2 Samuel 21:10

Contextual Overview

¹⁰Rizpah daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and spread it out for herself on a rock. From the beginning of the harvest till the rain poured down from the heavens on the bodies, she did not let the birds of the air touch them by day or the wild animals by night.¹⁰ Rizpah daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and spread it out for herself on a rock. From the beginning of the harvest till the rain poured down from the heavens on the bodies, she did not let the birds touch them by day or the wild animals by night. ¹⁰And Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and spread it for herself on the rock, from the beginning of harvest until it rained on them from the sky; and she allowed neither the birds of the sky to rest on them by day nor the beasts of the field by night. ¹⁰ And Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and spread it for herself on the rock, from the beginning of harvest until it rained on them from the sky; and she allowed neither the birds of the sky to rest on them by day nor the beasts of the field by night.¹⁰ And Rispha the daughter of Aia, toke sackcloth, & hanged it vp for her vpon the rocke [euen] from the beginning of haruest, vntill water dropped vpon them out of heauen, & suffered neither the byrdes of the ayre to lyght on them by day, nor beastes of ye fielde by night. ¹⁰ Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took a mourning cloth and put it on the rock. That cloth stayed on the rock from the time the harvest began until the rains came. Rizpah watched the bodies day and night. She protected them from the wild birds during the day and the wild animals at night. ¹⁰ And Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth and stretched it out for herself on the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water poured on them out of the heavens. And she did not allow a bird of the heavens to rest on them byday nor the beast of the field by night. ¹⁰ Then Rizpah the daughter of Ai'ah took sackcloth, and spread it for herself on the rock, from the beginning of harvest until rain fell upon them from the heavens; and she did not allow the birds of the air to come upon them by day, or the beasts of the field by night. ¹⁰ Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth, and spread it for her on the rock, from the beginning of harvest until water was poured on them from the sky; and she allowed neither the birds of the sky to rest on them by day, nor the animals of the field by night. ¹⁰ And Rizpah the daughter of Aiah tooke sackecloth, and spread it for her vpon the rocke, from the beginning of haruest, vntill water dropped vpon them out of heauen, and suffered neither the birds of the aire to rest on them by day, nor the beastes of the fielde by night.

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

Rizpah: 2 Samuel 21:8, 2 Samuel 3:7

took sackcloth: 1 Kings 21:27, Joel 1:18

from the: 2 Samuel 21:9, Deuteronomy 21:13

until water: Some suppose that this means a providential supply of rain, in order to remove the famine; but from the manner in which it is introduced, it seems to denote the autumnal rains, which commence about October. For five months did this broken-hearted woman watch by the bodies of her sons! Deuteronomy 11:14, 1 Kings 18:41-45, Jeremiah 5:24, Jeremiah 5:25, Jeremiah 14:22, Hosea 6:3, Joel 2:23, Zechariah 10:1

the birds: Genesis 40:19, Ezekiel 39:4

Reciprocal: Job 37:13 - for mercy Proverbs 30:17 - the ravens

Cross-References

Genesis 17:19
Then God said, "Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.

Genesis 17:19
Then God said, "Yes, but your wife Sarah will bear you a son, and you will call him Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.

Genesis 17:19
But God said, "No, but Sarah your wife will bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; and I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant for his seed after him.

Genesis 17:19
But God said, "No, but Sarah your wife will bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac; and I will establish My covenant with him for an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.

Genesis 17:19
Unto who God sayd: Sara thy wife shall beare thee a sonne in deede, & thou shalt call his name Isahac: and I wyll establishe my couenaunt with hym for an euerlastyng couenaunt [and] with his seede after hym.

Genesis 17:19
God said, "No, I said that your wife Sarah will have a son. You will name him Isaac. I will make my agreement with him that will continue forever with all his descendants.

Genesis 17:19
God said, "No, but Sarah your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac. I will establish my covenant with him as an everlasting covenant for his descendants after him.

Genesis 17:19
And the Lord seide to Abraham, Sara, thi wijf, schal bere a sone to thee, and thou schalt clepe his name Ysaac, and Y schal make my couenaunt to hym in to euerlastynge boond of pees, and to his seed aftir hym;

Genesis 17:19
And God said, Sarah thy wife shall beare thee a sonne in deede, and thou shalt call his name Isaac: and I will establish my couenant with him, for an euerlasting couenant, and with his seed after him.

Genesis 17:19
And God said, Sarah thy wife shall bear thee a son indeed; and thou shalt call his name Isaac: and I will establish my covenant with him for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after him.

