Commentaria in I Regum (I Samuelis)
Chapter 13. Synopsis of the Chapter
Saul takes to himself and to his son Jonathas three thousand soldiers. Jonathas smites the garrison of the Philistines. They gather again a huge army, and prepare for battle. Saul, in fear, offers sacrifice to implore the help of God. Samuel intervenes, verse 10, and rebukes him because he did not wait for him, as he had commanded; and therefore, verse 14, declares that God will transfer the kingdom from him, as disobedient, to David. The Philistines, verse 19, to take arms from the Hebrews, take care that no blacksmith be among them.
1. Saul was a child of one year when he began to reign; and he reigned two years over Israel. 2. And Saul chose him three thousand men of Israel: and two thousand were with Saul in Machmas, and in mount Bethel, and a thousand with Jonathas in Gabaa of Benjamin: and the rest of the people he sent back every man to his own tent. 3. And Jonathas smote the garrison of the Philistines, which was in Gabaa. And when the Philistines had heard of it, Saul sounded the trumpet through all the land, saying: Let the Hebrews hear. 4. And all Israel heard this report: Saul hath smitten the garrison of the Philistines: and Israel rose up against the Philistines. And the people was called together after Saul to Galgal. 5. And the Philistines assembled to fight against Israel, thirty thousand chariots, and six thousand horsemen, and the rest of the people like the sand that is on the sea shore for multitude: and they went up and camped in Machmas, at the east of Bethaven. 6. And when the men of Israel saw themselves in a strait (for the people was distressed) they hid themselves in caves, and in secret places, and in rocks, and in dens, and in pits. 7. And the Hebrews went over the Jordan into the land of Gad and Galaad. And when as yet Saul was in Galgal, all the people were afraid that followed him. 8. And he waited seven days, according to the appointment of Samuel, and Samuel came not to Galgal, and the people slipped away from him. 9. Then Saul said: Bring me the holocaust and the peace offerings. And he offered the holocaust. 10. And when he had made an end of offering the holocaust, behold Samuel came: and Saul went out to meet him and salute him. 11. And Samuel said to him: What hast thou done? Saul answered: Because I saw that the people slipped away from me, and thou didst not come according to the days appointed, and the Philistines were gathered together in Machmas, 12. I said: Now will the Philistines come down upon me to Galgal, and I have not appeased the face of the Lord. Forced by necessity, I offered the holocaust. 13. And Samuel said to Saul: Thou hast done foolishly, and hast not kept the commandments of the Lord thy God, which he commanded thee. And if thou hadst not done thus, the Lord would now have established thy kingdom over Israel for ever: 14. But thy kingdom shall not continue. The Lord hath sought him a man according to his own heart: and him hath the Lord commanded to be prince over his people, because thou hast not observed that which the Lord commanded. 15. And Samuel arose and went up from Galgal to Gabaa of Benjamin. And the rest of the people went up after Saul to meet the people who fought against them, coming from Galgal to Gabaa in the hill of Benjamin. And Saul numbered the people that were found with him, about six hundred men. 16. And Saul and Jonathas his son, and the people that were found with them, were in Gabaa of Benjamin: but the Philistines camped in Machmas. 17. And there went out of the camp of the Philistines three companies to spoil. One company went by the way of Ephra, to the land of Sual. 18. And another went by the way of Beth-horon: and the third turned to the way of the border hanging over the valley of Seboim towards the desert. 19. Now there was no smith to be found in all the land of Israel: for the Philistines had taken care lest perhaps the Hebrews should make them swords or spears. 20. So all Israel went down to the Philistines to sharpen every man his ploughshare, and his spade, and his axe, and his mattock. 21. So that the edges of the ploughshares, and spades, and forks, and axes were blunted, even to the goad to be mended. 22. And when the day of battle was come, there was not found a sword nor spear in the hand of all the people that were with Saul and Jonathas, except Saul and Jonathas his son. 23. And the garrison of the Philistines went out to pass over into Machmas.
