[JSOT 73 ( 19971 3-23]

EATING THE BLOOD:

S AUL AND THE WITCH OF ENDOR '

Pamela Tamarkin Reis

8 Rockland Park. Branford. CT 06405. USA

'You shall nOl eat on the blood; you shall not practice divinati on nor
wilchcraft' (Lev. 19.26).

The witch of Erdor has cast a spell over biblical commentators. Despite
God's virulent c.enunciations of soothsayers, Josephus says, 'It would be
weU .. . to imitate the example of this woman' (A nt. 6.14.4) ; Origen writes
of her as a ' type of Christ'; Jerome calls her ' industrious and practical '.'
EquaUy enchanted, the modems extoU her ' pity ' (Beuken), her ' motherly
care' (Fokkelm an), her 'generosity' (Ades), her ' insight of an angel'
(Simon)2 According to these exegetes, the bustling domesticity of this
paragon of womanly solicitude results in a beneficent meal that revives
King Saul 's physical strength , relieves the torpor into which he has
sunk, and fortif es hi s determination to face courageously certain death

I am indet Lcd to Elizabeth Rei s and Marc Brcnler for their comments and

suggestions and to Matthew Dennis for his painstaking reading and re-reading of thjs
anicJe.
I.

P. Cox, 'Odgen and the Witch of Endor: Toward an Iconoclast ic T ypology',

ATR 66 ( 1984), p 144: R. Brown, J. Fitzmyer and R. Murphy (cds.). The Jerome
Biblical Commelll "Y (Englewood Cliffs, NJ : Prenlice-Hall, 1968). p. 173.
2. W.A.M. B , uken , ' I Samuel 28: The Prophel as Hammer of Wilches', JSOT
6 (1978), p. 13; J.P. Fokkelman , Narrative Ar/lInd Poetry ill 'he Books of Samuel
(3 vols.; Assen : Van Gorcum, 1986), n, p. 620; J. Ades, 'Samuel , Whear ' AS! Th"
Bee n Sin' r Saw Thee'?'. in V. Toile rs and J. Mai er (eds .), Mappings of ,he Biblical

Terrain: The Bib" as Text (Lewisburg, PA : Bucknell University Press, 1990), p. 263:
U. Simon, 'A Balimced Story: The Stem Prophet and the Kind Witch', Proo!tex!s 8
( 1988), p. 165.

JOLlmal for the Study of tire Old Testament 73 ( 1997)

in battle. The reader is also served by the witch, A. Schulz teUs us, for
the homely conclusion of Saul' s encounter with her has a calming effect,
relieving emotions contemporary authors would 'whip Up' .3 H. Hertzberg
says our sympathy for Saul is roused by the moving description of the
witch's hospitality, for although the chapter depicts Saul 's fate as well
deserved, we respond to the tender concern the woman shows the king
and are thereby led to see the 'tragic element' in Saul 's puni shment 4
Saul ' s dignity is restored, D. Gunn writes, for the ' mundane incidental s'
of normal sustenance tum the reader's attention from Saul's enervating
fear to his ordinary fast-induced hunger. s The literary device of devoting
so much of the chapter to the everyday details of food preparation, Ades
says, ends the account of God' s judgment on Saul on a 'touching
dinninuendo' .6
I too am charmed by the witch of Endor, but I find her moti vation to
be self-preservation, not hospitality. She is not a model of motherly protectiveness but of mother wit, professionalism, resource fulness, and
daring. Although imperiled, she does not become petrified like Saul but,
controlling her fear, manages to manipulate her adversary, protect herself, and do her job. She not only raises a ghost but offers a ritual meal
that assures her survival . The God of Israel is a jealous God, and the
infernal worship that secures the witch 's life blasts what is left of Saul 's.
The purpose of this article is to demonstrate by a close reading of the
text that the meal the witch prepares for Saul has many functions other
than nourishment. Firstly, it is a mantic sacrifice to the dead entailing the
stringently proscribed eating of blood; secondly, it is an unholy but legally
effective covenant between God's anointed and an idolatrous shaman ;
thirdly, it warrants Saul 's consequent suicide; and lastly, it provides a
scenario for the contrast of Saul's perfidious complicity with David 's
later faithful integrity in an analogous situation . The witch does not set
before the king so dainty a dish as has been hitherto supposed.
The pericope begins by reminding us that Samuel is dead and that al l
3. A . Schulz, 'Narrative Art in the Books of Samuel ', in D . Gunn (ed.),
Narrarive and Novella ill Samuel: Studies by Hugo Gressman and OIlier Scholars ,
1906-1923 (JSOTSup. 116: Sheffield : JSOT Press, 1991 ), p. 156.
4. H . Hertzberg, I alld /I Samuel (repr.: Philadelphia: W estrnini stcr. 1976
[1964]), p. 220.
5. D. Gunn. The Fate oj Kill g Saul (JSOTSup. 14 : Sheffield: JSOT Press.
1980), p. 109.
6. Ades, 'Samuel, Whear . A Sl Tha Been '. p. 266.

REIS Eating the Blood

Israel mourned him ( I Sam. 28.3). Samuel 's prominence is reiterated for
a reason, as we shall see.7 We are also told that Saul has removed (i'O;,)
witches (n-o~ and O'll1") from the land, which was his kingly duty (v. 3).8
In vv. 4-5 we learn that the Israelites and the Philistines are massed for
war, and the sight of the Philistine camp incites fear in Saul and a great
trembling of the heart. He inquires of the Lord and receives no answer,
neither by dreanls, nor by Urim, nor by prophets. Saul feels alienated
from access to God; he could seek reconciliation through prayer and
repentance, but he does not attempt these avenues of grace. He is looking
for the occult. The thrice repeated 0) (neither, nor, nor) in v. 6 toll s
God's rejection (If Saul's predilection for the numinous. God is not to be
coerced.
Unable to wn,st instruction or assurance from God, Saul teUs hi s
servants to seek Jut (tDp:J) a witch that he might inquire of her (v. 7). In
Lev. 19.3 1 God (ommands the Israelites, 'Do not seek out [tDP:J) a witch',
because '1 am th , Lord' .9 Seeking witches is apostasy, unfaithfulness to
God. The alacri :y with which a witch is located and her convenient
proximity to Sad 's camp has been noted by many commentators. 1O At
one time Saul m iy have removed witches from the land, but they have
either returned o ' new practitioners have become established. Canaanite
7. I Sam. 3.20 aJso testifies lO Samuel's renown.
8. On the basis of Hittite, Ugaritic, Assyrian, and Sumerian parallels, H. Hoffner
defines :J1t1 as a rilUal pit used for com munion with the deceased (pp. 385, 392).
A :l'~- n?,t.'I :J (v. 7 is a woman who possesses such a pit (, Seco nd Millenn ium
Antecedents to the Hebrew '68' , J8L 86 [ 1967J, p. 394). T. Lewis defines :J1t\ and
"JDi"as denoting bolh spirits of the dead and. el liptically. the conjurors of such spirits
(CULlS o/the Delld in Ancient Israel (l nd Ugari( [Atlanta: Scholars Press, 19891.
p. 163). F. Cryer sa{s that ~l ~ is 'a famous puzzle' and that "Jli-P 'has something to
do with knowledge but of what sort it is impossible to say' (Divination in Ancien t
Israel and its Near t.'as/ertl Environmellf: A Socia-Historical Illvestigation [JSOTSup.
142; Sheffield: JSOT Press, 1994J, pp. 260-61). The common understanding of
these terms in I Sa n. 28 is that they refer to a human medium for co mmunication
with the dead, and ulal is the sense in which 1 use the word 'witch'.
9. Though docllmentary theorists propose that the laws of Leviticus were written
after the books of SllllUel, sequence of authorship is immaterial to my literary view
of the Bible. J belie, e the artistically consummate. received lext of the MT is intended
by the '<luthor' (autl.ors, editors, final redactor) to be read as a cohesive, consecUlive,
integrated whole.
10. See. for exmnple, Fokkelman, Narrative An, p. 597 n. 1; Hertzberg. I amlll
Samuel, p. 218 n. c; and R. Klein. I Samuel (WBC, 10: Waco: Word Books. 1983),