Gill's Notes on the Bible

And Rizpah the daughter of Aiah took sackcloth,.... Both as a token of mourning for her sons, and as fittest to defend from the weather, the heat by day of cold by night:

and spread it for her upon the rock; the hill on which her sons were hanged; this she spread as a canopy or tent to sit under, and be covered with it; not to cover the bodies with it, but herself, and where she sat to mourn the loss of her sons, and to watch their bodies, that they might not be devoured by birds and breasts of prey, as after observed: and here she sat

from the beginning of harvest until water dropped on them out of heaven; that is, as the Jews say n, from the sixteenth of Nisan, when barley harvest began, to the seventeenth of Marchesvan, when the former rain fell; that is, from the beginning of April to the beginning of October: but it is not likely that she continued so long watching the bodies, nor would there be any need of it to keep the birds and beasts from them; for after they had hung so many months, there would be nothing left for them; but rather the meaning is, that she continued there until it pleased God to send rain from heaven, which had been restrained, and a famine came upon it, because of the ill usage of the Gibeonites: and very probably the order from the king was, that the bodies should hang till rain came, that it might be observed what was the reason of their suffering; and no doubt Rizpah sat there praying that rain might come, and which, as Abarbinel thinks, came in a few days after, though not usual in summertime; but this was an extraordinary case, as in 1 Samuel 12:17; and was done to show the Lord was entreated for the land; and so Josephus says o, that upon the hanging up of these men, God caused it to rain immediately, and restored the earth to its former fruitfulness. According to the law in

Deuteronomy 21:22, the bodies should have been taken down and buried the same day: but these men suffered not for their own personal, sins, but for the sins of others, and to avert a public calamity, and therefore must hang till that was removed; nor were they executed by men bound by that law; and besides their continuing on the tree was according to the will of God, till he was entreated, who could dispense with this law; to which may be added, the ceremonial and judicial laws, of which this was one, gave place to those of a moral nature p, as this did to that of sanctifying the name of God in a public manner; hence the saying of one of the Rabbins upon this q, which is by many wrongly expressed,

"it is better that one letter should be rooted out of the law, than that the name of God should not be sanctified openly;''

that is, a lesser precept give way to a greater, or a ceremonial precept to a moral one, such as the sanctification of the name of God is:

and suffered neither the birds of the air to rest on them by day; as it is usual for crows r and ravens, and such sort of birds, to light on bodies thus hung up, and pick their flesh:

nor the beasts of the field by night; for it seems it was usual to make the gibbets, and so in some other nations the crosses, so low, that wild beasts could easily come at the bodies and devour them; so Blandina was hung upon a tree so low, that she might be exposed to the wild beasts to feed upon her, but not one of them would touch her body s; now Rizpah, by her servants, had ways and means to frighten away the birds, and beasts from doing any injury to the carcasses.

n Bemidbar Rabba, fol. 190. 1. o Antiqu. l. 7. c. 12. sect. 1. p See Stillingfleet's Origines Sacr. p. 140. q T. Bab. Yebamot, fol. 79. 1. r "---- non pasces in cruce corvos", Horat. Epist, l. 1. Epist. 16. ver. 48. s Euseb. Eccl. Hist. l. 5. c. 1. Vid. Lipsium de Cruce, l. 3. c. 11. & l. 3. c. 13.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

Dropped - Rather, “poured,” the proper word for heavy rain Exodus 9:33. The “early rain,” or heavy rain of autumn, usually began in October, so that Rizpah’s devoted watch continued about six months. How rare rain was in harvest we learn from 1 Samuel 12:17-18; Proverbs 26:1. The reason of the bodies being left unburied, contrary to Deuteronomy 21:23, probably was that the death of these men being an expiation of the guilt of a violated oath, they were to remain until the fall of rain should give the assurance that God’s anger was appeased, and the national sin forgiven.

Birds of the air ... beasts of the field - It is well known how in the East, on the death e. g. of a camel in a caravan, the vultures instantly flock to the carcass. (Compare Matthew 24:28.)

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse 2 Samuel 21:10. Rizpah - took sackcloth — Who can read the account of Rizpah's maternal affection for her sons that were now hanged, without feeling his mind deeply impressed with sorrows?

Did God require this sacrifice of Saul's sons, probably all innocent of the alleged crime of their father? Was there no other method of averting the Divine displeasure? Was the requisition of the Gibeonites to have Saul's sons sacrificed to God, to be considered as an oracle of God? Certainly not; God will not have man's blood for sacrifice, no more than he will have swine's blood. The famine might have been removed, and the land properly purged, by offering the sacrifices prescribed by the law, and by a general humiliation of the people.

Until water dropped upon them — Until the time of the autumnal rains, which in that country commence about October. Is it possible that this poor broken-hearted woman could have endured the fatigue, (and probably in the open air,) of watching these bodies for more than five months? Some think that the rain dropping on them out of heaven means the removal of the famine which was occasioned by drought, by now sending rain, which might have been shortly after these men were hanged; but this by no means agrees with the manner in which the account is introduced: "They were put to death in the days of harvest, in the first days, in the beginning of barley harvest. And Rizpah - took sackcloth, and spread it for her on the rock, from the beginning of harvest, until water dropped upon them out of heaven." No casual or immediately providential rain can be here intended; the reference must be to the periodical rains above mentioned.