Commentaries:
Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown
they hanged them in the hill before the Lord—Deeming themselves not bound by the criminal law of Israel (Deuteronomy 21:22-23), their intention was to let the bodies hang until God, propitiated by this offering, should send rain upon the land, for the want of it had occasioned the famine. It was a heathen practice to gibbet men with a view of appeasing the anger of the gods in seasons of famine, and the Gibeonites, who were a remnant of the Amorites (II Samuel 21:2), though brought to the knowledge of the true God, were not, it seems, free from this superstition. God, in His providence, suffered the Gibeonites to ask and inflict so barbarous a retaliation, in order that the oppressed Gibeonites might obtain justice and some reparation of their wrongs, especially that the scandal brought on the name of the true religion by the violation of a solemn national compact might be wiped away from Israel, and that a memorable lesson should be given to respect treaties and oaths.
Other Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown entries containing 2 Samuel 21:9:
2 Samuel 21:1
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