{"id":58271,"date":"2019-06-26T08:37:12","date_gmt":"2019-06-26T05:37:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=58271"},"modified":"2023-01-18T19:28:38","modified_gmt":"2023-01-18T17:28:38","slug":"alone-like-saul","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/alone-like-saul\/","title":{"rendered":"Alone Like Saul"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"entry-content\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[877,834,362,885],"acf":{"old_id":"58271","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":36149,"related_cahpter":"250","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"As much as King Saul\u2019s animosity is directed at David, it is really an internal battle, against his own demons","content":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">1 Samuel 18 begins the ten-chapter-long saga of King Saul and his relentless pursuit of David. The account is animated by the strongest of human emotions \u2013 jealousy and deep, deep depression \u2013 and portrays the great clash between David and Saul as one between a future king, with his star on the rise, and a disappointing monarch, whose star is setting.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The two main characters could not be painted in more different light. Saul hatches a murderous plan to get David killed at the hand of the Philistine enemy, and he later tries to kill him himself, when the king is overcome by an evil spirit. David, on the other hand, is kind and obedient, almost to a fault. He does not bask in the praises he receives from fawning women, nor does he complain when Saul tries to kill him.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Then an evil spirit of the LORD came upon Saul while he was sitting in his house with his spear in his hand, and David was playing [the lyre]. Saul tried to pin David to the wall with the spear, but he eluded Saul, so that he drove the spear into the wall. David fled and got away (19:10-11).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It seems clear that the author of the text wants us to take sides in the conflict, to be sympathetic towards David, and critical of Saul.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Yet, the late Israeli poet Yehuda Amichai, in his <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.929.org.il\/lang\/en\/page\/218\/post\/55413\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cOpen Closed Open\u201d<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, takes the unusual step of removing David from the picture, and collapsing the different artifacts of violence into a single subject:<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Sometimes I am alone like King Saul.<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">I need to play the music for myself and to throw the javelin by myself<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">and to dodge the javelin. And I am also the wall<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><br \/>\n<\/span> <span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">in which the thrusted javelin quivers (\u201cOpen Closed Open; The Bible and You,\u201d 17).<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In this imaginative reading, Amichai challenges us to think of the story as an internal, rather than external, conflict. In this way, one can appreciate how, as much as King Saul\u2019s animosity is directed at David, it is really an internal battle, against his own demons. When Saul thrusts his javelin at the wall, he is only hurting himself.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Image: <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Saul and David by Rembrandt (detail), Mauritshuis Museum, c. 1660 \/ wikimedia<\/span><\/p>\n","image":{"ID":58272,"id":58272,"title":"isam18-rembrandt","filename":"isam18-rembrandt.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/06\/isam18-rembrandt.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/alone-like-saul\/isam18-rembrandt\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"isam18-rembrandt","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":58271,"date":"2019-06-26 05:37:00","modified":"2019-06-26 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