p. 271.

Journal fo r the Study of the Old Testamellf 73 (1997)

cui tic practice is difficult to eradicate, as the Hebrew Bible tells us over
and over again. I I
Saul disguises himself in order to visit the witch ( I Sam. 28.8). He
needs to. Although Israelites were commanded, ' You shall not suffer a
sorceress to live' (Exod. 22.17), obviously there has been toleration,
albeit not by the king. Lf the witch were to learn the identity of her regal
client, she might cast a retaliatory hex or be too intimidated to perform.
Some critics think Saul had to pass through Philistine lines to get to the
witch and disguised himself for military reasons, but a man whose heart
trembled within him at the sight of the Philistine camp would hardly
venture to penetrate its defenses with so small a cohort. 12
Since we are told in the first clause of I Sam. 28.8 that Saul disguises
himself, why in the second clause of v. 8 are we further told that he puts
on other clothing? As he was unlikely to possess a wig, make-up, or fal se
beard at his military camp, he must have effected his disguise by replacing
his royal robes with commonplace garments; therefore, the first clause
of the verse suffices to inform us that Saul changes his apparel and
renders the second clause unnecessary. The apparent redundancy invites
exam ination. The verb used in the second clause for ' put on ' (iDJ': is
often used in a figurative sense to mean becoming clothed in a personal
attribute." For example, one puts on (iDJ': righteousness (lsa. 59. 17),
majesty (Ps. 93 . I), or desolation (Ezek. 7.27). Literally, Saul puts on
clothing, but the word selected for 'clothing' and the word ' treachery'

I J. K. Spronk associates the witch of Endor's necromancy with the Canaanil.e

death cull and finds, in 1 Sam. 28, implication of syncretistic worship (Beatific Afterlife
in Ancient Isra el ami ill 'he Ancient Net" Eml [Neukirchen-V luyn: Neukirchener
Verlag, 19861, pp. 52,256). E. Bloch-Smith says, 'A cull of the dead appears to
have been a sign ificant and ongoing component of Israelite and Judahile society'
(Juda hile Burial Practices (lfId Beliefs about fhe Dead [J SOTSup, 123: Sheffield:
JSOT Press, 1992], p. 127). Lewis says that ' necromancy was widespread throughOul Israelite society and not j ust in Canaanite enclaves' (CUlfS of the Dead, p. 113).
Like Lewis (p. 177), 1 define 'death cult' as the performance of acts designed to
placate the dead or to procure favors from them.

12. D. Edelman asc ribes Saul's disguise to mania! caution and ci les others who
agree (King Saul ill the Historiography of Judah [JSOTSu p. 12 1; Sheffield: JSOT

Press, 1991], p. 242). Klein says Saul intended to hide his identity from both the
Philistines and the witch (1 Samuel, p. 271).
13. BOB, p. 528, says that 'very often' the verb is used with figurative clothes as

in Job 7.5 (worms) and Isa. 49.18 (inhabitants), but 'more often the garment is some
abstract quality' .

REI S Eating the Blood

have the same root (' ,J ). The Hebrew word denotes infidelity. In seeking
out a witch, Sat I is being disloyal to the Lord; he is 'whoring after other
gods' (Judg. 2.17). The needless duplication of the second clause in I
Sam. 28.8 admits the implication that Saul has clothed himself with
faithless treachery. Further, the image of Saul attired specifically in D" ' J
(rather than in 11'i1:liD, m~:! , OiD1J'i, mn:!, O"1:l-sy nonyms for apparel)
will be recalled to his disadvantage later in the chapter.
Saul uses the same root to accuse his army of treachery (om)J ) when
he discovers thc:m sinning against the Lord by eating meat on the blood
( 14.33). What p :ecisely was the sin of Saul 's army? J. Grintz distinguishes
between the tr, ~spass of eating blood (Gen . 9.4; Lev . 3. 17; 7.26-27;
17.10,12,14; ])eut. 12.16, 23; 15.23) and that of eating 'on' or ' upon'
('ill and 'i ~ ) th! blood (Lev. 19.26; I Sam. 14.32,33 , 34 ['i~l; Ezek.
33.25) . The former offense is prohibited because 'the blood is the life'.
The stricture agai nst the latter sin of eating 'on' or ' upon' the blood is
based, he belie"es, upon the second clause of my epigraph, Lev. 19.26:
' You shall not eat on the blood; you shall not practice divination nor
witchcraft,'!4 He argues that Saul's army was sacrificing to chthonic
powers for the Jurpose of divination (p. 84) and compares their slaughtering to the ac l prohibited in 17.5-7: 'sacrifice in the open field ... unto
satyrs they whore after'.
Though, as Cirintz states, ' modem Jewish Biblical research has continued to unden tand the verse in the same way: viz. that the act of "eating
on the blood" \las for purposes of divination' (p. 80), the Talmud does
not associate the law against eating blood in the first clause of 19.26
with the contirluation of that verse. The sages connect it with rather
more distantly I elated restrictions against eating the fl esh of a live animal
and against eating the flesh of the sacrifice before the blood has been
ritually sprinkkd on the altar. 15 However, Jewish scholars of the Middle
Ages, with the exception of Saadia Gaon, did understand eati ng the
blood to be an dement of soothsaying and sorcery (p. 79) . Maimonides
discusses eating the blood and says,
They thought it was the food of the spirilS [the dead]; by eating it, man
has somethillg in common with the spirits, which join him and tell him
future eventL . . They imagined thaL .. lovc , brotherhood. and friendship
with the spir Is were established, because they dined with the latter alone
14. J. Grinlz. "'Do Not Eat on the Blood": Reconsiderations in Setting and
Dating of the Prie:;tly Code' , ASTI8 ( 1972), pp. 78-105.
15. b. Sa,,". 6:a.

