The Reading
The Summary
Shemuel Alef Chapter 14
The situation facing Israel is a dire one, yet King Shaul refrains from taking any action to resolve it. Yonatan is accompanied by his young armor-bearer as he secretly crosses over to the garrison of the Pelishtim. He devises an unorthodox strategy to predict the way in which the conflict will unfold. If, when the Phillistines see him, they tell him to “come up” to them, this indicates that the Jews will “rise up” and triumph over their enemies. If, however, they tell Yonatan and his escort to remain in place while they “come down” to apprehend them, this is a sign that the Jews are destined to lose the war.
A logical way to understand Yonatan’s strategy is as a helpful barometer of the morale of the Pelishtim. If they are confident and secure, they will feel comfortable leaving the protective borders of their camp and coming down to confront Yonatan. If they prefer to invite Yonatan up to the place where they are standing, the implication is that they are fearful of him and perceive him as a threat; they feel a need to remain in a physically superior position because their psychological morale is shaky.
The Pelishtim tell Yonatan to come up to them; emboldened by what he interprets as a sign from Hashem, Yonatan proceeds to attack the Pelishtim in the camp, and chaos ensues – there is a panic of such magnitude that the Phillistines begin killing one another, incapable of distinguishing between friend and foe.
The Israelite camp notices the havoc that has erupted in the garrison of the Pelishtim; a brief investigation reveals that Yonatan is absent and most likely responsible for it. At first, Shaul approaches the Kohen to seek Hashem’s word through the Urim VeTummim; however, he interrupts the process when it becomes evident that the tumult on the Phillistine side is out of control and delaying any further might mean losing the opportunity to take advantage of their state of confusion and attack them. As Shaul leads his men forward to vanquish the Pelishtim, he imposes an oath upon all of them – no one is to eat or drink anything until the battle reaches its conclusion.
Yonatan rejoins the troops and travels with them through a forest in which there is a stream of honey. Unaware of the oath his father imposed, he samples some of it. When he is warned that this was forbidden by his father, he criticizes the short-sightedness of the oath, arguing that it would have been wiser and more efficient to encourage the men to eat than to prevent them from doing so.
At the conclusion of the successful battle, the famished Jews descend upon the spoils and begin slaughtering animals and consuming their meat. It is brought to the attention of King Shaul that the people are eating “on the blood”, in violation of the Torah (the commentaries discuss what precisely the transgression was, since the Oral tradition interprets “do not eat upon the blood” in various metaphoric ways.)
Shaul instructs his officers to roll a large rock to a place that would be designated as the official location for slaughter. He then has them direct the people to bring their animals to the rock to be killed before taking the meat and consuming it in other areas far away from any blood. Shaul builds an altar in honor of Hashem to express his gratitude to God for the salvation the Jews experienced on the battlefield.
Shaul proposes that the troops of Israel continue attacking the Pelishtim through the night to consolidate their military gains. Before pursuing this course of action he seeks the word of Hashem to confirm that it is proper and will be successful. However, Shaul receives no response from the Urim Vetummim. This signals that the divine presence has departed from the camp and suggests that some sin has been committed by the troops. Shaul swears that whoever is responsible for this loss of divine assistance will pay with his life, even if it turns out to be his own son Yonatan.
A lottery is conducted and Yonatan is indeed identified as the perpetrator; he confesses the sin he committed in partaking of the honey and accepts the judgment that he is condemned to die. Shaul once again swears that he will mete out the punishment he promised and that Yonatan will be killed. However, the people intervene and defend Yonatan; after all, it was Yonatan’s heroic infiltration of the garrison of the Pelishtim that led to the miraculous victory of Israel against their persecutors.
Shaul relents and Yonatan’s life is spared. The chapter concludes with a description of Shaul’s distinguished career of successful military operations against many of the oppressors and enemies of the Jewish people. In addition to marrying and starting a family, Shaul develops a strong and formidable army to protect and defend his nation.
This story contains at least two allusions to narratives in the Book of Shofetim. Yonatan’s crossing over to the camp of the Pelishtim to gauge their morale is reminiscent of the story of Gideon who likewise sneaks over to the camp of the Midianites to listen in on the conversations of the enemy troops. There, as here, the enemy camp descends into chaos and Midianites begin killing one another amidst sheer panic.
Shaul’s oath which unwittingly condemns his son to death reminds us of the oath of Yiftah which leads him to condemn his daughter. These literary and thematic parallels highlight the fact that the Book of Shemuel is the culmination and completion of the Book of Shofetim; the career and character of Shaul cannot be fully understood without reference to the Judges who preceded him.
The episode of Shaul’s oath again illustrates his tragic inability to be decisive in the face of social pressure. Shaul invokes the name of God numerous times to back up his conviction that whoever has caused the Divine presence to depart must die; he reiterates his promise even after discovering the identity of the perpetrator. Nonetheless, the response of the people wins the day – he backtracks on a sacred vow, in an egregious violation of the Ten Commandments, in deference to popular opinion.
One might be tempted to argue that Yonatan’s transgression wasn’t serious enough to warrant such a harsh response to begin with, and that Shaul’s promise to execute the sinner was made without due deliberation. However, the fact that the Divine Presence withdrew from Israel as a result of Yonatan’s sin is a testimony to its seriousness. Examined closely, his crime was not the consumption of honey, the prohibition of which he was unaware of when he did violated it. The real sin of Yonatan was in his reaction to those who informed him of the prohibition – rather than apologize for the oversight, he ridiculed his father’s decision publicly, and told the troops that they would have been better off not abiding by it. This disrespectful and rebellious speech was an attack on the authority of the king and cannot be dismissed lightly.
Shaul’s failure to punish his son, even after swearing to do so more than once, was a monumental mistake, illustrating his distorted set of priorities in which honor of the people ranked above the honor of the Almighty. Ironically, he committed this sin immediately after rebuking the nation for disgracing God by eating next to blood and after constructing an altar in the name of Hashem.