David Learns of Saul’s Death

Now it came about after the death of Saul, when David had returned from the slaughter of the Amalekites, that David stayed two days in Ziklag.

When your days are finished and you lie down with your fathers, I will raise up your descendant after you, who will come from you, and I will establish his kingdom.

So Joab sent a messenger to Tekoa and brought a wise woman from there, and said to her, “Please follow mourning rites, and put on mourning garments now, and do not anoint yourself with oil but be like a woman who has been mourning for the dead for many days.

Now the advice of Ahithophel, which he gave in those days, was taken as though one inquired of the word of God; so was all the advice of Ahithophel regarded by both David and Absalom.

Now the king said to Amasa, “Summon the men of Judah for me within three days, and be present here yourself.”

Gibeonite’s Revenge

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

Then he handed them over to the Gibeonites, and they hanged them on the mountain before the Lord, so that the seven of them fell together; and they were put to death in the first days of harvest at the beginning of barley harvest.

So when they had roamed about through the whole land, they came to Jerusalem at the end of nine months and twenty days.

So Gad came to David and told him, and said to him, “Shall seven years of famine come to you in your land? Or will you flee for three months before your enemies while they pursue you? Or shall there be three days’ of plague in your land? Now consider and see what answer I shall return to Him who sent me.”