l oumalfor the Study oflhe Old Testament 73 ( 1997)

place and at the same time; that the spirits would appear to them in dreams,
inform them of coming events, and be favorable to them . . . The Law [the
Pentateuch) , which is perfect in the eyes of those who know it, and seeks
to cure mankind of lhese lasting diseases, forbade the eating of blood, and
emphasized the prohjbition in exact ly the same terms as it emphasizes
idolatry.' 6

In commenting on 19.26, Nachmanides says that eating on the blood is

'a kind of witchcraft' and that in I Samuel 14, when Saul's men feared
the Philistines, they were
eating with the blood in order to perform that craft. It is for this reason
that Scripture there states, 'Then they told Sau l, saying: "Behold the people
sin against the Eternal, in that they eat with the blood," And he said: "Ye

have dealt treacherous ly [Cni):l]." 17

Saul' s use of IDp:l in 28.7 and the narrator's word choice of lJ:l in v. 8
presage Saul' s imminent commission of the same dead! y sin.
When Saul asks the witch to divine for him, her response is heavily
weighted with her fear (vv . 8-9). She acc uses Saul both of seekin g her
life and of causing her to die. She assumes everyone knows of the king's
zeal in casting out witches and is apprehensive of any stranger who
could and should denounce her to the authorities. Although we are told
in v. 3 that Saul has removed (TO;"!) the sorcerers, the witch says that
Saul has cut them off (ni:l). Unlike modern literary stylists, the biblical
author does not vary words merel y to avoid repetition.'s We are meant
to notice that the witch uses a more lethal verb than does the narrator. It
expresses her perspective on Saul 's extermination of her profession.
Though it may be translated as 'cut off, it is a technical term used for the
death penalty; it is also the specific term used for agreeing to a covenant.
One 'cuts' a covenant just as, in contemporary English vernacular, one
'cuts' a deal. ' The author may also have used this verb to foreshadow
subtly the impending covenant-cutting between Saul and the witch.
Saul reassures the woman in the name of the Lord and asks ber to
16. Maimonides. The Guide for rhe Perple.'4:ed (trans. M. Friedlander; repr.: New
York: Dover, 1956 [1904]), p. 362.
17. Ramban (Na ch mall;e/es) Commentary on Ihe Torah: Leviticlls (trans.
C. e have l; New York: Shilo. 1974), p. 307.
18. See R. Alter's chapter, 'The Techniques of Repetition ', The Ar' of Biblical
Namllive (New York : Basic Books, 1981 ), pp. 88-113.
19. BOB says thar one 'cuts' a covenant 'becau se of the cutting up and dislribu
lion of the flesh of the victim for eating in the sacrifice of the covenants' (p. 503),

REIS Eating the Blood

bring up Samuel (vv. 10-11). When she succeeds in manifesting the

prophet, she rEalizes that her visitor is the king (v. 12). Many exegetes
are troubled by her recognition of Saul upon the sight of Samuel. With
no scriptural foundation, Lev. Rob. 26.7 advances the fancifu l solution
that spirits of tle dead normally rise from the netherworld upside down ,
but if they rise at a king's behest, they emerge right side up. When the
witch, therefole, sees Samuel emerge right side up, she pierces Saul's
disguise. P.K. McCarter offers a source-critical explanation: the verses
are confused and amended; the woman recognizes Saul from hearing his
imperious ton, : in v. 10 and would have unmasked him earljer had the
verses been in correct order.'o Several commentators maintain that only
an important person would presume to request the raising of another
important pers)n, or that onl y one individual , Saul , would be interested
in interviewing Samuel in time of war." In either of these cases, however, the witch would have identified Saul as soon as she heard whom he
wanted; there \lould have been no need for her to see Samuel to make the
connection. W.A.M. Beuken also makes this point and offers his theory
that the very presence of the prophet strips away all ambient decei t and
enables the wi :ch to see through Saul's disguise." J.P. Fokkelman, too,
relies upon the power of the prophet to dissipate Saul's disguise. He suggests the 'energy field' between the prophet and the king is so highly
charged that tlte witch intuits Saul's identity from the 'aura' Samuel's
emergence ger erates. 23
My reasonir lg is rather more prosaic. Judging from Samuel's querulous, 'Why ha'ie you disturbed me, to bring me up?' (v. 15), the shades
apparently prf fer to preserve their posthumous rest. As an effective
prophet of God and a celebrity in life, Samuel' s ghost must have been
frequently sought in vain by an anxious populace on the brink of war.
He would allo' v himself to be raised only by one to whom he had strong
affective ties. ~:amuel's regard for Saul has been frequently underscored.
When he anoints him (10.1), he kisses him-a gesture of affection not
20. P.K. McCaner, I Samuel (AB, 21 ; Garden CilY, NY: Doubleday , 1980),
p. 423.
21. J-Iertzbeq ;. / and /I Samllel. p. 219. In his comments he al so di smisses the
notion that an an(mymous ghost was replaced by Samuel in a later redactional stage,
Ihough Ados ('SlOlUel, Whear ' ASl Tha Been', p. 263), and McCarlee (l S{l/Il/1el,
p. 423) subscribe 10 the idea.
22. Beuk.en, ' Hammer of Witches', p. 9.
23 . Fokkelml n, Narrative Art, p. 606.

10

Journalfor the Study of the Old Testamelll73 ( 1997)

repeated with David; Samuel grieves for Saul and cries out to God all
night on Saul's behalf after the Lord repents of having made Saul king
( 15.11); even after this event Samuel honors Saul in the eyes of the
people (vv. 30-31) and mourns Saul 's failure as king (v . 35) so obsessively that the Lord chides him (16.1). The witch of Endor, amazed to
see Samuel actually rise to a summons, knows that her tall client is
Samuel's beloved k:ing.24
By her great cry of distress upon recognition of Saul (28.12), the text
makes the point that the woman is afraid of the king, not of the ghost.
She was frig htened when three anonymous men came to her; now she
recognizes one of these men to be her chief enemy. Up to this time Saul
has been acting as an individual. His conversations with his men and
with the witch have been personal; the narrator has used only Saul 's
name and will revert to this exclusive use after the one utterance Saul
makes with the power of his position. In the only instance in this chapter
in which Saul speaks in his capacity as k:ing, he orders the woman not to
fear and asks what she sees (v. 13). He has already invoked the Lord' s
majesty, but, until this moment, he has not compromised his own, and
he proves reluctant to be as free with his own authority as he was with
God's: in God's name he swears surety; as king he does not promise the
woman immunity from punishment. Since the reader knows Saul is
speaking here with the might of the k:ingship, his peremptory directive
to the witch may be interpreted as a mandatory royal command : 'Do
not be so frightened that you cannot do your job! ' The witch knows the
k:ing can cut her off. Her jeopardy is now official.
Saul's self-absorbed answer to Samuel's question reveals the extent of
his narcissism and of his estrangement from God (v. 15). His own state
of mind is his first concern: 'I am greatly troubled .' He sees the Philistine
threat to Israel in personallenns as well: 'The Philistines are attacking
me.' That God' s spirit no longer rests upon him takes the position of
least significance in his list of woes, and this loss seems to be regretted
only because, without advice, he cannot plan his military tactics.
The sequence of Samuel's response is a rebuke to Saul and displays
the proper ordering of priorities (vv . 16-19).25 The issue of greatest
importance is Saul 's loss of God's support, and Samuel addresses it first,
24. Saul's unusual height is mentioned in I Sam. 9.2 and 10 .23.
25. P. Miscall notes without discussion that Samuel's first poinl is Saul's third
(1 Samuel: A Literary Readillg [Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 1986] ,
p. 169).

