Outline of Chapter 13:

       vv.    1–4        Jonathan Initiates Aggressions Between the Israelites and the Philistines

       vv.    5–7        The Huge Philistine Force Causes the Bulk of Saul’s Army to Desert

       vv.    8–9        Saul Offers a Burnt Offering to God

       vv.   10–14      Samuel Chastises Saul for Offering this Burnt Sacrifice

       vv.   15–18      Saul Organizes and Moves His Troops While the Philistine Army Strikes Israel at Will

       vv.   19–23      The Israelites Lack Iron Weapons Which the Philistines Have

Charts and Maps:

       v.      1           Theories Concerning the Time Frame of Saul’s Reign and v. 1

       v.      1           Just How Old Was Saul and for How Long Did He Reign?

       v.      1           Saul’s Palace

       v.      2           Map of Michmash and Surrounding Area

       v.      2           The Time Line of 1Samuel 13

       v.      7           V. 7 Refers to Gilgal in the Jordan Valley and not to Jiljilia

       v.      7           Troop Locations

       v.      8           1Sam. 10:8 is to be Understood as a Directive and not as a Prophecy

       v.      9           Why Saul Should not have Offered up Animal Sacrifices

       v.     11b         What Was Wrong with Saul Offering Up Sacrifices?

       v.     12c         Saul’s Argument to Samuel

       v.     14           God’s Message to Saul and to Eli

       v.     15           1Samuel 13:15 Text from the Greek Septuagint

       v.     15           A Summary of Gibeah, Geba and Gibeon

       v.     15           Should 1Samuel 13:15 Include the Text from the Septuagint?

       v.     15           The Troop Movement

       v.     16           How Do the Modern Translations Differ on 1Samuel 13:15–16?

       v.     16           Why is Gibeah the More Likely City to be Found in V. 16?

       v.     20           Agrarian Instruments from 1Samuel 13:20

       v.     20           The Bronze Age

       v.     20           The Iron Age

I ntroduction: 1Sam. 13 begins with Jonathan attacking and defeating a garrison of Philistines in Geba. This sets into motion a series of events which costs Jonathan the throne of Israel. The Philistines will move en masse against Israel. Saul will panic and begin offering up sacrifices to God when Samuel doesn’t show up in time (actually, Samuel does show up in time; Saul simply jumped the gun here). Then Samuel does show and tells Saul that his dynasty has just ended. Saul cannot take the place of Samuel as a priest to Israel. Finally, this chapter ends where one would not expect—the Philistines aggressively move out against Israel.

What we have in this chapter is the revealing of Saul’s true nature. Saul is not a heathen; he does not worship foreign gods; but his obedience to God is less than stellar. In this chapter, Jonathan will take out a garrison of Philistines, but Saul will blow the trumpets, signaling the land that Saul was victorious over the Philistines.

However, what Jonathan does will set off a war between the Philistines and the Israelites. Saul panics. Samuel has already instructed him to wait until Samuel came to him (Samuel still provided divine guidance for Saul). When Samuel makes known Saul’s act of disobedience known to him, no where does Saul express regret or repentance. He does not even admit that he screwed up—he simply gives Samuel a long list of reasons why he did what he did.

Application: God knows the long list of reasons for every screwed up thing that you do. He doesn’t need to hear you justify yourself. What is important is, did you do the right thing before God? Anything else is irrelevant. We may view Saul’s act of disobedience as minor; God did not, and God’s opinion is herein expressed against Saul. This simply prepares us for continued disobedience throughout Saul’s reign over Israel.

Because the Philistines play a prominent part in the life of Israel over the next several chapters, we would do well to quickly examine their background. They were a non-Semitic people who originally settled in the southern coastal regions of the Land of Promise, being a part of the great invasion of the sea peoples referred to by Rameses III of Egypt circa 1200 b.c. Both their knowledge of metallurgy and access to sources of iron gave them a great advantage over other nations, despite the fact that the Philistines were comparatively small in number. At the time of this chapter, the Philistines will have the iron weapons and the technology to build and maintain these weapons and Israel does not. The animosity of the Philistines toward Israel began during the time of Samson and continued throughout the reign of David (although David did strike up an uneasy alliance with the Philistines during the time he was at odds with Saul). Although we no longer have Philistines with us, they are preserved in the name Palestine.

Saul finally, with this chapter, begins ruling over Israel as king. There are a lot of people who think that all they need is power, and they could accomplish something great. Or, they think that would be happy. Saul now has all of the power that he could desire, and we will find out that he is not happy. In v. 2, he chooses an elite force of 3000 men of those who defeated the Ammonites, and they will function as his and Jonathan’s personal guard, local police force, and quick military response team. Then Jonathan takes his 1000 men and strikes an outpost of Philistines in Geba (v. 3). This sets into motion a series of events which will result in the end of Saul’s dynasty (1Sam. 13:4–15:35).

Almost simultaneously, Saul gathers Israel to Gilgal (v. 4) and the Philistines gather their troops to Michmash (v. 5). The latter is the most aggressive of the moves, because Michmash is right in the center of Israel. Saul perhaps chooses Gilgal because it is barely west of the River Jordan and it may be the route that he will have to take to escape. The writer of this chapter, who is not necessarily Samuel, seems to know a great deal about the Philistines—he knows that they have 30,000 chariots and 6000 horsemen (v. 5). Because of the great buildup of Philistine forces, many of the Israelites desert their army. They hide in every conceivable hiding place and some flee to the other side of the Jordan (vv. 6–7). Saul begins to panic. He began with 3000 crack troops and called for the assemblage of the other men of Israel, and suddenly, he finds himself down to 600 men, none of whom has an iron weapon of any sort (vv. 2, 4, 6–7, 15, 22). Now, Samuel had promised to come to him after seven days (1Sam. 10:8), but here he was in Gilgal, it was the 7^th day, and there was no Samuel. So Saul does the unthinkable—he offers up animal sacrifices himself (vv. 8–10). He’s seen Samuel do it many times and it appears to be easy enough. Just as he offers the sacrifices, it is told to him that Samuel is arriving. Saul goes out to meet him and to feel out the situation (v. 10). Saul had a long excuse put together for Samuel. It was inevitable that Saul would find out about his offering animal sacrifices to God and Saul had a long list of reasons why he had to do it (vv. 11–12). The problem was that this was clearly outside of God’s plan and Saul should have known better. Samuel pronounces a curse over Saul’s dynasty and leaves (v. 14). Saul takes Jonathan and his troops and stations them in Gibeah (vv. 15–16). At the same time, the Philistines are running military maneuvers by sending troops out east, west and north to attack any of the cities near to Michmash (vv. 17–18). Finally, to add to the inequity of it all, it turns out that only the Philistines have iron weapons and the Israel has none, apart from Saul and Jonathan (vv. 19–22). Then the Philistines advance south toward the army of Israel (v. 23). And, believe it or not, that ends 1Sam. 13.

1Sam. 13–15 essentially form a unit in the book of Samuel, and, although Israel will emerge victorious over Philistia, the overall tenor of these 3 chapters is one of defeat. Saul will make several critical mistakes, the chief being that he will disobey God on several occasions. It appears that he will take credit for Jonathan’s victory over the Philistines in 1Sam. 13:4. Saul will usurp Samuel’s spiritual authority in 1Sam. 13:9. The fact that none of his men at the end of this chapter will have iron weapons is an error reasonably placed at Saul’s doorstep. And that is just this chapter. His mistakes will continue in the next several chapters, culminating with God regretting that He made Saul king in the first place (1Sam. 15:35—this is an anthropopathism, of course).

Now, because I have more of a Greek mind than a Hebrew mind, things that I ponder in this chapter are: how old was Saul when he took office? How old was Jonathan when he takes a thousand men into battle against a Philistine outpost? What about the prophecy of Samuel’s and how he would come to Gilgal in 7 days—was this prophecy meant to be delivered 10–15 years previously? Then the geography concerns me—where is Geba, Gibeon and Gibeah? Are they all different forms of the same noun and therefore refer to the same city? We also have Saul offering up sacrifices—was that so wrong? He is facing a major war with the Philistines and Samuel is nowhere to be found—shouldn’t Saul communicate with the God of his fathers? Finally, near the end of this chapter, we have Israel functioning without weapons (or, without iron weapons). How was such a thing enforced? At the time that I write, we are having a hell of a time keeping weapons of mass destruction out of the hands of the Iraqis (as per satellite photographs and armies of inspectors). I think any reasonable person knows that Iraq definitely has chemical weapons and probably has untested nuclear capabilities (I am writing in the year 2002). However, given the satellite pictures, the inspectors and the UN resolutions, we cannot keep them from developing these weapons; so how could the Philistines keep Israel from acquiring weapons? In short, we are going to take several side trips and discuss various aspects of this chapter and reference other passages throughout Scripture so that we can get a handle of many of the details which we crave, but do not have.

