The Runaround - 1st Samuel 19

Even though Saul had just had David marry his second daughter Michal, he STILL told Jonathan and all his servants, “that they should kill David.” What’s interesting to me is that David was doing lots of good things for Saul, he soothed him with music when he was upset, he could not be defeated in battle against Saul’s enemies, he was loyal, and all that and Saul STILL wanted him dead because he was jealous. Human psychology is so interesting because why would you want to kill someone who could not be defeated in battle, and what makes someone think that they even could. Like if David could kill 200 Philistine men and not die, what makes Saul think that HE could kill him. Either David is so skilled in fighting that he could defeat that many professional soldiers, so Saul stood no chance at killing him, OR David was protected by God and then Saul not only couldn’t kill David but risked pissing off that God that protected him supernaturally. I personally wouldn’t play with that fire, but that’s just me. I think keep you friends close and your enemies closer would work better in this situation if I was an evil king.

Jonathan’s reaction to Saul’s request that he kill David if he had the chance was probably not what Saul expected because he goes straight to David and concocts a plan to smooth all of this over. Jonathan tells David to go hide for a while and that he will go talk to his father in a field and figure this out then he’ll let David know. The IM had an interesting point about Jonathan’s character here that I hadn’t considered before because Jonathan would have been next in line to the throne and most children are loyal to their parents, so if anyone would have considered David a threat to their status it should have been Jonathan by that logic, but he didn’t at all. The IM says, “Jonathan, Saul’s son, was one of the most noble men of ancient Israel. He could have seen David as a threat, as Saul did, since the oldest son generally succeeded the kingship. But instead, Jonathan assisted David, even helping him to escape from Saul. Truly Jonathan loved David ‘as his own soul.’” Jonathan is an interesting character here.

Jonathan goes out to the field to talk to his father to try to persuade him to not kill David, and he uses the one argument that I probably would have used, logic. Jonathan reasons with Saul that David has been a loyal servant, had victory over the Philistines through God’s goodness, and he also invokes the blood curse which is that David is innocent and if Saul kills an innocent man then Saul and Israel as a whole would come under God’s judgment because of blood guilt. The problem with this argument is something that I’ve learned recently, you can’t reason someone out of an opinion that they didn’t reason themselves into. Saul’s hatred of David wasn’t reasonable or sensible, therefore he couldn’t be reasoned out of that hatred. Verse 6 says that “Saul hearkened unto the voice of Jonathan: and Saul sware, as the Lord liveth, he shall not be slain.” It seems like Saul was persuaded, but we’ll see here soon that it was only to appease Jonathan into a false sense of security. Additionally, the problem is that Saul invokes another promise to God that he won’t kill David, which when he tries to break that promise, it just digs his spiritual grave even further.

Jonathan thinks that everything is fine now, so he calls for David and tells him that he can come back and everything could go back to normal. The Philistines instigate another war, and David goes out and defeats them again. It’s just half of a verse, just thrown in there like it’s not important, but again, God gives David a military victory over a superior, professional fighting force, and it’s just half a verse, even though it’s incredibly important. After that war, everyone was gathered around Saul’s house, and it seems like David was playing music and Saul again, even after this miraculous victory that David had just won for him, throws his spear at David trying to kill him. This is another example of how sometimes you’re just not good enough for some people, no matter what you do for them, they’ll still hate you. David escaped Saul’s assassination attempt, and went to his house where he lived with his wife Michal, Saul’s daughter.

Saul sends messengers, I assume this is kind of like an armed guard because they are sent to David’s house to kill him, so it’s not like they are western union or something, they are armed to kill. Michal knows what’s happening, that Saul sent people to kill David in the morning, and so she “let David down through a window: and he went, and fled, and escaped.” From this we can deduce that they lived in a walled city and that David and Michal lived on the wall of that city, like Rahab. Michal tries to buy David some time so she put an “image” and the KJV says and laid it in the bed and put goats hair over it and covered it with a cloth. This “image” that is said here seems innocent enough but what it actually is, TB says, is a Teraphim, which is better translated as “household idol” and this one was apparently life sized because Michal used it to imitate David laying in bed. TB says, “But what is concerning is that David had one in his own home… It is certainly a wrong thing and indefensible for David to have such an abomination in his own house. It violates the very heart of Torah. God’s anointed king, clearly possess a life-sized idol. This will not be the last of many flaws in his character and sins that he commits that will be exposed in the coming chapters.” So even David still had a idol in his house, even as the anointed king of Israel and look at what God blessed him with even with that. It’s interesting and something that I’ve been thinking about, just who righteous someone has to be in order to do God’s work. Of course no one can be perfect but where’s the line of what’s acceptable and what’s not?

