Puzzling Passages

Why were Saul's sons put to death?

During David's reign it is recorded that there was a famine in Israel. God explained to David that it was "for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he slew the Gibeonites"; and the record then explains: "now the Gibeonites were not of the children of Israel, but of the remnant of the Amorites; and the children of Israel had sworn unto them: and Saul sought to slay them in his zeal to the children of Israel and Judah" (2 Samuel 21:1,2).

Whatever the incident was in which Saul had shown misplaced zeal against the Gibeonites, it is not recorded. We may surmise that, since Gibeon fell within Benjamite territory when Joshua divided the land by lot, but was a city given to the Levites (Joshua 21:17), Saul, being of the tribe of Benjamin, sought to slay the Gibeonites to retrieve the city for Benjamin. Whether that was the reason or not, his actions were clearly unjustified, and David therefore acceded to the request of the Gibeonites that seven of Saul's family be hanged to pay for the wrong. When this was done the famine ended (see the remainder of 2 Samuel 21).

David's actions may seem vicious and heartless at first sight, but we know his godly character and that what he did was approved by God Who is both just and merciful. The sum of the evidence suggests that those who were hanged were guilty men, possibly because they were Saul's accomplices against the Gibeonites, possibly because they were idolaters, or possibly because they were both. Idolaters were punished for up to three succeeding generations: "
Thou shalt not make thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the waters beneath the earth: thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate Me" (Deuteronomy 5:8,9). Note that it is only those that "hate" God who are so punished. The innocent do not suffer for the guilty. As Ezekiel affirms, "the soul that sinneth, it shall die" (Ezekiel 18:4).

We conclude therefore that the seven men of Saul's family who were hanged were guilty men.