As I begin to exegete this chapter, I have noticed several things about the writing. When it came to narrative, Samuel (or, the previous author) used the wâw consecutive continually. There were a lot of simple phrases beginning with the wâw consecutive, then the verb, the subject, the direct object and then another wâw consecutive. Furthermore, his vocabulary was fairly simple. It was rare for Samuel to use a word which he had not used before. This chapter is different. We have slightly more complex sentence structure; a slightly expanded vocabulary, and we are dealing with incidents that Samuel would not necessarily observed first-hand. What made me think that Samuel may not be the writer is the continual use of the proper noun ׳Ib^erîy (י.רב̣ע) [pronounced ģi^be-VREE], which is transliterated Hebrews. We found this used twice in 1Sam. 4:6, 9; but the Philistines were using the term to refer to the Jews. Here we have this terms used several times from the standpoint of the Jews. Whereas, these few things do not necessarily rule out Samuel as the author, it does cause me to question whether he was the author of this and the next several chapters.

There’s one more thing that I should mention: the correct text in several places is difficult to ascertain. We have a number of variant readings in this chapter and the next. This means that we will plow through several alternate readings and spend a fair amount of time determining the correct reading.

Jonathan Initiates Aggressions Between the Israelites and the Philistines

First, this is how others have translated this verse:

Ancient texts:

Dead Sea Scrolls                   All of 1Sam. 13 and most of 1Sam. 14–15 are missing from the Dead Sea Scrolls due to degraded manuscripts.

Latin Vulgate                         Saul was a child of one year when he began to reign, and he reigned two years over Israel.

Masoretic Text                       Saul [was] a son of a year in his reigning and a pair of years he reigned over Israel,...

Peshitta                                 And when Saul had reigned one or two years in his kingdom over Israel,...

Septuagint                             [in my version of the LXX, there is nothing here for v. 1]

Significant differences:          There are obviously more problems here than we want to deal with in one paragraph, so we will discuss this in much greater detail in the exegesis below.

Thought-for-thought translations; paraphrases:

CEV                                       Saul was a young man when he became king, and he ruled Israel for two years.

The Message                         Saul was a young man when he began as king. He was king over Israel for many years.

NLT                                Saul was thirty years old when he became king, and he reigned for forty-two years.

REB                                       Saul was thirty years old when he became king, and he reigned over Israel for twenty-two years.

TEV                                       [there’s nothing here for v. 1]

Mostly literal renderings (with some occasional paraphrasing):

God’s Word™                         Saul was [thirty] years old when he became king, and he was king of Israel forty-two years.

JPS (Tanakh)                        Saul was...years old when he became king, and he reigned over Israel two years.

Literal, almost word-for-word, renderings:

The Amplified Bible                Saul was [forty—The complete numbers in this verse are missing in the Hebrew. The word “forty” is supplied by the best available estimate] years old when be began to reign; and when he had reigned two years over Israel,...

NASB                                     Saul was forty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned thirty-two years over Israel. Recall that italicized text in certain literal translations mean these words are not found in the original text.

Young's Updated LT              A son of a year is Saul in his reigning, year, two years he has reigned over Israel,...

What is the gist of this verse? Although it appears as though originally the age of Saul and the length of his reign was given, I think that this verse simply tells us that it takes Saul about a year to assume his kingly responsibilities, then, after two years go by, we face the crisis of the Philistines (which is to follow in the remainder of this chapter and the next).

So that we know what to expect, there are some late Greek manuscripts which tell us that Saul was 30 years old when he began his reign. The Hebrew does not have a number here. Some Greek manuscripts, like Brenton’s, lacks a first verse entirely. This suggests to me that this number had been lacking for a long time, and that the later manuscripts indicate that someone figured that they had better put something there. Josephus and Acts 13:21 tell us that Saul actually ruled for 40 years. Now, let’s delve into the Hebrew text, after which, we will examine this topic in greater depth:

Translation: Saul was a son of a year in his reigning and a pair of years he reigned over Israel. You may already have an opinion about this, but let’s think about this for a moment—why would we have, at the beginning of Saul’s reign, the total number of years that he reigned over Israel? Prior to this, it was at the end of someone’s life, that we are given the time that they functioned in whatever office they held (compare Deut. 34:5–7 Joshua 24:29 Judges 16:21 1Sam. 7:15). We may reasonably assert that Samuel, at 1Sam. 7:15–17, figured that he had come to the end of his time and was simply adding an ending to his ministry. It is at the end of one’s life or reign when we expect to see the numbers indicating how long they have reigned. Saul is going to be with us for another 19 chapters.

Now, although it is possible that someone sat down at the end of Saul’s reign and began writing this or piecing it together from memory and from the available documents, and he would therefore have indicated the number of years that Saul reigned. However, it is more likely that the writer or writers wrote this information down at more than one sitting. This introduces another issue—who recorded the life and reign of Saul? Given the simplistic style found in 1Sam. 1–12, we may reasonably guess that Samuel recorded everything up until that time (or, at least, the same person recorded 1Sam. 1–12). If this simple style continues, there would be no reason to assume that a different author picked up the pen right at this time. Samuel is still the spiritual leader; therefore, we would expect (1) him to continue to record the history of Israel; and (2) we would therefore expect his simple style to continue. With regards to the latter, note that already in this first verse we have a repetition of two words. Therefore, to what conclusion are we forced? First of all, we would expect Saul’s age to be given here; however, it appears to have been dropped from the text. It is also possible that the original author wrote this verse in with the expectation that someone (perhaps even himself) would, at a later date, insert the correct number of years.

The problem here goes way back. The Chaldee paraphrase reads Saul was an innocent child when he became king (this was there way of dealing with the problem). The Latin and Greek both lack the number of years that we would expect to find. We do not even have a 1Sam. 13 in the Dead Sea Scrolls to help us out here. Since the addition of these years that we do have occurs in late Greek texts, my opinion is that the years were added at that time, realizing that something should be there.

Furthermore, there is no reason to think that we would have the length of Saul’s reign here. What we should expect is to find is perhaps how many years went by before Saul had to spring into military action again (as per the next verse). However, subsequent kings will have their ages given and the number of years that they ruled over Israel (2Sam. 2:10 5:4 1Kings 14:21 22:42 2Kings 8:26) using the exact same verbiage, except that they insert the actual number of years that the king ruled and his actual age when he took office.

Before we examine the various theories, let me insert Acts 13:21, so that can have that as a guiding beacon: Paul stands up in the synagogue in Antioch, after the reading from the Law and the Prophets, and he says, “And then they asked for a king, and God gave them Saul the son of Kish, a man of the tribe of Benjamin, for forty years.”

Of course, what Josephus offers us may be of some help, and he tells us that Saul reigned for 18 years while Samuel was alive and then ruled an additional 22 years after his death. However, Dr. Doddridge (note in loco) has shown that this cannot be correct, and that he probably reigned, as some copies of Josephus have it, but two years after the death of Samuel. Many critics suppose that the term of 40 years mentioned here includes also the time in which Samuel judged the people.

Let me add a few more points: (1) there is no way that we can allow the text to stand as is; it makes little sense as it is, and it cannot be twisted to make sense. (2) Similar passages do insert actual numbers here. (3) This problem goes way back. If we have the same missing text in the Chaldee, the Greek and the Latin, without a solution to be found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, then we can rest assured that the corruption of this passage goes way back, easily to 300 b.c. or earlier.

So, where do we stand on this verse? I was at first more apt to agree with the insertion of missing years than not, primarily because this is the format found with other kings. However, that is not absolutely necessary; and the fact that a later author used this same formula to give the age of a king as well as the number of years that he reigned does not mean that this author had something else in mind when he wrote these words. After letting this gel for awhile, I am more apt to simply let this verse stand as is. Because this verse apparently puzzled very early translations, we may assume that they grappled with the exact same questions that we are grappling with.

One item which should be at the back of your mind is that, if you choose this age or that for Saul, it will of course affect the age of Jonathan when Saul began to reign, as well as impact the number of years which transpire between this verse and those following. If Saul is, say, 30, Jonathan would be, at most, 15 or 16, when Saul began his reign. When Saul takes out 3000 men (v. 2a), and sends the remainder home, it appears as though he has just begun to reign, that the men who went to war with him against the Ammonites are still with him in force, and that he takes out 3000 of the best and sends the remainder home (v. 2b). Entrusting Jonathan with a 1000 men may have actually occurred several years later; however, it appears that this all occurred at once. If Jonathan is old enough to command these troops, I would assume that he is between 18–25 years of age, making Saul at least 35 years old at this time (however, I am thinking the thoughts of an American—the king’s son could head an army at age 12). The other option, which Barnes proposes, is that Saul is about 30 when he begins to reign, and that the incidents of this chapter actually occur at least 10–15 years later. However, it is not out of the question for Saul to be 29–30 when he begins to rule over Israel; and for his son to be 15 (or even younger) when he takes this 1000 men in the next verse to war against the Philistines. For a man of this age to command a thousand men might seem unthinkable today, but bear in mind, this is the king’s son and this is a long time ago when a young man was much more mature in his early teens than now. Furthermore, Jonathan would have also had many of Saul’s physical characteristics (height and physical attractiveness, as well as some natural leadership ability).

