the dead, they would not do so to these mangled remains, that they might not, as it were, perpetuate their

disgrace. They burned them just sufficiently to destroy all traces of insult, and the bones they reverently

laid under their great tamarisk tree, themselves fasting for seven days in token of public mourning. All honor

to the brave men of Jabesh-gilead, whose deed Holy Scripture has preserved to all generations!

It was the third day after the return of David and his men to Ziklag. Every heart must have been heavy with

anxiety for tidings of that great decisive struggle between the Philistines and Saul which they knew to be

going on, when all at once a messenger came, whose very appearance betokened disaster and mourning

(comp. 1 Samuel 4:12). It was a stranger, the son of an Ama lekite settler in Israel, who brought sad and

strange tidings. By his own account, he had fled to Ziklag straight out of the camp of Israel, to tell of the

defeat and slaughter of Israel, and of the death of Saul and of Jonathan. As he related the story, he had,

when the tide of battle turned against Israel, come by accident upon Saul, who stood alone on the slope of

Gilboa leaning upon his spear, while the Philistine chariots and horsemen were closing in around him. On

perceiving him, and learning that he was an Amalekite, the king had said, "Stand now to me and slay me, for

cramp has seized upon me for my life is yet wholly in me."  239 On this the Amalekite had "stood to" him, and

killed him, "for" - as he added in explanation, probably referring to the illness which from fear and grief had

seized Saul, forcing him to lean for support on his spear - "I knew that he would not live after he had

fallen;240 and I took the crown that was on his head, and the arm-band which was upon his arm, and I

brought them to my lord - here!"

Improbable as the story would have appeared on calm examination, and utterly untrue as we know it to have

been, David's indignant and horrified expostulation, how he had dared to destroy Jehovah's anointed (2

Samuel 1:14), proves that in the excitement of the moment he had regarded the account as substantially

correct. The man had testified against himself: he held in his hand as evidence the king's crown and arm-

band. If he had not murdered Saul, he had certainly stripped him when dead. And now he had come to

David, evidently thinking he had done a deed grateful to him, for which he would receive reward, thus

making David a partaker in his horrible crime. David's inmost soul recoiled from such a deed as murder of his

sovereign and daring presumption against Jehovah, Whose anointed he was. Again and again, when

defending precious life, Saul had been in his power, and he had rejected with the strongest energy of which

he was capable the suggestion to ensure his own safety by the death of his persecutor. And that from

which in the hour of his supreme danger he had recoiled, this Amalekite had now done in cold blood for

hope of a reward! Every feeling would rise within him to punish the deed; and if he failed or hesitated, well

might he be charged before all Israel with being an accomplice of the Amalekite. "Thy blood on thy head! for

thy mouth hath testified upon thyself, saying, I have slain the anointed of Jehovah." And the sentence thus

spoken was immediately executed.

It was real and sincere grief which led David and his men to mourn, and weep, and fast until even for Saul

and for Jonathan, and for their fallen countrymen in their twofold capacity as belonging to the Church and

the nation ("the people of Jehovah and the house of Israel," ver. 12). One of the finest odes in the Old

Testament perpetuated their memory. This elegy, composed by David "to teach the children of Israel," bears

the general title of Kasheth, as so many of the Psalms have kindred inscriptions. In our text it appears as

extracted from that collection of sacred heroic poetry, called Sepher hajjashar, "book of the just." It consists,

after a general superscription, of two unequal stanzas, each beginning with the line: "Alas, the heroes have

fallen!" The second stanza refers specially to Jonathan, and at the close of the ode the head-line is repeated,

with an addition, indicating Israel's great loss. The two stanzas mark, so to speak, a descent from deepest

grief for those so brave, so closely connected, and so honored, to exp ression of personal feelings for

Jonathan, the closing lines sounding like the last sigh over a loss too great for utterance. Peculiarly

touching is the absence in this elegy of even the faintest allusion to David's painful relations to Saul in the

past. All that is merely personal seems blotted out, or rather, as if it had never existed in the heart of David.

In this respect we ought to regard this ode as casting most valuable light on the real meaning and character

of what are sometimes called the vindictive and imprecatory Psalms. Nor should we omit to notice, what a

German divine has so aptly pointed out: that, with the exception of the lament of Jabesh-gilead, the only real

mourning for Saul was on the part of David, whom the king had so bitterly persecuted to the death -