1 Samuel 14:43

SAUL CONDEMNS HIS SON JONATHAN TO DEATH

Then Saul said to Jonathan, "Tell me what you have done." And Jonathan told him, "I tasted a little honey with the tip of the staff that was in my hand; here I am, I will die." And Saul said, "God do so to me and more also; you shall surely die, Jonathan." Then the people said to Saul, "Shall Jonathan die, who has wrought this great victory in Israel? Far from it! As the Lord lives, there shall not one hair of his head fall to the ground; for he has wrought with God this day." So the people ransomed Jonathan, that he did not die. Then Saul went up from pursuing the Philistines; and the Philistines went to their own place."

"Here I am, I will die" (1 Samuel 14:43). Josephus wrote that Jonathan also said:

"I do not desire you, father, to spare me. Death will be to me very acceptable, when it proceeds from thy piety, and after a glorious victory; for it is the greatest consolation to me that I leave the Hebrews victorious over the Philistines."[23]

"God do so to me and more also" (1 Samuel 14:44). We have already noted the pagan nature of this godless oath which so effectively marred and nullified what would have been the greatest victory in Israel's history. To us it appears that there is no possible justification for Saul's disastrous oath. These words perfectly fit the pagan mouth of Jezebel, but had no place whatever in the mouth of "The Lord's Anointed"!

"Saul's oath did not proceeds from a proper attitude toward the Lord but was an act of false zeal in which Saul had more regard to himself than to the cause of the kingdom of God ... Saul issued that prohibition (in the oath) without divine authority ... And when the people pronounced Jonathan innocent and ransomed him, declaring that "Jonathan had wrought with God," it was a divine verdict. Saul could not have failed to recognize then, that it was not Jonathan but he himself who had sinned, and through his arbitrary and despotic command had brought guilt upon Israel, on account of which God had given him no reply."[24]

"Saul went up from pursuing the Philistines; and the Philistines went to their own place" (1 Samuel 14:46). It appears from this that Saul at last recognized himself as the chief sinner in that episode, and he therefore gave up the pursuit of the Philistines. In the words of Jonathan, My father (Saul) has troubled the land (1 Samuel 14:29).