What we need to examine next, is what was Saul’s reasonable age and length of reign?

Let’s continue with Saul’s reign:

Here is how others have handled this verse:

Ancient texts:

Masoretic Text                       And so chooses to himself Saul a trio of a thousand from Israel and so are with Saul two thousand in Michmash and in [the] hill-country of Bethel and a thousand have been with Jonathan in Gibeah of Benjamin. And [the] rest of the people he sent away each one to his tents.

Septuagint                             And Saul chooses for himself three thousand men of the men of Israel; and there were with Saul two thousand who were in Michmas, and in mount Bethel, a thousand were with Jonathan in Gabaa of Benjamin; and he sent the rest of the people every man to his tent.

Significant differences:          There is one phrase in the Greek which is not found in the Hebrew. My thinking is, this short phrase (or, in this case, actually just a word) was not readable in whatever manuscript family the MT is taken from. Rather than make a good guess at the actual words, they were simply left out. On the other hand, the Greek translator may have felt this word was needed in the text and added it, which did not violate the meaning of the verse. This word is found in my translation of the Peshitta and Vulgate (however, I don’t know if it is there in the original, and it makes so little difference that I’m not going to fool with the actual Vulgate in order to figure it out).

Thought-for-thought translations; paraphrases:

CEV                                       Then he chose three thousand men from Israel to be full-time soldiers and sent everyone else home. Two thousand of these troops stayed with him in the hills around Michmash and Bethel. The other thousand were stationed with Jonathan at Gibeah in the territory of Benjamin.

NLT                                Saul selected three thousand special troops from the army of Israel and sent the rest of the men home. He took two thousand of the chosen men with him to Micmash and the hill country of Bethel. The other thousand went with Saul’s son Jonathan to Gibeah in the land of Benjamin.

Mostly literal renderings (with some occasional paraphrasing):

God’s Word™                         Saul chose 3,000 men from Israel; 2,000 of them were stationed with Saul at Michmash and in the mountains of Bethel, and 1,000 were stationed with Jonathan at Gibeah in Benjamin. But the rest of the people he sent home.

JPS (Tanakh)                        Saul picked 3,000 Israelites, of whom 2,000 were with Saul in Michmas and in the hill country of Bethel, and 1,000 with Jonathan in Gibeah of Benjamin; the rest of the troops he sent back to their homes.

Literal, almost word-for-word, renderings:

NASB                                     Now Saul chose for himself 3,000 men of Israel, of which 2,000 were with Saul in Mishmash and in the hill country of Bethel, while 1,000 were with Jonathan at Gibeah of Benjamin. But he sent away the rest of the people, each to his tent.

Young's Updated LT              ...and Saul chose for himself three thousand men out of Israel; and two thousand are with Saul in Michmash, and in the hill country of Bethel; and a thousand have been with Jonathan in Gibeah of Benjamin; and the remnant of the people he has sent each to his tents.

What is the gist of this verse? After the successful battle with the Ammonites, Saul has 2000 of his best troops remain with him as the palace guard and police/military force. He appears to move his personal headquarters to Michmash. Saul stations his son Jonathan in Gibeah with 1000 crack troops.

Translation: Then Saul chose 3000 from Israel... You may recall that a group of men took it upon themselves to follow Saul back to his hometown after he was chosen by God by lot (or by ceremony) to be king over Israel. These are not from that group (which, I assume, was a much smaller group of men). However, the original small guard may be a part of this 3000 or in addition to them.

Saul has just defeated Nahash the Ammonite with the army (according to the text and according to our present translation, that is 300,000 men from Israel and 30,000 from Judah—1Sam. 11:8). After the battle, the army, Saul and Samuel went to Gilgal to install Saul as king over Israel. Confusion and disagreements over number aside, Saul takes from that group of 330,000 Israelites and Judæans (which may or may not be an accurate amount) 3000 men (the term Israel occasionally stands for those of northern Israel, as we have in 1Sam. 11:8; and, it mostly refers to those from Israel, as we have in this verse).

Translation: ...and 2000 were with Saul in Michmash and in the hill country of Bethel... Saul chose 3000 men altogether for his standing army and personal guard. What we have in the remainder of this verse is how he split them up. 3000 is actually a fairly small number. This would tend to support the relative peace that Israel had enjoyed, which peace was disturbed by Nahash the Ammonite. Apart from that, there has been an extended period of peace when Samuel was the spiritual and political leader of Israel (see 1Sam. 7:13–17). However, now that Saul has been named king, this peace was broken by Nahash and will be shattered by Jonathan.

Keil and Delitzsch pondered about what was meant by the mountain of Bethel, as Bethel is situated on very high ground and is surrounded by mountains and hills. The word har refers to hill-country as well as to a particular mountain; so we would reasonably interpret this as the hill country of Bethel.

The hill country of Ephraim refers to a set of mountains which extends from the southern portion Sea of Chinnereth down along the western side of the Dead Sea, with the Jordan River to the east of these mountains. Although many of these mountains and hills are in Ephraim, they extend north through Manasseh and south through Benjamin and deep into Judah. Recall that I theorized that the Philistines made a wide cut through Ephraim, separating Shiloh from northern and southern Israel and burning Shiloh to the ground. This troop movement also split Israel in half. At this time, we will have a similar attack by Philistia.

Now, recall that we have two basic options with respect to the age of Saul. If he begins his reign at an early age (say, 25–35), then Jonathan is a very young teen at that point, and Saul entrusts him with these troops years later (as Barnes suggests, at least 10–15 years later, if not more). Option #2 is that Saul is 35–40 and that these couple verses all occur over the short period of say a month or so. The latter appears to easily work with the flow of this chapter; however, the former view can be easily reconciled to this chapter. Option #3, which is somewhat of a compromise, is, Saul is 28–32 when assuming power; and two years later, a very young Jonathan (say, age 13–15), takes control of 1000 crack troops. As we have discussed, the number of this 3^rd option are more in keeping with the Hebrew text than any others (again, bear in mind that Saul was a young man when he was chosen to rule over Israel (1Sam. 9:2). The impetuousness of the next verse, along with Saul’s lack of criticism, would indicate that Jonathan is a teen at this time.

A Map of Michmash
Michmash has not been mentioned before. It is not a city cited in the book of Joshua, where we would expect to find it. It seems to come out of nowhere. We know that Saul will station troops here and in the hill country of Bethel because of this verse. We know that the Philistines will later station their troops there (1Sam. 13:16). This city or location will figure into Jonathan’s attack in 1Sam. 14. So, I have had three guesses: (1) Michmash was originally an encampment of the Philistines. Although they retained some troops in Israel, this general area was taken back in 1Sam. 7:13. (2) Michmash was simply the camp of the Philistines during this attack; however, Saul placed his troops here first. (3) Michmash was simply a city which sprung up since the time of Joshua; which is not an unlikely scenario. (4) It is possible that Saul originally had thoughts of establishing a royal city in Michmash, and that placing his troops there was the first step. This map gives us a better idea of the location of Michmash, which is on the northern edge of the great Wady Suweinit. For whatever reason, it appears as though a great deal of Israeli civilization was building up in the territory of Benjamin, despite the fact that the tribe of Benjamin had been reduced to practically nothing in size. However, this was the area within which Samuel ministered (recall that he was a circuit judge over Bethel, Mizpeh and Gilgal; and his house was in Ramah—1Sam. 7:16–17). This was central Israel, so it was the most convenient place for Israelites to come for worship and to come for judgments. Saul also lived in this general area, his city being Gibeah.	Scanned and edited from The MacMillan Bible Atlas; 3rd Edition; Aharoni, Avi-Yonah, Rainey, and Safrai; MacMillan; ©1993 by Carta; p. 90. Michmash was added by me. According to The Open Bible, Michmash is Northwest of Gibeah, rather than northeast as my map shows.
To get an idea of the positioning of the troops, Saul has 2000 men in northern Benjamin, in the cities of Michmash and Bethel, which are relatively close. Jonathan is about an hour and a half south of these cities in Gibeah with 1000 men of his own. The Philistines (in v. 5), will move their troops into Michmash, after Jonathan assaults them in Geba.

Saul did not simply say, “Hey, let’s station 2000 men Michmash and in the hill country of Ephraim.” It is very likely that his intelligence indicated that there was Philistine movement in these areas or, Saul suspected that if there was any Philistine movement, that this is where it would occur. Or, much more simply, it was simply well-known that there was a Philistine outpost in that general area (which is the most likely case). Because of the decimation of the Benjamite tribe in the book of the Judges, that particular area was quite vulnerable to enemy invasion. In any case, this was the general area where Saul would be and provide for the defense of Israel. Certainly, even though Saul was a wack job later on in his reign, that does not mean that he lacked intelligence or military savvy. Another option, which I have already mentioned, is that Saul may have looked upon this area as a reasonable place to establish a royal city (however, I doubt that option, as it strikes me that Saul would rather look upon his hometown of Gibeah as being the royal city).