These armed guards from Saul try to come in to kill David, but Michal tells them that he’s sick and to come back later, and they say that they’ll just take him in the bed to Saul and that’s when they figure out that David is gone and that what’s in the bed was a ruse. Michal gets confronted by her father, why did she deceive his men like that and she blames David, saying that he forced her to do it under threat of death. We know that that’s not true but what did we expect this girl to do? She’s confronted by the most powerful man in the kingdom but who is also very erratic and obsessed with killing the man that she loves. She doesn’t know where David is and if she’s ever going to see him again, in fact, she doesn’t see him again for a long time. She does what she thinks is safest for her in that moment and she lies and I can’t blame her for that.

In his escape, David goes to Ramah to where Samuel is and together they go to the school of the prophets that Samuel had established. The concept of school of the prophets, the IM comments, “These scholars showed that such prophets as Samuel, Elijah, and Elisha conducted special schools that were called here ‘the company of prophets.’ Elsewhere, the men who attended these schools were called ‘sons of the prophets.’ This fact is of interest to Latter-day Saints because Joseph Smith set up a similar school in Kirtland, Ohio, to help teach priesthood holders their special duty.” I wonder what they would teach at these schools, and if they could only be for men because that would be cool to go to.

Saul sends another cohort of armed “messengers” to kill David but when they get there, “the Spirit of God was upon the messengers of Saul, and they also prophesied.” I wonder what that looks like, what does prophesy even mean and what does it look like for someone to prophesy under the influence of the Spirit in this manner? Saul finds out that the first group failed and sends another group, and the same thing happens to them, so finally Saul decides that he’ll come to Ramah and kill David himself. Again, where does Saul get his audacity to think that he can kill David when the other groups couldn’t because God’s Spirit protected him? So Saul goes to Ramah himself and guess what, the same thing happens to him, “and he stripped off his clothes also, and prophesied before Samuel in like manner, and lay down naked all that day and all that night.”

A few comments about this last verse, first Saul didn’t take off all his clothes so that the was bear naked, he removed his royal robes and his military clothes and was only wearing his under tunic which I assume was considered obscene during this time and must have been the equivalent to being naked socially. The second point I wanted to make was how did Saul come prophesy here in front of Samuel when 1st Samuel 15:35 says “Samuel came no more to see Saul until the day of his death.” I was confused by this so I googled it and it says, “this means Samuel stopped functioning as Saul’s spiritual mentor, counselor, and ally. It represents a permanent covenantal and official rupture-Samuel never again sought out or initialed a meeting with Saul… Saul did not go to Ramah to visit Samuel; he went to hunt David. The encounter happened because God’s Spirit forcefully intervened, overpowering Saul’s messengers and then Saul himself to protect David… Samuel did not actively go or seek to see Saul anymore. It is a statement about Samuel’s intentional avoidance, not an absolute geographical ban that prevents God from staging an involuntary, miraculous intervention where their paths cross.” This made more sense to me, it’s not that they never saw each other again, it’s that Samuel refused to serve as spiritual advisor to Saul anymore.

The IM gives an interesting account of something similar to the prophesying happening to Wilford Woodruff while on a mission. Essentially, there was a magistrate where Wilford Woodruff was teaching who didn’t want him teaching anymore, so he sent a constable to arrest him and he agreed to go with him after the sermon, so the constable waited and listened to the sermon. Afterward, instead of arresting him, the constable wanted to be baptized. So the magistrate send another group to arrest him, and that group wanted to be baptized afterward too. So the magistrate didn’t send anyone else.