1. SAUL WAS A CHILD OF ONE YEAR WHEN HE BEGAN TO REIGN; AND HE REIGNED TWO YEARS OVER ISRAEL.—It seems impossible that Saul, a child of one year, was made king, and in fact reigned. Wherefore Melchior Canus, book 11 On the Commonplaces, chap. 5, on argument 12, would have it read: “Saul was twenty-one years old when he began to reign.” The Greek Scholiast, however, reads: “Saul was thirty years old when he began to reign.” But against this reading are the Hebrews, the Chaldee, the Septuagint, the Roman edition, Aquila, Symmachus and the rest, who constantly read: Saul was a child of one year. Add: Saul at this time was of more than 20 or 30 years; for he had already begotten Isboseth, who at this time was 20 years old, and Jonathas older than he, inasmuch as he was a leader of war against the Philistines, as is clear from the following chapter. In what sense then is he here said to have been a child of one year?
First, Rabanus in the Gloss takes Saul in the dative case, as if to say: “To Saul at the beginning of his reign was born a son of one year,” namely Isboseth: but this is as violent; violent, because Saul here is of the nominative case, as is clear from what follows: “and he reigned two years over Israel”; which although Rabanus refers likewise to Isboseth, who, Saul his father being dead, reigned two years, as is clear from 2 Kings 2:10, yet that it is to be referred to Saul is clear from what precedes and follows, which all concern Saul, not Isboseth. False, because Isboseth at this time was not one, but twenty years old at the least. For Saul after Samuel reigned only 20 or 18 years, which being completed he died, and his son Isboseth succeeded him, who was then 40 years old, as is clear from 2 Kings 2:10.
Second, others commonly explain thus, as if to say: Saul, when he began to reign, was so simple and innocent as if he had been a child of one year, and persisting in this innocence he reigned two years, which being completed he fell from it through disobedience, and therefore was reprobated by God and Samuel. Whence the Chaldee renders: As a son of one year, in whom there are no faults, was Saul when he reigned. So St. Gregory, Angelomus, Eucherius, St. Jerome in the Quaestiones (or whoever the author is), Theodoret, Rupert, Procopius, Hugo, Lyranus, Abulensis, Dionysius, Cajetan and St. Augustine, book 7 of Locutions on Judges. Hear Blessed Peter Damian, book 2, epist. 20: “He was so innocent, like a child of one year, when he began to reign; and for two years he remained in the simplicity of the same innocence; but he who was then a son in humility afterwards through pride became a servant.” Hear also Rupert on chap. 2 of the Apocalypse p. 21: “Saul reigned two years in the same humility; he fell from it when he offered holocaust against the law, though he was not a priest of the stock of Aaron, he spared Agag,” etc.
Furthermore Scripture says this, first, to show that the election of God was the best, inasmuch as he raised to the kingdom none but Saul, a man most excellent and most worthy, that he teaches us to do the same. So St. Gregory. Second, “to show,” says Dionysius, “the providence of God, which is always so disposed, unless our iniquity resist, that the greater the dignity he confers, the greater holiness he also confers; and therefore in Saul he joined supreme innocence with supreme headship.” Third, to strike all with holy fear, that none may presume on himself and be secure in his holiness, seeing that Saul, so innocent, fell from it, says Abulensis. Lyranus gives a fourth cause, to show how foul and deep was the fall of Saul; for as mud on white linen, so sin clings more foully to an innocent mind. Hence tropologically St. Gregory: “Although he reigned many years, he is said to have reigned only in those in which he is said to have been innocent and humble.” And a little after: “Let us rejoice, then, that we have lived only in that time in which we have lived innocently and humbly. For those times which we have spent in the vanity of the world and the fleeting life of the flesh are scarcely remembered, as lost.”
Wherefore Josaphat, asking his catechist Barlaam how many years old he was, heard from him: “I was born 45 years ago”; to Josaphat’s wonder, seeing him grey, he answered: “If thou wishest to know my years from the very beginning of life, thou hast rightly conjectured them to be more than seventy. But to me those are in no way counted among the years of life which have been spent in the vanity of this world.” Admirably Philo, book On Rewards and Punishments, near the end: “Of those,” he says, “who have been instructed neither by disciplines nor laws, neither is the number reckoned, nor account taken.” And a little after: “Virtue and honesty,” he says, “consist in quality, not in quantity; whence even one day passed without fault is equal to the whole life of a wise man.” Wherefore wisely and forcibly Eusebius of Emesa (or rather Gallicanus), hom. 9 to Monks: “Reckon,” he says, “that thou hast lived only that day on which thou hast denied thy own wills, on which thou hast resisted evil desires; which thou hast led without any transgression of the rule, reckon that thou hast lived that day which has had the light of purity and holy meditation.”