2 Samuel 21

1 Then there was a famine in the days of Dawid three years, year after year; and Dawid enquired of יהוה. And יהוה answered, “It is for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he slew the Giveonites.”

2 And the king called the Giveonites, and said unto them; (now the Giveonites were not of the children of Yisrael, but of the remnant of the Amorites; and the children of Yisrael had sworn unto them; and Saul sought to slay them in his zeal to the children of Yisrael and Judah (Yehudah).)

3 Wherefore Dawid said unto the Giveonites, “What shall I do for you? and wherewith shall I make the atonement, that you may bless the inheritance of יהוה?”

4 And the Giveonites said unto him, “We will have no silver nor gold of Saul, nor of his house; neither for us shalt you kill any man in Yisrael.” And he said, “What you shall say, that will I do for you.”

5 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 Yisrael,

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

7 But the king spared Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan (Yehonatan) the son of Saul, because of יהוה’s oath that was between them, between Dawid and Jonathan (Yehonatan) the son of Saul.

8 But the king took the two sons of Rizpah the daughter of Ayah, 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;

9 And he delivered them into the hands of the Giveonites, and they hanged them in the hill before יהוה; 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.

10 And Rizpah the daughter of Ayah 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.

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

12 And Dawid went and took the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan (Yehonatan) his son from the men of Yavesh-Gilad, which had stolen them from the street of Bethshan, where the Philistines had hanged them, when the Philistines had slain Saul in Gilboa.

13 And he brought up from thence the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan (Yehonatan) his son; and they gathered the bones of them that were hanged.

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

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

16 And 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 Dawid.

17 But Avishai the son of Tseruyah succoured him, and smote the Philistine, and killed him. Then the men of Dawid sware unto him, saying, “You shalt go no more out with us to battle, that you quench not the light of Yisrael.”

18 And 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.

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

20 And 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.

21 And when he defied Yisrael, Jonathan (Yehonatan) the son of Shimea the brother of Dawid slew him.

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