REIS Eatillg the Blood

II

not last. Saul is Ihen told that the land of Israel will fall to the Philistines,
and only after that is he informed of his own fate. He learns he and his
sons, that is, the dynasty, will perish on the morrow. Of least moment is
that his army, DO, will succumb to the Philistines. They are soldiers,
after all, and it i ; the common lot of soldiers to die in combat. However,
the loss of land, the holy land God promised to Israel, is an uncommon
calamity. No Ph ilistines had dwelt within Israel 's borders since Samuel's
prayerful interc ession had resulted in the recovery of previously lost
territory (7. 13- 14). Though there were transient incursions during Saul 's
reign, the integ 'ity of the boundaries had endured. The coming battle
will leave part 0 ' the holy land under Philistine occupation (31.7).
Saul was tol in 15.19-23 that his kingdom would be torn from him
and from his heirs for his failure to execute Agag, the king of Amalek.
From Samuel's denunciation he now learns not only the precise day of
his death but a1 ;0 of further punishments and disasters 26 Land will be
lost, he and his ions will die violently, and his army will be vanquished.
Throughout thE Hebrew Bible there is a strong sense of appropriate
justice, of meas lfe for measure. If the consequence of sparing Agag and
the best of the Amalekite spoil is the failure of the dynasty, what
offenses led to the additional penalties?
In I ehron. 10.13 we are told that Saul died for failing to kill Agag
and for consulting a ghost. The extended retribution, then, is a result of
the divination.i.ev . Rab. 26.7 adds Saul 's slaughter of the priests of Nob
( I Sam. 22.16-1 ~) to the list of sins justifying punishment. PS.-Philo (Bib.
Ant. 58; 63.3) b lames the army of Israel for not interceding on behalf of
the priests and 'escuing them as they had Jonathan ( I Sam. 14.45). No
source I have f(lund hazards a reason why land is lost to the Philistines
(or even acknowledges the loss), but I believe the immediate discovery
and proximate bcation of a witch in 28.7 teaches that under Saul, and in
spite of his witch-hunting, the land had become polluted with death cults
and their attend.tnt mediums.
In his respon se to Saul, Samuel repeats the sacred telragrammaton,
26. Against Miscall , who says, 'The dead have nothing new to say' (J Samuel,
p. 171 ), and Fokkdman, who asserts that the message is 'in no way new' (Narrar ive
An, p. 605). McC:ner says that clauses a and c of v. 19 are the conflated versions of
one original clausl : (I Samuel. p. 419). S.R. Driver says, 'Clauses a and c are almost
identical : and the verse is decidedly improved by the omission of one of them'
(NOles 011 the He , rew Text and lit e Topog raph y of the Books of Samuel [repr. ;
London : Oxford Lniversity Press, 1966 ( 1913)], p. 218).

12

Journal for rhe Srudy of rhe Old Tesramel11 73 ( 1997)

;11;1', seven times." The extraordinary power and influence of the mysti-

cal number seven is evoked over and over again in the Bible. The seven
fat cows and seven lean cows in Pharaoh' s dream (Gen. 41.18-19) and
the seven priests with seven horns circling Jericho seven times on the
seventh day (Josh. 6.4) are but two examples among hundreds. Samuel
makes one last formidable attempt to turn Saul back to God and away
from the pagan conjuring to which he has resorted. By the sevenfold
repetition of the name of God, Samuellries but fails to turn Saul to God
and prevent the desecration of God 's name (Lev. 20.3-6) that is to
come. The prophet delivers his necessarily harsh message with a potent
formula that testifies to his love for Saul and to his abhorrence of the
grievous sin Saul is poised to commit. 28
Saul' s interview with Samuel is over. As unwilling to listen to Samuel
as he was to hearken to the voice of God, Saul falls crushed to earth by
the weight of the divine retribution foretold for hi s sins ( I Sam. 28 .20).
Emotionally, he suffers from great fear and, physically, he is weakened
by a twenty-four hour fast .' The witch's fear of Saul, already great, must
also have intensified with Samuel 's prophesy. Her arch nemesis may have
been willing to let her live as long as he might need her services, but
now he will require her astral powers no longer. He might even, in an
attempt to mollify God, order her immediate execution. She has literally
been the medium of bad news to Saul; that alone is sufficient ground for
the king to put her to death.3o

27. Verses 16. 17 (twice), 18 (twice), 19 (twice).

28. Samuel' s formulaic repelition of God 's name fail s to influence Sau l, but,
when Abigail employs the sevenfold re iteration in 1 Sam. 25. mentioning the name
of God in v. 26 (twice), v. 28 (twice), and vv. 29. 30. 31. she successfull y deters
David from bloodshed (my paper, 'Cupidity and Stupidity: Woman's Agency an d
the "Rape" of Tamar', forthcoming in JANESCU [ 1997]).
29. Both Miscall (I Samuel, p. 170) and Simon (, Balanced Story' . p. 163)
differentiate between conscious fasting and failure to eat. Simon assertS that Saul
does nOl fast but loses his appeLite in nervous apprehension of the coming battle.
Klein (1 Samuel, p. 272) offers that Saul may not have eaten due LO the rigors of the
lrip to Endor and also joins McCarter (I Samuel, p. 42 J n. 20) in suggesting that Saul
engaged in a ritual fast to purify himself for the witch's conjuration. Saul may have
fasted on the eve of battle to engage God's sUppor!, according to Edelman, but 'His
reasons for not eating seem to have been deliberately shielded from the audience to
raise the questi on of his intentions' (King Saul, p. 249).
30. See 2 Sam. 18.2 1-22 in which Joab dispatches an expendable Cushite to
convey bad news to David and tries 10 dissuade Ahimaaz from being the messenger.

