On the Witch of Endor (Homily on 1 Samuel 28)

The passages read are rather many, and since I must speak briefly, there are four sections. The sequel of the story about Nabal the Carmelite was read. Then after this the story about David's hiding among the Ziphites and being informed on by them, and Saul's coming, wishing to take David, and having come, watching for an opportunity; and David's coming upon Saul and taking, while he and his guards slept, “the spear and the jar of water,” and after this bringing a reproach against those who had been entrusted with guarding him but had fallen asleep. Then the third story after these was that David fled “to Achish son of Maoch, king of Gath,” and how much favor David found with him after his many brave deeds, to whom he says, “I will make you chief of my bodyguard.” Next to these was the celebrated story about the woman with a divining spirit and about Samuel: that the woman with a divining spirit seemed to have brought up Samuel, and Samuel prophesies to Saul. There being four sections, each of which contains many matters and can occupy those able to examine them for the hours not of one assembly but of several, let the bishop propose whichever of the four he wishes, so that we may occupy ourselves with it. “Let the matter of the woman with a divining spirit,” he says, “be examined.”

Some stories do not touch us, but some are necessary for our hope; I have said “stories” since we have not yet come to the higher sense, useful to everyone who knows how to interpret it or to hear it interpreted. Of the things in the history, then, some are useful to all, some not to all. For example, the story about Lot and his daughters: whether it has something useful in the higher sense, God knows, and whoever he grants to examine those words; but as to the history, you might ask: “What benefit is it to me, the story about Lot and his daughters?” Likewise, what benefit to me is the story of Judah and Tamar and what happened to her, told simply? But the story about Saul and the woman with a divining spirit touches everyone; it is a truth necessary according to the letter. For who, released from this life, wishes to be under the power of a demon, so that a woman with a divining spirit may bring up not just any believer, but Samuel the prophet? About him God says through Jeremiah, “Even if Moses and Samuel stood before me, I would not listen even to them”; about him the prophet says in hymns, “Moses and Aaron among his priests, and Samuel among those who call upon his name; they called upon the Lord, and he heard them; in the pillar of cloud he spoke to them”; and elsewhere, “If Moses and Samuel stand,” and the rest. If, then, so great a man was under the earth and the woman with a divining spirit brought him up, does a demon have power over a prophetic soul? What are we to say? These things are written: are they true or not true? To say that they are not true leads to unbelief (let it come on the heads of those who say it); but to say that they are true gives us inquiry and perplexity.

And indeed we know some of our brothers who have faced up to Scripture and say: “I do not believe the woman with a divining spirit. The woman says she saw Samuel; she is lying. Samuel was not brought up; Samuel does not speak. But just as there are some false prophets who say, ‘Thus says the Lord,’ when ‘the Lord has not spoken,’ so this demon too lies, promising to bring up the one Saul ordered.” For “Whom shall I bring up?” she says; “Bring up Samuel for me.” And this is said by those who maintain that this story is not true: “Samuel in Hades? Samuel brought up by a woman with a divining spirit, the exceptional among the prophets, who was dedicated to God from his birth, who before his birth was said in the temple to be going to be, who as soon as he was weaned put on an ephod and a double robe and became a priest of the Lord, to whom the Lord gave oracles, speaking, while he was still a child? Samuel in Hades? Samuel among those under the earth, who succeeded Eli, who had been condemned by providence because of the sins and transgressions of his children? Samuel in Hades, whom God heard in the time of the wheat harvest, and let rain come from heaven? Samuel in Hades, who spoke so boldly, whether he had taken anything anyone desired? He did not take the calf, he did not take the ox; he judged and governed the people, remaining poor; never did he desire to take anything from so great and so large a people. Samuel, why in Hades? Do you see what follows from Samuel in Hades? Samuel in Hades? Why not Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in Hades too? Samuel in Hades? Why not Moses too, who is yoked with Samuel according to the saying, ‘Not even if Moses and Samuel stand, not even them’? Samuel in Hades? Why not Jeremiah too in Hades, to whom it was said, ‘Before I formed you in the womb I know you, and before you came out of the womb I have sanctified you’? Isaiah in Hades too, Jeremiah in Hades too, all the prophets in Hades, in Hades!”

