Reference: Gibeonites
Fausets
Their safety was covenanted by Israel (Joshua 9), even though obtained by a deceit, their ambassadors having taken old sacks and mended wineskins (the tear being tied up like a bag) and old mended sandals ("clouted," i.e. mended coarsely); but they were made "hewers of wood and drawers of water." Israel's error was in making the treaty without inquiring of the Lord; a warning to the church of all ages against the dissimulation of the world, which seeks admission and union with the kingdom of God without real conversion, faith, and sanctification, when it suits its own carnal advantage. Saul in his zeal for Israel where God sanctioned it not, though wanting in zeal against Israel's foe Amalek (1Sa 15:18-20) where God commanded it, sought to slay them, probably (2 Samuel 21) in the dark closing period of his reign seeking to atone for his deficiency as to Amalek and to win the divine favor and popularity with his people by this mis-timed and misplaced zeal.
God remembers the sins of the fathers upon the children, and vindicates His righteousness as Ruler of the nations by making an entail of curse go down from one generation to another for the unexpiated guilt of bloodshed and violation of covenants. The three years' famine, the Lord's answer when consulted as to the cause, that it was "for Saul and his bloody house because he slew the Gibeonites," and after the execution of Saul's seven (seven, the sacred number, denotes the performance of a work of God) sons "the Lord being entreated for the hind," prove that David did not contrive or eagerly fall in with this device for ridding himself of the remainder of Saul's royal line. Nay, he showed by the honorable burial he gave their remains, and by sparing Mephibosheth, that he entertained no such feeling, nor had he by this time anything to fear from Saul's family.
The whole matter was divinely ordered to teach solemn moral lessons of God's government to the king and the nation (Ex 20:5; 34:7; Le 26:34-40; Nu 14:18-34, especially Nu 35:33, "blood it defileth the land, and the land cannot be cleansed of the blood that is shed therein but by the blood of him that shed it"; Isa 14:20-21; 65:6-7; Jer 2:9; 32:18). The "water dropping upon them (the hanged or crucified seven) out of heaven" marked the cessation of the heaven sent drought and the point of time when the bodies might be taken down from the stakes and buried. Ordinarily bodies were taken down for burial before night (De 21:22-23); but in this case guilt rested on the whole land, and therefore the expiatory sacrifice was to remain exposed to birds of prey (the greatest ignominy, 1Sa 17:44) before Jehovah, until the cessation of the drought showed that His wrath was appeased.
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thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them; for I, Jehovah thy God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the sons to the third and to the fourth generation of them that hate me,
keeping mercy unto thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin, but by no means clearing the guilty; visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, and upon the children's children, upon the third and upon the fourth generation.
Then shall the land enjoy its sabbaths all the days of the desolation, when ye are in your enemies' land; then shall the land rest, and enjoy its sabbaths. All the days of the desolation it shall rest, the days in which it did not rest on your sabbaths, when ye dwelt therein. read more. And as to those that remain of you I will send faintness into their hearts in the lands of their enemies, that the sound of a driven leaf shall chase them, and they shall flee, as fleeing from a sword; and they shall fall when none pursueth; and they shall stumble one over another, as it were before a sword, when none pursueth; and ye shall have no power to stand before your enemies. And ye shall perish among the nations, and the land of your enemies shall eat you up. And they that remain of you shall waste away through their iniquity in your enemies' lands; and also through the iniquities of their fathers shall they waste away with them. And they shall confess their iniquity, and the iniquity of their fathers, through their unfaithfulness wherein they were unfaithful to me, and also that they have walked contrary unto me,
Jehovah is slow to anger, and abundant in goodness, forgiving iniquity and transgression, but by no means clearing the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children, upon the third and fourth generation. Pardon, I beseech thee, the iniquity of this people according to the greatness of thy loving-kindness, and as thou hast forgiven this people, from Egypt even until now. read more. And Jehovah said, I have pardoned according to thy word. But as surely as I live, all the earth shall be filled with the glory of Jehovah! for all those men who have seen my glory, and my signs, which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and have tempted me these ten times, and have not hearkened to my voice, shall in no wise see the land which I did swear unto their fathers: none of them that despised me shall see it. But my servant Caleb, because he hath another spirit in him, and hath followed me fully, him will I bring into the land whereinto he came; and his seed shall possess it. (Now the Amalekites and the Canaanites dwell in the valley.) To-morrow turn you, and take your journey into the wilderness, on the way to the Red sea. And Jehovah spoke to Moses and to Aaron, saying, How long shall I bear with this evil assembly, which murmur against me? I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel, which they murmur against me. Say unto them, As surely as I live, saith Jehovah, if I do not do unto you as ye have spoken in mine ears! In this wilderness shall your carcases fall; and all that were numbered of you, according to your whole number from twenty years old and upwards, who have murmured against me, shall in no wise come into the land, concerning which I have lifted up my hand to make you dwell in it; save Caleb the son of Jephunneh, and Joshua the son of Nun. But your little ones, of whom ye said they should be a prey, them will I bring in, and they shall know the land that ye have despised. And as to you, your carcases shall fall in this wilderness. And your children shall wander in the wilderness forty years, and bear your whoredoms, until your carcases be wasted in the wilderness. After the number of the days in which ye have searched out the land, forty days, each day for a year shall ye bear your iniquities forty years, and ye shall know mine estrangement from you.
