2 Samuel 21
CoffmanTHINGS PERTAINING TO THE REIGN OF DAVID
(2 Sam. 21–24)
THREE YEARS OF FAMINE;
RIZPAH’S LOVE;
MILITARY HEROES
Some of the problems and questions that confront us in this chapter are undoubtedly due to the imperfection of the text as it has come down to us. “There are many places in this chapter which have suffered much from the ignorance or carelessness of transcribers; and, indeed, I suspect that the whole has suffered so materially as to distort, if not misrepresent the principal facts.” F1 Many other scholars have also mentioned the “corruption” of certain passages in this chapter; and, in all candor, how else could we possibly explain passages that stand in direct contradiction of God’s Word as revealed in other passages?
True to the genius of the critical community of scholars, a defective chapter of the the Hebrew text of the O.T. is quickly chosen by them and labeled as an especially instructive section of God’s Word! For example, Smith in the International Critical Commentary wrote that, “Few sections of the O.T. show more clearly the religious ideas of the times. Here we see God as the Avenger of a broken covenant requiring from the children (grandchildren) of the offender the blood that had been shed.” F2 On the other hand, what we shall really see, as explained below, is another one of David’s tragic mistakes!
With regard to the time when the events mentioned in this chapter occurred, it is unknown, there being not the slightest clue upon which an intelligent guess may be founded. F3 Still, some suppose that these things occurred, “In the beginning of the reign of David.” F4
Footnotes for 2 Samuel 21 1: Adam Clarke, Vol. 2, p. 369. 2: International Critical Commentary, Samuel, p. 374. 3: The Pulpit Commentary, Vol. 4c, p. 511. 4: The Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. 2, p. 1157. 5: John T. Willis, p. 398. 6: Ibid. 7: Arthur S. Peake’s Commentary, p. 292. 8: The Interpreter’s Bible, Vol. 2, p. 1159. 9: Adam Clarke, op. cit., pp. 367, 368. 10: Matthew Henry’s Commentary, Vol. 2, p. 556. 11: John T. Willis, p. 399. 12: Matthew Henry’s Commentary, Vol. 2, p. 557. 13: Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown’s Commentary, p. 209. 14: John T. Willis, p. 400. 15: Adam Clarke, Vol. 2, p. 367. 16: John T. Willis, p. 400. 17: Ibid. 18: The Interpreter’s Bible, op. cit., p. 1159. 19: International Critical Commentary, op. cit., p. 376. 20: Ibid., p. 377. 21: Flavius Josephus, Antiquities, p. 229. 22: Wycliffe Old Testament Commentary, Samuel, p. 303. 23: The New Bible Commentary, Revised, pp. 318, 319. 24: John T. Willis, p. 402. Ibid. 26: The New Bible Commentary, Revised, p. 319.
2 Samuel 21:1
THE THREE YEARS OF FAMINE THROUGHOUT ISRAEL
And there was a famine in the days of David three years, year after year; and David sought the face of Jehovah. And Jehovah said, It is for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he put to death the Gibeonites. And 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 for the children of Israel and Judah); and David said unto the Gibeonites, What shall I do for you? and wherewith shall I make atonement, that ye may bless the inheritance of Jehovah? And the Gibeonites said unto him, It is no matter of silver or gold between us and Saul, or his house; neither is it for us to put any man to death in Israel. And he said, What ye shall say, that will I do for you. And they said unto the king, The man that consumed us, and that devised against us, [that] we should be destroyed from remaining in any of the borders of Israel, let seven men of his sons be delivered unto us, and we will hang them up unto Jehovah in Gibeah of Saul, the chosen of Jehovah. And the king said, I will give them.
This episode recounts another of the shameful sins of David. In the first place, why should he have waited three whole years to seek the face of the Lord? What hindered him from seeking to know God’s will after two full years instead of waiting three?
There is bloodguilt on Saul and on his house, because he put the Gibeonites to death (2Sa_21:1). Saul, by reason of his excessive zeal, attempted to exterminate the whole race of the Gibeonites, evidently thinking that God’s instructions to Israel regarding their putting the nations of Canaan to death might still be implemented (Jos_9:24). Of course, God’s commandment in that instance was to Joshua, not to Saul. It was far too late for Israel to attempt to do that. Furthermore, Saul also ignored a very important fact. The Israelites had made a solemn covenant with the Gibeonites that they would not be harmed and that the Gibeonites would be slaves to Israel (Jos_9:22). It was therefore a crime of maximum guilt when Saul wantonly violated that covenant.
So the king called the Gibeonites (2Sa_21:2). David here made the same mistake that Joshua and the elders had made during the Conquest in that, They did not ask direction from the Lord (Jos_9:14). It is simply amazing that David would have asked the pagan Gibeonites what should be done; there was not a chance in a million that they would have, or even could have given him a correct answer.
