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The First Book of Samuel 14

14 One day, Saul’s son Jonathan said to the young man who carried his weapons, “I want to attack the Philistine soldiers who are staying on the other side of the valley from us, and I want you to help me do that.” But Jonathan did not tell his father what he wanted to do. 2 Saul was staying in the outskirts of the city of Gibeah, under the pomegranate tree in the neighborhood of Migron. He had about 600 soldiers with him. 3 Ahijah the priest was also there, wearing a sacred apron. Ahijah’s father Ahitub was the older brother of Ichabod. Ahijah’s grandfather was Phinehas, and his great-grandfather was Eli. Eli had been Yahweh’s priest at Shiloh. None of the soliders knew that Jonathan had left the Israelite camp. 4 Jonathan recognized a route that he and the young man could follow to cross through the valley that was between them and the Philistine army. But they would have to climb over a huge rock when they first went into the valley, and they would have to climb over another huge rock as they came out of it. People called one of the rocks Bozez, and they called the other rock Seneh. 5 Bozez would be at the north end of their route, as they approached Michmash, and Seneh would be at the south end of their route, as they were leaving Geba. 6 Jonathan said to the young man who carried his weapons, “Come with me. We will go to where those pagans have set up their tents. Perhaps Yahweh will help us. It does not matter to him that there are only two of us, rather than many soldiers. Yahweh can still enable us to defeat them.” 7 The young man who was carrying Jonathan’s weapons said, “Go ahead and do what you are planning. Go across the valley, and I will come with you and help you do what you want to do.” 8 Then Jonathan said, “Very well then, come with me. As we are crossing the valley to where the Philistine army is, we will allow their soldiers to see us. 9 If they see us and call out to us, ‘You two stay there until we come down to you,’ we will stay where we are and not try to climb up and fight them. 10 But if they see us and call out to us, ‘Come up here,’ that will show us that Yahweh is going to enable us to defeat them. In that case, we will climb up and fight them.” 11 While the two of them were crossing the valley, the Philistine soldiers noticed them coming. They said to each other, “Look! Some Hebrews are crawling out of the holes in which they were hiding!” 12 Then some Philistine soldiers called out to Jonathan and the young man who carried his weapons, “Come up here, and we will show you how real soldiers fight!” Jonathan said to the young man who was with him, “Because they said that, now we know that Yahweh is going to help us to defeat them! So let us climb up and fight them. I will go first.” 13 So Jonathan climbed up out of the valley to the Philistine camp. He had to use both his hands and his feet because the ground was so steep. The young man climbed up after him. When Jonathan got to the top, he fought all the Philistine soldiers who approached him, and he killed them. The young man followed Jonathan into the camp of the Philistines, and he also fought and killed their soldiers. 14 In this initial attack, the two of them killed about 20 soldiers as they advanced about 30 meters into the Philistine camp. 15 This made the other Philistine soldiers in that camp panic. When they ran back to the main camp at Micmash and described what happened, the soldiers in the main camp also panicked. When those soldiers told soldiers in other camps and the groups of soldiers who were making raids, they also panicked. Then God caused the ground to shake, and all of them became even more afraid. 16 Saul’s soldiers in the city of Gibeah in the territory of Benjamin included lookouts. When they heard the noise in the Philistine camp, they looked to see what was happening. They saw that the Philistine army was dispersing and that its soldiers were running away in all directions. 17 Saul realized that some of his soldiers must have attacked the Philistine army. So he told his officers, “Check to see which of our soldiers are not here.” So they checked, and they found that Jonathan and the young man who carried his weapons were not there. 18 Now the Israelite army had the sacred chest with it at that time. So Saul told Ahijah the priest, “Bring the sacred chest here so that I can use it to consult Yahweh.” 19 But while Saul was still talking to Ahijah, the noise coming from the Philistine camp kept getting louder. So Saul told him, “Stop what you are doing.” 20 Then Saul gathered his whole army and they went to fight the Philistines. They found that the Philistine army had become so disorganized that its soldiers were killing each other with their swords. 21 Some of the Hebrew soldiers had earlier deserted their army and joined the Philistine army. They were in different areas throughout the Philistine camp. But now those men helped Saul and Jonathan and the other Israelite soldiers fight against the Philistines. 22 Some other Israelite soldiers had also deserted and hidden in the hilly area where the tribe of Ephraim lived. But when they heard that the Philistine soldiers were running away, they came and joined the other Israelite soldiers and also chased the Philistine soldiers. 23 So Yahweh rescued the Israelites on that day. The Israelite soldiers chased the Philistines all the way to the city of Beth Aven and beyond it. 24 But the Israelites did not win as great a victory as they could have, because the Israelite soldiers became weak from hunger that day. That was because Saul had shouted out a curse on the soldiers. He had said, “May Yahweh make bad things happen to any of you who eats any food before this evening, before I get revenge on my enemies!” So none of the Israelite soldiers ate any food, and this made them weak. 25 As the Israelite troops kept pursuing the Philistines, they went into a forest where bees had made honeycombs in the trees. Honey from those combs was flowing onto the ground. 26 When the Israelite troops came into that forest, they saw the honey flowing. But because they were afraid of the curse that Saul had shouted out, none of them ate any of the honey. 