¹³ Do not feel sorry for that murderer! Purge from Israel the guilt of murdering innocent people; then all will go well with you.

³¹ “Do as he said,” the king replied. “Kill him there beside the altar and bury him. This will remove the guilt of Joab’s senseless murders from me and from my father’s family.

⁹ By following these instructions, you will do what is right in the Lord’s sight and will cleanse the guilt of murder from your community.

¹⁶ “You must destroy all the nations the Lord your God hands over to you. Show them no mercy, and do not worship their gods, or they will trap you.

² When the Lord your God hands these nations over to you and you conquer them, you must completely destroy^[a] them. Make no treaties with them and show them no mercy.

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.”

³³ This will ensure that the land where you live will not be polluted, for murder pollutes the land. And no sacrifice except the execution of the murderer can purify the land from murder.^{[a] 34} You must not defile the land where you live, for I live there myself. I am the Lord, who lives among the people of Israel.”

⁵ No one had the slightest interest in you; no one pitied you or cared for you. On the day you were born, you were unwanted, dumped in a field and left to die.

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.

¹² you must cut off her hand. Show her no pity.