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tribute: and Jehoshaphat the son of Ahilud was recorder: and Sheva was scribe: and Zadok and Abi

athar were the priests: and Ira also the Jairite was a chief ruler about David.

THEN there was a famine in the days of David

three years, year after year; and David enquired of the Lord. And the Lord answered, It is for Saul, and for his bloody house, because he slew the Gibeonites. 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 to the children of Israel and Judah;) wherefore David said unto the Gibeonites, What shall I do for you? and wherewith shall I make the atonement, that ye may bless the inheritance of the Lord? And the Gibeonites said unto him, We will have no silver nor gold of Saul, nor of his house; neither for us shalt thou kill any man in Israel. And he said, What ye shall say, that will I do for you. And they answered the king, The man that consumed us, and that devised against us that we should be destroyed from remaining in any of the coasts of Israel, let seven men of his sons be delivered unto us, and we will hang them up unto the Lord in Gibeah of Saul, whom the Lord did choose.

And the king said, I will give them. 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. But the king took the two sons of Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, whom she bare unto Saul, Armoni and Mephibosheth; and the five sons of Michal the daughter of Saul, whom she brought up for Adriel the son of Barzillai the Meholathite: and he delivered them into the hands of the Gibeonites, and they hanged them in the hill before the Lord: and they fell all seven together, and were put to death in the days of harvest, in the first days, in the beginning of barley harvest.

And Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for her upon the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water dropped upon them out of heaven, and suffered neither the birds of the air to rest on them by day, nor the beasts of the field by night. And it was told David what Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, the concubine of Saul, had done.

And David went and took the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son from the men of Jabesh-gilead, which had stolen them from the street of Beth-shan, where the Philistines had hanged them, when the Philistines had slain Saul in Gilboa: and

he brought up from thence the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son; and they gathered the bones of them that were hanged. And the bones of Saul and Jonathan his son buried they in the country of Benjamin in Zelah, in the sepulchre of Kish his father: and they performed all that the king commanded. And after that God was intreated for the land.

Moreover the Philistines had yet war again with Israel; and David went down, and his servants with him, and fought against the Philistines: and David waxed faint. And Ishbi-benob, which was of the sons of the giant, the weight of whose spear weighed three hundred shekels of brass in weight, he being girded with a new sword, thought to have slain David. But Abishai the son of Zeruiah succoured him, and smote the Philistine, and killed him. Then the men of David sware unto him, saying, Thou shalt go no more out with us to battle, that thou quench not the light of Israel. And it came to pass after this, that there was again a battle with the Philistines at Gob: then Sibbechai the Hushathite slew Saph, which was of the sons of the giant. And there was again a battle in Gob with the Philistines, where Elhanan the son of Jaare-oregim, a Beth-lehemite, slew the brother of Goliath the Gittite, the staff of whose spear was like

a weaver's beam. And there was yet a battle in Gath, where was a man of great stature, that had on every hand six fingers, and on every foot six toes, four and twenty in number; and he also was born to the giant. And when he defied Israel, Jonathan the son of Shimeah the brother of David slew him. These four were born to the giant in Gath, and fell by the hand of David, and by the hand of his servants.

AND David spake unto the Lord the words of this song in the day that the Lord had delivered him out of the hand of all his enemies, and out of the hand of Saul: and he said,

THE Lord is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer;

The God of my rock; in him will I trust:

He is my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my high tower, and my refuge,

My saviour; thou savest me from violence.

I will call on the Lord, who is worthy to be praised:
So shall I be saved from mine enemies.
When the waves of death compassed me,
The floods of ungodly men made me afraid;
The sorrows of hell compassed me about;
The snares of death prevented me;

In my distress I called upon the Lord,
And cried to my God:

And he did hear my voice out of his temple,
And my cry did enter into his ears.
Then the earth shook and trembled;

The foundations of heaven moved
And shook, because he was wroth.

There went up a smoke out of his nostrils,
And fire out of his mouth devoured:
Coals were kindled by it.

He bowed the heavens also, and came down;
And darkness was under his feet.

And he rode upon a cherub, and did fly:

And he was seen upon the wings of the wind.
And he made darkness pavilions round about him,
Dark waters, and thick clouds of the skies.
Through the brightness before him
Were coals of fire kindled.

The Lord thundered from heaven,

And the most High uttered his voice.

And he sent out arrows, and scattered them;
Lightning, and discomfited them.

And the channels of the sea appeared,

The foundations of the world were discovered,

At the rebuking of the Lord,

At the blast of the breath of his nostrils.

He sent from above, he took me;

He drew me out of many waters;

He delivered me from my strong enemy,

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