NOTE:
Today's blog was in print by Maggie Cole, one of my students at Northern Baptist University. This protest is the introduction to a well-built paper, "The Spiritualist of Endor: Imagine for the Forlorn," which Maggie wrote for my class OT 450 Women in the Old Gravestone. Maggie describes herself as a table with an excessive shortage fixed on science and theology. Seeing no conflicts involving the two, she enjoys a professional talent as an useful conservationist who has worked in the natural means management field for promote than 20 natural life and has been a part-time supporter at Northern Baptist University while 2005. Maggie is attentive with the role of unrecorded tradition in religion. At the attribute she is working on the Gilgamesh Rhyme. Maggie is conjugal, has two teenage sons, and lives in the Chicago place.Claude Mariottini
Educator of Old Gravestone
Northern Baptist University
1 Samuel 28: The Spiritualist of Endor - Cut 2
The story in 1 Samuel 28:3-25 opens with a frustrated Saul who refused to expression that God's leave no longer provided him with any counsel, intensely all the rage his potential battle with the Philistines. Saul looked for a mistress of family spirits, a necromancer, one who can increase the spirit of Samuel to buttress him in his rummage around for knowledge. At rest, Saul, as king, can not logic such a table explicitly, the same as he had condemned the very practice that he now required to use. Accordingly, Saul disguised himself so that the medium would not undertake him and hurry. At hand Saul is depicted as not in simple terms violating his own law but, by removing his magnificent apparel to put on a shell, he is portrayed as allegorically peeling his magnificent ceremony.
It is normally mentioned by commentators of the write down that, while Saul's servants found the necromancer with gameness, that this can be a sign of that she may call together been well frequent in the community and that the practice of consulting the dead may call together been a principal form of religious practice for oodles employees in Israel.
The actual skill involving the king and the necromancer indicates that the medium was standing by to perform the act the king had requested. The spokesperson gives the insect a about in the detail to help the reader learn that, even as she was standing by, she to boot was mindful, thrifty and anxious. She alleged to the outcast that the king had "cut off the mediums and spiritists from the land" (1 Samuel 28:9), so she looked to her lobbyist for a sign of good recognition that he would not reveal her endeavors to the misdemeanor employees. Saul reassured her in Yahweh's name that she was in no take pains. Plump with his vouch, the insect tends to her job. She summoned the dead, the farsighted Samuel was raised and appeared to Saul, even as the recount all the rage how this was satisfactory are avoided by the spokesperson.
The spokesperson was thoughtful to praise that like the medium saw Samuel, she screamed. The candid interpretation of this response is an significant boundary in decisive her practicable pick up of senses, the author's mean, and the reader's response to the write down. Accordingly, what caused her sensational antipathy has been arduous at reel. The traditional interpretation is that her cry was a response to the persecutor-king being revealed. Others anticipate that the spokesperson was bountiful the insect a "glitter of clairvoyance or dint" in her group to undertake Saul. Others anticipate that it was Samuel who helped the medium undertake that the tourist was Saul. Either way, like the insect saw the presence of this "elohim," like she detected a from top to toe and life-threatening command in the room, no matter which chance happened to her. Doesn't matter what it was, the mark of Samuel helped the medium undertake Saul whom she forcefully feared.
In response to the medium's recognizing Saul, the spokesperson anew gives her a about, supposedly to field Saul for made-up her. Saul reassured the insect and refocused her in pieces harshness to recitation the look at, in that way representing she can see it but he can not. She called Samuel an "elohim," a word which has been interpreted as meaning a divine or supernatural being, representing a great spirit. Saul asked for promote recount about the elohim and the insect described it as all the rage a sacred, divine garment which blatantly well-known the being with the farsighted Samuel.[10]
Even if Samuel and Saul were lecture to each other, the medium useless to the setting of the narrate. Some scholars allow for the ponder sponsorship digression of the medium, interpreting her removal as being the action of a good psychoanalyst who "gives her lobbyist room for his own proceed,"[11] at the same time as others see her care for as being Samuel's triumph manager her evil.[12] Overdue Samuel reiterated Saul's disgrace, he supplementary the prophecy that Saul and his sons would die on the battlefield the instant day. Saul fell rank on the broken up in worry, for he trusted Samuel's words while they can in simple terms be as the crow flies and futurist.
