Jonathan is not named in connection with the war against Amalek, nor is he allowed to stand as Israel's champion against Goliath; this honour is reserved for the shepherd lad. His first recorded meeting with David is when Abner leads the victor into Saul's tent, bearing in his hand the symbol of his triumph - the head of the giant.
In that hour a life-long love was born, a love which for its sheer unselfishness stands almost unique in the annals of man. He sees David using the sling, the weapon for which his own tribe Benjamin had been famous for generations (1 Chr 12.2; Judg 20.16). He knows that the rise of David means the setting of his own star, and that his claims will be set aside when the shepherd lad mounts the steps of the throne; yet his heart slips out of his breast into David's keeping - he loves him as his own soul.
We, too, have been brought to face a greater than David, returning from a fiercer fight than that of the Valley of Elah. We have seen sorrow and love flowing mingled down from the thorn pierced brow of the Son of God. Have we, like Jonathan, by an act of faith and devotion, set Him upon the heart's throne, the citadel of a consuming and absorbing love?
On that day a covenant was cut between the two friends; its terms we are not told but its practical issues stand revealed. Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was upon him and gave it to David, also his apparel, even to his sword and to his bow and to his girdle.
This speaks of the distinctions which stamped him as a prince: his girdle was a symbol of service, the bow the sign of far-reaching influence, the sword of his surrendered powers. The last-named gift is peculiarly touching, since there was only one other sword available amongst the Hebrews (1 Sam 13.22) and David himself was already furnished with the one he had taken from Goliath and should need no second.
But love refuses to calculate, and Jonathan gladly enslaves himself to his friend. Aristotle points out that a slave "is a part of his master, as it were a living though separated portion of his body"; we, in turn, are members of Christ's body and have ceased to enjoy the right of independent action.
Concluded.