REIS Eating the Blood

13

Unlike Saul, t le woman does not collapse under her fear but takes the
first desperate action that occurs to her, and, hoping to buy her life with
her body, she a,)proaches Saul sexual ly: 'And the woman came in to
Saul' (v. 21).31 Although 'coming in to' (1': 1:::!) is often a sex-neutral
expression, a woman coming in to a man, particularly a specific manas here where the woman comes in expressly ' to Saul' - may bear a
sexual insinuation n In current English slang, one might say the woman
'comes on' to S lUI. The Hebrew expression need not convey this interpretation, but I ! ee no other reason for the narrator to tell us the woman
came in. We "ere never told she went out; nor are the goi ngs and
comings of SaU l's men recorded. They are present in v. 23, but we do
not know whetller or not they attended the seance. This extraneous
information is 1I0t important to the narrative; neither is the woman ' s
coming in unleg,; it bears an erotic alIusion 33
She makes carnal overtures to Saul but then sees that he is paralyzed
by terror and changes her tack. She tenders him a proposition in the foml
of an equation, 1 formal statement of equality: ' Behold your handmaid
hearkened to your voice and set my life in my hand, and I hearkened to
your words that you spoke to me. And now you please hearken also to
the voice of yo r handmaid and I will set a morsel of bread before you'
(vv. 21-22). It i; not appropriate for a woman, and especially a woman
so low in the social order, to set the terms for a king . The witch's proposition is exprc:ssed with intelligence, delicacy, and tact. The terms she
sets are obviou, ly unequal. It is up to the king to correct the equation;
he must make the mental computation and understand her to be actually
saying: 'I hearl:ened to you and set my Ufe in your hand ; now you
hearken to me and set your life in my hand.'
3 J. Whether OJ not prostitution was an actual concomitant of sorcery. the interweaving of sexual and death cult imagery is ubiquitous throughout the Bible. See
Lewis. elllts o/til. Dead, pp. 149-50. 158.
32. See Gen. 19. 33-34 in which Lot 's daughters. in tum, come in to ( ~,::::!. ), i. C.,
sleep with , their f.lther; 2 Sam. 11.4 in which Bathsheba comes in to (K):J, sleeps

with) David; and Ruth 3.7 in which Ruth comes into (Ki:: :!. ) Boaz for what is an
arguably chaste bu undeniably sexually charged encounter.
33. Edelman St:cs echoes or Abigail 's exchange with David and says that both
women attempt 'H' steer [the men] toward a correct course of action L!J ... Whether
the woman of EndoJr is making sexual overtures toward the king as Abigail seems to
have been doing [I) David is open to the imagination .' Edelman run her argues that
the witch's knowledge or ignorance of Saul's fale is 'irrelevant to the plot line' (King
Salll. pp. 250-51 ).

14

Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 73 (1997)

The witch tells the king that she listened both to his voice and to the
words he spoke to her, but she pointedly asks him to hearken onl y to
her voice. Shrewdly, she directs Saul's attention away from her exact
words. She wants him to apprehend her vital message from her tone
and from her syntax but not to heed the disingenuous 'morsel of bread '
words of her equation. Her contract is not about bread; it equates a
life with a life. Since she leaves it open-ended, Saul may also understand
the bargain to be, 'As you save my life, so will I save your life.' She is
offering to perform her augury, to make an idolatrous sacrifice to the
spirits of the dead in order that Saul will not die as Samuel foretold. The
advantage of the covenant to her, of course, is that Saul will spare her
life. Beuken says the witch 'unwittingly' proposes a covenant to Saul, for
' by listening to others and acting accordingly, people enter into covenant
with each other and God with them'.34 I believe the witch to be neither
so unwitting nor so winsome as male exegetes seem to find her.
Fokkelman finds ' reciprocity' in the witch's compact and a 'natural
and efficient tit for tat' .35 I do not consider a human life, even a witch 's
life, in exchange for a morsel of bread to be reciprocal tit for taL Simon
observes the ' marked lack of both symmetry and proportion' in the
witch' s proposal and finds the 'logical weakness' part of her 'delightful
charm' . The behavior Simon interprets as generous hospitality to Saul
and as innocence of any grudge toward him for cutting the spiritualists
from the land seems to him to exhibit 'marvelous faithfulness to the truth
of Iife'.36 I think it far from realistic to suppose that a menaced and
evidently terrified woman overlooks the mortal danger her worst enemy
inflicts upon her and becomes his gracious hostess. Indeed, in such a
predicament, a response of eager hospitality would be bizarre. It is more
true to life for a frightened , hunted, and condemned person to try to
outwit and outmaneuver her adversary to save her own life than to try
to feed him to save and fortify his.
Saul understands and initially refuses the witch' s offer. He may want
to make a pact with the woman that might save his life and the lives of
his sons, but God's laws and Samuel 's words against witchcraft, idolatry,
and teraphirn in 15.23 restrain him]7 Eventually, however, Saul-like, he
34. Beuken , ' Hammer of Witches' , p. 13.
35 . Fokkelman, Narrative Arl, p. 620.

36. Simon, 'Balanced Story' , pp. 164-67.

37 . K . Spanier says. 'Saul was rebuked by Samuel for resorting to teraphim for
the purpose of divination ( 1 Sam. xv 23), CRachel' s Theft of the Teraphim: Her

REIS Eating the Blood

15

cannot withst.md the urging of the witch and of his courtiers, and he
gives in to th,: force of their persuasion and to his own inclination as
three times pr ~viously he has given in to pressure. At Gilgal in 13.8-14
he disobeys God's command and performs an untimely sacrifice to keep
his men from scattering from him; in 14.45, abandoning the oath he
made in God' !, name, he spares Jonathan's life at the people' s insistence,
and in 15 .24 ~.e transgresses the commandment of the Lord because, he
says, ' I feare:! the people and listened to their voice '. Though Saul
hearkens neitl ,er to the voice of God nor to the voice of Samuel, he does,
in the end, hearken to the voice of the witch and of his men (28.23).
Saul rises from the earth, but not to his feet; he sits upon the bed (v. 23).
Contrary to Gunn (see n. 5), the Bible does not record ' mundane
incidentals ' . Why then are we told that Saul sits upon the bed? We are
not informed of the position of the witch and of the courtiers. I believe
only Saul's p )sture is important to the story because of the correlation
of the phrase '~l:l;J-"t\ (on the bed, upon the bed) with the same phrase
in 19.13, 16 describing the placement of the teraphim Michal uses to save
David 's life. 3' In all of Scripture the expression ;J~l:l;J-"1': is used only of
Saul, of the t,:raphim, and of Jacob at his death (Gen. 49.33). The last
mentioned may also alJude to teraphim, for in v. 27 Jacob's son, Benjamin
(Saw 's progectilOr), is designated as the divider of the spoil ; on Jacob' s
death he ma:1 have taken possession of the teraphim stolen by his
mother, Rach ~I, from her father (3 1.19).39 The Bible may be intimating
that the terapltim were handed down from mother to son to distant heir.
The nexus between I Sam. 28 and 19.11 - 17 is iUustrated by a number
of other COITI!spondences: David is told, ' If you do not save your life
tortight,lOmoTow you will be slain ' (19.11); Saul also knows that he has
only this one night in which to save his life, for tomorrow, Samuel tells
him, he will de (28. 19). Michal disguises the teraphim with a cloth, ll:l
(19.13); Saul as we have seen, is disguised with O'll:l- the same root
word (28 .8). Saul asks Michal, ' Why thus have you deceived me?'
Struggle for Family Primacy'. VT 42 [1992J. p. 406).
38. Note tha only the teraphim are ilro1-?l't David, in the same passage, is said
to be ;]=, 'in .he bed' (v. 14).
39. Teraphi n are defined as ancestor figurines used for divination and cui tic
inquiry directed to the dead. See H. Hoffner, 'Hittite TarpiJ and Hebrew Tertjpltim' ,
JNES 27 (196.l), p. 66; Spanier, 'Rachel's Theft' , pp. 405, 410; Bloch-Smith,
Judahite Burial. p. 121 : K. van dec Toom, 'The Nature of the Biblical Teraphim in
the Light of the Cuneiform Evidence', CBQ 52 ( 1990), pp. 204. 2 13, 2 15, and 222.

