Samuel: Chapter 9

 

Who do you find
As you rise, as you fall
looking for
this day, this hour, this now

For full chapter, click here

After the drama and heartbreak of the previous chapter's depiction of Samuel's old age, this chapter opens with a new beginning--and a new protagonist: "There was a man in Benjamin whose name was Kish son of Abiel...a Benjaminite, ..He had a son whose name was Saul". This sonorous introduction deliberately echoes the exact syntax of the opening verses of the book:  "There was a man from Ramathaim...whose name was Elkanah son of Jeroham son of Elihu ... an Ephraimite. And he had two wives..." , as does the focus on food and sacred eating. If until now, we have been reading the saga of Samuel, it now turns into the story of Saul.

The name itself emphasizes the linkages between the two protagonists: the name  Saul (Shaul ש'א'ל--lit. "asked for""lent") takes us back to Hannah's introduction of her own son: "This is the child I prayed for, and God has given me my request (sha'alti ש'א'ל) that I asked (sha'alti ש'א'ל) of him. I in tוrn lend him (hish'altihu ש'א'ל) to God...For as long as he lives, he is lent (shaul ש'א'ל) to God"--Saul retroactively taking the place of Samuel.

The change in protagonist comes with a shift in ambiance, as the narrative switches to a fable-like quest of threes, full of direct dialogue, and replete with allusions to earlier biblical narratives, from Abraham to Joseph to Moses to Gideon. In this version, Samuel is no longer the national leader, but a local "seer", come to play his part in a quest of "searching" and "finding" (מצאו)--two leitworts of the chapter.

The appointment of a king is also redefined: not as idolatrous betrayal, but as an act of mercy analogous to the Exodus itself: "He will deliver My people from the hands of the Philistines; for I have taken note of the plight of My people, and their outcry has come to Me”.  

Yet the chronotope of this fairytale-like story is complex. Space is defined by a continuous oscillation between rising and falling, echoing Hanna's song of flux; meetings happen at liminal spaces, heavy eith expectation. Time opens with a retrospective look at history ("Formerly in Israel...the prophet of today was formerly called a seer), then narrows down to focus on a specific day ("one day before" "on this day" "this time appointed" "just then"): far from being timless, this fable is almost breathlessly of a moment, easily missed and transient. 

Samuel: Chapter 7

 

Loop around

and return

back to where you began

back to your heart

For full chapter, click here

The saga of the Ark's capture, which seemed to end in the previous chapter with the Ark's return, is now revealed to be part of a longer saga of twenty years of longing and displacement. For "return" (sh'v שב)--the chapter's key word--is a process. The Ark has physically returned to Israeli territory, but remains decentered, tucked away on a hill outside of national consciousness. The Philistines' "sending forth"  of the Ark undoes its physical taking, but not the distance from God that precipitated its capture.  Only after time and space become saturated with "longing" can this distance be addressed.  

The saga, which is introduced with  Samuel's "word going forth to all of Israel" can only be resolved by Samuel. Return, he tells the people, begins within: God will only return when "you return to God with all of your heart." Samuel, indeed, goes back in history, all the way back to Joshua, and his final address to the people, where he demands that they remove "the alien gods from within you" and "prepare their hearts" for God.

Israel's removal of the alien gods precipitates a second address, as Samuel calls the people together in Mitzpa (a redemption, perhaps, of the last gathering of "all" Israel in Mitzpa, which ended in civil war), which becomes a reprise of the fatal war with the Philistines--with profound differences. This time it is the Israelites rather than the Philistines who fear the "sounds" in the camp; this time, the people pray, rather than mechanically attempting to control God; this time, it is God, rather than the Israelites, who makes the noises that terrify the Philistines.  This reprise ends in victory, offering a way back, as the territory previously lost "returns" to Israel. 

The looping nature of this saga of restoration is highlighted by the location "Even HaEzer"--the "helping stone": previously introduced as the site of Israel's great defeat and the loss of the Ark,  it is here reintroduced as indicating that "God has helped us unto here". The reprise has redefined the beginning. 

Samuel 3: In Writing

It's only a matter of time, 
he says, till they try again. 
There may be a warning-- 
there may not. So just know.
Everybody says. 

Sun ricochets off the waves

and the siren begins

ereely unconstrained.

Bathers stampede towards the changing huts.

I crouch over my baby

tell the preschooler arms over her head

It's nothing, I say. Nothing

to fear. The wail dies.

See, not even a boom, I sooth.

These days, these weeks,

in a shark mouth

propped open with a stick 

ready to snap.

An egret scries the murkey water

then plungers, silver

flailing in her beak.

Two weeks till first grade,

two weeks till kindergarten

We balance at the soupy cusp

of the turning year.

Samuel: Chapter 3

 The fraught moment

Before

it all begins

it all ends

For full chapter, click here

This chapter continues where the previous one closed, reiterating and amplifying the prophecy regarding the fall of the House of Eli.

As in the previous chapter, Samuel and the sons of Eli are repeatedly juxtaposed, in an implicit yet insistent link. Every description of the sins of Eli's sons is bookended by descriptions of Samuel's virtue; Samuel here becomes Eli's "son", after the two biological sons fail so completely. He is the beloved usurper, stepping into the place of the rejected priests. In this chapter, Samuel's linkage with the destruction of Hofni and Pinhas becomes more explicit, as he actually speaks the words of doom. With the rise of the "naar" (youth) Samuel, Eli's "nearim" fall.      

Their fate was already been inscribed with the previous chapter's prophecy. What this chapter adds is the element of time. Samuel hears God speak "on that very day," and prophesies about "that very day" that will bring destruction that lasts "forever." A key word of the chapter is terem--before, not yet. The light of God has not yet gone out; Samuel has not yet heard God voice, he does not yet know God. We stand at the cusp, in the expectant before. The silence that precedes the storm that will end Eli; before Samuel regularly communes with God. 

Joshua 11: In Writing

Like ripples, spreading over the water
widening, softening, smudging
there will come a time
when names can't be remembered
when faces blur
when one battle runs into another
one day, one hill, one plane, one river
all slide into an amorphous
pool of many days