Samuel: Chapter 11

 

Push the bounds

to find the story 

tell it anew

For full chapter, click here

This chapter continues and intensifies the Book of Samuel's redemptive dialogue with the closing of the Book of Judges. If the opening chapters revisited the relationship to women and to vows, here we return to the painful linchpins of the closing of Judges: the relationship of individual to tribe and national framework. These issues come to a head in the final stories of Samson, and Pilegesh bGiva--the rape of the concubine at Geva and its aftermath. If Samson represents the extreme of individuality, the story of Geva exemplifies its opposite: nameless characters acting within a context of mob rule.   

Samson is consecrated before birth, a nazarite who is set apart. The "spirit of god pulses within him"--he is never "like one of the people." In his superhuman strength, he is the archetypal superhero, his fight against the Philistines that of a lone vigilante. He is a leader who dies, as he lived, separate from his people. It is only after death that he can p be brought back "to his fathers" for reintegration.

On the other side of the pendulum is the Israelite response to the incident at Geva, in which "all Israel, brothers" unite as one to fight Benjamin. This is a model of national identity sans individual leadership, where the people themselves seem to spontaneously self-organise into a cohesive national group. Yet it is a group that allows no individuality, with every dissent ruthlessly destroyed.   

Both these stories are framed by the refrain: "In those days there was no king in Israel."

This chapter returns to these painful stories, to recontextualise them in the context of "a king in Israel."

Here, the tragedy of Geva seems to run in reverse, as though time can be turned back and redeemed. The allusions to Geva introduced in the previous chapters become more explicit and insistent. Now it is Jabesh Gilead, destroyed in the aftermath of the war on Benjamin, that is attacked. As in the case of the concubine, there is a threat of mutilation.  The people of Yabesh, like the Levite in Geba, send messengers to "all the border of Israel"--yet this is a message that seeks help, not revenge. As in  the case of Geva, there is a response of helpless weeping. 

Ironically, help comes when the message reaches Geva itself. This time it is Saul who acts the part of the Levite, tearing apart flesh--but this time of animals, rather than a woman. Like the Levite, he sends these body parts to "the borders of Israel" to call in the people for war. Yet this time, it is not just a wordless horrific message, but an explicit command.  And the people come, "as one." In this iteration, the rejected tribe of Benjamin comes to the rescue of the city it indirectly destroyed, rewarding Yabesh's hesitancy about joining the civil war. This time, Saul takes responsibility, and the weeping is turned to "joy" (a leitword repeated several times at the closing of this chapter.)

When "the spirit of God descends upon him," Saul not only acts the part of the Levite. He also channels Samson's preternatural power in tearing apart the lion.  Similarly, Nahash's threat to poke out the right eye of the people of Jabesh  echoes Samson's prayer to be "avenged of one of his eyes."  The book of Samuel evokes Samson from its very opening, with the figure of Samuel--also a Nazarite consecrated before birth--recreates his vast powers, yet places them within the safe confines of the Mishkan. Now Saul also channels the inspired. charismatic leader, yet his power is placed within a national context, as the cleaving of the animal is used to call the nation together.  

Saul's first battle as king weaves together the two sides of Judges' pendulum, placing the individual within the national structure, while placing a leader at the head of the faceless masses--a leader who heads off threats of violence. 

 Yet Saul can only play this part via Samuel. The merging between himself as Samuel continues in this chapter, as there is a consistent pattern of triangulations--between Saul, Samuel and God; and between Saul, Samuel and the people. The people follow "after Saul... and after Samuel... and fear God." The people go to Samuel to initiatite the recrowning of Saul. Samuel, as prophet, continues to enable linkage and communication.