These things the one who does not wish to take up the struggle, that it really is Samuel who was brought up, will say. But since one must be fair-minded in hearing the Scriptures, now that the argument has thundered at us persuasively and can truly disturb and move us, let us see whether Scripture has been understood by the one who does not accept this, or whether he argues from plausible opinions but says what is contrary to what is written. For what is written? “And the woman said: Whom shall I bring up for you?” Whose person is it that says, “the woman said”? Is it the person of the Holy Spirit, by whom Scripture is believed to have been written, or someone else's? For the narrative person everywhere (as even those versed in all kinds of literature know) is the person of the author; and the author of these words is believed to be not a man, but the author is the Holy Spirit, who moved the men. So the Holy Spirit says: “And the woman said: Whom shall I bring up for you? And he said: Samuel, for me.” Who says, “And the woman saw Samuel, and the woman cried out with a loud voice, saying”? We shall say to that man who thundered so much at us and said ten thousand things to the effect that Samuel was not in Hades: “The woman saw Samuel”: the narrative voice said this; “and the woman cried out with a loud voice and said to Saul: Why have you deceived me? You are Saul. And the king said to her: What is it? Do not fear; what have you seen? And the woman said to Saul: I saw gods coming up out of the earth. And he said to her: What is their appearance? And she said to him: An old man coming up, and he is wrapped in a double robe, an ephod.” It says she saw even the priestly garment. But I know that the one on the other side of the argument says: “No wonder; for Satan himself disguises himself as an angel of light. So it is no great thing if his servants too disguise themselves as servants of righteousness.” But what is it that “the woman saw”? “Samuel.” And why is it not said, “The woman saw a demon that pretended to be Samuel”? But it is written that “Saul knew that it was Samuel.” If it were not Samuel, it should have been written, “Saul thought it was Samuel.” But as it is, it is written, “Saul knew,” and no one knows what is not; “Saul,” then, “knew that it was Samuel,” “and he fell on his face to the ground and did obeisance.” Then again the person of Scripture: “And Samuel said to Saul: Why have you troubled me by bringing me up?” “Said,” says Scripture (which one must believe): “Samuel said: Why have you troubled me by bringing me up?” Then Saul answers this: “The Philistines are making war on me greatly, and God has departed from me and has not answered me any more, either by the hand of the prophets or in dreams; I have called you to show me what I shall do.” Again Scripture did not speak otherwise, but said that Samuel himself said: “And why do you ask me? The Lord has departed from you.” Is he speaking truly or falsely in saying this: “The Lord has departed from you, and has become against you, and has made for himself another, as he spoke by my hand, and he will tear the kingdom out of your hand”? And does a demon prophesy about the kingdom of Israel? What does the opposing argument say? You see how great a struggle there is in the word of God, needing also hearers able to hear holy words, great and secret words about the departure from this life, while the former things are still in doubt and the latter are not clear.

But the argument is still being examined. I say that both the story and the examination of it are necessary, so that we may see what awaits us after our departure. “He has spoken by my hand, and the Lord will tear the kingdom out of your hand and give it to your neighbor, to David.” A demon cannot know about the kingship of David, who was appointed by the Lord. “Because you did not listen to the voice of the Lord, you did not carry out the fury of his anger on Amalek.” Are these not words of God? Are they not true? For truly Saul did not do the will of the Lord, but “spared the king of Amalek,” for which Samuel reproached Saul both before his falling asleep and at his departure: “And for this reason the Lord has done this thing to you this day; and the Lord will give Israel too into the hands of the Philistines.” Can a demon prophesy about a whole people of God, that the Lord is going to hand Israel over? “And the Lord will give the camp of Israel too into the hands of the Philistines. Make haste, Saul: tomorrow you and your sons will be with me.” Can a demon know this too, about a king appointed with prophetic anointing, that tomorrow Saul was going to depart from life, and his sons with him? “Tomorrow you and your sons will be with me.”

These things, then, show that what is written is not false, and that it is Samuel who came up. What, then, is a woman with a divining spirit doing here? What is a woman with a divining spirit doing with the bringing up of the soul of a righteous man? The one who gave the first argument fled (so as not to seem to have a struggle over so many other questions raised about the passage) and says: “It is not Samuel; the demon lies,” since Scripture cannot lie. But the words of Scripture are not in the person of the demon itself, but in its own person: “And the woman saw Samuel,” “Saul said” … the things spoken by Samuel. How, then, will the matters of the woman with a divining spirit in this passage appear resolved? I ask the one who said the former things (“Samuel in Hades?” and the rest), and let him answer the question: Who is greater, Samuel or Jesus the Christ? Who is greater, the prophets or Jesus the Christ? Who is greater, Abraham or Jesus the Christ? Here none of those who have once come to know the Lord Jesus Christ, who was proclaimed beforehand by the prophets, will dare to say that Christ is not greater than the prophets. When, then, you confess that Jesus Christ is greater: was Christ in Hades, or was he not there? Is what is said in the Psalms not true, interpreted by the apostles in their Acts, about the Savior's having gone down into Hades? It is written that what is in the fifteenth Psalm refers to him: “For you will not abandon my soul to Hades, nor let your holy one see corruption.” So Jesus Christ was in Hades. And are you afraid to say that a prophet too goes down there, yes, to prophesy and to come to the other souls? Then after this, if he answers that Christ went down to Hades, I will say: Christ went down to Hades to do what? To conquer, or to be conquered by death? And he went down into those regions not as a slave of those there, but as master, to wrestle, as we said recently in explaining the twenty-first Psalm: “Many young bulls surrounded me; fat bulls encircled me; they opened their mouth against me like a lion ravening and roaring; my bones were scattered.” We remember, if indeed we remember the sacred writings; for I remember them being spoken on the twenty-first Psalm. So the Savior went down to save. Did he go down there proclaimed beforehand by the prophets, or not? Was he proclaimed beforehand here by the prophets, but goes down elsewhere not through prophets? And Moses proclaims him as going to come to the human race, so that it is well said by our Lord and Savior: “If you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote of me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?” And Christ came to this life, and Christ is proclaimed beforehand as coming to this life. And if Moses prophesies him here, do you not wish that he went down there too, to prophesy that Christ would come? And what? Moses, but not the prophets after him? Not Samuel? What is absurd in physicians going down to the sick? And what is absurd in the chief physician too going down to the sick? Those were many physicians; but my Lord and Savior is the chief physician; for he heals even the inward desire which cannot be healed by others; which “could not be healed by any” of the physicians, Christ Jesus heals it. Do not fear, do not be amazed: Jesus was in Hades, and the prophets before him, and they proclaim beforehand the coming of Christ.