27 But because he had left the camp early that morning, Jonathan did not know that his father had cursed anyone who ate any food before evening. So when he saw a honeycomb in a tree, he reached out with the end of the spear he was holding and collected some honey. He ate that honey, and it was evident from his appearance that afterwards he felt stronger. 28 But one of the Israelite soldiers saw him eating the honey and said to him, “Your father put a serious curse on anyone who ate food today. So none of us has eaten anything, and as a result we soldiers are weak.” 29 Jonathan exclaimed, “My father has made things more difficult for the soldiers in our army! You can tell from my appearance that I feel stronger after eating some of this honey. 30 If only he had allowed us today to eat some of the food that we captured from our enemies while we were pursuing them! Then we would have felt stronger and been able to kill many more of those Philistine soldiers!” 31 The Israelite soldiers pursued and killed Philistine soldiers all that day, from their camp near Michmash all the way west to the city of Aijalon. But the Israelite soldiers became very weak because they had not eaten anything. 32 The Israelites had captured many sheep and cattle, including their calves, that the Philistine soldiers had abandoned. Because they were extremely hungry, they acted like wild birds gobbling up the carcass of an animal. They butchered some of those animals right on the ground, and they ate the meat without first draining the blood from the animals. 33 One of the soldiers told Saul, “Look! The soldiers are eating meat that still has blood in it. Yahweh told us not to do that, so they are sinning!” Saul told all the soldiers, “You are breaking a law that Yahweh gave us when he made his agreement with us! Roll a large stone over here right now!” 34 Some soldiers rolled over a large stone, and then Saul told his officers, “Go around and tell all of our soldiers that each of them must bring any ox or sheep that they wish to eat here where I am. Each one must slaughter it on this large stone and drain the blood. Then he can eat the meat. They must not sin against Yahweh by eating meat from an animal without draining its blood.” So that evening each of the soldiers led the animals they wanted to eat over to the great stone, and there they slaughtered them and drained the blood before eating them. 35 Then Saul built an altar that he dedicated to Yahweh as a monument to commemorate this victory over the Philistines. That was the first time he built something as an altar for Yahweh. 36 Then Saul said to the Israelite soldiers, “We should chase the Philistine soldiers tonight. We can attack them all night long. We will not allow any of them to escape alive.” The Israelite soldiers answered, “We will do whatever you think is the best thing for us to do.” But Ahijah the priest said, “We should ask God what he wants us to.” 37 So with Ahijah’s help, Saul asked God, “Should we keep chasing the Philistine soldiers? Will you enable us Israelites to defeat them?” But God did not answer Saul when he asked this. 38 Then Saul summoned all the leaders of his army. He said to them, “I am sure that God has not answered me because someone has sinned. So we must carefully investigate how someone committed a sin today. 39 I swear by Yahweh, who has just rescued us Israelites, that we will certainly execute whoever has sinned. Even if it is my son Jonathan who has sinned, we will execute him.” His men knew who was guilty, but none of them said anything to Saul. 40 Then Saul told all the Israelite soldiers, “If no one will say who has sinned, we must cast a lot to find out. All of you stand over there, and my son Jonathan and I will stand over here.” The soldiers told Saul, “Do whatever you think is best.” 41 Then Saul prayed to Yahweh as the God whom the Israelites worshiped, “Please use this lot to show who has sinned.” Then the priest threw a lot, and it indicated that either Jonathan or Saul had sinned, not one of the other Israelite soldiers. 42 Then Saul told the priest, “Throw the lot again to indicate which of us has sinned.” So he did, and the lot indicated that Jonathan had sinned. 43 Then Saul said to Jonathan, “Tell me how you sinned.” Jonathan replied, “I ate some honey. It was only a little bit that was on the end of the spear that I was holding. If you feel that you must execute me for doing that, then go ahead.” 44 Saul replied, “Yes, I must certainly execute you, Jonathan! I hope that God will kill me and do further bad things to me if I do not execute you for committing this sin!” 45 But the Israelite soldiers said to Saul, “Jonathan has led all us Israelites to this great victory! So you must not execute him! That would be very wrong! Since Jonathan led us to this great victory by depending on God’s help, we swear by Yahweh that we will not allow you to harm him in any way.” By saying that, the Israelite soldiers persuaded Saul not to execute Jonathan. 46 Then Saul ordered his soldiers to stop pursuing the Philistine army, and he returned to his home in the city of Gibeah. The Philistine soldiers returned to their land. 47 After Saul became the king of Israel, he fought against its enemies on every side. He fought against Moab, the Ammonites, Edom, the kings of Zobah, and the Philistines. Wherever the Israelite army fought, they badly defeated their enemies. 48 Saul’s army fought bravely and defeated the very tall descendants of Amalek. His army rescued the Israelites from those who had been stealing their crops and animals. 49 When he became king, Saul had three sons. Their names were Jonathan, Ishvi, and Malki-Shua. Saul also had two daughters. Their names were Merab and Michal. Merab was the older sister, and Michal was the younger sister. 50 The name of Saul’s wife was Ahinoam. She was the daughter of Ahimaaz. The name of the commander of Saul’s army was Abner. He was the son of Saul’s uncle Ner. 51 Saul’s father Kish and Abner’s father Ner were both sons of a man whose name was Abiel. 52 For the whole time that Saul was alive, his army had to fight hard against the Philistine army. So whenever Saul saw a skillful soldier or a strong man, he forced him to join his army.

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