1 Samuel 20–22

Jonathan Supports David over Saul

20Then David fled from Naioth in Ramah and came and said before Jonathan, “What have I done? What is my guilt and what is my sin before your father that he is trying to kill me?^{a 2}And he said to him, “Far from it! You will not die! Look, my father does not do^b anything large or small unless he reveals it to me.^c Why should my father hide this thing or anything from me?” ³Then David took an oath^d again and said, “Your father knows very well that I have found favor in your eyes, and he thought, ‘Do not let Jonathan know this, lest he worry.’ But as Yahweh lives^e and as your soul lives,^f surely there is merely a step between me and death!” ⁴Then Jonathan said to David, “Whatever you wish,^g I will do for you.” ⁵David said to Jonathan, “Look, tomorrow is the new moon, and I should certainly sit with the king to eat. You must send me away so that I can hide myself in the field until the third evening. ⁶If your father misses me at all, then you must say, ‘David earnestly asked from me to run to Bethlehem his city, for the yearly sacrifice^h is there for all the clan.’ ⁷If he says ‘Good,’ it will mean peace for your servant; but if he is very angry, know that he has decided to do me harm.^{i 8}So you must show loyal love to your servant, for you have brought your servant into a covenant of Yahweh with you. But if there is guilt in me, then kill me yourself! But why should you bring me to your father?” ⁹Then Jonathan said, “Far be it from you! For if I know for certain that my father decided evil should come upon you,^j would I not have told it to you?” ¹⁰Then David said to Jonathan, “Who will tell me if what your father answers you is harsh?” ¹¹And Jonathan said to David, “Come, let us go out to the field.” So the two of them went out to the field.

¹²Then Jonathan said to David, “Yahweh the God of Israel is my witness^k that I will question my father by this time the day after tomorrow.^l And look, if he is well disposed toward you,^m will I not send word to you and disclose it to you?^{n 13}So may Yahweh punish Jonathan and more^o if my father decides to do you harm^p and if I fail to disclose it to you^q and send word to you that you can go safely. And may Yahweh be with you, as he has been with my father. ¹⁴And not while I am still alive, will you not show the loyal love of Yahweh with me, that I may not die?^{r 15}And do not cut off your loyal love from my family^s forever, not even when Yahweh exterminates^t each of the enemies of David from the face of the earth.” ¹⁶So Jonathan made a covenant^u with the house of David, saying, “May Yahweh call the enemies of David to account.”^{v 17}And Jonathan again made David swear an oath, because he loved him; for with the love of his soul he loved him.

¹⁸Then Jonathan said to him, “Tomorrow is the new moon, and you will be missed, for your seat will stay empty. ¹⁹On the third day you must go down quickly and go to the place where you hid yourself on the day all this started^w and remain beside the stone Ezel. ²⁰I will shoot three arrows to the side as if I were shooting at a target. ²¹Then^x I will send word to my servant, ‘Go, find the arrows!’ If I clearly say to the boy, ‘Look, the arrows are on this side of you;^y bring^z it,’ then^a come, for it means peace for you. And there is no problem, as Yahweh lives.^{b 22}But if I say this to the young man, ‘Look, the arrows are beyond you,’^c go, for Yahweh has sent you away. ²³And as for the matter about which you and I spoke, look, Yahweh is between you and me forever.”

²⁴So David hid himself in the field. When the new moon came,^d the king was seated at the feast.^{e 25}The king sat at his seat as before,^f the seat by the wall, and Jonathan got up, and Abner sat beside Saul, but David’s place was empty. ²⁶But Saul said nothing on that day, for he thought, “Something happened to him.^g He is not ceremonially clean; surely he is not clean.” ²⁷And then^h on the next day, the second day of the new moon, that David’s place was empty. So Saul asked Jonathan his son, “Why did the son of Jesse not come either yesterday or today to the feast?” ²⁸Jonathan answered Saul, “David earnestly asked permission from me to go up to Bethlehem. ²⁹He said, ‘Send me away, please, for our clan sacrifice is in the city, and my brother commandedⁱ me to be present. So then, if I have found favor in your eyes, please let me slip away and see my brothers.’ Therefore he has not come to the table of the king.” ³⁰Then Saul became angry^j at Jonathan and said to him, “You son of a perverse, rebellious woman!^k Do I not know that you have chosen the son of Jesse to your shame and to the shame of your mother’s nakedness? ³¹For as long as^l the son of Jesse is alive on the earth, you and your kingdom will not be established! So then, send and bring him to me, for he will surely die!”^{m 32}But Jonathan answered his father Saul and said to him, “Why should he be put to death? What has he done?” ³³Then Saul hurled hisⁿ spear at him to kill him. So Jonathan knew that his father had decided^o to kill David.

