Now Abner son of Ner, the general in command of Saul's army, had taken Saul's son Ish-bosheth and had brought him to Mahanaim.

Then the king summoned Ziba, Saul's attendant, and said to him, "Everything that belonged to Saul and to his entire house I hereby give to your master's grandson.

So the king took Armoni and Mephibosheth, the two sons of Aiah's daughter Rizpah whom she had born to Saul, and the five sons of Saul's daughter Merab whom she had born to Adriel the son of Barzillai the Meholathite.

Now Saul's son Jonathan had a son who was crippled in both feet. He was five years old when the news about Saul and Jonathan arrived from Jezreel. His nurse picked him up and fled, but in her haste to get away, he fell and was injured. Mephibosheth was his name.

The king asked, "Is there not someone left from Saul's family, that I may extend God's kindness to him?" Ziba said to the king, "One of Jonathan's sons is left; both of his feet are crippled."

Then King David reached Bahurim. There a man from Saul's extended family named Shimei son of Gera came out, yelling curses as he approached.

So David said, "Good! I will make an agreement with you. I ask only one thing from you. You will not see my face unless you bring Saul's daughter Michal when you come to visit me."

Now Saul's son had two men who were in charge of raiding units; one was named Baanah and the other Recab. They were sons of Rimmon the Beerothite, who was a Benjaminite. (Beeroth is regarded as belonging to Benjamin,

As the ark of the Lord entered the City of David, Saul's daughter Michal looked out the window. When she saw King David leaping and dancing before the Lord, she despised him.

When David went home to pronounce a blessing on his own house, Michal, Saul's daughter, came out to meet him. She said, "How the king of Israel has distinguished himself this day! He has exposed himself today before his servants' slave girls the way a vulgar fool might do!"

Now Michal, Saul's daughter, had no children to the day of her death.

Now there was a servant from Saul's house named Ziba, so he was summoned to David. The king asked him, "Are you Ziba?" He replied, "At your service."

There were a thousand men from Benjamin with him, along with Ziba the servant of Saul's household, and with him his fifteen sons and twenty servants. They hurriedly crossed the Jordan within sight of the king.

Now Mephibosheth, Saul's grandson, came down to meet the king. From the day the king had left until the day he safely returned, Mephibosheth had not cared for his feet nor trimmed his mustache nor washed his clothes.

When David was told what Rizpah daughter of Aiah, Saul's concubine, had done,

The king had mercy on Mephibosheth son of Jonathan, the son of Saul, in light of the Lord's oath that had been taken between David and Jonathan son of Saul.

However, the war was prolonged between the house of Saul and the house of David. David was becoming steadily stronger, while the house of Saul was becoming increasingly weaker.

As the war continued between the house of Saul and the house of David, Abner was becoming more influential in the house of Saul.

They brought the head of Ish-bosheth to David in Hebron, saying to the king, "Look! The head of Ish-bosheth son of Saul, your enemy who sought your life! The Lord has granted vengeance to my lord the king this day against Saul and his descendants!"

he went and took the bones of Saul and of his son Jonathan from the leaders of Jabesh Gilead. (They had secretly taken them from the plaza at Beth Shan. It was there that Philistines publicly exposed their corpses after they had killed Saul at Gilboa.)

They lamented and wept and fasted until evening because Saul, his son Jonathan, the Lord's people, and the house of Israel had fallen by the sword.