This is as far as we will examine Michmash at this point in time. However, we must take careful note that the number of troops which Saul has culled from his army represent a small national security force which in place primarily for intelligence and to protect him. They are a holding force, but not one that Saul would necessarily mobilize for a major war. No real military moves could be made apart from a redrafting of those who fought against Nahash.

Translation: ...and a thousand were with Jonathan near Gibeah of Benjamin. Note how this is written. There is no explanation as to who Jonathan is, even though this is the first time he is named in Scripture. This would indicate to me that Jonathan was very well-known at the time that this was written, which would suggest that this account was recorded relatively soon after the events occurred. This would also indicate that Saul has wisely delegated some of his authority to his son, Jonathan, whose integrity is far greater than the integrity of Samuel’s sons.

It is interesting that Saul would place his son here, near where there is apparently a Philistine garrison (see v. 3). I would have expected Saul to put himself in harm’s way before putting his firstborn in harm’s way. What we are observing here is possibly a lapse of personal character on Saul’s part or a lack of realization of where the Philistines are (which I doubt). Another possibility is that Saul places Jonathan there knowing that he, in his youthful exuberance, will start something—which possibility, I doubt as well. Geba is between Michmash and Gibeah, and the placement of himself and Jonathan apparently sealed off the Philistines from going north or south. So I think the idea that Saul had was simple peaceful containment.

The REB footnotes Gibeah and tells us Gibeah: Geba in verse 3. There are several translators and commentators who struggle with these two cities throughout this chapter. Are we in Gibeah or Geba? Did Jonathan just strike Gibeah or Geba? Are they the same? When we get to vv. 15–16, we will discuss this situation in great detail. However, for the time being, simply understand that Gibeah, Geba and Gibeon are three different cities, all located in the territory of Benjamin, and all fairly close to one another. This accounts for their confusion more than anything else. I have shown the three cities on the map above in order to get an idea as to what is occurring.

Translation: And the rest of the people he sent away each to his tents. I originally assumed that the events of this chapter closely followed in time the war against the Ammonites. The scenario I pictured was first, the whole of Israel’s fighting force had been gathered to fight the Ammonites (1Sam. 11:8). These men would have remained with Saul during the inaugural celebration (1Sam. 11:14–12:25). However, at this point, Saul sees no reason to keep this entire army on active duty. Instead, he maintains a small force of crack soldiers; and the rest of Israel he sends back to their homes. The indication is that there is not an immediate threat of any kind (i.e., the Philistines are not, at this moment, breaking out of their area and encroaching on Israel again). We may assume that the retention of these 3000 men was (1) a show of force to contain and check the indigenous Philistine force; (2) a portion of these men acted as Saul’s personal bodyguard force; and (3) they were Saul’s immediate, emergency military force. This is exactly what we would expect of a nation going from wartime to peace time.

After completely exegeting chapters 13–14, I am not so certain that these events immediately follow those in 1Sam. 11–12. In 1Sam. 14:47–48, we have a long list of peoples whom Saul defeated in battle; which battles are not all recorded in Scripture. So, at some point in time, Saul and Jonathan had to fight against the several other nations named in that passage. My thinking is that v. 2 does not necessarily describe just what happened after Saul’s defeat of the Ammonites, but sets a pattern. When Saul is at war, he summons up all of the forces in Israel, and they generally meet in Gilgal. They wait on Samuel for seven days (who is, of course, also summoned) who offers sacrifices on their behalf and gives the troops guidance. The war is fought, and, when it is over, Saul maintains a small army of 3000, handing a thousand of these men over to Jonathan. In other words, 10–20 years may have passed since Saul fought and defeated the Ammonites. What we have here is typical. The only thing which might be specific to this time period is where Saul and Jonathan place their troops—Saul is in northern Benjamin in Michmash, and Jonathan is south of him in Gibeah. Between them is a garrison of Philistines, and the stationing of Israeli troops was not necessarily an aggressive action (in Saul’s mind), but a containment action.

I offer the alternate scenario above just in case; however, there is nothing which prevents us from understanding that vv. 1–2 follow shortly after 1Sam. 12. There is no particular time interval between 1Sam. 13:2 and 3, however.

Recall that the Hebrew writer does not think linearly but topically. Therefore, there is nothing in the Hebrew which indicates that Jonathan was given control over a thousand men the day that Saul culled out the best of his military, immediately after the inauguration and war with the Ammonites. The topic of this chapter is the war against the Philistines which Jonathan set into motion. Therefore, we have to realize that the writer will first concentrate on the catalyst of this war. The fact that possibly a number of years go by between Saul’s culling out of the 3000 soldiers and Jonathan taking his group against the Philistines is not a problem for this passage. So, to help follow what is occurring, Saul has completed a successful war against the Ammonites. Jonathan is never mentioned in that campaign, possibly because he did not participate, and possibly because he was not old enough at that time. The people of Israel are 100% behind Saul (recall that most United States presidents in war time have a very high approval rating), so he finally assumes the reins of his kingship.

A couple years later (and possibly even 10–20 years later), the young man that Saul trusts the most, his son Jonathan, is old enough to command a small army. Therefore, Saul puts him in charge of 1000 of the men that he had culled out. It is possible that several wars have occurred since Saul’s victory over Ammon. My guess is that Jonathan, at the time of 1Sam. 13, is between 14–25 years of age. Perhaps he was even conceived about the time of Saul’s inauguration. Knowing the psychology of the teen, that they see themselves as indestructible, it would be most reasonable that Jonathan is a middle or late teen when he takes command of these thousand men and attacks the Philistine outpost in Geba (or, wherever the outpost is). His youthfulness explains a lot of what is about to occur. Also, young people tend to be stronger in faith, particularly after they have just believed; and Jonathan acts with great conviction throughout the next two chapters.

The biggest problem with this sort of gap is, this leaves the ending of v. 1 unexplained. What I believe to be the case is, it took a year for Saul to become king of Israel and what is about to be described occurs 2 years after he became king. So, despite what I have suggested, if we want to accept v. 1 at face value, as it stands in the Hebrew, without requiring that anything be added to it, then Jonathan’s attack against the Philistines will have to occur about 2 years after Saul’s ascension to the throne of Israel.

Vv. 2–4 possibly occur two years after the inauguration , and the v. 5 picks up possibly 10–20 years later. For reasons which I will go into when I exegete 1Sam. 14, I think that the division of the troops occurred two years after Saul’s inauguration and that the events which follow occurred 15–20 years later, including the stationing of the troops. In between, I think that there is a rich history of many successful wars led by Saul which are not recorded. Jonathan, with this crack team of 1000 soldiers, will act on his own in a surprise attack against the Philistines (concerning which action, the exact series of events are not given to us). Regardless of the time frame, at this time, the Philistines are contained in the city of Geba with Saul north of them and Jonathan is south of them. Even though Saul’s standing army is rather small, this move completely contains the Philistine troops in Geba. In the next verse, I will give you more information as to the geography of all this.

I realize that I did not take a position here. There are other options as well. What I don’t want is for you to get a specific idea that things just happened within such and such a time table, when the passage does not demand it. All this passage demands (accepting v. 1 as is) is, within 2 years of his inauguration, that Saul establish a split standing army (and even that is not a certainty). This passage does not really require Jonathan to be the commander of the smaller force immediately (although that scenario seems to be the most likely).

The reason I explore these options is, there are times that you develop some pre-conceived notion of what is going on in a passage, and you set up a time frame or a series of incidents in your mind, which the passage does not necessarily support. Then, when you come across something later which contradicts what is in your head (but not what is in Scripture), you become confused.

Now, actually, the armies of Saul and Jonathan are positioned well for an attack upon the Philistine camp. They were strategically in a good place. The Philistines are in Geba. Saul is north of them in Michmash and Jonathan is southwest in Gibeah. If we move northwest from Geba, there is a deep descent today known as the Wady-es-Suweinit. According to Edersheim, there are two very steep rock-covered eminences, one to the southwest, towards Geba, and the other to the northwest, towards Michmash. Other wadys moving north and south, render these eminences quite abrupt and isolated (more on these in the next chapter). The Philistine army in Geba is actually in a difficult spot, since Saul and his 2000 men occupied Michmash and Mount Bethel to the northeast, north and northwest, threatening their communications through the Wady-es-Suweinit with Philistia, while Jonathan and his 1000 men were in Gibeah, southwest of Geba.

