2 Samuel 21

In David's time there was a famine that lasted three years, one year after another. David asked the LORD about it. The LORD answered, "It is because of Saul and his family, who are guilty of shedding blood, because he killed the Gibeonites."

1Then there was a famine in the days of David three years, year after year; and David enquired of the LORD. And the LORD answered, It is for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he slew the Gibeonites.

Note"Asked the LORD about it" describes a formal inquiry, usually put to God through a priest as a question expecting a yes-or-no or short answer, not private prayer. The reply assumes a widespread ancient idea, stated plainly in Israel's law, that blood shed without redress leaves a stain on the land itself until the wrong is settled, which is why a killing in the previous reign is given as the cause of a famine now.

2So the king called the Gibeonites and spoke to them. (The Gibeonites were not Israelites. They were what was left of the Amorites. The Israelites had sworn an oath to spare them, but Saul, in his zeal for Israel and Judah, had tried to wipe them out.)

2And the king called the Gibeonites, and said unto 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 unto them: and Saul sought to slay them in his zeal to the children of Israel and Judah.)

NoteThe Gibeonites lived in a group of towns a few miles north of Jerusalem. The oath referred to is the treaty in Joshua 9: the Gibeonites disguised themselves as travelers from far away and got Israel's leaders to swear a peace treaty with them, and Israel held to it even after the trick was discovered. "Amorites" is used broadly here for the pre-Israelite peoples of Canaan. Saul's attack on them is not described anywhere else in the Bible.

3David said to the Gibeonites, "What can I do for you? How can I make up for this wrong, so that you will bless the people who belong to the LORD?"

3Wherefore David said unto the Gibeonites, What shall I do for you? and wherewith shall I make the atonement, that ye may bless the inheritance of the LORD?

Note"Make up for this wrong" translates a Hebrew word for covering or settling a debt of blood, providing whatever compensation the injured party names so the matter is legally closed. The blessing David asks for is the flip side: a wronged party's curse was thought to keep working until the wrong was settled, and their blessing released it.

4The Gibeonites said to him, "We want no silver or gold from Saul or from his family, and it is not for us to have you put anyone in Israel to death." David said, "Whatever you say, I will do for you."

4And the Gibeonites said unto 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.

NoteUnder the usual custom, a killing could be settled by a payment to the victim's family. Israel's law refused that option for deliberate murder, and the Gibeonites refuse it here too. Their second sentence is difficult in the Hebrew and can be read either as a disclaimer (it is not for us to have Israelites killed) or as a lead-in to the demand they make in the next verses.

5They answered the king, "As for the man who destroyed us, and who planned to wipe us out so that none of us would be left anywhere inside Israel's borders,

5And 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,

6let seven of his male descendants be handed over to us. We will hang them before the LORD at Gibeah, the town of Saul, the one the LORD chose." The king said, "I will give them to you."

6Let seven men of his sons be delivered unto us, and we will hang them up unto the LORD in Gibeah of Saul, whom the LORD did choose. And the king said, I will give them.

NoteThe Hebrew verb rendered "hang" is rare and its exact sense is uncertain; it may mean impaling or exposing the bodies rather than hanging by the neck. Either way the point is public execution followed by leaving the corpses on display, which is what makes Rizpah's vigil in verse 10 necessary. Gibeah was Saul's home town, so the deaths take place on his own ground. "The one the LORD chose" is ambiguous in the Hebrew: it can refer to Saul, whom God chose as king, or to the place.

7But the king spared Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan and grandson of Saul, because of the oath sworn before the LORD between David and Jonathan son of Saul.

7But the king spared Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan the son of Saul, because of the LORD’s oath that was between them, between David and Jonathan the son of Saul.

NoteThe oath is the one in 1 Samuel 20, where David and Jonathan swore mutual protection extending to each other's descendants.

8Instead the king took Armoni and Mephibosheth, the two sons that Rizpah daughter of Aiah had borne to Saul, and the five sons that Michal daughter of Saul had borne to Adriel son of Barzillai from Meholah.

8But the king took the two sons of Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, whom she bare unto Saul, Armoni and Mephibosheth; and the five sons of Michal the daughter of Saul, whom she brought up for Adriel the son of Barzillai the Meholathite:

NoteThere are two men named Mephibosheth in this chapter, Jonathan's son, spared in verse 7, and a son of Saul by Rizpah, handed over here. They are different people. "Michal" is a known problem in the text: elsewhere Michal is said to have had no children, while it was her sister Merab who married Adriel. Some ancient manuscripts read Merab here, and the King James wording "brought up for" may be an attempt to smooth the difficulty.

9He handed them over to the Gibeonites, and they hanged them on the hill before the LORD. All seven of them died together. They were put to death during the first days of harvest, when the barley harvest was just beginning.

9And he delivered them into the hands of the Gibeonites, and they hanged them in the hill before the LORD: and they fell all seven together, and were put to death in the days of harvest, in the first days, in the beginning of barley harvest.

NoteBarley was the first grain to ripen, so this is roughly April, the start of the dry season, months before rain would normally fall. That timing is what makes verse 10 remarkable.

10Rizpah daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, the rough cloth worn in mourning, and spread it out for herself on the rock. From the start of harvest until rain fell on the bodies from the sky, she let no bird land on them by day and no wild animal near them by night.

10And Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for her upon the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water dropped upon them out of heaven, and suffered neither the birds of the air to rest on them by day, nor the beasts of the field by night.