And ye shall not pollute the land wherein ye are; for blood, it polluteth the land; and there can be no atonement made for the land, for the blood that hath been shed therein, but by the blood of him that shed it.
And if a man have committed a sin worthy of death, and he be put to death, and thou have hanged him on a tree, his body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but thou shalt in any wise bury him that day (for he that is hanged is a curse of God); and thou shalt not defile thy land, which Jehovah thy God giveth thee for an inheritance.
And Jehovah sent thee on a way and said, Go and utterly destroy the sinners the Amalekites, and fight against them until they be consumed. Why then didst thou not hearken to the voice of Jehovah, but didst fall upon the spoil, and didst evil in the sight of Jehovah? read more. And Saul said to Samuel, I have indeed hearkened to the voice of Jehovah, and have gone the way which Jehovah sent me, and have brought Agag the king of Amalek, and have utterly destroyed the Amalekites.
And the Philistine said to David, Come to me, and I will give thy flesh to the fowls of the heavens and to the beasts of the field.
Thou shalt not be joined with them in burial; for thou hast destroyed thy land, hast slain thy people. Of the seed of evildoers no mention shall be made for ever. Prepare ye slaughter for his children, because of the iniquity of their fathers; that they may not rise up and possess the earth, nor fill the face of the world with cities.
Behold, it is written before me: I will not keep silence, but will recompense, even recompense into their bosom, your iniquities, and the iniquities of your fathers together, saith Jehovah, who have burned incense upon the mountains, and outraged me upon the hills; and I will measure their former work into their bosom.
Therefore will I yet plead with you, saith Jehovah, and with your children's children will I plead.
who shewest mercy unto thousands, and recompensest the iniquity of the fathers into the bosom of their children after them, thou, the great, the mighty God, Jehovah of hosts is his name;
Morish
Gib'eonites
The people of Gibeon and perhaps of the three confederate cities
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And the men of Israel said to the Hivite, Perhaps thou dwellest in the midst of us, and how should I make a covenant with thee?
And the children of Israel journeyed, and came to their cities on the third day; and their cities were Gibeon, and Chephirah, and Beeroth, and Kirjath-jearim.
And now ye are cursed, and ye shall never cease to be bondmen, and hewers of wood, and drawers of water for the house of my God.
And there was a famine in the days of David three years, year after year; and David inquired of Jehovah. And Jehovah said, It is for Saul, and for his house of blood, because he slew the Gibeonites. And the king called the Gibeonites, and spoke to them. (Now the Gibeonites were not of the children of Israel, but of the remainder of the Amorites; and the children of Israel had sworn to them; and Saul sought to smite them in his zeal for the children of Israel and Judah.) read more. And David said to the Gibeonites, What shall I do for you? and with what shall I make atonement, that ye may bless the inheritance of Jehovah? And the Gibeonites said to him, As to Saul and his house, it is with us no question of receiving silver or gold, neither is it for us to have any man put to death in Israel. And he said, What ye say will I do for you. And they said to the king, The man that consumed us, and that devised against us that we should be destroyed from remaining in all the borders of Israel, let seven men of his sons be given up to us, and we will hang them up to Jehovah in Gibeah of Saul, the chosen of Jehovah. And the king said, I will give them. 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. And the king took the two sons of Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, whom she had borne to Saul, Armoni and Mephibosheth; and the five sons of the sister of Michal the daughter of Saul, whom she had borne to Adriel the son of Barzillai the Meholathite; and he gave them into the hands of the Gibeonites, and they hanged them on the hill before Jehovah. And they fell all seven together, and were put to death in the first days of the harvest, in the beginning of barley harvest. Then Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for her upon the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water poured on them out of the heavens, and suffered neither the fowl 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 open place of Beth-shan, where the Philistines had hanged them, the day the Philistines had smitten 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 them with the bones of Saul and Jonathan his son in the country of Benjamin in Zela, in the sepulchre of Kish his father; and they did all that the king had commanded. And afterwards God was propitious to the land.
and Jishmaiah the Gibeonite, a mighty man among the thirty, and over the thirty; and Jeremiah, and Jahaziel, and Johanan, and Jozabad the Gederathite.
And next to them repaired Melatiah the Gibeonite, and Jadon the Meronothite, the men of Gibeon and of Mizpah, to the seat of the governor on this side the river.