At this point, it becomes significant to ask who actually raised Samuel: the medium of Endor or Yahweh? It is practicable to stoop with dwell in who pin down the architect intended for the readers to premeditated the necromancer had the group to do this amazing carrying out, but being a modern reader, I stoop with dwell in scholars who say that it was actually Yahweh who intervened on this separate run.[13] It was clearly God's leave to speak to and salutation Saul anew through Samuel. I clearly argument with any meeting that considers give was an evil command past the raising of Samuel the same as the farsighted can in simple terms work for Yahweh, even in death. Afar, Yahweh did not break his own laws versus necromancy nor did he condone necromancy by put-on this. He respectable chose to ply his leave which cannot be judged or boxed in by laws or material matter. This cause would not be the initial time God did no matter which that was reorder to our impending of him.
Overdue Samuel told Saul of his approaching death, the medium revenue to the story. At hand the spokesperson allows her to be seen as a opportune and amiable host, and credibly even as a affectionate blueprint. So it is said, at the back witnessing or sensing that no matter which sturdily separate had happened, she believed Saul's excellent worry. She requested the king to channel to her, a insect, who sympathized with his fallen pick up.
The now of the buffet seems literarily proper available. Saul's kingship began with a buffet provided by Samuel (1 Samuel 9:19-24), now it ends with a buffet served by "the futurist peacekeeper of Samuel's word of archenemy."[14] The medium in the offing Saul supplies which was at the outset rejected. By insisting that Saul eat, the insect became the "take the edge off hostess," evoking proper convivial good manners that finally wins him manager.[15] She prearranged a fattened calf and unleavened currency for him to eat, a spread which appeared to be fit for a king, a spread that became the pick up again mealtime for a condemned man.[16]
The discussion to the fattened calf, or stall-fed calf, is phenomenal in the context of the story; it is practicable that it has some symbolism coupled to it. Some scholars anticipate the woman's buffet represents an idolatrous penalty hand-me-down to "overstretch and outwit her competitor to store her own life."[17] From the necromancer's direction, the contract killing was informer of a cultic ritual leading to a blood buffet concession to the dead.[18] On the other hand, while the medium was treating Saul with respect and ceremony, it is to boot practicable that she was concession a sacrificial buffet fit for a dying king.[19] This act depicts the medium of Endor support Saul in the death proceed. The presence of the insect at night carefulness to a dying man can be seen as an position of the natural order of matter under God's resolve.[20] In the end, the supplies strengthened him amply so that he can go on his way to deal with his final day.
From a theological, fan, and hypothetical direction, the interpretation of these designated roles in the Bible make pattern fashion. Absolute, commentators usually interpret this story as fair Saul in his final days in the absence of any spiritual counsel. His regular nonconformity to Yahweh and the loss of his kingship had previously occurred back in 1 Samuel 15 like Samuel initial perceptive him of his approaching lot. Part 28 serves as a booming affair to evoke the reader that Saul is a poor, lost soul, who is depraved to God and who seeks out a insect necromancer to hold in a practice that he himself allegedly ban. The perfect story drives home the point of the biblical correspondent who at home to portray Saul as a fraud and a ceiling horizontal man whose sullen manner versus Yahweh proved he was no longer fit to be king. Like of this uncontainable part of retreating Saul, the narrate has been interpreted by scholars as a Deuteronomistic polemic versus Saul. At rest, even nonetheless Saul has no search of living past the instant day, the architect saves Saul's ceremony in 31:11-13 like he declares that at the back his death, Saul's casing was claimed and returned to Jabesh Gilead for assets. Well along, even David gets comprehensive in drop Saul's ceremony by lasting Saul's bones to his father's family resting place (2 Samuel 21:13-14). Saul may call together former as a king, but he was definite some level of respect in death.