16

Journol/or the Study 0/ the Old Testament 73 ( 1997)

( 19.17); the witch asks Saul, 'Why have you deceived me?' (28. 12). The
word ' why', i1D?, a Leitworr in ch. 28, is used there four times (vv. 9, 12,
IS , 16). It i.s accentuated in ch. 19 by being enunciated by two different
speakers in the same verse (v. 17). Its first use is echoed by the witch as
quoted above; its second use, ' Let me go; why should I kill you?' attracts
notice because of tbe idiosyncratic phraseology. One would hardl y
suppose that a desperate, fleeing man had time for questions. [t seems a
more natural lie for Michal to claim David had said, 'Let me go, or [ will
kill you.'
In a general discussion of biblical literary devices, M. Stemberg writes
of the ' rhetorical power [of] implici t intertextual and interepisodic
relations' and of the ' intertextual analogy-by-allusion' 40 R. Alter
observes, 'The biblical writers like to lead their readers to inferences
through oblique hints rather than insisting on explicit statements. ' 41 The
analogous portrayals of Saul and of teraphim-both i1~Di1-'?t\ , both
covered with lJ:l-may hint at what the once majestic Saul has become:
a hollow man, a fake, an abomination. The allusion to teraphim in relation
to Saul may also be a portent of the forbidden ancestor worship to come.
The witch sacrifices (n:li) a calf (28.24). She does not 'kill' it ( KJV and
RSV), ' slaughter' it (McCarter and JPSV), or ' butcher' it (Klein); she
sacrifices it. The word for sacrifice (n:li) is used 129 times in the Hebrew
Bible, and, according to 1. Milgram, it refers to cultic ritual slaughter and
sacrifice in 127 of those instances." If the word n:li is used twice to
mean secular slaughter, [ cou ld believe it refers to secular slaughter in
our passage too were there not several other indications in the text,
discussed below, that also point to ritual sacrifice.
Along with the meat, the witch provides unleavened bread (i1::>D).
40. M. Sternberg. Th e Poetics of Biblical Narrat ive (Bloomington: I.n diana
University Press. 1987), p. 497.
4 1. Alter, The An of Biblical Narrative, p. 183.
42. J. Mil grom ('Profane Slaughter and a Formulaic Key to the Composition of
Deuleronomy ', H UCA 47 [19761, pp. 1-2) excepts only Delli. 12.15.21. In these
two cases alone he believes the word refers to secular slaugh ter for food. In I Sam.
28 he believes n~i inilicates some undefined but permissibl e ritual sla ughter and
sacrifice. for he finds it un1ikely 'that the witch of Endor would have prepared a profane [secular] meal before the very king who troubled himself to improvise an al tar
on the battlefield so that hi s troops wou ld not be guilty of profane or illicit slaughter

(I Sam. 14.32-35)'. Though Milgra m thus agrees with me (hat the witch proffers a
ceremonial oblation rather than a domestic repast, he considers the witch 's sacrifice

lawful.

REIS Eating the Blood

17

Unleavened bread is a constituent of a sacrificial offering; it is the mealoffering and if a sign and symbol of sacrifice. In Lev . 2 .4 the MT
specifies n:lt for the meal-offering, and in 2.11 we are told that no leaven
may be brough : to the altar for this purpose. Of course one cannot prepare quick.ly any bread other than unleavened bread, for leavened bread
needs time to ise. However, the unleavened nature of the bread the
witch serves ne,!d not have been specifically emphasized. In Gen . 18 .5-6,
to use a partic Ilarly apt parallel, when Abraham rushes to provide a
'morsel of bre d' for three strange men who unexpectedly arrive at his
dwelling, his wlfe hastily makes 'cakes of bread' (ll1lll).43 Unlike n:ll, this
word may refer to bread that is leavened or unleavened. The cakes, or
loaves, Sarah hakes are of necessity unleavened , but the word n:lt is
avoided. There is no hint of ritual sacrifice.
After the wit :h sacrifices the calf, we are not told how she prepares it.
The absence of detail in this regard is especially noticeable because we
are given so many particulars to describe the preparation of the n:ll; she
takes flour, kn eads, and bakes-three verbs. If we look again at the
paradigmatic hospitality scene of Abraham and the three strangers in
Gen. 18.6-7, we see that an equal number of operations is itemized for
the bread and for the meat. The bread is prepared-quickly (one word in
Hebrew), kneaded, and made; the meat is fetched, given to the servant,
and dressed. No commentator has remarked upon this deficiency in
regard to the meat in I Samuel 28, but Fokkelman at least has sensed it;
he furnishes th" lacuna for us by stating that the witch 'applies herself to
baking and roa ;ting' 44 What roasting? We do not know if the meat was
roasted, boiled or barbecued, and I submi t it was not cooked at all but
eaten raw with the blood.
In discussin ~ the 'depth and sophistication' of bibli cal narrative,
A. Berlin says ihe narrator may ' leave gaps in the story to be filled in by
the reader' 4s The yawning gap in this story is one more indication that
God ' s chosen, anointed, first king of Israel ate meat with the blood as
part of the abominable rite of divination. The narrator stresses the prepa43. The compll'ision of Gen. 18.1-8 and I Sam. 28.22-25 is singularly pertinent ,
for in both pass a~ es a 'morse) of bread ' is prepared for three unexpected , unknown ,

male visitors.
44 . Fokkciman, Narrative Art, p. 621.

45. A. Berlin, 'Point of View in Biblical Narrative'. A Sense of the Text (lQRSup:
Winona Lake, [N Eisenbrauns, 1983), p. 112. See also Sternberg' s chapter on 'Gaps,
Ambiguity, and tl e Reading Process', The Poetics, pp. t 86-229.