And David said to the Gibeonites, What shall I do for you? And how shall I make expiation? (2Sa_21:3). David was here asking the pagan slaves of Israel what he should do instead of asking direction of the Lord. Furthermore, God had legislated on this matter through Moses; and, in this case, David, like any other Oriental despot, was himself making the decision on what to do.
The Gibeonites were not. of Israel, but of the remnant of the Amorites (2Sa_21:2). These people were actually Hivites (Jos_9:7); but their being called Amorites here is no problem, because, That is a common O.T. name for (any or) all of the pre-Israelite inhabitants of Canaan (as in Gen_15:16; Deu_1:37; Jos_5:1; Jos_24:15 and 1Sa_7:14). F5
A number of scholars appeal to the fact that, “Bloodguilt rests on the murderer until it is expiated properly,” F6 but the Lord specifically stated that, “No expiation for the land can be made, for the blood that is shed in it, except by the blood of him that shed it” (Num_35:34). Furthermore, in certain cases, the ashes of a red heifer were involved (Deu_21:1-9). It is difficult to see how any of this can be applied to the case of the Gibeonites. Saul, the man who had attempted to destroy them, was already dead, and presumably the seven sons whom the Gibeonites requested David to deliver to them were innocent of any outrage whatever against the Gibeonites. Nowhere does this text say that God commanded David to grant any such hateful and vengeful request as that of the Gibeonites, and this writer simply cannot believe that it was right for him to do it.
The Gibeonites said, Let seven of his sons be given to us that we may hang them (2Sa_21:6). The meaning of the word hang here is unknown. F7 It is generally believed to be some brutal, inhuman torturing death often practiced among heathen people. Furthermore, they left the bodies exposed from March 21 to the time of the autumn rains, directly contrary to and a wanton violation of God’s Word (Deu_21:22-23). Of course, the radical critics seize upon this sinful action as an excuse to claim, That law must have been of later origin. F8 Indeed!
Indeed! It would be just as reasonable to affirm that because David committed adultery with Bathsheba and murdered Uriah that the Ten Commandments had not been written at that time! The critical canard that affirms a fifth- or sixth-century date for the Pentateuch is so weak and untrustworthy that those who have foolishly accepted it must never overlook an opportunity to re-assert their false allegation!
The nineteenth-century scholar Adam Clarke has a very discerning comment on this episode: F9
“DID GOD REQUIRE THIS SACRIFICE OF SAUL’S SEVEN SONS, PRESUMABLY ALL OF THEM INNOCENT OF THE CRIMES OF THEIR FATHER? WAS THERE NO OTHER WAY OF AVERTING THE DIVINE DISPLEASURE? WAS THIS REQUISITION OF THE PAGAN GIBEONITES FOR THE PRIVILEGE OF TORTURING TO DEATH SAUL’S SONS TO BE RECEIVED BY DAVID AS AN ORACLE OF GOD? CERTAINLY NOT. GOD WILL NOT HAVE HUMAN BLOOD FOR SACRIFICE ANY MORE THAN HE WILL HAVE SWINE’S BLOOD. THE FAMINE MIGHT HAVE BEEN ENDED AND THE DIVINE FAVOR RESTORED, AND THE LAND PROPERLY PURGED, BY OFFERING THE SACRIFICES PRESCRIBED IN THE PENTATEUCH, AND BY A GENERAL HUMILIATION OF THE PEOPLE.”
Before leaving this vengeful request of the Gibeonites, we should point out what a foolish request it was from their own viewpoint. Having been condemned by Israel to perpetual slavery, why did they not ask for an end of that? Instead, they wished to torture the sons of Saul! Not until the request of Salome who turned down half a kingdom to choose instead the head of John the Baptist is there anything in the Bible that matches this insane request of the Gibeonites. As Matthew Henry said, “They had a fair opportunity to get rid of their servitude, but they did not take it.” F10
God indeed promised that the sins of one generation might indeed be the reason for punishment of succeeding generations, but there is no record where God ever extended this privilege of executing innocents for the crimes of their ancestors into the hands of mortal and fallible men. These men David turned over to the Gibeonites were not sons of Saul in the ordinary sense, but grandsons, and there never was a Divine law that allowed men to execute grandsons for the crimes of their grandfather.
The scholars who excuse this outrage by relating it to the ancient custom of blood-vengeance (for which the cities of refuge were provided as a deterrent) which allowed the next of kin to kill the murderer have simply failed to see that this case resembles that custom in no manner whatever. Here we have, not the next of kin but a racial contingent murdering all of the offender’s next of kin! There is no correspondence whatever in the two cases. In the case of the scriptural avenger of blood, the next of kin (singular) murdered the offender (singular) (and if the manslayer sought refuge in an appointed city, even that was allowed only after a judicial hearing); here we have, not the next of kin, but mere members (plural) of the same race murdering all the descendants (plural) of the offender.