Then I also wish to say something else from Scripture itself. Samuel comes up; and what does the woman say to Saul that she has seen? She does not say she has seen a man; she cowered before the one she saw. Whom does she see? “Gods,” she says, “I saw, gods coming up from the earth.” And perhaps Samuel did not come up alone then to prophesy to Saul; but it is likely that, just as here “with the holy you will be holy, and with the innocent man you will be innocent, and with the chosen you will be chosen,” and here there are dwellings of saints with saints, not of saints with sinners (and if ever the saints do dwell with sinners, it is in order to save the sinners too), so perhaps with Samuel as he came up there came up either holy souls of other prophets, or angels had come up with the spirits. Perhaps you will ask whether angels were over their spirits? The prophet says, “The angel who spoke in me”; and all things are full of those who need salvation, and “all are ministering spirits sent out to serve for the sake of those who are to inherit salvation.” Why are you afraid to say that every place needs Jesus Christ? The one who needs Christ needs the prophets; for he does not need Christ and not need those who prepare the way for Christ's coming and sojourn. And John, than whom none among those born of women was greater, according to the testimony of our Savior, who says, “Among those born of women none is greater than John the Baptist”: do not fear to say that he went down to Hades proclaiming my Lord beforehand, to foretell that he would come down. That is why, when he was in prison and knew that his departure was at hand, he sent two of his disciples and asked, not “Are you the one who is to come?” (for he knew), but “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?” He saw his glory; he said much about his wonderfulness; he testified to him first: “He who comes after me has become before me”; he saw his glory, “glory as of the only-begotten from the Father, full of grace and truth.” Having seen such great things about Christ, does he hesitate to believe, does he doubt, and not say, “Tell him: Are you the Christ?” For some, not understanding what is said, now say: “John, so great a man, did not know Christ, but the Holy Spirit had departed from him.” But he knew him, to whom he bore witness before his birth, and at whose coming he leaped, when Mary too came to him, as his mother testified of him, saying: “For behold, when the sound of your greeting came to my ears, the babe in my womb leaped for joy.” This John, then, who leaped before his birth, who said, “This is he of whom I said, He who comes after me has become before me,” and “He who sent me said to me: He on whom you see the Spirit descending and remaining, this is the Son of God”: did this man, they say, no longer know Jesus Christ? He knew him in the womb. But because of the surpassing greatness of his glory he did something like Peter. What? Peter knew something great about Christ. “Who am I? Who do men say that I am?” He said: this and that. “But you, what do you say?” “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God,” for which he is also called blessed, because “flesh and blood did not reveal it” to him, “but the Father who is in heaven.” Since, then, he had heard great things about Christ and conceived great things, he did not accept the … toward him: “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem, and it will be accomplished,” and “The Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the chief priests and elders and be killed, and on the third day rise again,” but says, “God be merciful to you, Lord.” He knew great things about Christ; he would not accept the humbler thing about him. Understand for me that John too was of this kind. He was in prison knowing great things about Christ; he had seen the heavens opened, he had seen the Holy Spirit coming down from heaven upon the Savior and remaining on him; having seen such great glory, he doubted, and perhaps disbelieved, whether one so glorious would come down even to Hades and to the abyss; that is why he said, “Are you the one who is to come, or shall we look for another?”

