1 Samuel 14 · a question people ask
Why didn't the LORD answer Saul? Was it Jonathan's taste of honey?
The chapter says that when Saul asked counsel of God, "he didn’t answer him that day" (14:37), and it doesn't say why. It says that Jonathan "didn’t hear when his father commanded the people with the oath" (14:27), that the lot took Jonathan (14:42), that Jonathan told what he had done (14:43), and that "the people rescued Jonathan, so he didn’t die" (14:45). Christians read the LORD's silence in two main ways, each resting on verses, and both take all of these verses as true. Judges 11 has a vow made before a battle (Judges 11:30-31), and its honest question sets out the main readings of what Jephthah did (Judges 11:39); here, the one caught by the oath hadn't heard it (14:27), and he doesn't die (14:45).
How Christians read it
Where Christians differ, Favor sets out the main views side by side and doesn't pick one.
The oath had been broken
Those who read it this way start from what Saul did when no answer came: "know and see in whom this sin has been today" (14:38), and the lot went on to take Jonathan (14:41-42). The Law says of anyone who "swears an oath to bind his soul with a bond, he shall not break his word" (Numbers 30:2). In Joshua 7, when "Israel has sinned" (Joshua 7:11), the LORD said, "I will not be with you any more, unless you destroy the devoted things from among you" (Joshua 7:12), and the one who had done it was selected tribe by tribe (Joshua 7:16-18). Read this way, the silence came because Saul's oath had been broken, even though Jonathan didn't know of it (14:27).
1 Samuel 14:38 · 1 Samuel 14:41-42 · Numbers 30:2 · Joshua 7:11-12 · Joshua 7:16-18 · 1 Samuel 14:27
The trouble lay elsewhere
Those who read it this way start from Jonathan's words about the oath itself: "My father has troubled the land" (14:29). They point to what the hunger led to: the people "ate them with the blood" (14:32), and Saul himself was told, "Behold, the people are sinning against the LORD" (14:33). The Law speaks of one who "swears rashly with his lips" (Leviticus 5:4). And the people say of Jonathan, "he has worked with God today!" (14:45). Read this way, the silence isn't laid on Jonathan's taste of honey, but on Saul's oath or on the people's sin with the blood.
1 Samuel 14:29 · 1 Samuel 14:32-33 · Leviticus 5:4 · 1 Samuel 14:45
The verses
“But Jonathan didn’t hear when his father commanded the people with the oath. Therefore he put out the end of the rod that was in his hand and dipped it in the honeycomb, and put his hand to his mouth; and his eyes brightened.”
“Saul asked counsel of God: “Shall I go down after the Philistines? Will you deliver them into the hand of Israel?” But he didn’t answer him that day.”
“Jephthah vowed a vow to the LORD, and said, “If you will indeed deliver the children of Ammon into my hand, then it shall be, that whatever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the children of Ammon, it shall be the LORD’s, and I will offer it up for a burnt offering.””
“At the end of two months, she returned to her father, who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed. She was a virgin. It became a custom in Israel”