Deeper Commentary
2Sa 21:1 There was a famine in the days of David three years, year
after year; and David sought the face of Yahweh. Yahweh said, There is
bloodguilt on Saul and on his house, because he put to death the Gibeonites-
The record in 2 Samuel is not necessarily chronological but follows
themes. This material may be inserted here to follow on from the mention of
Gibeon in 2 Sam. 20:8, where Joab had killed Amasa. The seven victims were
all young and unmarried, which would suggest a date earlier in the reign of
David. And it would be more appropriate that judgment for Saul's
misbehaviour came early on in David's reign, rather than as it were being
remembered much later. "Three years, year after year", could refer
to the three years after Saul's death.
We ponder how there was bloodguilt on Saul's descendants.
Saul's sins were not to be visited upon his descendants (Ex. 18:2; Dt.
24:16; Jer. 31:29) and Num. 35:33 is clear that Saul personally was
responsible: “Blood pollutes the land and the land can have no expiation
for blood that is shed on it, except by the blood of him who shed it".
When asked what can make ammends, the Gibeonites naturally ask for the
blood of Saul's family. But this is apparently in line with what Yahweh
Himself had told David here. It seems rather politically convenient for
David that here we have the destruction of the potential claimants to his
throne. That is what David humanly would have wanted, but grace and his
honouring of his promise to Saul stopped him from killing the descendants
of his enemy, the previous king. Usually a new king destroyed the family
of the previous dynasty. But God through the incident of the Gibeonites
works to ensure that this happens anyway, as some kind of reward for
David's attempt to live by grace and integrity in the matter.
2Sa 21:2 The king called the Gibeonites and said to 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 to them: and Saul sought to kill them in
his zeal for the children of Israel and Judah)-
Joshua 9 records how the Gibeonites had been promised security by
Joshua, although they were Hivites who were to have been destroyed (Josh.
9:7; Dt. 7:2). Saul's apparent zeal to obey part of God's word whilst
ignoring the covenant made by Joshua recalls how he murdered or expelled all
witches (1 Sam. 28:9), in almost fanatic obedience to Ex. 22:18; Lev. 20:6.
Saul's zeal to punish the apostate was really a classic case of
psychological transference. He knew, subconsciously, that he was a sinner
and deserved punishment for his sins. So he transferred those sins on to
others, and punished them, revelling in it. But he was picking up verses
from the Bible out of context, and with the witches, he himself used one. It
was this attitude which was deeply displeasing to God. And the fact all
Israel had known of this and done nothing to honour the covenant made in
their name with the Gibeonites... meant that all Israel had to suffer the
results of the famine.
2Sa 21:3 and David said to the Gibeonites, What shall I do for you? And with
what shall I make atonement, that you may bless the inheritance of Yahweh?-
"Atonement" is not used here in a religious sense but simply meaning
a covering, which the Gibeonites understand as hinting at a financial
payment (:4). For David personally had not sinned against them, and
atonement in the religious sense was only appropriate towards God. But the
Gibeonites like to use it in a religious sense, playing God by demanding
that without the shedding of blood there could be no reconciliation with
them.
2Sa 21:4 The Gibeonites said to 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-
The law of Moses forbad the payment of money as compensation for
murder (Num. 35:31). That David had apparently hinted at this possibility
in :3 would therefore suggest that he was willing to break the letter of
the law of Moses, a feature of David's which was largely an outcome of his
understanding so well the spirit of the law. And yet it was to lead him
into the sin with Bathsheba and Uriah. And yet it has to be said that this
was a difficult legal situation. God had shown that the sin of Saul needed
some atonement, but Saul was dead. The Gibeonites were asking for blood as
atonement, although they accept it is not within their power to execute
this.
He said, Whatever you say, that will I do for you-
This was unwise, because David was to be asked to break the law. But
he perhaps lacks the humility to pull out of this blanket promise he has
now made.
2Sa 21:5 They said to the king, The man who consumed us, and who devised
against us, that we should be destroyed from remaining in any of the
borders of Israel-
This implies Saul's campaign against them had been widespread and
systematic. See on :2.