³⁴Jonathan got up from the table enraged,^p and did not eat on the second day of the new moon because he was upset about David, because his father had disgraced him. ³⁵And then^q in the morning Jonathan went out to the field for the appointment with David, and a young boy^r was with him. ³⁶He said to his servant,^s “Run, please find the arrows that I am shooting!” The boy^t ran, and he shot the arrow to pass over him. ³⁷When the boy came up to the place of the arrow that Jonathan had shot, Jonathan called out after the boy and said, “Is not the arrow beyond you?”^{u 38}Then Jonathan called out after the boy, “Quick, hurry, do not linger!” And Jonathan’s servant collected the arrows and came to his master. ³⁹But the boy did not know anything about this; only Jonathan and David knew the matter. ⁴⁰Jonathan gave his weapons to his servant and said to him, “Go, bring them to the city.” ⁴¹The boy left, and then David got up from the south side,^v and he fell on his face to the ground and bowed three times. And they kissed each other^w and wept together,^x but David wept the most. ⁴²Jonathan said to David, “Go in peace, because we have sworn, the two of us, an oath in the name of Yahweh, saying, “Yahweh will be between me and you, and between my offspring and your offspring forever.”^y Then he got up and left, and Jonathan went into the city.

David Encounters the Priests of Nob

21Now David came to Nob, to Ahimelech the priest. And Ahimelech came trembling to meet David, and he said to him, “Why are you alone and there are no men with you?” ²So David said to Ahimelech the priest, “The king charged me with a matter and said to me, ‘No one must know anything about this matter on which I am sending you, with which I have charged you and the servants.’ ” So I have arranged to meet with my servants at a certain place.^{a 3}Now then, what do you have at hand?^b Give me five loaves of bread or whatever is here.”^{c 4}The priest answered David and said, “There is no ordinary bread here at hand;^d there is only holy bread, but only if the young men have kept themselves from women.” ⁵David answered the priest and said to him, “Indeed, women were held back from us as it has been when I’ve gone out before.^e And the things^f of the young men are holy when^g it is an ordinary journey. How much more^h todayⁱ will the things^j be holy?” ⁶So the priest gave him the holy bread, for there was no bread there except the bread of the Presence, which was removed from before Yahweh, in order to set hot bread there on the day when it was taken away.

⁷Now there was a man from the servants of Saul on that day, detained before Yahweh, whose name was Doeg the Edomite, the chief of Saul’s shepherds. ⁸David asked Ahimelech, “Is there not at your disposal^k a spear or a sword? For I took neither my sword nor my weapons with me because the king’s matter was urgent.” ⁹So the priest said, “The sword of Goliath the Philistine whom you killed in the valley of Elah is here, wrapped in a cloth behind the ephod. If you want to take it for yourself, then take it, for there is no other except it here.” And David said, “There is none like it; give it to me.”

David Flees to Achish in Gath

¹⁰So David got up and fled on that day from the presence of Saul, and he came to Achish the king of Gath. ¹¹The servants of Achish said to him, “Is not this David the king of the land? Is it not for this one that they sang in the dances, saying, ‘Saul killed his thousands, but David his ten thousands?’ ” ¹²David took these words seriously^l and felt severely threatened by^m Achish the king of Gath. ¹³So he changed his behavior before themⁿ and pretended to be mad in their presence.^o He made scratches on the doors of the gate and let his saliva run down into his beard. ¹⁴Then Achish said to his servants, “Look, you see a madman! Why did you bring him to me? ¹⁵Do I lack madmen that you have brought this one to act like a madman before me? Should this one enter my household?”

Saul Takes Revenge on the Priests Who Helped David

22David went from there and escaped to the cave of Adullam. When his brothers and all his father’s household^a heard, they came down to him there. ²Every man in distress and every man who had a creditor and every embittered man gathered to him, and he became their commander.^b Now there were about four hundred men with him. ³And David went up from there to Mizpah of Moab. He said to the king of Moab, “Please let my father and my mother stay^c with you until I know what God will do for me.” ⁴So he brought them before the king of Moab,^d and they stayed with him all the days David was in the stronghold.

⁵Then Gad the prophet said to David, “You should not stay in the stronghold; leave and go into the land of Judah.” So David left and came to the forest of Hereth. ⁶Now Saul heard that David and the men who were with him had been located. Saul was sitting at Gibeah under the tamarisk tree at…