Oh yes, ONLY SEVEN OF SAUL’S GRANDSONS WERE SLAIN, but that seven (a perfect number) was a token of all of Saul’s whole generation, and the only reason the Gibeonites did not make their request include all of them was probably their knowledge that David would NOT have granted it, as indicated by his sparing Mephibosheth.
Thus, we see that what was in operation here was the old pagan system that, “If you kill some of us, we will wipe out your whole generation.” That is exactly the system that the Biblical system regarding the avenger of blood (and its relation to the cities of refuge) was designed to supplant. We have never found in the Holy Bible one line that approves of the execution of members of a third generation to expiate the crimes of one who lived in the first generation. If anything like that is in God’s Word, “Where is it”?
2 Samuel 21:7
DAVID COMPLIED WITH THEIR BLOODY REQUEST
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. But 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 bare to Adriel the son of Barzillai the Meholathite: And he delivered them into the hands of the Gibeonites, and they hanged them in the mountain before Jehovah, and they fell [all] seven together. And they were put to death in the days of harvest, in the first days, at the beginning of barley harvest.
The two sons of Rizpah (2Sa_21:8). This was one of Saul’s concubines, concerning whom the quarrel between Abner and Mephibosheth occurred, resulting in Abner’s defection to the cause of David (2Sa_3:7-11). It is of interest that one of her sons was named Mephibosheth. Thus, Saul had two sons with the same name.
And the five sons of Merab the daughter of Saul, whom she bore to Adriel (2Sa_21:8). The corrupt Hebrew text here has Michal instead of Merab, an error which the KJV translators avoided by rendering the place, which she brought up for Adriel. That also is an adequate solution of what is obviously a corrupt text. The solution by the translators of the RSV simply changed the name Michal to Merab. To us, it appears that one solution is just as good as the other one. If Merab and Adriel were deceased, Michal, as a member of the king’s harem, would have had both the opportunity and the means to have brought up their five orphaned sons. Guessing at the true meaning of a damaged and corrupt text is, at best, a very precarious business.
Barzillai (2Sa_21:8). This man is not the same as the Barzillai who helped David at Mahanaim (2Sa_19:31-40). F11
And he gave them into the hands of the Gibeonites, and they hanged them (2Sa_21:9). Mercifully, we are not told any of the cruel and disgusting details of this pagan execution of the grandsons of Saul. The assertion of Matthew Henry that, Those executions must not be complained of as cruel which have become necessary to the public welfare, F12 while true enough if his assumption that these executions were necessary is allowed, is nevertheless founded upon what this writer believes to be a false premise. Nowhere did God declare that these executions were necessary. David alone, acting upon the bloody request of the Gibeonites, ordered these killings.
Jamieson noted that, “The practice of gibbeting men with a view of appeasing the anger of the gods in seasons of famine was a heathen custom; and the Gibeonites, who were a remnant of the Canaanite pagans, although brought to a knowledge of the true God, were not free from that superstition.” F13 Willis also tells us that, “Several scholars have suggested that the Gibeonites sacrificed these seven descendants of Saul at this time as a sacrifice to their (pagan) god of fertility.” F14 And this writer finds no fault with that viewpoint. These murders cannot be made to fit anything else.
They were put to death at the beginning of the barley harvest (2Sa_21:9). The barley harvest began about the first of April at the time of the Passover; and the wheat harvest began fifty days later at the time of Pentecost. Adam Clarke identified the beginning of the barley harvest with the vernal equinox on March 21st. F15
2 Samuel 21:10
RIZPAH GUARDED THE BODIES OF THE SLAIN
And Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for her upon the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water was poured upon them from heaven; and she suffered neither the birds of the heavens to rest on them by day, nor the beasts of the field by night. And it was told David what Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, the concubine of Saul, had done. 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 street of Beth-shan, where the Philistines had hanged them, in the day that the Philistines slew Saul in Gilboa; 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. And they buried the bones of Saul and Jonathan his son in the country of Benjamin in Zela, in the sepulchre of Kish his father: and they performed all that the king commanded. And after that God was entreated for the land.