Here is how others have handled this verse:

Ancient texts:

Masoretic Text                       And so strikes Jonathan a garrison of Philistines which [was] in Geba and so hear [the] Philistines. And Saul blew in the horn in all the land to say, “Hear the Hebrews!”

Peshitta                                 And Jonathan struck the garrison of the Philistines that was in Geba, and the Philistines heard of it. And Saul blew the trumpet throughout all the land, saying, “Let the Hebrews and all Israel hear the news.”

Septuagint                             And Jonathan struck Nasib the Philistine that lived in the hill; and the Philistines hear of it, and Saul sounds the trumpet through all the land, saying, “The servants have despised [us].”

Significant differences:          The first difference is one of translation vs. transliteration. The second will require a more careful examination. The Latin and Hebrew are identical.

Thought-for-thought translations; paraphrases:

CEV                                       Jonathan led an attack on the Philistine army camp at Geba. The Philistine camp was destroyed, but the other Philistines heard what had happened. Then Saul told his messengers, “Go to every village in the country. Give a signal with the trumpet, and when the people come together, tell them what has happened.”

NJB                                Jonathan killed the Philistine governor stationed at Gibeah and the Philistines were informed that the Hebrews had risen in revolt. Saul had the trumpet sounded throughout the country.

NLT                                Soon after this, Jonathan attacked and defeated the garrison of Philistines at Geba. The news spread quickly among the Philistines that Israel was in revolt, so Saul sounded the call to arms throughout Israel.

REB                                       Jonathan defeated the Philistine garrison in Geba, and the news spread among the Philistines that the Hebrews were in revolt. Saul sounded the trumpet all through the land;...

Mostly literal renderings (with some occasional paraphrasing):

Complete Jewish Bible          Y̓honatan assassinated the governor of the P̓lishtim in Geva. The P̓lishtim heard of it; so Sha̓ul had the shofar sounded throughout the land, saying, “Let the Hebrews hear!”

God’s Word™                         Jonathan defeated the Philistine troops at Geba, and the Philistines heard about it. With the sounding of the ram’s horn throughout the land, Saul announced, “Listen, Hebrews!”

JPS (Tanakh)                        Jonathan struck down the Philistine prefect in Geba; and the Philistines heard about it. Saul had the ram’s horn sounded throughout the land, saying, “Let the Hebrews hear.”

Literal, almost word-for-word, renderings:

NASB                                     And Jonathan smote the garrison of the Philistines that was in Geba, and the Philistines heard of it. Then Saul blew the trumpet throughout the land, saying, “Let the Hebrews hear.”

Young's Updated LT              And Jonathan smites the garrison of the Philistines which is in Geba, and the Philistines hear, and Saul hath blown with a trumpet through all the land, saying, “Let the Hebrews hear.”

What is the gist of this verse? There are apparently garrisons of Philistines stationed throughout Israel (or, at least one garrison in Geba as well as one in Gibeah—1Sam. 10:5). Jonathan is stationed in Gibeah with 1000 men; he attacks and destroys the Philistine garrison in nearby Geba (because of the similarity of the names Geba, Gibeah and Gibeon, we cannot be 100% certain that we are speaking of Geba right here).

Obviously, given the various translations, Jonathan struck the Philistines. However, when comparing these various renderings, it is not clear exactly which of them he struck, or whether it was an entire garrison or whether Jonathan assassinated their ambassador-leader in Israel (which will be discussed in the exegesis).

Translation: Later, Jonathan struck the garrison of Philistines which was near Geba. Many interpret here that Geba should be Gibeah instead. There are even some who consider them the same city. As is mentioned above, the Greek translation at this point is hill, which possibly means that the Greek translators came across the word Gibeah and rendered it hill rather than as a proper noun. Either Jonathan has taken out the garrison of Philistines which are in the city that he was assigned (which is reasonable); or that he struck the Philistines in nearby Geba. Geba and Gibeah are within 2–3 miles of one another, so taking 1000 men from one city to the other is not that big of a deal. Furthermore, had the Philistines gone from Geba to Gibeah, then they would have been the ones to strike Jonathan and not vice versa. Furthermore, if this is supposed to read Gibeah, then Jonathan was stationed in a city where there was a Philistine garrison (meaning that this garrison is the same one mentioned in 1Sam. 10:5), which is unlikely. Stationing Saul and Jonathan in cities above and below the Philistine camp makes sense (particularly because the geography of Geba now isolates the Philistines). Therefore, our passage is probably correct the way it reads, and all that has occurred is that the Philistine garrison moved from Gibeah (1Sam. 10:5) to Geba (1Sam. 13:3). Relocating a few thousand troops a distance of a few miles is not that big of a deal and should cause us no concern. That the Philistine moved and we are not told when they moved does not indicate that there is any sort of a contradiction, nor does it indicate that the reading of the Masoretic text is wrong. Furthermore, there is nothing which would prevent the Philistines from having several outposts established in Israel (which is probably the more likely scenario).

Now, had Jonathan been deployed in the same city as the Philistines (Gibeah), then this would have been seen as an act of aggression and would have provoked an immediate confrontation. Furthermore, if there is a Philistine outpost in Gibeah at this time, why would Jonathan go to Geba to strike the Philistines. Taking our passage as is simply means that Saul and Jonathan stationed their troops to contain the Philistines. It also suggests that the Philistines had an outpost in Gibeah which is no longer active; and that there present outpost (which may be one among several) is in Geba.

Geba is situated between Gibeah and Michmash. It is located just south of Michmash on the other side of a ravine, and Geba is northeast of Gibeah. Edersheim: Geba...lay on a low conical eminence, on the western end of a ridge which shelves eastwards towards the Jordan. Passing from Geba northwards and westwards we come to a steep descent, leading into what now is called the Wady-es-Suweinit...On the opposite steep brow, right over against Geba, lies Michmash, at a distance of barely three miles in a north-westerly direction. It would make sense for Saul to place his crack divisions on both sides of the indigenous Philistines population for containment purposes. When we get to v. 13, we will cover Geba, Gibeah and Gibeon in much greater detail.

The strike force that Jonathan commands is close enough to the garrison of the Philistines to successfully attack them. The impression given is that Jonathan acts on his own here, and there is nothing said one way or the other about possible provocation. There is no indication that Jonathan did this in obedience to an order from his father; the inference that we can draw is that Jonathan acted impetuously and aggressively on his own. I do not say this in such a way as to denigrate what Jonathan does here. Given that he commands a significant portion of Israel’s standing army, given the natural animosity between the Israelis and the Philistines, and given his youthful exuberance, this is completely within Jonathan’s character to do this.

Some other translations suggest that this reads And Jonathan struck down a governor of the Philistines who was in Geba... The reaction of the Philistines would have been the same, whether Jonathan had assassinated a governor or taken out a garrison of Philistines. However, given Jonathan’s later actions, I would suggest that Jonathan did more than assassinate one man. If he had 1000 men at his disposal, it seems that he would have set his sights higher than just taking out a particular Philistine leader.

Translation: ...and the Philistines heard [about this]. Obviously, there was a group of Philistines that lived within the borders of Israel, not unlike the situation which has existed in Israel since 1947 when Jews reclaimed their God-given land. The impression is not that Jonathan assassinated a local Philistine leader, but that he took out an entire garrison, one which has existed in that area for some time. Also, it is important to note that there was a Philistine intelligence system in place where, when this occurred, the Philistines knew about it immediately. Given their mutual animosity, the Philistines were aware that, at any time, their forces which were within Israel could be attacked and destroyed. Obviously, this was not expected; but it was not out of the question either. This is not unlike the situation to day. The Jews at any time could go throughout their area and kill the Arabs who live there. The could send a detachment of troops to a foreign embassy and destroy it. This is unlikely, but that does not mean that it could not happen. The relationship between Israel and the Philistines was at least equally antagonistic and even more volatile than between Israel and neighboring Arab nations today.

A reasonable question is: what the hell is Jonathan doing? There has always been a careful balance of power in Israel, as there is even today. An all-out war changes things dramatically. Jonathan was aware of the strengths of the Philistines, but he was also aware that nowhere had God told Israel to back off from her enemies. The Philistines were Israel’s enemies, they lived within Israel’s borders, and they were heathen who did not worship of the God of Israel. Possibly, it would have been better to consult Samuel who would have then consulted God. However, even without conferring with his father, Jonathan is not out of line here.

Translation: And Saul blew in the horn in all the land, saying, “The Hebrews will hear [this].” Saul essentially had to back his son at this point, as well as protect Israel. In Saul’s own mind, his crack force of 3000 men would not be enough to fend off an invading horde of Philistines. Therefore, this is a call to the men of Israel to come together as soldiers again. It should be obvious that there was more to be said than, “Listen, Hebrews,” which is all we find in this verse. The blowing of the horn was a call for Israel to gather with the strong likelihood of going to war (Judges 3:27 6:34).

In the next verse, we find out actually what was said after the blowing of the trumpet—there was more to this than Saul sending men out to blow the trumpet throughout the land.

