King Saul and the Ghost of Samuel - Death and Necromancy in Israel
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- čas přidán 22. 04. 2023
- Episode 7: King Saul and the Ghost of Samuel
The tragic rise and fall of King Saul ends with a seance that raises the ghost of the prophet Samuel from the dead. What is the meaning of this story, and how does it intersect with Israelite beliefs about magic and the afterlife?
Contents:
0:02 Prologue
0:43 The Eve of Battle
2:37 A Necromantic Rendezvous
7:45 The Afterlife Is a Come-As-You-Are Party
10:12 The Netherworld and Israelite Death Cults
14:43 Greek Parallels to King Saul’s Seance
16:32 The Medium Is Not the Message
18:10 End and Credits
Special thanks to John Kesler for consultation and advice.
Related blog post:
⦾ isthatinthebible.wordpress.co...
Buy me a coffee to support the channel:
⦾ ko-fi.com/pauldavidson
Academic works cited:
⦾ A. Graeme Auld, I & II Samuel: A Commentary, 2011
⦾ Christopher B. Hays, Death in the Iron Age II and in First Isaiah, 2011
⦾ Klaus-Peter Adam, “1 Sam 28: A Comment on Saul’s Destiny From a Late Prophetic Point of View”, Revue Biblique 116/1 (January 2009)
⦾ Joseph Blenkinsopp, “Saul and the Mistress of the Spirits (1 Samuel 28.3-25)”, Sense and Sensitivity, 2002
⦾ Antony Campbell, 1 Samuel, 2003
⦾ Esther J. Hamori, Women’s Divination in Biblical Literature: Prophecy, Necromancy, and Other Arts of Knowledge (Anchor Yale Bible Reference Library), 2015
⦾ Keith Bodner, 1 Samuel: A Narrative Commentary, 2009
⦾ Elizabeth Bloch-Smith, Judahite Burial Practices and Beliefs About the Dead, 1991
⦾ Bruce Louden, Homer’s Odyssey and the Near East, 2011
Music by Fesliyan Studios (fesliyanstudios.com) and Scott Buckley (www.scottbuckley.com.au).
Lots of great insight here. This is actually one of the Bible stories that stands out to me the most, and for many reasons. It's portrayal of the after life, and how it contrasts with Christian theology is a big one, but even more significant to me is how it explicitly reemphasizes that the reason Saul had lost God's favor is because he didn't do a good enough job of the genocide God commanded him to do. Such a God is not worthy of my devotion.
Good for you! Yahweh is not "god". An evil Anunnaki Reptilian shapeshifter overlord Colonizer. No more , no less. Thank you, great comment. Deuteronomy 32:8-9 Dead Sea Scrolls 4Q44. Only One True God The Great Spirit Holy Spirit Creator of All Creation ❤️. God has inserted Him Her ITSELF INTO Nearly all WORKS of Man's Art, Music and Literature EVEN In the bible So that We may KNOW GOD ❤. But not All attributed to GOD IN THE bible IS OF GOD OR OF A GODLY NATURE. THANK GOD FOR THAT!!❤
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I came in with so many assumptions about this story and you managed to dash away a number of them. I really thought necromancy was more widespread than the evidence apparently suggests! Also, I had not put together this pericope and that scene from Homer involving Odysseus.
Great work! Thanks for putting it together!
Thanks for the comment Ben. I think the extent of necromancy-related practices and how they would have been carried out is still an open question, but the ghost becoming an on-stage character and having a dialogue with the protagonist does seem more akin to Greek literature than what we find in Mesopotamian texts. I didn't mention in the video that several commentators think the chapter is a late insertion into the story because of how it disrupts the surrounding narrative.
@@InquisitiveBiblefor all we know - it was fabricated by King David-himself for the purpose of anti-Saulite propaganda.
Dr Joel Baden argues that all the stories about Saul were written during the lifetime of David/Solomon-and he is a liberal scholar no less
Great video, even today the cult of the dead survives among Orthodox Jews although more similar to the cult of saints
Thanks for the comment. Are you referring to mitzvot for the elevation of the soul? Unfortunately, I’m not nearly as knowledgeable about modern Judaism as I ought to be.
Your videos are brilliant - thank you for the great work you do.
The story has always fascinated me, I was unaware of the Greek parallels.
Fascinating that mediums were stereotypically women in the ancient world, seems to hold true today as well. I wonder why that is?
For the ancient literature, at least, Hamori argues that there was a widespread trope of the sorceress who preyed on men both magically and sexually, and so witchcraft was equated with sexual perversion. This is seen elsewhere in the Bible, like when Jehu accuses Jezebel of being a sorceress and a prostitute. Neither of those labels is true, but they go together to create the image of a dangerous woman. See also Isaiah 47, where Babylon is personified as a sorceress and a whore. Hamori gives Circe as another example of this trope, this time in Greek myth.
Thank you for your hard work. This video was really good. 😊🙂🙏🏼
This story is very intriguing. Thank you
Myth vision sent me... Thank you for your work.
Thanks for watching!
Well done! Thank you
Thanks, brother!
God's perfect timing on this one! 😀👍
God bless!
Thanks, I appreciate the comment.
Love it. Keep up the good work 👌
Thanks, I appreciate the comment!
