Passage Resources Hebrew/Greek Your Content
Previous Next
Add parallel Print Page Options
Close NLT

2 Samuel 21:1-14
New Living Translation

David Avenges the Gibeonites

21 There was a famine during David’s reign that lasted for three years, so David asked the Lord about it. And the Lord said, “The famine has come because Saul and his family are guilty of murdering the Gibeonites.”

2 So the king summoned the Gibeonites. They were not part of Israel but were all that was left of the nation of the Amorites. The people of Israel had sworn not to kill them, but Saul, in his zeal for Israel and Judah, had tried to wipe them out. 3 David asked them, “What can I do for you? How can I make amends so that you will bless the Lord’s people again?”

4 “Well, money can’t settle this matter between us and the family of Saul,” the Gibeonites replied. “Neither can we demand the life of anyone in Israel.”

“What can I do then?” David asked. “Just tell me and I will do it for you.”

5 Then they replied, “It was Saul who planned to destroy us, to keep us from having any place at all in the territory of Israel. 6 So let seven of Saul’s sons be handed over to us, and we will execute them before the Lord at Gibeon, on the mountain of the Lord.[a]”

“All right,” the king said, “I will do it.” 7 The king spared Jonathan’s son Mephibosheth,[b] who was Saul’s grandson, because of the oath David and Jonathan had sworn before the Lord. 8 But he gave them Saul’s two sons Armoni and Mephibosheth, whose mother was Rizpah daughter of Aiah. He also gave them the five sons of Saul’s daughter Merab,[c] the wife of Adriel son of Barzillai from Meholah. 9 The men of Gibeon executed them on the mountain before the Lord. So all seven of them died together at the beginning of the barley harvest.

10 Then Rizpah daughter of Aiah, the mother of two of the men, spread burlap on a rock and stayed there the entire harvest season. She prevented the scavenger birds from tearing at their bodies during the day and stopped wild animals from eating them at night. 11 When David learned what Rizpah, Saul’s concubine, had done, 12 he went to the people of Jabesh-gilead and retrieved the bones of Saul and his son Jonathan. (When the Philistines had killed Saul and Jonathan on Mount Gilboa, the people of Jabesh-gilead stole their bodies from the public square of Beth-shan, where the Philistines had hung them.) 13 So David obtained the bones of Saul and Jonathan, as well as the bones of the men the Gibeonites had executed.

14 Then the king ordered that they bury the bones in the tomb of Kish, Saul’s father, at the town of Zela in the land of Benjamin. After that, God ended the famine in the land.

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. 21:6 As in Greek version (see also 21:9); Hebrew reads at Gibeah of Saul, the chosen of the Lord.
  2. 21:7 Mephibosheth is another name for Merib-baal.
  3. 21:8 As in a few Hebrew and Greek manuscripts and Syriac version (see also 1 Sam 18:19); most Hebrew manuscripts read Michal.
Close NET

2 Samuel 21:1-14
New English Translation

The Gibeonites Demand Revenge

21 During David’s reign there was a famine for three consecutive years. So David inquired of the Lord.[a] The Lord said, “It is because of Saul and his bloodstained family,[b] because he murdered the Gibeonites.”

2 So the king summoned the Gibeonites and spoke with them. (Now the Gibeonites were not descendants of Israel; they were a remnant of the Amorites. The Israelites had made a promise to[c] them, but Saul tried to kill them because of his zeal for the people of Israel and Judah.) 3 David said to the Gibeonites, “What can I do for you, and how can I make amends so that you will bless[d] the Lord’s inheritance?”

4 The Gibeonites said to him, “We[e] have no claim to silver or gold from Saul or from his family,[f] nor would we be justified in putting to death anyone in Israel.” David asked,[g] “What then are you asking me to do for you?” 5 They replied to the king, “As for this man who exterminated us and who schemed against us so that we were destroyed and left without status throughout all the borders of Israel— 6 let seven of his male descendants be turned over to us, and we will execute[h] them before the Lord in Gibeah of Saul, who was the Lord’s chosen one.”[i] The king replied, “I will turn them over.”

7 The king had mercy on Mephibosheth son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, in light of the Lord’s oath that had been taken between David and Jonathan son of Saul. 8 So the king took Armoni and Mephibosheth, the two sons of Aiah’s daughter Rizpah whom she had born to Saul, and the five sons of Saul’s daughter Merab[j] whom she had born to Adriel the son of Barzillai the Meholathite. 9 He turned them over to the Gibeonites, and they executed them on a hill before the Lord. The seven of them[k] died[l] together; they were put to death during harvest time—during the first days of the beginning[m] of the barley harvest.