18

Joumalfor the Study of the Old TeSIOlllem 73 (1997)

ration of the bread and leaves a void concerning the meat so that, by
means of the disparity, this degrading and treacherous (1lJ ) act of Saul 's
may be inferred.
The witch takes the raw meat, the blood, and the sacred bread and
offers them in the presence of Saul and his men (v. 25). The KJV translates toll (offers) as 'brought'. The RSV says 'put'. Klein and the JPSV
have 'set'. The word Cl1to (put or set) is tbe word one is led to expect
here from the two precedents established by its use in v. 21, ' \ have set
(Cl1to) my life in my hand' and in v. 22, 'Let me set (Cl1to) a morsel of
bread before you.' Any variation in a rhetoric that stresses repetition
confers added significance on the variant. The change of verb alerts the
careful reader that, though the woman asked permission to 'set' (CI'lto), in
the actual event she 'offers' (toll) .46 Cl1to is a neutral verb that denotes
'place' or ' put'; toll is a loaded verb that connotes both tbe priestly
approach to the altar and sexual intercourse 4 ? This verb choice confirms
that the witch sacrifices, not butchers, the calf. Here, instead of setting
(Cl1to) food before Saul, she is offering (toll) gifts to the dead.
For Saul the forbidden food propitiates the spirits. For the witch the
communal meal seals a covenant; that is, it performs the legal function of
a treaty, eliminating enmity and establishing peace between the partici,
pants. A. Viberg lists all the biblical covenantal meals that satisfy hi s
criteria for the symbolic, yet legal , act. 48 He does not include the meal
shared by the witch, Saul, and the courtiers. Nevertheless, tbis meal
fulfills the four indications of legality he stipulates:
These indkalions are, firstly. the pivotal position of the meal in the literary
structure, followed by a geographical dislocation, secondl y. the use of
terminology w ithin the context otherwise well known from covenant-

making. thirdly , the lack of any other explicit means of satisfy in g the
covenant, and fourthly, the mere fact that the mea1 is mentioned. 49

46. Aller says, 'Where the narration so abundantly encourages us to expect. ..

repetition, on occasion the avoidance of repetition, whether through substi tlllion of a
synonym or of a wholly divergent word or phrase for the anticipated reoccurrence.
may aJso be particularly revealing' (The Art of Biblical Narrative, p. 180).
47, The verb choice hints that the witch offers food to the dead and offers herself
sexually to Saul and his men (see n. 32 above).
48. A.. Viberg defines a legal symbolic act as 'a non-verbal ac t which fulfill s a
legal function when it is performed under the proper circumstances' (Symbols of
UIW (Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1992] , p. 9).
49. Viberg, Symbols of Law, p. 75 .

REIS Eating (he Blood

19

The pivotal p )sition of the meal in our text is marked; we are told that
Saul and his men rise up and leave (geographical dislocation) in the same
verse in which we are told that they eat (v. 25). Covenantal terminology
is first implied by the witch's use of the technical word for cutting a
covenant, nT), and then realized by Saul's acceptance of her obliquely
equilateral proposition. The presence of two witnesses (Saul' s men) is
another technical indication of tbe legal context'O Viberg's third criterion is acbiev ~d , for, other than the shared meal, no means of satisfying
the covenant is explicitly specified. The fourth criterion is extensively
fulfilled, for tle meal is not only mentioned but dwelt upon. In our pericope of twenty-three verses (vv . 3-25), talk of the meal, preparation of
the meal , and consumption of the meal occupy five verses.
The witch of Endor intends to survive. She instigates this meal because,
as a covenanl , it safeguards her life. She does not promote it in order to
nurture her enemy by bolstering his declining strength. Nor does the
author provide a calming breather for the reader; on the contrary, Saul's
apostasy intellsifies our apprehension. The loathsome conviviality of this
prohibited sa;rifice does not arouse our sympathy for Saul; rather, our
contempt for him is increased. And it does not suggest thaI the witch is
a ministering angel; it establishes that she is a clever, capable, determined
woman.SI

The witch' ; sorcery may have saved her life, but it fails Saul. The next
morning he goes into battle-heroically, according to the commentators'2
They believe him gallant because, they think, he braves the battlefield in
the certain kr.owledge of death. Stoically, he submits to God ' s sentence
for himself and for his sons rather than leave them behind to an uncertain
future. However, Saul, unlike David ( l6. 18), is never identified as a
'mighty man of valor' or a ' man of war' . Saul's father is distinguished
as a ' mighty nan of valor' in 9.1, whereas Saul is introduced in the very
next verse as 'a young man and handsome ' . Perhaps the comparision is
indirectly de,i sive. Certainly, the reader notes Saul 'h iding among the
50. Viberg, Symbols of Law, p. 10.
51. Lewis SlY S, 'Little can be said about the woman 's feast. It may be enticing to
look for some t ype of cultic ritual here uniting Saul with a meal for the dead , but the
text, with its enphasis on the woman 's compassion, does not seem La support such
a notion' (Culls of the Dead, p. 117). Contrary to Lewis, I fi nd no emphasis o n
compassion in our text, but amp le accent on appropriate ly responsive, su rvi va loriented intelJiFence wh.ich does, indeed. support this notion.

52 . Lev. Reb . 26.7; Josephus, Alit. 6. 14.4 , 7; Simon praises Saul ' s heroi s m
(p. 169) and ci t!S others who glori fy it ('Balanced Story' , p. 17 I n. 15).

20

Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 73 (1997)

baggage' in 10.22, sees him afraid to engage Goliath himself but willing
to let David , as a sort of proxy, fight the giant dressed in the king ' s
armor in 17.38, and observes his self-abasement before David on being
spared death at the latter' s hands in chs. 24 and 26. Is the reader then
to accept that Saul is suddenly, uncharacteristically, totally unafraid of
death and willing to consign not only himself but also his sons to certain
oblivion? In my exegesis, Saul risks battle only because he believes he
has enlisted the protection of the infernal deities. He is not courageous
but is encouraged by the witch's conjuring to trust that the friendly
ghosts, the spirits with whom he shared blood, will save him and his
heirs.
With the death of hi s sons, Saul realizes the witch 's necromancy has
not been a shield. Writhing (,:>n", writhe or whirl-not wounded as it is
frequently translated) in mental anguish, contorting with fright, cowering,
or perhaps dodging the archers, he ends his life by suicide, lest the
Philistines torture bin1 to death (31.2-4)." This denouement provides the
reader with a sense of equity. After Samuel's pronouncement, it seemed
no further punishment could possibly be given Saul, yet the retribution
he receives for eating the blood is fitting. The horror that spurs his suicide
goes beyond Samuel ' s prophesy and fulfills the measure for measure
standard of judgment. It is as though God had said, ' You feared death ;
now you will fear to live. You wanted to escape your fate; now you will
run toward it.'
The meal Saul shares with the witch has yet another function beyond
sacrifice and covenant. It provides a means of comparing Saul and David
directly, to Saul ' s decided disadvantage. In 2 Sam. 12.16-23 , David
beseeches God for the life of his ill son, the fruit of hi s adulterous union
with Bathsheba. The prophet, Nathan, has already foretold that the child
will die because of David's sin. The thematic parallels between this scene
and the witch of Endor scene are striking. Both kings are shown by prophets to be sinners, both hear a forecast of doom, both are threatened with
the death of progeny, both fast , lie on the ground, refuse food, change
clothes, rise from the earth, and finally accept food. S4 For seven days
53 . Those who believe that after Saul stabbed himself the AmaJekite killed him
see Saul' s end as (a more acceptable) euthanasia rathe r than suic ide (2 Sam. 1.6- 10).
By either the Amalekite' s or the narrator' s account , however, Saul committed suicide
o r tried and failed to commit suicide.
54. David 's changing of clOlhes is expressed by the mauer-of-fact 1mCitl ="j?rn

rather than by the metaphoricall y significant InD w:J?'1 used for Saul.