2Sa 21:6 let seven men of his sons be delivered to us, and we will hang
them up to Yahweh in Gibeah of Saul, the chosen of Yahweh. The king said,
I will give them-
Their allusion is to Num. 25:4, where the bodies of the leaders in
the worship of Baal were hung up to turn away Yahweh's anger (cp. :1). But
the seven sons of Saul were not personally responsible for the sin. And
David had solemnly vowed before Yahweh to Saul and Jonathan on at least
two occasions that he would not destroy their seed. David's acquiescence
therefore was wrong, and like Herod and other kings trapped by their own
pride to fulfil their promises, so David agrees to the death of Saul's
sons. He ought to have said something like "I have vowed a vow not to do
this, I believe in grace, and will not allow this to happen. I will throw
myself down before Yahweh and beg for this situation to be resolved
another way". But pride stops him. Yet David generally was humble in this
kind of thing. So as with the sin with Bathsheba, I take this to be an out
of character failing of David.
2Sa 21:7 But the king spared Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan the son of
Saul, because of Yahweh’s oath that was between them, between David and
Jonathan the son of Saul-
As noted on :6, David had made a similar oath before Yahweh to Saul
(1 Sam. 24:21,22). But he seems to justify breaking that by arguing that
he was honouring a similar oath he had made to Jonathan. I suggested on :6
what his response ought to have been.
2Sa 21:8 But the king took the two sons of Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, whom
she bore to Saul, Armoni and Mephibosheth; and the five sons of Michal the
daughter of Saul, whom she bore to Adriel the son of Barzillai the
Meholathite-
David comes over as wrong all around in this matter. Michal was his
former wife. He had broken up Michal's marriage with Paltiel even though
Paltiel wept over it. And now he slays Michal's five sons. If this is the
same Barzillai who was later so kind to David at the time of Absalom's
rebellion, then we see that man's grace, forgiving David for slaying his
five grandchildren. And it contrasts with David's low estimate of the
value of human life which we again see.
God sees to the end of a man’s history, to the end of human history, He
weighs men, and weighs them up in grace. Further, we all likely struggle
with the unspirituality of others against us. We ponder how brother X or
sister Y can really be a Christian, can have any real relationship with
God, because of how we see them act. This struggle over these kinds of
issues is, in my experience, the number one reason why people leave
Christian communities. The raw anger, hatred and viciousness they see in
others disillusions them, and they walk. The pull of materialism, of false
doctrine etc., are actually not significant reasons in the majority of
cases I know of where a believer has quit the community of believers. It’s
nearly always personal disillusion with the evil side of their brethren.
All I can say is, Consider David’s poorer side. Think of men like Adriel
and Phaltiel, women like Rizpah, the mothers of Moab and Edom, who all
likely considered David a sadistic maniac- given their experience of him.
And, of course, Uriah, who surely knew all along what was going on. They
saw the weaker side of David. Thanks to the extent of Biblical revelation
about David, we see a wider picture. And even if that wider picture
remains invisible to us concerning brother A and sister B, try to imagine
that they have a prayer life, read Scripture, are loved by God, and
probably in some ways and to some extent do respond to that love… and
leave the final analysis of human character to the God who judges, weighs
and knows far deeper, more graciously, more hopefully, than we ever can in
this life.
David had loved Jonathan's sister Michal, and she loved him; only for her
to come to despise David's spirituality, and to be unfaithful to him (2
Sam. 21:8 implies she had even more relationships than just with Paltiel).
But then David killed her five sons.
She was part of the ineffable sadness of David's personal life.
Michal has many similarities to Rachel in the book of Genesis.
They each had an older sister who was set up to be their husband's wife.