No greater and inspiring example of mother love is to be found anywhere in the literature of all nations and generations. Willis also commented on this and gave us these lines from Rudyard Kipling’s immortal poem: “If I were hanged on the highest hill, Mother of mine, O mother of mine! I know whose love would follow me still, Mother of mine, O mother of mine!” F16 Until the rain fell upon them from the heavens
(2Sa_21:10). The rains usually came in late November or early December, so Rizpah must have kept a six-months vigil over the bodies. F17
If left unattended an exposed corpse, whether of a man or an animal, would soon be nothing but bones. “A strict order of priority is followed by carrion eating birds and beasts. The vultures come first … the jackals wait in a circle until the vultures are satisfied, and the crows wait for the jackals.” F18 Since only the bones of those who were hanged are mentioned (2Sa_21:13). it may be that Rizpah’s long vigil might not have been completely successful. Then too, “the bones of those who were hanged” could merely be a euphemism for “their decaying bodies.”
Although the text does not say so, it is likely that these seven grandsons of Saul were likewise buried in the tomb of Kish.
It appears to this writer as very significant that the rains did not come promptly after this brutal and inhuman sacrifice of the sons of Saul, which indeed may be viewed as God’s displeasure with the whole episode. Yes, the rains finally came over six months later AT THE USUAL TIME WHEN THE RAINS GENERALLY CAME.
We have already noted that this long-time exposure of dead bodies to public view was a direct violation of God’s Law in Deu_21:23. We find no agreement whatever with the scholars who fail to note this sinful action allowed by the king. Smith’s assertion that, “That God was propitiated toward the land after that is the conclusion of the narrative,” F19 but the sacred text does not say that God was propitiated, but merely that it finally rained! All efforts to identify the action of this section as the will of God and as something that God was pleased with are a failure for the want of one thing. That lack is the total absence of any line in the Bible that says so!
2 Samuel 21:15
DAVID’S LIFE WAS SAVED BY ABISHAI
And the Philistines had war again with Israel; and David went down, and his servants with him, and fought against the Philistines. And David waxed faint; and Ishbibenob, who was of the sons of the giant, the weight of whose spear was three hundred [shekels] of brass in weight, he being girded with a new [sword], thought to have slain David. But Abishai the son of Zeruiah succored 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 lamp of Israel.
Here again the exact time of this episode is unknown; and, “Part of the text here is corrupt.” F20 David was often critical of his nephews, the sons of Zeruiah, but on this occasion Abishai saved his life. Josephus tells us that, “David was totally exhausted and that he had fallen to the ground at the time the giant turned back to slay him, but Abishai covered David with his shield as he lay down and slew the enemy.” F21
Three hundred shekels of bronze (2Sa_21:16). The scholars who mention this generally agree that the weight indicated is between 7 and one-half pounds and 8 pounds. The Hebrew word here rendered ‘giants’ is a collective noun denoting a giant race that inhabited Canaan in the pre-Israelite times. The word is [~rapha’], rendered by the Vulgate Arapha; and from it comes Harapha the name of the giant in Milton’s Samson Agonistes. F22
2 Samuel 21:18
REGARDING THE SLAUGHTER OF THE GIANTS OF GATH
And it came to pass after this, that there was again war with the Philistines at Gob: then Sibbecai the Hushathite slew Saph, who was of the sons of the giant. And there was again war with the Philistines at Gob; and Elhanan the son of Jaareoregim the Beth-lehemite slew Goliath the Gittite, the staff of whose spear was like a weaver’s beam. And there was again war at 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. And when he defied Israel, Jonathan the son of Shimei, David’s brother, slew him. These four were born to the giant in Gath; and they fell by the hand of David, and by the hand of his servants.
Elhanan killed Goliath (2Sa_21:19). The great difficulty here is that the Hebrew text is apparently a flat contradiction of 1 Sam. 17, where it is stated that David killed Goliath. For any who might be interested in a more detailed discussion of this, D. F. Payne in The New Bible Commentary (Revised) devotes a special appendix to the problem, F23 Bearing in mind the admitted corruption evident in this chapter, the Christian should have no difficulty with the problem. There are a number of ways to resolve the matter: (1) The parallel account in 1Ch_20:5 states that, Elhanan. slew Lahmi the brother of Goliath. (2) Elhanan and David were names of the same individual, just as Solomon was also named Jedidiah (2Sa_12:24 d). (3) It is also possible that Goliath was a name worn by more than one Philistine giant, or that it was a Philistine title, or that it described a certain type of Philistine soldier.
F24 It is perfectly silly for any Christian to be upset about this type of difficulty. There is simply not enough information for anyone to be dogmatic about the problem. F25 As Payne stated it, In view of the textual problems, it is a precarious argument to insist that 2Sa_21:19 contradicts 1 Sam. 17. F26
These four were descended from the giants in Gath, and they fell by the hand of David and by the hand of his servants (2Sa_21:22). It is significant that David is here mentioned as one who had a hand in killing these giants, and that certainly harmonizes with 1 Sam. 17.