One thing that puzzles me is why was Samuel allowed to divulge the future to Saul, when Yahweh was clearly against doing so at this point? Does Samuel do so against the wishes of Yahweh?
Yeah, I'm not sure there's a clear answer to that. Is Samuel even still a prophet of Yahweh now that he's dead? But it's also important to point out that part of Saul's purpose in summoning Samuel is to get advice on how to handle the Philistines, and Samuel doesn't give him any. He just tells him he will die tomorrow, and there's nothing that can be done. So the encounter is not really helpful for Saul.
@@InquisitiveBible Thats a good point. As to Samuel's status as a prophet, I would guess that he was still one, seeing as he knew the future, which I assume he could only know via a connection to Yahweh.
That was good. Very worth watching.
Thanks for the nice comment!
Another interesting video!
Are you planning on maybe interviewing some Bible and ANE scholars down the line? You reference so many!
Thanks for the nice comment. I'm not sure the interview style is really my thing, but I might give it a shot. I'm in touch with a number of the scholars I cite through email or social media.
@@InquisitiveBible Could be interesting. There are many channels that interview Bible and ANE-scholars these days, such as MythVision, Gnostic Informant, History Valley and What Your Pastor Didn’t Tell You.
Yeah, it's a really effective format, so I'd consider it. One advantage most of those channels have is they are monetized (and much bigger than my channel), so they can afford to pay guests for their time. :)
@@InquisitiveBible True, but some scholars seem to be open for an interview without payment (Amar Annus, Bruce Well etc). One can always try to reach out
I appreciate your channel as a natural extension of your blog, which I've followed for years. Please don't turn it into just another interview channel.
great work, I enjoyed it as always! thank you!
one question, who is this artist? 15:47
Thanks for the nice comment. The artist there is the late American illustrator Newell Convers Wyeth (N.C. Wyeth).
Saul went by night because he didn't want to be seen. (Proveing his guilt farther. )
He knew it was wrong .
The same reason Nicodemus sought Jesus by night.
It was to remain unseen
Perhaps, but I think that's what the disguise is for.
Great video. But regarding the parallels to Greek literature, are you suggesting that the Saul’s story took the theme from Greek literature, or the other way around? Because clearly Samuel was written a very long time before the Odyssey.
Thanks for the nice comment, Christian.
As for the dating of Samuel, is there any particular reason you think it was earlier than the Odyssey? The Odyssey is typically dated to the 8th century BCE. The dating of Samuel (and Kings) is difficult to determine, but the books of Samuel and Kings, taken together, look back at the monarchies of Judah and Israel and must post-date the Babylonian conquest in their final form. John Van Seters, for example, thinks the David saga was written in the 4th century based on the social and political background it reflects. (Source: Van Seters, The Biblical Saga of King David, p. 118) This does not preclude there being older material contained within them, of course.
@@InquisitiveBible Oh, I didn't know that we supposed such a late writing for Samuel. I'll look into that, thank you.
Thank you for this story. I pray not to go the route of Saul. How can i prevent that from happening ?
Great video!!! Question, I thought ancient isrealites didn't see the soul as separate from the body, so how would this view work with this witch of Endor story?
Yeah, that’s a great question. On that point I would say a few things.
1. It's true that the words translated "spirit" or "soul" are associated with a person's breath and life force, and these disappear upon death. Yet it's clear that many Israelite believed that some form of the deceased person went down to Sheol as a shade or ghost. However they conceived of this, it was quite different from our notion of an immortal soul.
2. The Old Testament contains more than one viewpoint. The belief in a shadow netherworld where the ghosts of the dead reside was widespread in the ANE and was certainly part of Israelite folk religion. However, the texts associated with the priestly writer and normative Yahwism never mention Sheol, the teraphim, or anything else related to the spirits of the dead. Even levirate marriage, which is mandated in some texts and apparently originated to ensure that childless males would have a son to carry out ancestor cult rituals, is forbidden by the priestly version of the mosaic law (e.g. Leviticus 20:21). Friedman and Overton (“Death and Afterlife: The Biblical Silence”) argue that the temple priesthood suppressed the cult of the dead and afterlife-related beliefs in general because they threatened the income and authority of the priesthood. This view lived on in the Sadducees, who believed that there was no afterlife.
3. Separate from the priestly tradition, some of the late wisdom literature (Job, Ecclesiastes, Ben Sira, etc.) seems to promote the view that there is no afterlife. It’s not clear to me what they would have believed about the existence of spirits and ghosts.
This is the moment jimmy became saul
The ghost of Samuel wasn't Samuel it was a demon.
I see no hint of that in the story. The biblical text says it was Samuel. In fact, demons don't even appear in the Old Testament.
@@InquisitiveBible God would not take part in something that he has deemed ungodly. Satan uses many forms to deceive people. This witch wasn't connected to God in any way shape or form. So therefore it wasn't the real Samuel.
That's what we call eisegesis: forcing the biblical text to conform to preconceptions based, in this case, on modern Christian doctrine and sensibilities about the afterlife, as opposed to exegesis, which allows the Bible to speak for itself.
@@InquisitiveBible Still makes sense. Just my opinion.
@@InquisitiveBible OK that's fine I still believe it wasn't Samuel though.
yes Israelites DID dabble in necromancy........King Solomon