I have not digressed nor forgotten the subject; but we wish to establish this: that if all the prophets of Christ, forerunners of Christ, went down to Hades before Christ, so Samuel too went down there; for not simply, but as a holy man. Wherever the holy man is, he is holy. Is Christ no longer Christ because he was once in Hades? Was he no longer the Son of God because he had been in the place under the earth, “so that at the name of Jesus Christ every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth”? So Christ was Christ even when he was below, and, so to speak, being in the place below, he was above in his purpose. So too the prophets and Samuel, even if they go down where the souls below are: they can be below in place, but they are not below in purpose. And I ask: † they prophesied the things above the heavens. But I cannot grant a demon such great power that it prophesies about Saul and the people of God, and prophesies about the kingdom of David, that he is going to reign. Those who say these things will learn the truth about the passage; they will not find how to show that a holy man should not come, for the sake of those who are in a bad state, to the place of those in a bad state. Let physicians go to the places of the sick soldiers, and enter where the stench of their wounds is; medical love of humankind suggests this. So the Word suggested this to the Savior and to the prophets, both to come here and to go down into Hades.

And this too must be added to the argument: if it was Samuel, and when he departed the Holy Spirit left him and prophecy left him, then the apostle is not speaking truly when he says: “Now I prophesy in part, and I know in part; but when the perfect comes, then what is in part will be done away.” So the perfect is after this life. And if Isaiah prophesied anything, he prophesied in part with all boldness; and David has borne witness here to the perfection of prophecy. So Samuel did not cast off the prophetic grace. And that he did not cast it off, did he then use it as those who speak in tongues, so as to say, “My spirit prays, but my mind is unfruitful”? And yet the one who speaks in a tongue does not build up the church; for Paul says that the one who prophesies builds up the church, saying in these very words: “But the one who prophesies builds up the church.” And if “the one who prophesies builds up the church,” and he had the prophetic grace (for he had not lost it, not having sinned; for he alone loses the prophetic grace who, after prophesying, has done things unworthy of the Holy Spirit, so that it forsakes him and flees from his ruling faculty; which David too feared then, after his sin, and said, “And do not take your Holy Spirit from me”); if, then, the Holy Spirit prophesies, and Samuel was a prophet, and “the one who prophesies builds up the church,” whom does he build up? Does he prophesy to heaven? To whom? To angels, who have no need? “Those who are well have no need” [of a physician], “but those who are sick.” Some need his prophecy; for the prophetic grace is not idle; no gift in the Holy Spirit is idle. So the souls of those who had fallen asleep (if I may say so) needed the prophetic grace. Here Israel needed the prophet; and the one who had fallen asleep, released from life, also needed the prophets, so that the prophets might again proclaim to him the coming of Christ. Besides, before the coming of my Lord Jesus Christ it was impossible for anyone to pass to where the tree of life is; it was impossible to pass those appointed to guard the way to the tree of life: “He stationed the cherubim and the flaming sword that turned, to guard the way to the tree of life.” Who could make a way? Who could make anyone pass through the flaming sword? Just as it was no one's to make a way through the sea but the pillar of fire, the pillar of light from God; just as it was no one's to make a way through the Jordan but Jesus (that Jesus was a type of the true God), so Samuel could not pass through the flaming sword, nor Abraham. That is why Abraham too is seen by the one being punished, and the rich man, being in torment, lifting up his eyes, sees, though far off, yet sees, Lazarus too in his bosom. So patriarchs and prophets and all awaited the coming of my Lord Jesus Christ, so that he might open the way. “I am the way,” “I am the door.” He is the way to the tree of life, so that it may come to pass: “If you pass through fire, the flame will not burn you.” But what fire? “He stationed the cherubim and the flaming sword that turned, to guard the way to the tree of life.” So for this reason the blessed waited there, carrying out a dispensation and not able [to be] where the tree of life is, where the paradise of God is, where God is the gardener, where the blessed and chosen and holy ones of God …

So there is no stumbling block in the passage, but everything has been written wonderfully and is understood by those to whom God reveals it. And we who have come at the end of the ages have something more. What more? If we depart from here having become good and noble, not bringing with us the burdens of sin, we too shall pass through the flaming sword, and shall not go down into the region where those who had fallen asleep before his coming awaited Christ; we shall pass through, harmed in nothing by the flaming sword. “But the fire itself will test what sort of work each one's is. If anyone's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, but he himself will be saved, yet so as through fire.” So we shall pass through; and we have something more: having lived well, we cannot depart badly. The ancients did not say, nor the patriarchs, nor the prophets, what we can say if we live well: “For it is better to depart and be with Christ.” So, having something more in this way, and great gain in having come at the end of the ages, we are the first to receive the denarius; for hear the parable, that beginning from the last he gave the denarius; and the first thought they would receive something more. So you are first, you who came last, receiving the wages from the master of the house in Christ Jesus our Lord, to whom be the glory and the power for ages of ages. Amen.