REIS Eatillg the Blood

21

David resists h e exhortations of his servants, never accedes to them, bUl

insists upon c.oing what he knows to be right; Saul gives in to rar less
coaxing, thoU:lh he knows he is acquiescing to the ultimate iniquity.
The lexical correlations between the two scenes are also remarkable.
In both scene ;, and nowhere else in the Hebrew Bible, mention is made
of joining the dead: Samuel tells Saul that tomorrow Saul and his sons
' will be with me' ( I Sam. 28.19), and David, speaking of hi s dead son,
tell s hi s servllnts, ' I shall go to him ' (2 Sam. 12.20) ." [n both scenes,
and nowhere !Ise in the Hebrew Bible, there is the locution ' and he rose
from the eanh ', f lK;)Q Of'" (I Sam. 2&.23 and 2 Sam. 12.20). The
reader is guic ed to compare the supplicatory behavior of the two kings
by similarity of incident, of issue, and of expression. '6
Both Davi e and Saul are disappointed in their appeals. David washes
himself after his polluting association with death, faithfully worships the
Lord despite Ihe severe chastisement he has received, and eats an appropriately secu ar meal in his own house. Saul does not wash after the
defilement of hi s contact with the ghost of Samuel, sits on a bed in the
house of a witch, worships his ancestors instead of the Lord, and eats a
detestable wit ch's stew of raw meat, blood, and unleavened bread.
I have pre ~ented arguments that expose the witch's motivati on and
King Saul 's defection from monotheism,s7 The charge against Saul is
grave, but th" text demands it. '8 His record of yielding to entreaty, his
proclivity fOi magic, and his fear-numbed stupor constitute the background for his penultimate act of desperation. Among the evidence in
55. In Gen. 37.35 Jacob says thai he will go to hi s so n in Sheol: however, Ihe
reader knows thll Jacob is deceived; his son is ali ve.
56. That Da vid's behavior is not normative [sraelite ritual is shown by the consternation of h.i ; servants (2 Sam. 12.2 1). Lewis makes lhe, to me rather dubious,
case that David s seven-day fasting and lying on the ground constitu te a ceremonial
descenl lO Sheo . He states. 'll seems quite likely tbat David was ritually acting out a
descent into the underworld to try to bring his son back from the clutches of death'
(Cults of th e D !ad, p. 43). Those who agree with Lewis's assertion will find yet
another corresI=ondence between Saul and David, for Saul briefly brings Samuel
back from the cl ulch of death.
57. The spir IS of Ihe dead are called gods (I Sam. 28.13): Bloch-Smilh says 'The
dead were "divi le beings'" (Judahite Burial Pract ices, p. 123), and Ps. 16.3 refers
to the dead as 'holy ones in the eanh' . Worship of and sacrifice to such pretemalllral
beings is polylh ' ism.
58. Though recent death cu ll research (cited several times above) suppOrts my
argument, the s< riplural evidence alone is sufficient to justify my conclusions.

22

lournalfor the Study of the Old Testament 73 (1997)

the foreground is the pointed use of the root 1lJ tying Saul to treachery,
to the eating of blood by his army, and to teraphim. The phrase ;;t!lQ;J-'tI,
used in the Bibleonly of Saul and of teraphim, again links Saul to ancestor
worship. The witch's use of distinctly covenantal terminology-the technical term n1::>, plus her equation in the form of: 'as I did X, now you
do Y'-delineates the heretical bargain. The absence of detail in the meat
preparation (made noticeable by juxtaposition of rich detail in the preparation of the bread) becomes substantive evidence of the bloody rite
when coupled with the use of the word nJi (sacrifice, rather than a verb
meaning, simply, slaughter) and the needlessly explicit mention of the
unleavened, and thus sacrificial, character of the bread. That the witch 's
meal is a blasphemous ritual is further indicated by the surprising use of
the allusive word IVl) (offer, approach) where we are led by double precedent to expect 011V (set). Saul's end, his final terror-not of death but
of life-shows the playing out of an inexorable justice. It is the un foretold penalty for his treacherous blood worship of false gods.
My exegesis of I Samuel 28 contradicts all preceding analyses. History
may be written by the victors (the Davidic faction), but it is interpreted
by partisans of a particular point of view. Analysts, blinkered by their
religions' theology, have been averse to allowing Saul the autonomy
that God permits him. Although Samuel predicts the certain end of
Saul ' s disobedience (15.23), and we are twice told that God repents of
his selection of Saul (vv. II, 35), prior commentators cannot let themselves perceive apostasy in God's choice for a king. Saul is portrayed as
a tragic, yet valiant, figure because to recognize him as the craven idolater
he becomes would, in their philosophies, be tantamount to declaring that
God errs.
Correspondingly, in previous explications, the witch cannot have
seduced Saul to heterodox worship. Her role had to be that of care-giver.
The interpreter's image of a selfless and compassionate nurturer also fits
an idealized standard of femi.ninity. Even today, the biblical author's
depiction of the medium as self-interested and resourceful is not a representation of woman that is readily embraced. The witch is not seen as
an adroit strategist but as a generous, solicitous, and adorably illogical
hostess. God's vehement condemnations of witchcraft are discounted, the
human drive for self-preservation is depreciated, and the witch of Endor
basks in approval, continuing to entrance exegetes down the centuries.

REIS Eatillg the Blood

23

ABSTRACT
This article recnmi nes the encoumer between King Saul and the wi tch of Endor
and demonstrates by a close reading of the text that the witch is not a solicitous
hostess but an adnit strategist intent upon survival. The food she prepares for Saul
is, firstly. a manti ~: sacrifice to the spirits of the dead entailing the stri ngently proscribed eating of l:lood. Secondly, the shared meal is an unholy bUllegaJ ly effective
covenant between God's anoi nted first king of Israel and a sorceress. Third ly, the
forbi dden meal SCI ves an apostasy that warrants Saul'sconscqucnl suicide; and lastly,
it provides a scencrio for the conlrast of Saul's treachery with David's constancy in
an analogous situa jon.

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