otherwise, for a man in the flesh always does exactly the opposite of what the Spirit would instruct one to do. And still Saul was full of “zeal for the children of Israel and Judah” (v. 2), but it was a zeal that, alas, was only too closely allied to hatred against the Lord's anointed. Saul of Tarsus too was full of a zeal which made him the persecutor of Christ in His Assembly. In our days we also may be zealous for our own nation or for our church without God having any part in the matter.

Amongst these combined peoples were the Hivites, whose cities — Gibeon, Chephirah, Beeroth, and Kirjath-jearim — were four. The heads of these cities took counsel together, and, while others of their nation sought the sword, they resorted to stratagem in order to gain their end — "they did work wilily."