The fathers were both obsessive and unpleasant, and both fathers pursued
after their husbands. Both women present as not very spiritual in that
they had teraphim [household idols], which they both use to deceive their
fathers to save their own skin, and to help their husbands save their
lives from the murderous intent of their fathers. They both lie to their
fathers. In the teraphim incident, Rachel claims to be sick and Michal
claims David is sick. Both have husbands who work for their father, who
deceives their husbands. Both had to chose their husbands over their
fathers. Both had an older sister, Leah cp. Merab. The fathers of both
women made an agreement with the sons in law [David and Jacob] to give
them their daughters in marriage for a dowry [years of labour, killing
Goliath], but deceived them. David effectively paid two dowries in order
to marry Michal- slaying Goliath, and then 100 Philistine foreskins. Jacob
also pays two dowries, each of seven years labour. Each woman had a time
of infertility. In Michal's case this is recorded in 2 Sam. 6:23 "Michal,
daughter of Saul, had no child to the day of her death". That could imply
she had a child the die she died- she died in childbirth. Which would be
another parallel with Rachel. This verse however stands in tension with 2
Sam. 21:8 "the five sons of Michal the daughter of Saul, whom she bore to
Adriel" (NEV). The translations squirm around this by translating "bore"
as "brought up for", or by appealing to a changed text which read "Merab"
for Michal. But the Hebrew is simply as NEV- that Michal had five children
by the man whom her older sister was married off to rather than David, and
then she marries David. All spaghetti junction in terms of relationships,
and all reminiscent of the Jacob-Rachel-Leah mess. All so mixed up and
intertwining it's hard to get any mental map of it. Apparently both Michal
and Merab were at one point married to the same man, Adriel. By the
intrigue of their father. Just as with Laban and his daughters Rachel and
Leah.
Clearly Jacob, Laban and Rachel are reflected in David, Saul and Michal.
All these connections cannot be mere coincidence. We naturally enquire why
such similarities constantly occur between the lives of God's people. We
see the same thing today, the deeper we engage with other believers and
get to know them. The repeated circumstances occur over time [between us
and earlier believers we meet in the Bible] and also horizontally between
us and present believers whom we know. We see the same Divine hallmark and
way of operating in our lives, as comfort that indeed man is not alone-
not least because our apparently unique situations aren't in fact so
unique.
2Sa 21:9 He delivered them into the hands of the Gibeonites, and they
hanged them in the mountain before Yahweh, and all seven of them fell
together. They were put to death in the days of harvest, in the first
days, at the beginning of barley harvest-
That is, at Passover (Dt. 16:9). At the time when David ought to have
been celebrating God's deliverance from death by grace, he was putting to
death innocent young people, who may have been no more than children.
2Sa 21:10 Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for her
on the rock-
To form a tent for her to live in whilst she protected the bodies day
and night from wild animals.
From the beginning of harvest until water was poured on them
from the sky-
The heavy rains usually came about six months after the beginning of
harvest.
She allowed neither the birds of the sky to rest on them by
day, nor the animals of the field by night-
The idea of blood sacrifice being required to bring rain suggests that
the Gibeonites believed in a rain god. Yet when David is asked to give seven men of the family of Saul as a blood
sacrifice to appease the rain god who was not sending rain, David agrees.
He doesn’t make the Biblical argument that rain being withheld indicates
the need for repentance before Yahweh, and that sacrificing humans is
wrong and won’t change anything in this context. He gives in to the false
understanding of the Gibeonites, breaking his undertakings to Saul and
Jonathan by doing so, and selects seven men to be slain and hung up. We
read of the mother of two of them, Rizpah, lovingly watching over the
bodies of her sons day and night, with all the distraction of true love (2
Sam. 21:10). David didn’t have to do this. But he did. We get the
impression this was another example of his wrong attitude to the shedding
of blood (1 Chron. 22:8). He doesn’t seem to have cared for the mother’s
feelings, nor for the lives of her sons. And note that David makes up the
total of seven men by having the five foster sons of his own estranged
wife Michal slain. Was this not David somehow hitting back at Michal, who
had mocked him for his style of worship in 2 Sam. 6? And how did Adriel,
the father of those five sons, feel? He wasn’t of the house of Saul, but
because of David’s desire to placate someone else, he lost all his sons,
just because his wife had died and Saul’s daughter had raised them. And
yet this same David is recorded as saying soon afterwards: “I have kept
the ways of the Lord, and have not wickedly departed from my God. For all
his ordinances were before me; And as for his statutes, I did not depart
from them. I was also perfect toward him; And I kept myself from mine
iniquity. Therefore hath the Lord recompensed me according to my
righteousness, According to my cleanness in his eyesight” (2 Sam.