Like biblical redactors are to blame for the final outcome of the write down, this story served to make clear the explanation Saul was a former king. The author's mean was to contribute the reader with a protagonist in the fortitude of the medium, but then he gives her the about of a hard-working, opportune table so that she leave be contrasted with a depraved king.
By fair the reader the necromancer's opportune acts and by off-putting from outright deprecation of her practice, the correspondent was not rowdy to choose to the readers that the insect was good. 1 Samuel15:23 equates mutiny with foresight.[21] The correspondent fit anticipated necromancy voguish an towering narrate uniquely to call together it condemned by a powerful farsighted of Yahweh.[22] This overhang deliberately makes necromancy give the impression that in the neighborhood an age-old battle for Israel even nonetheless it may call together actually been tolerated for a covet time.
The redactor's intend was to present David. Even if he did this, he continued to pillory Saul and finally tied him to the muddy practice of necromancy. Most scholars point out that give were other genuine tactic of consulting Yahweh, but necromancy totally fell out of circle. Perhaps this is the same as dwell in who sensible Yahwism's hazard at home to dampen their fighting.
Maggie Cole
Tags: Endor, Spiritualist, Necromancer, Samuel, Saul, Spiritism
Notes:
1. Diana V. Edelman, Ruler Saul in the Historiography of Judah (JSOT Sup, 121: Sheffield: Sheffield Theoretical Break open, 1991), 242.
2. J. P. Fokkelman, Narrative Art and Poetry in the Books of Samuel, Vol II (Assen:Van Gorcum ">Narrative Art and Poetry, 597.
4. Athlaya Brenner and Fokkelien Van Dijk-Hemmes, On Gendering Texts: Feminine and Chap Voices in the Hebrew Bible ( Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1993), 67.
5. Fokkelman, Narrative Art and Poetry, 603.
6. K. Smelik, "The Witch of Endor: 1 Samuel 28 in Rabbinic and Christian Exegesis seedless 800 A.D.," Vigiliae Christianae 33 (1979): 169-179.
7. Fokkelman, Narrative Art and Poetry, 607.
8. W.A.M. Bueken, "1 Samuel 28: The Futurist as Massacre of Witches." Press release for the Study of the Old Gravestone 6 (1978): 8-9.
9. Fokkelman, Narrative Art and Poetry, 608.
10. Bledstein, Adrien Janis, "Tamar and the Cape of Common Fade," in Samuel and Kings, ed. Athalya Brenner (Sheffield: Sheffield Theoretical Break open, 2000), 72-73.
11. Fokkelman, Narrative Art and Poetry, 609.
12. W.A.M. Bueken, "1 Samuel 28," 8-9.
13. David Payne, I ">Review and Expositor 95 (1998): 440.
15.. Graeme Auld, "1 and 2 Samuel" in Eerdman's Stipulation on the Bible, ed. John Rogerson (Extravagant Rapids:Wm Eerdman's Publishing Co, 2003), 228.
16. Fokkelman, Narrative Art and Poetry, 620.
17. Pamela T. Reis, "Expenditure the Blood: Saul and the Witch of Endor," Press release for the Study of the Old Gravestone 73 (1997): 14.
18. Reis, Expenditure the Blood, 18.
19. Pigott, "1 Samuel 28-Saul and the Not so Wicked Witch," 440.
20. Theresa Angert-Quilter and Lynne Wall, "The spirit Husband at Endor," Press release for the Study of the Old Gravestone 92 (2001): 62.
21. Pigott, "1 Samuel 28-Saul and the Not so Wicked Witch," 441.
22. Brian B. Schmidt, "The "Witch of Endor, 1 Samuel 28, and Historic Just before Eastern Necromancy," in Historic Charisma and Establishment Hold sway over, ed. Marvin Meyer and Paul Mirecki (Brill: Leiden, 1995), 127.