NoteLeaving a body unburied and exposed to scavenging animals was the deepest disgrace an ancient Israelite could suffer, and Israel's law required even an executed criminal to be buried the same day. Rizpah cannot bury the bodies, so she guards them instead, for what would have been several months.

11David was told what Rizpah daughter of Aiah, Saul's secondary wife, had done.

11And it was told David what Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, the concubine of Saul, had done.

NoteA concubine was a legally recognized wife of lower rank, whose children had a weaker claim on the father's estate than those of a primary wife. In a royal household the position was politically loaded: taking over a dead or deposed king's concubine was treated as a claim on the throne itself.

12So David went and got the bones of Saul and the bones of his son Jonathan from the men of Jabesh-gilead. They had taken them secretly from the public square at Beth-shan, where the Philistines had hung the bodies after killing Saul at Gilboa.

12And David went and took the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son from the men of Jabeshgilead, which had stolen them from the street of Bethshan, where the Philistines had hanged them, when the Philistines had slain Saul in Gilboa:

NoteThe Philistines were a people settled on the coastal plain to Israel's west, in five main cities including Gath; they were Israel's chief military rival throughout Saul's reign and David's. After Saul died in battle on Mount Gilboa they fastened his body to the wall of Beth-shan, a town they controlled, as a trophy. The men of Jabesh-gilead retrieved it by night because Saul had rescued their town early in his reign (1 Samuel 11).

13He brought the bones of Saul and the bones of his son Jonathan up from there, and the bones of the men who had been hanged were gathered as well.

13And 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.

14They buried the bones of Saul and his son Jonathan in the land of Benjamin, at Zela, in the tomb of Saul's father Kish. They did everything the king had commanded. After that, God answered the prayers made for the land.

14And the bones of Saul and Jonathan his son buried they in the country of Benjamin in Zelah, in the sepulchre of Kish his father: and they performed all that the king commanded. And after that God was intreated for the land.

NoteBurial in the ancestral family tomb was what everyone hoped for; Saul and Jonathan had been denied it, and this puts it right. "God answered the prayers made for the land" signals the end of the famine that opened the chapter.

15The Philistines went to war with Israel once more. David went down with his men and fought the Philistines, and David grew worn out.

15Moreover the Philistines had yet war again with Israel; and David went down, and his servants with him, and fought against the Philistines: and David waxed faint.

16Ishbi-benob, one of the sons of the giant, meant to kill David. The head of his spear weighed three hundred shekels of bronze, and he was wearing a new sword.

16And Ishbibenob, which was of the sons of the giant, the weight of whose spear weighed three hundred shekels of brass in weight, he being girded with a new sword, thought to have slain David.

NoteThree hundred shekels of bronze is roughly seven and a half pounds, or three and a half kilograms, a very heavy spearhead. "The sons of the giant" translates a Hebrew phrase meaning descendants of Rapha; it may name an ancestor or refer to the Rephaim, a people remembered in Israelite tradition as unusually tall warriors. It is a description of stock, not a claim that each man was individually a giant.

17But Abishai son of Zeruiah came to David's aid. He struck the Philistine down and killed him. Then David's men swore to him, "You will never go out with us to battle again. The lamp of Israel must not be put out."

17But Abishai the son of Zeruiah succoured him, and smote the Philistine, and killed him. Then the men of David sware unto him, saying, Thou shalt go no more out with us to battle, that thou quench not the light of Israel.

Note"Lamp" is a common image for a family line or a life still burning; a household lamp kept alight through the night stood for the house continuing. David's men are telling him he is too valuable to risk.

18Some time after this there was another battle with the Philistines at Gob. In that fight Sibbecai from Hushah killed Saph, who was one of the sons of the giant.

18And it came to pass after this, that there was again a battle with the Philistines at Gob: then Sibbechai the Hushathite slew Saph, which was of the sons of the giant.

19There was another battle with the Philistines at Gob, and Elhanan son of Jaare-oregim from Bethlehem killed the brother of Goliath from Gath. The shaft of that spear was as thick as the heavy wooden bar on a weaver's loom.

19And there was again a battle in Gob with the Philistines, where Elhanan the son of Jaareoregim, a Bethlehemite, slew the brother of Goliath the Gittite, the staff of whose spear was like a weaver’s beam.

NoteThe Hebrew text of Samuel here says simply that Elhanan killed Goliath the Gittite. The words "the brother of" are supplied by the King James translators from the parallel in 1 Chronicles 20:5, which reads "Lahmi the brother of Goliath." Whether Samuel preserves a rival tradition about who killed Goliath, or has suffered a copying error, is disputed. The father's name has similar trouble: "Jaare-oregim" contains the Hebrew word for "weavers," probably picked up by accident from the weaver's beam later in the verse, and Chronicles reads "Jair." A weaver's beam is the thick wooden roller on a loom.

20There was still another battle, at Gath. A man of huge size was there. He had six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot, twenty-four in all. He too was born to the giant.

20And there was yet a battle in Gath, where was a man of great stature, that had on every hand six fingers, and on every foot six toes, four and twenty in number; and he also was born to the giant.

NoteSix fingers and six toes is a real and not especially rare condition. The detail is given as a mark of the man's unusual physique, alongside his size.

21When he taunted Israel, Jonathan son of Shimeah, David's brother, killed him.

21And when he defied Israel, Jonathan the son of Shimeah the brother of David slew him.

22These four men were born to the giant in Gath, and they died at the hands of David and his men.

22These four were born to the giant in Gath, and fell by the hand of David, and by the hand of his servants.