22:22-25).
2Sa 21:11 It was told David what Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, the
concubine of Saul, had done-
It seems it took David the six months alluded to in :10 to respond. He
gathers up the bones of the men or boys, along with those of Saul and
Jonathan, and gives them a decent burial.
2Sa 21:12 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 public
square of Beth Shan, where the Philistines had hanged them, in the day that
the Philistines killed Saul in Gilboa-
The last mention of the David : Jonathan relationship is in 2 Sam.
21:12-14, where we read that David personally ("he" cp.
they" ) took and carried the bones
of Saul and Jonathan to their final resting place. The love of David for
Jonathan is apparent. We are invited to imagine David carrying the bones
of his best friend, perhaps just the ashes of them (1 Sam. 31:12,13),
cradling them (or the container) in his arms, weeping as he walked. How
about this for pathos. The words of David's lament in 2 Sam. 1 would have
surely come to his mind. It is almost certain that David memorized them,
seeing it was taught as a song of remembrance (2 Sam. 1:18). There would
have been the restimulation of so much. So that is how the Spirit
concludes the story, David walking off into the sunset with the bones of
Jonathan. It should be remembered that this occurred after David's
disgrace with Bathsheba. The thought must surely have gone through his
mind: It's a good thing dear Jonathan isn't here to see it. The very name
of the prophet Nathan, the exposer of David's sin, would have restimulated
David. For 'Jonathan' means 'Yahweh-Nathan'. It is quite likely that in
practice David would not have pronounced the 'Yah' prefix; he would have
called Jonathan 'Nathan' (how many 'Jonathan's do you know whose name
isn't abbreviated by their friends?). The reason why there is so much
pathos in the story, so powerfully expressed, is to set us a standard of
love and feeling towards Christ; for Jonathan represents us, and the love
of David for him really is a reflection of the love of Christ for us.
Truly do we sing that "Thou art far above / dearest of human love".
2Sa 21:13 and he brought up from there the bones of Saul and the bones of
Jonathan his son: and they gathered the bones of those who were hanged-
The extreme grief of Rizpah is intentionally contrasted with this
symbolic gesture from David in at least giving the sons an honourable
burial, although it took David six months to do so. He is presented as
callous in the face of very genuine grief caused by his pride and refusal
to honour his covenant before Yahweh that he had made with Saul.
2Sa 21:14 They buried the bones of Saul and Jonathan his son in the
country of Benjamin in Zela, in the tomb of Kish his father: and they
performed all that the king commanded. After that God responded to the
prayer for the land-
David was wrong in
killing those seven men or boys. God is not appeased by blood sacrifice in that sense.
After the horror of what he had done was brought to his attention, David
buried the bones of Saul as if he felt he should have been more respectful
to the house of Saul (2 Sam. 21:12) and only then God responded to the
prayer for the famine to be lifted (:14)- as if He sought respect for the
house of Saul and not the disrespect of killing seven random relatives of
Saul's on the say-so of mere men. If indeed God wanted the sacrifice of
those men, we would surely read that immediately after their murder He lifted the famine; but He
did so only after David had subsequently shown respect to the house of
Saul as a token of regret and repentance for what he had authorized.
2Sa 21:15 The Philistines had war again with Israel; and David went down,
and his servants with him, and fought against the Philistines. David grew
faint-
The material in 2 Samuel isn't chronological. The material we have
now at the end of the book appears to be various cameos of the life of
David which are for some reason not incorporated into the book as a whole.
Perhaps the common theme in them all is that they mention David's
weaknesses in various ways. We now read of how David was "faint",
physically weak during a battle. It is one of a number of hints that he
did not enjoy good health. We think of him laying sick at Mahanaim during
Absalom's rebellion, and the copious evidence in the Psalms that he had a
breakdown of his health soon after the sin with Bathsheba. These
events are located in 1 Chron. 20:4-8 immediately after the capture
of Rabbah, which was again not David at his spiritually strongest.
