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In the days of David, King of Israel, there prevailed a famine which lasted three years. On inquiring of the Lord the cause, David received for answer that it was "because of Saul and his bloody house." Already is one striking lesson to be derived from the history. We learn, not only that the weather is in the hands of God, — Rain and sunshine, "wind and storm, fulfilling His word"; but also, that one of the causes which influence Him in sending the weather which produces abundance, or which occasions famine, is the conduct of the people. Now the crime of Saul was this. Whereas Joshua and the men of Israel on first coming into Canaan had entered into a solemn covenant with the Gibeonites that they would do them no injury, but suffer them to dwell on unmolested, Saul had sought to slay them. That ancient oath and covenant of the people of the land, — made upwards of four hundred years before, — Saul, the unscrupulous, irreligious Captain of the Lord's people, had. broken; and three years of famine were the penalty, inflicted on all Israel for the sin of their ruler. Money they spurned. They would have the lives of seven of Saul's sons. Accordingly, seven men were surrendered, and "hanged in the hill before the Lord." Two mothers here come to view, — Rizpah and Michal. Of the latter, little is related: but we are guided to a very solemn warning to be derived from this seemingly casual mention of her name. Saul's daughter had loved David when she knew him as the warlike and victorious captain; but despised him when she beheld him as the religious King, transported with holy joy at the recovery and return of the Ark of God. Michal proved childless: but she is found from this place of Scripture to have adopted five of her sister's children and made them hers. Yet, mark you! Those five children are taken from her to complete the number required to make atonement for her father's sin; and she remains childless until the day of her death. Very different is the character of Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, — who becomes for evermore a pattern to mankind in respect of piety towards the dead. The sackcloth which she is said to have taken and spread upon the rock, was a token of her mourning, as well as an emblem of her grief. What is of more importance, is the hint afforded us of Rizpah's piety towards God no less than towards man, contained in those words, — "until water dropped upon them out of Heaven." "Cursed" (says the Law,) "is every one that hangeth upon a tree": and here were seven men appointed to sustain the curse which rested upon the land, and to make atonement for the sin of Saul and of his bloody house. So long as the famine (occasioned by the want of rain) lasted, so long was it to be thought that the wrath of God rested upon the people, and the atonement remained unaccepted by the injured majesty of Heaven. The poor mother watched, therefore, in sackcloth, upon the hard rock; "until water dropped upon them out of Heaven": and Rizpah enjoyed the blessed assurance that the Lord was pacified, and that His wrath had indeed passed away! Only one circumstance more requires to be mentioned. "It was told David what Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, the concubine of Saul had done." David beholds in Rizpah's conduct a lesson to himself; and he proceeds at once to copy the example of piety which that sorrowful bereaved mother has set him. He bethinks him of the bones of Saul and of Jonathan his son which are still lying dishonoured at Jabesh-gilead; sends for them; causes the bones of the seven sons who had been hanged at Gibeah to be gathered also; and honourably buries them. So true is it that no one lives to himself; but the effect of good example spreads, and (as in the case before us) a weak woman's example becomes a model for the imitation of the monarch on the throne! We never know, we cannot possibly tell the remote consequences of our acts for good or for evil. We cannot even pretend to describe their present influence, and the results which they may immediately occasion.

(J. W. Burgon, M. A.)

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KJV: 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.

WEB: 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. She allowed neither the birds of the sky to rest on them by day, nor the animals of the field by night.