King James Version · The united kingdom
1 Samuel 19
Touch any underlined name to see who or where it is. Tap a verse number to see where it is taken up elsewhere.
And spake to his son, and to all his servants, that they should kill . But ’s son delighted much in : and told , saying, seeketh to kill thee: now therefore, I thee, take heed to thyself until the morning, and in a secret place, and hide thyself: And I will go out and stand beside in the field where thou art, and I will commune with of thee; and what I see, that I will tell thee. And spake good of unto his , and said unto him, Let not the king against his servant, against ; because he hath not against thee, and because his works have been to thee-ward very good: For he did put his life in his hand, and slew the , and wrought a great for all Israel: thou sawest it, and didst rejoice: wherefore then wilt thou against innocent , to without a cause? And hearkened unto the voice of : and sware, As liveth, he shall not be slain. And called , and shewed him all those things. And brought to , and he was in his , as in times past. And there was war again: and went out, and fought with the , and slew them with a great slaughter; and they fled from him. And the from was upon , as he sat in his house with his javelin in his hand: and played with his hand. And sought to smite even to the wall with the javelin; but he slipped away out of ’s , and he smote the javelin into the wall: and fled, and escaped that night. also sent unto ’s house, to watch him, and to him in the morning: and ’s wife told him, saying, If thou not thy life to night, to morrow thou shalt be slain. So let down through a window: and he went, and fled, and escaped. And took an , and laid it in the bed, and put a pillow of goats’ hair for his bolster, and covered it with a cloth. And when sent to take , she said, He is sick. And sent the again to see , saying, Bring him up to me in the bed, that I may him. 16And when the were come in, behold, there was an in the bed, with a pillow of goats’ hair for his bolster. And said unto , Why hast thou deceived me so, and sent away mine enemy, that he is escaped? And answered , He said unto me, Let me go; why should I kill thee? So fled, and escaped, and came to to , and told him all that had done to him. And he and went and dwelt in . And it was told , saying, Behold, is at in . And sent to take : and when they saw the company of prophesying, and standing as appointed over them, of was upon the of , and they also prophesied. And when it was told , he sent other , and they prophesied likewise. And sent again the third time, and they prophesied also. 22Then went he also to , and came to a great well that is in Sechu: and he asked and said, Where are and ? And one said, Behold, they be at in . And he went thither to in : and of was upon him also, and he went on, and prophesied, until he came to in . And he stripped off his clothes also, and prophesied before in like manner, and lay down all that day and all that night. Wherefore they say, Is also among ?
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · The united kingdom, 1050 BC to 931 BC ›
Saul, David, and Solomon. A rare window when both Egypt and Mesopotamia are weak, which is how a small kingdom in the corridor between them could briefly become a regional power.
- The power vacuum
- This is the whole political explanation for the united kingdom. Egypt is fragmented, Assyria is recovering but still local, the Hittites are gone, and nobody is in a position to object to a strong state in the corridor. It lasts about a century, and Israel's golden age fits exactly inside it.
- Phoenicia
- Tyre under Hiram is the commercial power of the coast, and supplies the cedar, the craftsmen, and the shipping for Solomon's building programme. The alliance is trade, not charity: Israel had grain and a land route, Tyre had timber and ships.
- Egypt
- Weak enough that a pharaoh gives a daughter in marriage to an Israelite king, which is the opposite of Egyptian practice in stronger centuries. Late in the era it recovers under a new house, and Shishak will invade within five years of Solomon's death.
- Further afield
- Greece is still in its dark age but beginning to recover, and will adopt the Phoenician alphabet within a century or two. Carthage is founded by settlers from Tyre by tradition in 814 BC. In the Americas the Olmec centre shifts to La Venta.