Study Desk

Then the king said to Amasa, Call together for me the men of Judah three days, and be present here.

And there stood by him one of Joab's young men, and said, He that favors Joab, and he that is for David, let him follow Joab.

And there was a famine in the days of David three years, year after year; and David sought the face of Yahweh. And Yahweh said, It is for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he put to death the Gibeonites.

And the king called the Gibeonites, and said to them (now the Gibeonites were not of the sons of Israel, but of the remnant of the Amorites; and the sons of Israel had sworn to them: and Saul sought to slay them in his zeal for the sons of Israel and Judah);

and David said to the Gibeonites, What shall I do for you? and how shall I make atonement, that you may bless the inheritance of Yahweh?

And 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. And he said, What you shall say, that I will do for you.

And Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for herself on the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water was poured on them from heaven; and she allowed neither the birds of the heavens to rest on them by day, nor the beasts of the field by night.

And 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. And after that God was entreated for the land.

For the waves of death compassed me; The floods of ungodliness made me afraid:

He delivered me from my strong enemy, From those that hated me; for they were too mighty for me.

For I have kept the ways of Yahweh, 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.

For you are my lamp, O Yahweh; And Yahweh will lighten my darkness.

For by you I run on a troop; By my God I leap over a wall.

As for God, his way is perfect: The word of Yahweh is tried; He is a shield to all those that take refuge in him.

For who is God, save Yahweh? And who is a rock, save our God?

For you have girded me with strength to the battle; You have subdued under me those that rose up against me.

Even the God that executes vengeance for me, And that brings down peoples under me,

Great deliverance he gives to his king, And shows loving-kindness to his anointed, To David and to his seed, for evermore.

Truly my house is not so with God; Yet he has made with me an everlasting covenant, Ordered in all things, and sure: For it is all my salvation, and all [my] desire, Although he does not make it to grow.