1. Now there was a famine in the days of David for three years, year after year; and David called upon the Lord. The Lord said, “There is blood guilt upon Saul and upon his house because he put the Gibeonites to death.”
2. So the king summoned the Gibeonites and spoke to them. Now the Gibeonites were not from the children of Israel. Instead they were a remnant of the Amorites. Although the children of Israel had made a pact with them, Saul attempted to destroy them in his zeal for the people of Israel and Judah.
3. David said to the Gibeonites, “What must I do for you, and with what may I appease you that you may bless the inheritance of the Lord?”
4. The Gibeonites said to him, “We have no concern for silver or gold from Saul or his household, nor is it for us to put any man in Israel to death.”He said to them, “What are you saying I should do for you?”
5. They said to the king, “Regarding the man who put an end to us and planned to exterminate us from the entire territory of Israel,
6. let seven of his male descendants be handed over to us, and we will hang them before the Lord at Gibeah of Saul, the chosen one of the Lord.”The king said, “I will hand them over.”
7. But the king spared Mephibosheth the son of Jonathan, the son of Saul on account of the oath of the Lord that was between them, between David and Jonathan the son of Saul.
8. So the king took the two sons of Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, Armoni and Mephibosheth, whom she had born to Saul, and the five sons of Michal the daughter of Saul, whom she had born to Adriel the son of Barzillai the Meholathite.