Here is how others have handled this verse:

Ancient texts:

Latin Vulgate                         And all Israel heard this report: Saul hath smitten the garrison of the Philistines: and Israel took courage against the Philistines. And the people were called together after Saul to Galgal.

Masoretic Text                       And all of Israel heard, to say, “Struck Saul a garrison of Philistines and also had become malodorous Israel in the Philistines.” And so calling out the people after Saul the Gilgal.

Peshitta                                 [...and let all Israel hear the news,...] that Saul has struck the garrison of the Philistines and that Israel has prevailed over the Philistines. And the people were called together after Saul to Gilgal.

Septuagint                             And all Israel heard said that Saul had struck Nasib the foreigner; now Israel had been put to shame before the Philistines; and the children of Israel went up after Saul in Galgala.

Significant differences:          The Hebrew word garrison could be transliterated Namib, which explains the difference between the MT and the LXX (however, Philistines is in the plural in the MT and foreigner is in the singular in the LXX). The middle verb is different in all 4 translations. And, thirdly, in the MT, the people are called to Gilgal; in the LXX, they go up to Gilgal. These differences are significant, but they affect not major doctrines and they do not affect the overall narrative.

Thought-for-thought translations; paraphrases:

CEV                                       The messengers then said to the people, of Israel, “Saul has destroyed the Philistine army camp at Geba. Now the Philistines really hate Israel, so every town and village must send men to join Saul’s army at Gilgal.”

NLT                                He announced that the Philistine garrison at Geba had been destroyed, and he warned the people that the Philistines now hated the Israelites more than ever. So the entire Israelite army mobilized again and met Saul at Gilgal.

Mostly literal renderings (with some occasional paraphrasing):

God’s Word™                         (So all Israel listened) “I, Saul, have defeated the Philistine troops, and now Israel has become offensive [lit., became malodorous to] to the Philistines!” All the troops rallied behind Saul at Gilgal.

JPS (Tanakh)                        When all Israel heard that Saul had struck down the Philistine prefect, and that Israel had incurred the wrath of the Philistines, all the people rallied to Saul at Gilgal.

Literal, almost word-for-word, renderings:

NASB                                     And all Israel heard the news that Saul had smitten the garrison of the Philistines, and also that Israel had become odious to the Philistines. The people were then summoned to Saul at Gilgal.

Young's Updated LT              And all Israel have heard, saying, “Saul has struck the garrison of the Philistines,” and also, “Israel has been abhorred by the Philistines;” and the people are called after Saul to Gilgal.

What is the gist of this verse? Immediately, Jonathan’s strike against the Philistines reverberates throughout Israel. Saul see to that by sending out a trumpeter and the announcement, “Saul struck down a garrison of Philistines and has therefore become malodorous to the Philistines.” Then the people are called to Gilgal. Saul simply takes credit for this raid. Jonathan accepts this, because he, as his son, is under the authority of Saul, the commander-in-chief and king over all Israel; and therefore, his victories are Saul’s victories. Saul, fully aware of the possible consequences, bolsters his forces in Gilgal by calling upon the men of Israel to join him there (actually, Saul is not really the subject here, so even Samuel could have summoned all of the people to Gilgal, based upon the events which transpired).

As should be obvious from these various translations, the key to understanding this verse will be where the quotation begins and ends.

Translation: (And all Israel heard) I believe that God’s Word™ most closely conveys what is going on. The representatives of Saul go throughout Israel (these could, by the way, be the representatives of Samuel as well), blowing the horns, and saying, “Hear [this], Hebrews!” The trumpet was used to convey certain messages, and this was the sort of trumpet blast to gather the people of Israel to the messenger with the trumpet. This verse indicates that all the Israelites heard this message (obviously, some would get the word second-hand). The repetition of to say in the next portion of this verse make it clear that what is said is continued thereafter.

This would be a three-fold message.

Translation: And they said, “Saul has struck down the garrison of the Philistines.” I had to take some liberties with the wording here. The phrase to say simply indicates that what the messengers have to say is being continued. Now, you may be wondering, “Didn’t Jonathan strike this garrison? Is there a contradiction? Is Saul lying?” Well, Saul is taking credit for this victory, even though he really had nothing to do with it. The rationale behind this taking the credit would be as follows: Saul represents all Israel as commander-in-chief. He could simply direct his troops to do this or that and not even show up for the battle, and still those defeated would be said to be defeated by Saul. Jonathan, as his son and one of his commanding generals, represents Saul in battle. Also, since this is a message broadcast throughout Israel, everyone in Israel knows Saul and who he is. Perhaps half or fewer of them know Jonathan, his son. A call to come out and support their king is more likely to be heeded then a call to come out and support something that Saul’s son did; in fact, such a call might even imply that what Jonathan did was unauthorized (which, at least by Saul, it probably was; however, Jonathan was acting within the commandments of God).

Like I said, that was the rationale for the messengers saying, “Saul has struck down the garrison of the Philistines.” The message could have just as easily been, “Jonathan ben Saul has struck down the garrison of the Philistines.”

One of the things that makes me grimace is when I read that an exegete points to a passage like this and attributes the differences between vv. 3 and 4 to different traditions which came down to us, and that they were placed side-by-side by some redactor at a much, much later date. Just because it is clear that Jonathan led the raid against the Philistine garrison in v. 3, and just because Saul seems to take credit for it in v. 4 does not necessarily mean that we have two separate traditions. There are three simple alternate explanations: (1) Jonathan, acting as an agent of Saul’s (as he was a general in Saul’s army) defeated this Philistine garrison. Because he was a general under Saul, this can be seen as a victory of Saul’s. The fact that Jonathan did this apart from Saul’s orders does not change anything. He still represents Saul and Israel’s army. (2) Saul may have chosen to credit himself with this victory because of name recognition. He is the great king who beat back the Ammonites; in order to gather Israel, he needs to be the one in front as the victor over the Philistines. Had Jonathan’s name been a part of this message, the people of Israel would have been confused, as they identify Saul as their military savior.

(3) McGee gives us a third option below: He is even less charitable toward Saul than I am. Saul blew his own horn. He did not give his son credit for winning the battle. He called all of Israel together and gave a phony report. The army knew Saul’s report was not true and so did the followers of Jonathan. Folks are beginning to suspect that there is a weakness in Saul’s army and that it is his Achilles’ heel. Is he humble? I said at the beginning that Saul had a case of false humility, and this fact is coming to light now.

In other words, Saul took credit for Jonathan’s action simply because he could and because he was that kind of man. No doubt he will have a rationalization for taking credit (like #’s 1 and 2 above), just as he has a rationalization for Samuel later on in vv. 11–12. (4) It is possible that the entire message was “Jonathan ben Saul has struck down the garrison of Philistines” but we only got a portion of that message. Although this sort of explanation explains a lot in the gospels, I don’t think that is what happened here.

Application: Some people completely fall to pieces over something like this. They orchestrate a successful project, and the head of their department, who had very little to do with anything in the first place, seems to take credit for the project. First of all, for a believer in Jesus Christ, there is no reason to ever worry about who is getting credit for what. This is not now, nor will it ever be, a true issue. What God recognizes is important; what man sees is unimportant. Some of the greatest spiritual giants might be people who log 2–3 hours a day in prayer, and these people may seem like nobody’s to you in church. You’ve possibly never noticed them, or, having seen them, thought, “Hey, I really don’t feel like socializing with them—they just don’t seem like fun people.” But their prayers might be running interference for the pastor, for your church and for you, whether you know them or not. Now, if your superior looks successful because of your work on a project and he gives you some credit, great; if he does not, then don’t give it a second thought. God is in charge of promotions.

Application: Speaking of promotions, I felt denied for many years, due to a personality conflict with a superior (there are some people who just do not like me). But, when all is said and done, God made the choice. God placed me where He felt I should be placed. Now, does this mean you should not seek a higher position? Does this mean that you should not hope to ever be advanced in your field? Of course not. There is nothing wrong with ambition. However, the key is your priorities. If Bible doctrine is your priority in life, then everything else will fall into place. If moving up a level socially or economically is your priority, then regardless of what happens to you, you are going to be miserable.