10 Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and spread it out for herself on a rock. From the beginning of the harvest until the rain fell on them,[n] she did not allow the birds of the air to feed[o] on them by day, nor the wild animals[p] by night. 11 When David was told what Rizpah daughter of Aiah, Saul’s concubine, had done, 12 he[q] went and took the bones of Saul and of his son Jonathan[r] from the leaders[s] of Jabesh Gilead. (They had secretly taken[t] them from the plaza at Beth Shan. It was there that Philistines[u] publicly exposed their corpses[v] after[w] they[x] had killed Saul at Gilboa.) 13 David[y] brought the bones of Saul and of Jonathan his son from there; they also gathered up the bones of those who had been executed.

14 They buried the bones of Saul and his son Jonathan in the land of Benjamin at Zela in the grave of his father Kish. After they had done everything[z] that the king had commanded, God responded to their prayers[aa] for the land.

Read full chapter

Footnotes

  1. 2 Samuel 21:1 tn Heb “sought the face of the Lord.”
  2. 2 Samuel 21:1 tn Heb “and the house of bloodshed.”
  3. 2 Samuel 21:2 tn Heb “swore an oath to.”
  4. 2 Samuel 21:3 tn After the preceding imperfect verbal form, the subordinated imperative indicates purpose/result. S. R. Driver comments, “…the imper. is used instead of the more normal voluntative, for the purpose of expressing with somewhat greater force the intention of the previous verb” (S. R. Driver, Notes on the Hebrew Text and the Topography of the Books of Samuel, 350).
  5. 2 Samuel 21:4 tc The translation follows the Qere and several medieval Hebrew mss in reading לָנוּ (lanu, “to us”) rather than the MT לִי (li, “to me”). But for a contrary opinion see S. R. Driver, Notes on the Hebrew Text and the Topography of the Books of Samuel, 53, 350.
  6. 2 Samuel 21:4 tn Heb “house.”
  7. 2 Samuel 21:4 tn Heb “and he said”; the referent (David) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
  8. 2 Samuel 21:6 tn The exact nature of this execution is not altogether clear. The verb יָקַע (yaqaʿ) basically means “to dislocate” or “alienate.” In Gen 32:26 it is used of the dislocation of Jacob’s thigh. Figuratively it can refer to the removal of an individual from a group (e.g., Jer 6:8; Ezek 23:17) or to a type of punishment the specific identity of which is uncertain (e.g., here and Num 25:4); cf. NAB “dismember them”; NIV “to be killed and exposed.”
  9. 2 Samuel 21:6 tc The LXX reads “at Gibeon on the mountain of the Lord” (cf. 21:9). The present translation follows the MT, although a number of recent English translations follow the LXX reading here (e.g., NAB, NRSV, NLT).
  10. 2 Samuel 21:8 tc The MT reads “Michal” here, but two Hebrew manuscripts read “Merab,” along with some LXX manuscripts. Cf. 1 Sam 18:19.
  11. 2 Samuel 21:9 tc The translation follows the Qere and several medieval Hebrew mss in reading שְׁבַעְתָּם (shevaʿtam, “the seven of them”) rather than MT שִׁבַעְתִּים (shivaʿtim, “seventy”).
  12. 2 Samuel 21:9 tn Heb “fell.”
  13. 2 Samuel 21:9 tc The translation follows the Qere and many medieval Hebrew mss in reading בִּתְחִלַּת (bitkhillat, “in the beginning”) rather than MT תְחִלַּת (tekhillat, “beginning of”).
  14. 2 Samuel 21:10 tn Heb “until water was poured on them from the sky.”
  15. 2 Samuel 21:10 tn Heb “rest.”
  16. 2 Samuel 21:10 tn Heb “the beasts of the field.”
  17. 2 Samuel 21:12 tn Heb “David.” For stylistic reasons the name has been replaced by the pronoun (“he”) in the translation.
  18. 2 Samuel 21:12 tn Heb “the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son.” See also v. 13.
  19. 2 Samuel 21:12 tn Heb “lords.”
  20. 2 Samuel 21:12 tn Heb “stolen.”
  21. 2 Samuel 21:12 tc Against the MT, this word is better read without the definite article. The MT reading is probably here the result of wrong word division, with the letter ה (he) belonging with the preceding word שָׁם (sham) as the he directive (i.e., שָׁמָּה, samah, “to there”).
  22. 2 Samuel 21:12 tn Heb “had hung them.”
  23. 2 Samuel 21:12 tn Heb “in the day.”
  24. 2 Samuel 21:12 tn Heb “Philistines.”
  25. 2 Samuel 21:13 tn Heb “he”; the referent (David) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
  26. 2 Samuel 21:14 tc Many medieval Hebrew mss have here כְּכֹל (kekhol, “according to all”).
  27. 2 Samuel 21:14 tn Heb “was entreated.” The verb is an example of the so-called niphal tolerativum, with the sense that God allowed himself to be supplicated through prayer (cf. GKC 137 §51.c).
Next
2 Samuel 20
2 Samuel 22
Next
dropdown
New Living Translation (NLT)

Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Inc., Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.


New English Translation (NET)

NET Bible® copyright ©1996-2017 by Biblical Studies Press, L.L.C. http://netbible.com All rights reserved.