When Saul was informed of this, he said: “God hath delivered him into mine hand, for he is shut in by entering into a town that hath gates and bars.” As Saul approached, David bade Abiathar the priest, who had fled to him from Nob with the image of Jehovah, to bring the image. David inquired of it: “Will the men of Keilah deliver me and my men into the hands of Saul; O Lord God of Israel, I beseech thee tell thy servant.” And Jehovah said, “They will deliver thee up.” Then David despaired of holding the town and fled to Ziph and Maon in the wilderness by the Dead Sea. But Saul followed and overtook him: nothing but a mountain now divided David’s band from the king. David was already surrounded and lost—when a message reached Saul: “The Philistines have invaded the land.”
It was probably an expedition that the Philistines had undertaken in aid of the hard-pressed rebels. Saul immediately abandoned the pursuit and marched against the foreigner. But David named the rock the Rock of Escapes. After the king had beaten the Philistines he took three thousand men from the army that he might completely quell the rebellion. David had retreated farther east, on the border of the Dead Sea in the neighbourhood of Engedi, “upon the rocks of the wild goats,” and here Saul reduced him to such straits that he despaired of maintaining himself in Judah and got away to the Philistines with his following. The rising was at an end.
David’s attempt to induce the tribe of Judah to secede from Saul, had completely failed. Driven from the soil on which he had raised the standard of revolt, he no longer hesitated to formally enter the service of the Philistines, and the latter welcomed the support of a brave and clever rebel, knowing that though once their enemy, he had already given much trouble in Judah to the arms of Saul, whose force they had so often felt and who had snatched from them their dominion over Israel, and aware that his resentment against his benefactor and master might prove of the greatest service to them, King Achish of Gath, to whom David had a second time fled, declared: “He hath made his people Israel utterly to abhor him; therefore he shall be my servant forever.” And he gave him and his band of freebooters the town of Ziklag as a dwelling-place. David was now established at Ziklag as a vassal of Achish. At the latter’s command he had to march to battle and also to deliver up a share of the booty taken, and from Ziklag in the territory of the Philistines he and his small army, still recruited from the discontented of Israel who fled to David across the frontier, conducted a guerilla warfare against Saul and his native country. In these expeditions David was shrewd enough to spare his former adherents in Judah, the towns which had once declared for him, and to direct his attacks solely against the followers of Saul; he even secretly maintained relations with his party in Judah, and out of the booty derived from his warlike and plundering raids he sent presents to the elders of those towns which were well-disposed towards him.
David had dwelt some time in Ziklag when the Philistines assembled their whole force against Saul. When the princes of the Philistines reviewed the army and made the various sections pass before them, David and his men also came amongst the soldiers of Achish. Then said the other princes to Achish: “What do these Hebrews here? Let David not go down with us to battle, lest in the battle he be an adversary to us and go over to his master that he might once more gain favour with Saul with our heads.” Achish trusted David and said: “He has already been with me for some time, for years. I have found nothing against him up till now.” But the other princes insisted. When Achish informed David that he could not accompany the army, the latter answered: “But what have I done and what hast thou found in thy servant so long as I have been with thee unto this day, that I may not go fight against the enemies of my king?” But in spite of his urgent wish David was sent back.
[ca. 1010-1002 B.C.]
The army of the Philistines penetrated far into Israel; but north of the territory of the tribe of Ephraim, on the mountain of Gilboa, Saul encamped opposite them with the army of the Israelites. The battle was a fierce one. Abinadab and Malchishua, the sons of Saul, fell, and Jonathan himself was slain. The ranks of the Israelites gave way and the enemies’ archers attained the king.
THE DEATH OF SAUL AND THE STRUGGLE FOR THE SUCCESSION
Saul was determined not to survive the fall of his sons and his first defeat. He called to his armour bearer: “Draw thy sword and kill me, lest these uncircumcised come and thrust me through and abuse me.” But the faithful servant refused to lay hands on his lord; then Saul fell on his own sword, and the armour bearer followed the king’s example. The army of the Israelites fled in every direction and the inhabitants of many towns escaped from the Philistines by retreating across the Jordan.
The dread which Saul had inspired in the enemies of Israel and how great a shield he had been to his own people, was shown after his death. The Israelites sang laments for him.
“The gazelle, oh Israel, is slain upon thy high places: how are the mighty fallen. Tell it not in Gath; publish it not in the streets of Askalon, lest the daughters of the Philistines rejoice, lest the daughters of the uncircumcised triumph. Ye mountains of Gilboa, let there be no dew, neither let there be rain upon you, nor fields of offerings. For there the shield of the mighty is vilely cast away, the shield of Saul. From the blood of the slain, from the fat of the mighty the bow of Jonathan turned not back and the sword of Saul returned not empty. Saul and Jonathan were lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their death they were not divided: they were swifter than eagles, they were stronger than lions. Ye daughters of Israel, weep over Saul, who clothed you in scarlet with other delights; who put ornaments of gold upon your apparel. How are the mighty fallen in the midst of the battle!” The Philistines rejoiced when they found the body of Saul on Mount Gilboa. They took away the arms of the dead king and sent them round through their whole country, to convince all men that the dreaded leader of Israel was really dead. Then the arms were hung up in the temple of Astarte. The head of the corpse the Philistines hewed from the body, and hung it up in the temple of Dagon; the trunk, and the bodies of Saul’s three sons, they placed in the market at Beth-shan, in the territory of the tribe of Manasseh.