Now, let’s talk about the idea that there are two different historical accounts here woven together by some editor at a later date: when other great works of history are involved, most historians take them first at face value. Then, if there is no explanation for the text as written, then they look at alternate possibilities (exaggeration, for instance). Historians rarely look at old historical accounts and automatically assume that they were combined and smoothed out by some later editor, who also allowed his own imagination to fill in the gaps. However, there are many who do exactly that to Scripture. All the normal rules of historical interpretation are thrown out the window for some theologians when they examine Scripture. For a passage like this, you automatically look at the simplest explanations first before offering wild theories of two traditions combined by one redactor hundreds of years later. This is lame. A convoluted explanation like this makes little sense, and yet some cling to it like they have really explained away an apparent contradiction (where no such contradiction even exists). Let me explain what is actually going on: Satan looks to discredit Scripture whenever possible; therefore, he will look to inspire man to come up with convoluted theories, which, at their root, suggest this or that passage is inaccurate. That is all that these weird theories are. No one reads Josephus and suggests, “Well, in this chapter, I think that maybe Josephus A and Josephus B wrote it, about 100 years and 300 years after the historical event took place; and then Josephus C, who was a devout Catholic, went back and put these two different traditions together and then sprinkled it with his own theology.” If anyone suggested something like this at an ancient history symposium, most people would look and say, “So, what are you? An idiot?” Yet, when someone suggests the exact same approach to the Bible, this becomes the stuff of liberal theology courses, and nobody blinks an eye. Again, when interpreting a passage, keep it simple to begin with. The convoluted theories about this or that passage of Scripture which I have been exposed to in my readings would be absurd if applied to any other historical work. So, the next time you hear some theory which involves the interweaving of various traditions by a person far removed from the events, in order to explain a verse or two, step back and give it some thought.

Now, this does not mean that there are not a variety of historical sources for various books of the Bible. In 1Sam. 14, we will have a relatively detailed account of something that neither Saul, nor David, nor Samuel observed. Therefore, someone had to record the event or tell (for instance) Samuel about it. The Ark of God spent several months in Philistine territory—there are too many details in the Bible to assume that some Israelite wrote this from the top of their head. Someone had to observe these events and that someone was probably a Philistine who was saved because of what he observed. Samuel may have written the final draft, but Samuel did not observe any of what occurred. Do you see how these are reasonable and simple explanations? This is much different than saying 1Sam. 4–6 were observed by 3 different Philistines, whose accounts were verbally passed down for several hundred years, and then some priest wrote down these traditions and slipped in a little of his own theology as well? That would be a goofy explanation and reasonable only if all other simpler and more logical explanations had first been examined and rejected.

Translation: “Furthermore, Israel has made herself odious to the Philistines.” The Niphal form of a verb can be passive; however, it can also refer to an action in a state of progress or development; therefore we often add in the word being. It can express adjectival ideas and it can, in plural forms, stress the individual effect upon each member of the group. Here, because of what Jonathan has done, Israel has become odious to the Philistines. Jonathan’s attack had this metaphorical effect upon each Philistine (i.e., the Israelites had became objects of the intense hostility of the Philistines). We find a similar usage of this word in Gen. 34:30 Ex. 5:21 2Sam. 10:6. In almost any televised interview with a non-Jewish middle eastern person, you can easily hear their intense hatred of the Jew. The Jew is odious to many of the arabs today.

This completes the quote of what was said; what follows is additional narrative.

Translation: And so the people were summoned after Saul in Gilgal. This essentially gives us the manner in which the people were summoned to Saul. The messengers were sent out throughout the land. They would gather at the entrance of the various cities, blow the ram’s horn, make the announcement; and tell the people to go to Gilgal (the entirety of each messenger’s message is, of course, not given).

This is interesting that Saul is not said to be the initiator of this proclamation (although, we have no reason to assume that he did not issue this proclamation). There is a 3-fold message: Saul defeated a Philistine garrison, therefore the Israelites are odious to the Philistines, so all males are hereby summoned to follow Saul to Gilgal. Saul may have issued this proclamation and Samuel may have issued it—we simply aren’t told.

Now, why did Saul choose Gilgal? Let me give you my theory: Gilgal was right next to the Jordan, across which was eastern Israel. It was a distinct possibility that Saul thought of retreating across the Jordan if necessary. Furthermore, his personal army was originally situated in Michmash, which is where the Philistines will gather (see v. 5). Saul would simply take his men and follow the Wady Suweinit down to the Jordan valley to Gilgal. It is also reasonable to assume that there was a pattern established—during times of a military crisis, Saul would gather Israel in Gilgal, Samuel would offer up a sacrifice (promising to be there within 7 days of the proclamation) and Israel would do whatever God chose for them to do at that point. This viewpoint suggests that 1Sam. 10:8 was not exactly a prophecy, but a pattern or a general policy which Samuel sets up: “You will go down before me to Gilgal and, listen, I will go down to you and offer up burnt offerings and sacrifice peace offerings. You will wait seven days until I come to you to show you what you will do.”

There is also something which is unspoken here. Given the circumstances, Saul wanted all Israel to join him in Gilgal—this would include Jonathan. Jonathan did not remain with his troops in Geba, where he had attacked the Philistine outpost. Saul called for all to come to Gilgal. The idea was to regroup, wait for Samuel, and plan the next move. Also, Saul did not want Jonathan (this is what is left unspoken) out commanding 1000 men striking who knows where and pissing off who knows who. Nowhere in our narrative does Saul blame Jonathan for anything, and I believe that during this time period, he did not express any concern with what Jonathan did. However, with all the men in one place, Saul then assumes command over all of the troops. He does not actually relieve Jonathan of his duties; it is just assumed that Saul is in charge over all, since all Israel’s army is in one place. What follows in the next chapter will make more sense. Jonathan and his armor bearer will go to the camp of the Philistines in Michmash. If Jonathan had his 1000 men, then it wold be more reasonable for him to move with some of these men. However, Saul will assume complete command, yet, at the same time, he does not officially remove Jonathan from his command. The psychology behind this explains several things: (1) why we never see a riff between Saul and his son Jonathan, although Jonathan’s actions could easily have precipitated such a riff; and (2) why Jonathan approaches the Philistine camp in the next chapter with only his armor bearer.

Let’s see if I can lay out an analogy here that might help. I, as a teacher, might split my class into groups and appoint a leader over each group. Partway into the activity, I may begin teaching again, although the students are still left in their groups. I have not officially removed the leaders from the group or rescinded their leadership position; I have simply taken back my authority. Therefore, at my command, the entire class could return to group work with their original group leaders. No one has lost face, no leadership positions were disturbed. I merely reassumed the complete authority which I had in the first place.

The Huge Philistine Force Causes the Bulk of Saul’s Army to Desert

Here is how others have handled this verse:

Ancient texts:

Masoretic Text                       And Philistines were gathered to war with Israel—30,000 chariots and 6000 horsemen and people like the sand which [is] on a shore of the sea for multitude. And so they came up and so they encamp in Michmash east of Beth-aven.

Peshitta                                 And the Philistines gathered themselves together to fight with Israel, 3000 chariots and 6000 horsemen, and people as the sand which is on the seashore in multitude. And the come up and encamp in Michmash, east of Beth-el.

Septuagint                             And the Philistines gather together to war with Israel; and then come up against Israel 30,000 chariots, and 6000 horsemen, and people as the sand by the seashore for multitude; and they come up, and encamp in Michmas, opposite Bæth-oron southward.

Significant differences:          Here is a very unusual thing: the Syriac reads 3000 (a reasonable number) and the Greek, Latin and Hebrew all read 30,000. Which Mishmash is, is in question as well. The Latin and Hebrew have it east of Beth-aven; the Syriac has it east of Eth-el, and the Greek has it north of Bæth-oron.

Thought-for-thought translations; paraphrases:

CEV                                       The Philistines called their army together to fight Israel. They had three thousand chariots, six thousand cavalry, and as many foot soldiers as there are grains of sand on the beach. They went to Michmash and set up camp there east of Beth-Aven.

Mostly literal renderings (with some occasional paraphrasing):

God’s Word™                         The Philistines assembled to fight against Israel. They had 30,000 chariots, 6,000 horsemen, and as many soldiers as the sand on the seashore. They camped at Michmash, east of Beth Aven.

JPS (Tanakh)                        The Philistines, in turn, gathered to attack Israel; 30,000 chariots and 6,000 horsemen, and troops as numerous as the sands of the seashore. They marched up and encamped at Michmas, east of Beth-aven.

Literal, almost word-for-word, renderings:

NASB                                     Now the Philistines assembled to fight with Israel, 30,000 chariots and 6,000 horsemen, and people like the sand which is on the seashore in abundance; and they came up and camped in Michmash, east of Beth-aven.

Young's Updated LT              And the Philistines have been gathered to fight with Israel; thirty thousand chariots, and six thousand horsemen, and a people as the sand which is on the sea-shore for multitude; and they come up and encamp in Michmash, east of Beth-Aven.

What is the gist of this verse? The Philistines immediately put together a huge army of men and then encamp in nearby Michmash (Geba, Gibeon, Gibeah, Gilgal, and Michmash are all within the borders of Benjamin and are within 10 miles of one another—see the Map of Michmash).

