1 And there was a famine in the days of David three years, year after year; and David sought the face of the Lord. And the Lord said, It is for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he put to death the Gibeonites.
2 And the king called the Gibeonites, and said unto them; (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 for the children of Israel and Judah:)
3 and David said unto the Gibeonites, What shall I do for you? and wherewith shall I make atonement, that ye may bless the inheritance of the Lord?
4 And the Gibeonites said unto 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 ye shall say, that will I do for you.
5 And they said unto the king, The man that consumed us, and that devised against us, that we should be destroyed from remaining in any of the borders of Israel,
6 let seven men of his sons be delivered unto us, and we will hang them up unto the Lord in Gibeah of Saul, the chosen of the Lord; And the king said, I will give them.
7 But the king spared Mephibosheth, the son of Jonathan the son of Saul, because of the Lord'S oath that was between them, between David and Jonathan the son of Saul.