The Land Sings

The land sings at different times to seekers. Always, whispers rise, enticing one to look further, gaze longer, listen more closely, until terrain comes alive. But, frequently, the Holy Land uses one place, one ancient story to animate ageless sites where so long ago people lived and loved and laughed and fought and died.

On a trip to that mystical, marvelous, spiritual land, it happened to me as with so many others. Unexpectedly, the land hummed, I felt, more than heard, words form, then the ageless earth awoke…and my heart cracked a bit with the suddenness of it, and the tears fell, and as I looked around, the world stirred, and sang to me.

               We looked over another ancient city, one where the Greeks or Romans had (I need to study a few decades to get them straight) constructed a theater where we hoped to have morning worship; another group had claimed that convenient spot first. So, as our group explored other rooms and posts and the world of the ancients below, I stood above looking down, contemplating taking my sore feet down the ramp to explore the rooms. Enticing as that seemed, the coming back up gave me pause.

Mt. Gilboa--Where Saul & Jonathan Died

     

          Beside me, one of our leaders stood and looked as well. As happens, a conversation began:  “Right up there,” he pointed to the top of a mountain across from us, “is where the Philistines hung Saul and Jonathan’s bodies after they defeated them.”

Flannel Story Board

               I froze. The story of David and Jonathan moves me still—even after hearing it so often as such a young child in Sunday School where—before technology took over all presentations—my teachers used well-worn flannel boards, placing a boy, “David,” and his friend, “Jonathan,” sometimes able to change their robes, telling the story to rows of children enraptured with the flat, cloth characters. And here I stood, looking up and up and up—everything is “up” in Israel—and

seeing the place, the very spot where the bodies of Saul, Jonathan’s father, the king who lost his mind and his kingdom, his followers and his family, and Saul’s sons hung in disgrace, mocked by their
enemies, God’s anointed brought to disgrace. I felt the tears and turned to find privacy—among the 4,782, or so, tourists around me. However, none of them minded me. Perhaps the earth sang to them as well.

               So closely did I feel Jonathan and David from that point that I had to find the story again. In the Old Testament—there in the land of the Old Testament—I Samuel tells of their friendship. After

David and Goliath

the young shepherd boy David kills the giant Goliath, King Saul seeks a meeting.  Then, the son of the King meets the shepherd boy, and the Bible says, “Now it came about when he had finished speaking to Saul, that the soul of Jonathan was knit to the soul of David, and Jonathan loved him as himself,” (I Samuel 18:1).  The relationship grew; eventually, Jonathan and David became brothers-in-law, as David married Michal, Saul’s daughter. But, Saul grew so envious of David’s increasing popularity with the people, he sought to kill him, and Jonathan, loyal son, loyal friend, found himself caught in the middle.

               Over and over, he protected David, even as Saul stalked David to kill him, even as Saul flew into rages when he found Jonathan did not help in the effort to rid Saul of this annoyance who he saw as a rival, even then, Jonathan stayed faithful to David. Over and over the Scripture emphasizes Jonathan’s love for David; we see David’s care for Jonathan. But the words “he (Jonathan) loved him (David) as his own life” show up in one form or fashion over and over…..Though at times, Saul seemed to recover from the all-encompassing envy and hate he felt towards David, never again could David and Jonathan enjoy their companionship as they had has young men. The words “covenant” and “love” and “vow” litter the story of Jonathan and David, two friends who lost each other.

                

               Now, in this land, seeing caves and hills where David might have actually run, the story still feels such present tense, and David again flees. They live their lives as they can—one hiding out, one ruling and chasing, and Jonathan? How torn he must have been. The friend of his childhood, who he loved so strongly, and his father, who he also surely loved, with whom he shared that lifetime of memories, now unable to find sanity regarding one innocent man.

Caves where David migith have hidden from Saul

Eventually Saul and his sons and his troops go to fight the Philistines. Saul sees his sons die at his feet. How can any parent read those words and not ache at the thought of it, especially knowing you caused that loss? Too injured to fight or run, rather than be captured, Saul falls on his own sword.

I love the next words:  the “valiant men” of Jabesh-gilead walked all night to retrieve the bodies of Saul and his sons.  Their king would not be treated so...

And David? When he heard that the man who tried so long, so very long, to kill him had died—King Saul and his sons, including the beloved Jonathan—he cried out a dirge for nine verses in II Samuel 1. Words like “Your beauty, O Israel, is slain,” and “Saul and Jonathan, beloved and pleasant in their life,” call out from the page, wailing David’s broken heart, exploding his grief for his King and his friend. No relief that he can stop running; no “He got his!” attitude. Only grief, deep, searing, stabbing grief at the loss of his King and his friend. David led his people in mourning…and his grief stayed with him, I believe, a lifetime.

Eventually, after more fighting and politics, David, who could not forget his friend, seeks “anyone left of the house of Saul……for Jonathan’s sake.” Sorrow did not leave, even after other battles and wars. They find Mephiboseth, Jonathan’s son, crippled in both feet as a young child when his nurse fell while fleeing with him.  David brings him to the palace, assuages his fear, gives him servants to work land for him, and assures him always of a place at his table—because of his love for Jonathan, the young man whose soul knit with his as a youngster, for whom he surely still kept a soul-knit remnant in his heart, even after so many years of anger and grief, pillage and war.

Mephiboseth’s story moves me as much as his father’s.  In my own life, a series of

Mephiboseth

unexpected and strange events led to my own problems with both feet. Though I have better medical care than Mephiboseth, I have spent time understanding the limits physical handicaps can impose. Thankfully, recent treatment and time have eased my own difficulties. But, for this this young boy, so hurt, so afraid, later taken in and loved by the great friend of his father…..this story in the land of its occurrence brought to life for me the reality of these people.  To want to run or even walk and have physical injury hamper your movements frightens in this modern day and age; how much worse in a time when a young man knew his feet would hurt and fail him the rest of his life? David’s kindnesses must have felt a miracle.

Thousands of years ago, David lived. Jonathan lived. They cared for each other, and they lost each other through no fault of their own. As I stood and looked up at the top of that mountain where the Kingdom of Saul fell (Beth-shan in the Bible) I could almost see mighty, ancient armies in the valley below me, hear the clanging of armor, banging of swords and crying of men, see the bodies of Israel’s leaders hanging in shame.  At that moment, in that place, the Holy Land started her song to me, enticing me with the power she has to bring the past into the present.

A waving hat startled me, broke the spell, carried me from the ageless past to the very present. “Let’s go!” came the call. Time to find the bus, go to the next unforgettable site.

For all of us, a different place, a different time, a different song woke that world. But, oh, indeed, that ancient land sings, and now that song calls me back, if not physically, then emotionally and spiritually. The land does, indeed, sing.

The City of David