Translation: So the Philistines were gathered to war with Israel—3000 chariots and 6000 horsemen;... Again, although I can buy into the 6000 horsemen, the number of chariots seems incredibly excessive (recall that Sisera in Judges 4 had 900 chariots), besides being way out of proportion (you expect fewer chariots than horsemen—2Sam. 10:18 1Kings 10:26 2Chron. 12:3). However, this is how it reads in the Greek and the Hebrew. Barnes proposes that this is a copyist’s error for three hundred, and suggests comparing 1Chron. 18:4 with 2Sam. 8:4, where an obvious copyist error occurred. If the number of chariots is correct for Sisera, we might expect the Philistines to bring in 3000 chariots. The Syriac, the Arabic and some of the Septuagint manuscripts are in agreement with what seems to be intuitively correct, and they have the number 3000 here. If 3000 is the correct number, we are still out of proportion, but at least it is not unimaginable as 30,000 is.

In any case, what we have here is a huge mobile force against Israel, who will mostly be on foot.

Translation: ...and people [are] like the sand which [is] by the sea with reference to multitude. Even given the fact that we have a huge number of chariots and horsemen, there are an uncountable number of Philistine soldiers.

What we have in this phrase is a rarity for the book of Samuel; we have the word sand which occurs nowhere else. However, this phrase (or a similar phrase) is found several times previously in the Old Testament (see Gen. 22:17 Joshua 11:4). Therefore, even though it is unusual for Samuel, the author, to leave his normal vocabulary, this was an extraordinary situation, and Samuel takes the phrasing from books that he is familiar with.

Translation: Then they came up and they encamped in Michmash to the east of Beth-aven. We talked about Beth-aven back in Joshua 7:2, but let’s review: first off, for whatever reason, ZPEB suggests that Beth-aven is equivalent to Beth-el, and is simply a perversion of the meaning. Beth-el means house of God and Beth-aven means house of iniquity. However, it is clear that Bethel and Beth-aven are two separate cities from Joshua 7:2 18:12–13 (although they are near one another). They also suggest Beth-aven is the archaic name for Ai, for which we have no actual evidence. Furthermore, Ai and Beth-aven are mentioned together in Joshua 7:2 in such a way as to indicate that they are different cities.

Now, let’s regroup: there is no reason to say that Beth-aven is another name for any city. It is mentioned in Joshua 7:2 as being near Jericho, Bethel, and Ai. It is a border city of Benjamin (on the northern border, between Benjamin and Ephraim), mentioned in Joshua 18:12, and, again, placed near Jericho and Bethel. All that is new in this passage is the introduction of the city of Michmash (also mentioned back in v. 2); and Beth-aven would be situated west of Michmash, which helps us to place Michmash on the map. The prophet Hosea mentions Beth-aven thrice (Hosea 4:15 5:8 10:5); however, there is nothing which helps us there with its history. It is suggested, however, that its use in Hosea is as a perversion and mockery of Bethel and that actually Bethel is being referred to in that book (Bethel is mentioned by name in Hosea 10:15 12:4). Our only other mention of Beth-aven will be in 1Sam. 14:23, where the battle between the Israelites and the Philistines extends beyond Beth-aven.

In any case, all of these cities are fairly close to one another, in the territory of Benjamin. It is nice when we can identify them and make exact determinations as to their specific locations; but it is not a great loss when we cannot. In this case, it would be nice to determine if this is Beth-aven or Beth-el—but there will not be a great loss of understanding by not knowing.

Here is how others have handled this verse:

Ancient texts:

Latin Vulgate                         And when the men of Israel saw that they were straitened (for the people were distressed), they hid themselves in caves, and in thickets, and in rocks, and in dens, and in pits.

Masoretic Text                       And a man of Israel saw [plural verb] that an oppression to him for oppressed were the people; and so hid themselves the people in the caves and in the brambles and in the clefts and in the underground chambers and in the pits.

Peshitta                                 And when the men of Israel saw them, they were afraid; so they hid themselves in caves and in holes and in rocks and in clefts and in pits.

Septuagint                             And the men of Israel saw that they were in a strait so that they could not draw nigh, and the people hid themselves in caves, and sheepfolds, and rocks, and ditches, and pits.

Significant differences:          The second phrase as to what the men of Israel saw or felt is not completely clear. Obviously, they feel afraid, although that is not clear in some versions. The second place where they hide is uncertain—in some places, it is brambles or thickets; and in others, we have holes and sheepfolds.

Thought-for-thought translations; paraphrases:

CEV                                       The Israelite army realized that they were outnumbered and were going to lose the battle. Some of the Israelite men hid in caves or in clumps of bushes, and some ran to places where they could hide among large rocks. Others hid in tombs or in deep dry pits.

NLT                                When the men of Israel saw the vast number of enemy troops, they lost their nerve entirely and tried to hide in caves, holes, rocks, tombs, and cisterns.

Mostly literal renderings (with some occasional paraphrasing):

God’s Word™                         When the Israelites saw they were in trouble because the army was hard-pressed, they hid in caves, in thorny thickets, among rocks, in pits, and in cisterns.

JPS (Tanakh)                        When the men of Israel saw that they were in trouble—for the troops were hard pressed—the people hid in caves, among thorns, among rocks, in tunnels, and in cisterns. [the JPS footnotes that the meaning of the Hebrew is uncertain for this and v. 7]

Literal, almost word-for-word, renderings:

NASB                                     When the men of Israel saw that they were in a strait (for the people were hard-pressed), then the people hid themselves in caves, in thickets, in cliffs, in cellars, and in pits.

Young's Literal Translation    And the men of Israel have seen that they are distressed, that the people have been oppressed, and the people hide themselves in caves, and in thickets, and in rocks, and in high places, and in pits.

What is the gist of this verse? Although apparently some Israelites did join Saul in Gilgal, when they considered their relative military strength, they began to desert and to hide anywhere that they could. Near the end of this chapter, we will see just how mismatched Israel and Philistia were.

From the translations, the general idea of this verse is clear. The New Living Translation, although a thought-for-thought translation, gives us the general idea—the Israelites realize how huge the Philistine army is, and they deserted their posts, hiding anywhere that they could find.

Translation: And when the men of Israel saw that they were in trouble [lit, oppression to him],... There are some obvious problems with the translation of this verse. First of all, men of Israel is actually a man of Israel, but it is associated with the plural noun rââh. People will take on a masculine singular verb in this phrase, but a masculine plural verb in the next. My point is, there is more here than meets the eye. The singular use of man of Israel does often refer the men of Israel; the emphasis is simply upon each man’s personal reaction to the situation.

The soldiers of Saul are too far away from Mishmash to actually see the buildup of troops. However, Saul put out a directive to all Israel to meet him in Gilgal. I would assume when these various men travel to Gilgal, they also observe the build-up of the Philistine force and tell Saul’s army about it. Another option is, Saul has intelligence forces out there who trade out and report to him daily or every other day as to the state of things in Michmash (and in that general area) and his reports indicate a great buildup of Philistine troops. Either one of these scenarios would explain how Saul’s troops know what is going on 15–20 miles west of them.

Translation: ...for the people were hard-pressed [harassed or oppressed];... The verb found here is not what I would have expected. I would have expected to find a verb of fear or panic. I think the people find themselves in a very difficult situation. Saul is pressing them into service, but, at the same time, they seem to be waiting around Gilgal for a long time (a week). The Philistines could strike them at any time, and yet they have no encouragement from God, because Samuel is not there (possibly no encouragement from God is a factor). Furthermore, they feel hard-pressed by the Philistines striking various cities without these cities being defended.

What has happened is that the people have forgotten God, again. They look to Saul as their leader. He brings them together into battle; and then suddenly, they see the odds, and, from human viewpoint, they recognize that there is no way that they will defeat all these Philistines. They are just too great in number. Furthermore, they are just sitting there, for a week, which allows their fear to build. Therefore, the Israelites will panic and, if you will forgive the colloquialism, head for the hills.

Now, again, fear and panic are the motivating factors, so the verb, although it has some application here, does not seem to fit. For this reason, you see a variety of opinions in the ancient translations (as well as in the modern translations). The Peshitta actually uses the verb to fear; but I think they chose that verb for the same reasons which I have given—it just fits here. There are about 10 Hebrew verbs which can be translated to fear, to be afraid; but the one we find here is not one of them nor does it look anything like one of these other verbs (so we cannot blame this on a faulty manuscript). In fact, the verb found here is a verb associated with slaves being oppressed by their master; it is a verb for a slave being urged to work (and not in a nice way). I think the idea is, these soldiers were already enslaved in their minds. At best, at the outcome of this war, they saw themselves as slaves to the Philistines. They were already in subjection in their minds to the Philistines. It is in the next verse that we will have a verb which means to be afraid, to be in fear.

There is another interpretation which may be valid here: as the Philistines move into position in MIchmash, they harass and oppress the people of Israel that they come in contact with. If they need to have a barbecue, they stop at an Israeli ranch and take some of their livestock. If they want biscuits and olive oil with that, they take from an Israeli’s farm. This is a very large influx of soldiers and when a few hundred soldiers step onto the land of an Israelite, even one with a large family, there is not much that family can do but willingly assent to whatever demands these soldiers make.