2Sa 21:16 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 armed
with a new sword, was about to have slain David
We wonder therefore whether David's faith failed him at this point,
or whether he did not have the level of faith he showed when he triumphed
over Goliath. David had mocked armour as a source of strength, and yet
this suggests David almost perished because of the weaponry of this
Philistine. I suggested on :15 that the cameos from the life of David
which conclude 2 Samuel all have the common theme of David's weakness.
2Sa 21:17 But Abishai the son of Zeruiah helped him, and struck the
Philistine, and killed him. Then the men of David swore to him saying, You
shall go no more out with us to battle, that you don’t quench the lamp of
Israel-
The significance of this is that David is harking back to how he had
not gone out to war with his armies at the time of 2 Sam. 11:1, and it had
led him into the sin with Bathsheba. At every point we find him repentant
and playing along with how God too was referring him back to previous
points in his life. It seems that after the sin, David insisted on going
out with his troops to battle even when he was too old to effectively do
so (2 Sam. 18:2).
2Sa 21:18 It came to pass after this, that there was again war with the
Philistines at Gob: then Sibbecai the Hushathite killed Saph, who was of
the sons of the giant-
We note that the Rephaim had children like other human beings
(2 Sam. 21:16,18; Dt. 3:11), inhabiting an area known as the valley of
Rephaim (Josh. 15:8). The "giants" of Gen. 6:2-4 were therefore humans and
not celestial beings. "Gob" is LXX Gath; see on :20 for the significance.
2Sa 21:19 There was again war with the Philistines at Gob; and Elhanan the
son of Jaareoregim the Bethlehemite killed Goliath the Gittite’s brother,
the staff of whose spear was like a weaver’s beam-
Elhanan was from the small village of Bethlehem, and therefore was
likely a childhood friend of David's. He like us with the Lord Jesus was
inspired by David's victory over Goliath. He saw what was potentially
possible for man in faith, just as we are shown through the Lord's victory
on the cross what is possible for men apparently saddled with human
nature.
2Sa 21:20 There was again war at Gath, where there was a man of great
stature, who had on every hand six fingers, and on every foot six toes,
twenty four in number; and he also was born to the giant-
David fought the Philistines at Gath (see on :18), and yet we note
that he lived with Achish at Gath for over a year, and some of his most
loyal followers were Philistines from Gath like Ittai. His victories over
them therefore elicited humility and faith from some of the Philistines
there. They realized that David and his men won their victories not in
their own strength, but because of Yahweh. And they humbly came into
covenant relationship with the God of their enemies, and fellowship with
their one time enemies and murderers of their friends and families. It is
humility which is the critical requirement in coming to the true God, and
no amount of apparently high powered intellectual argument and slick
presentation can replace that.
2Sa 21:21 When he defied Israel, Jonathan the son of Shimei, David’s
brother, killed him-
Goliath's defiance of Israel is a major theme (1 Sam.
17:10,25,26,36,45). Later Philistine defiance is described with the same
word (2 Sam. 21:21; 23:9). David's victory over Goliath was inspirational
to other Israelites, just as the Lord's triumph on the cross should be to
us. Jonathan was brother to the crafty Jonadab, who led Absalom into major
sin by his subliminal suggestions. We see how faith and unbelief can exist
within the same family.
2Sa 21:22 These four were born to the giant in Gath; and they fell by the
hand of David, and by the hand of his servants-
David took five stones to kill Goliath but used only one. Was he faithless
and doubting that the first one would hit home? Or did he aim to use the
other four on Goliath's four giant sons (2 Sam. 21:16-22)? Do those five stones represent the five
books of Moses which Ps. 119 tells us was Christ's study all the day, it
being through the word that Jesus overcame the mind of sin? If he did aim
to use the other four on Goliath's four giant sons, that
shows supreme spiritual ambition. In reality those four were killed later
by David's closest followers- and they must have their counterparts
amongst us.
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