1 Kings 20

¹But David also fled from Najoth, which is in Ramatha, and coming spake before Jonathas: What have I done? What is mine iniquity, and what sin of mine against thy father, that he seeketh my life?

²Who said to him: God forbid, thou shalt not die: for neither will my father do any thing great or little, unless he first tell me: this word therefore only hath my father concealed from me? No, this shall not be.

³And he sware again to David. And David said: Thy father surely knoweth that I have found grace in thy sight, & will say: Let not Jonathas know this, lest perhaps he be sad. Yea more, our Lord liveth, and thy soul liveth, by one degree only (as I may so say) I and death are divided.

⁴And Jonathas said to David: Whatsoever thy soul shall say to me, I will do for thee.

⁵And David said to Jonathas: Behold the calends are tomorrow, and I after the manner am wont to sit beside the king to eat: dismiss me therefore that I may be hid in the field until the evening of the third day.

⁶If thy father looking inquire for me, thou shalt answer him: David desired me, that he might go quickly into Bethlehem his city: because there be solemn victims to all of his tribe.

⁷If he shall say: Well; peace shall be to thy servant: but if he be angry, know that his malice is complete.

⁸Do mercy therefore toward thy servant: because thou hast caused me thy servant to enter the league of our Lord with thee. But if there be any iniquity in me, do thou kill me, and bring me not in to thy father.

⁹And Jonathas said: Be this far from thee, for neither can it be, that I should not tell thee, if I shall certainly know that my father's malice is complete against thee.

¹⁰And David answered Jonathas: Who shall bring me word, if thy father answer thee perhaps any thing sharply of me?

¹¹And Jonathas said to David: Come, let us go forth abroad into the field: and when they were both gone forth into the field,

¹²Jonathas said to David: Lord God of Israel, if I shall search out my father's meaning, tomorrow or the day after, and some good thing be upon David, and I send not immediately unto thee, and make thee know thereof,

¹³these things do our Lord to Jonathas, and these things add he. But if my father's malice shall persevere against thee, I will reveal thine ear, and will dismiss thee, that thou mayest go in peace, and our Lord be with thee, as he hath been with my father.

¹⁴And if I live, thou shalt do me the mercy of our Lord, but if I die,

¹⁵thou shalt not take away thy mercy from my house for ever, when our Lord shall have rooted out the enemies of David, every one out of the land: take he away Jonathas from his house, and our Lord require it of the hands of David's enemies.

¹⁶Jonathas therefore made a league with the house of David: & our Lord required it of the hands of David's enemies.

¹⁷And Jonathas added to swear unto David, because he love him, for as his own soul, so he loved him.

¹⁸And Jonathas said to him: Tomorrow are the calends, and thou shalt be asked for:

¹⁹for thy sitting will be inquired of till after tomorrow. Thou shalt therefore go down in haste, and shalt come to the place, where thou must be hid in the day, when it is lawful to work, and thou shalt sit beside the stone which is named Ezel.

²⁰And I will shoot three arrows near it, and will shoot as it were exercising myself at a mark.

²¹I will send also a boy saying to him: Go, and fetch me the arrows.

²²If I shall say to the boy: Lo, the arrows are on this side thee, take them up: come thou to me, because there is peace to thee, and there is no evil, our Lord liveth. But if I shall speak thus to the boy: Lo the arrows are beyond thee: Go in peace, because our Lord hath dismissed thee.

²³And concerning the word which I and thou have spoken, our Lord be between thee and me for ever.

²⁴David therefore was hid in the field, and the calends came, and the king sat down to eat bread.

²⁵And when the king was set upon his chair (according to the custom) which was beside the wall, Jonathas arose, and Abner sat at the side of Saul, and David's place appeared void.

²⁶And Saul said nothing that day, for he thought it had chanced perhaps unto him, that he was not clean, nor purified.

²⁷And when the second day was come after the calends, again David's place appeared empty. And Saul said to Jonathas his son: Why came not the son of Isai neither yesterday nor today to eat?

²⁸Jonathas answered Saul: He desired me instantly, that he might go into Bethlehem,

²⁹and he said: Let me go, because there is a solemn sacrifice in the city, one of my brethren hath sent for me: now therefore if I have found grace in thy sight, I will go quickly, & see my brethren. For this cause he came not to the king's table.

³⁰But Saul being wrath against Jonathas, said to him: Thou son of a woman which of her own accord ravisheth a man, am I ignorant that thou lovest the son of Isai unto thine own confusion, & to the confusion of thine ignominious mother?

³¹For all the days, that the son of Isai shall live upon the earth, thou shalt not be established, nor thy Kingdom. Therefore now presently send, and bring him to me: because he is the son of death.

³²And Jonathas answering Saul his father, said: Why shall he die? What hath he done?

³³And Saul caught a spear to strike him. And Jonathas understood that it was determined of his father, that he would kill David.

³⁴Jonathas therefore rose from the table in anger of fury, and did not eat bread the second day of the calends. For he was strucken heavy upon David, because his father had confounded him.

³⁵And when the morning appeared, Jonathas came into the field according to the appointment with David, and a little boy with him,

³⁶and said to his boy: Go, & fetch me the arrows, which I shoot. And when the boy had run, he shot another arrow beyond the boy.

³⁷The boy therefore came to the place of the arrow, which Jonathas had shot: and Jonathas cried behind the back of the boy, and said: Lo the arrow is there further beyond thee.

³⁸And Jonathas cried again behind the back of the boy, saying: Make haste speedily, stand not. And Jonathas his boy gathered up his arrows, and brought them to his master:

³⁹and he was altogether ignorant, what was done: for only Jonathas and David knew the matter.

⁴⁰Jonathas therefore gave his armour to the boy, and said to him: Go, and carry them into the city.

⁴¹And when the boy was gone, David rose out of the place, which did bend to the South, and falling flat on the ground, adored thrice: & kissing one another, they wept together, but David more.

⁴²Jonathas therefore said to David: Go in peace: whatsoever we have sworn both of us in the name of our Lord, saying: Our Lord be between me and thee, and between my seed and thy seed for ever.

⁴³And David arose, and departed: but Jonathas also entered into the City.