5 min read

What Hillel Learned From Saul About the Cost of the Soul

Hillel bathed on Fridays and called it a commandment. Then he turned to Saul to show what happens when a man abandons his own soul.

Curated by Arthur · Told by Maggid ·
Table of Contents
  1. The Bath That Was a Commandment
  2. Saul Entered the Teaching
  3. What Hillel Was Saying About the Soul
  4. The Necromancer at Endor and What Saul Became

The Bath That Was a Commandment

Hillel the Elder bathed on Friday afternoons. His students watched this happen and finally asked him about it. He told them he was fulfilling a religious obligation.

They pushed: what obligation? He said he was going to honor the image of God.

The body, he explained, is the house in which the soul lives. The soul carries the divine image. To care for the body is not vanity. It is a form of service, the same kind of service owed to any sacred vessel. If the statues of kings standing in theaters and circuses are washed and maintained by the men appointed to tend them, how much more should a person tend the image of God in which every human being is made.

This was Hillel at his gentlest. The soul is precious. Treat what carries it accordingly.

Saul Entered the Teaching

The harder lesson came in the same breath. Hillel did not let the ablution stand alone. He pointed his students toward King Saul, and the story he drew on was the one the prophet Samuel delivered at the moment Saul lost everything.

Saul had been given a direct command: destroy Amalek completely. No livestock. No prisoners. No spoil. He had assembled four hundred thousand men and gone to war. Then he had stopped short. He spared Agag, the Amalekite king, and he spared the best of the sheep and cattle and lambs, everything valuable. The rest he destroyed.

When Samuel arrived, he heard sheep bleating. He asked what the sound was. Saul explained that the people had saved the animals to sacrifice to God. Samuel told him that obedience is better than sacrifice. The LORD does not delight in burnt offerings the way he delights in obeying the divine voice. Because you rejected the word of God, God has rejected you as king.

The kingdom departed from Saul in that moment. He had weighed a divine command against his own judgment and found the command insufficient. The cost was everything.

What Hillel Was Saying About the Soul

The connection Hillel drew was not obvious. On the surface, the bath story and the Saul story have nothing in common. One is about hygiene. The other is about military disobedience and prophetic rejection.

But Hillel was reading Saul as a case study in what happens when a person fails to honor what has been entrusted to him. The soul was given to Saul as the kingship was given to Saul: as a sacred charge, not a possession. What Saul did with the divine command at Amalek was what any person does when they decide that their own assessment of a situation matters more than the obligations placed on them. He evaluated. He edited. He kept what he found valuable and discarded the rest.

The soul works the same way. A man who does not tend to it, who does not protect and honor the divine image he carries, has made the same calculation Saul made. He has decided that his own preferences are sufficient guidance. He has chosen himself over what was placed in him.

Hillel's teaching turned a bath into a rebuke and a military disaster into a mirror. Both pointed at the same failure. Both pointed at the same remedy.

The Necromancer at Endor and What Saul Became

The tradition that connects Hillel to Saul does not stop with the Amalek episode. The arc of Saul's life carried the teaching forward to its worst point. The king who had ignored Samuel's command eventually had no voice left to ignore. God was silent. Dreams gave nothing. The Urim gave nothing. The prophets gave nothing. Saul had stripped himself of every legitimate channel, not by one dramatic act but by the accumulation of half-obediences and small substitutions.

He ended at Endor, in the dark, asking a necromancer to raise a dead prophet so that he could hear the voice he had spent his career not listening to.

Hillel's students heard the bath story and the Saul story together because they were the same story at different scales. The body honored is a soul protected. The soul abandoned is a king at the door of a woman who raises the dead, hoping that this time the answer will be different from every other time.

HillelSaulSoulHoly LandProphecySamuelMidrash Aggadah
← All myths

From the tradition

Sources

3 sources

The texts this telling draws on, in full. Open a card to read inline, or expand it for a wider, quieter read.

Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer 33:13Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer

It’s a theme that echoes throughout the ages, and one particularly striking example comes to us from the story of King Saul.

The great sage Hillel the Elder, known for his wisdom and gentle guidance, once used Saul's story to illustrate a crucial point. Hillel draws on a moment of intense confrontation between the prophet Samuel and King Saul. The scene? Saul, having disobeyed God's explicit commands, now seeks answers from a medium, a "one possessed of a familiar spirit" – basically, a fortune teller.

Can you feel the weight of that moment?

In Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, a fascinating text filled with stories and interpretations, Hillel points to Samuel's harsh words to Saul. Samuel rebukes him, saying, "Was it not enough for thee that thou didst not hearken unto His voice, neither didst thou execute His fierce anger upon Amalek, but thou dost also inquire through one possessed of a familiar spirit, and thou seekest (to know the future)."

Saul had been commanded to utterly destroy the Amalekites, a nation that had historically been enemies of Israel. He failed. He spared the king, Agag, and kept some of the spoils. A clear violation of God's command.

And then, to compound the error, he consults a medium. It's like adding insult to injury, a desperate attempt to control a situation already spiraling out of control.

Hillel, in this moment preserved in Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, emphasizes the gravity of Saul's actions. Samuel continues, "Woe is the shepherd, and woe is his flock! For on thy account has the Holy One, blessed be He, given Israel thy people into the hands of the Philistines, as it is said, 'Moreover, the Lord will deliver Israel also with thee into the hand of the Philistines.'"

The consequences are devastating. Because of Saul's disobedience, not only will he suffer, but the entire nation of Israel will be delivered into the hands of their enemies, the Philistines.

That’s a heavy burden of responsibility. It really makes you think about the ripple effect of our choices, doesn’t it? How one seemingly small deviation from the right path can lead to unforeseen and catastrophic consequences, not just for ourselves, but for those around us. The story isn't just a historical account; it's a timeless lesson about leadership, responsibility, and the importance of staying true to our values, even when it's difficult.

Full source
Vayikra Rabbah 26:7Vayikra Rabbah

It's a tale of desperation, disobedience, and the dark consequences that follow when we turn away from the divine.

The story begins with a pointed question: what comes before this story? The text references (Leviticus 20:27): “A man or a woman, if they are a conjurer or a necromancer, [they shall be put to death].” Rabbi Yehoshua of Sikhnin, quoting Rabbi Levi, makes a direct connection: “’A man,’ this is Saul. ‘Or a woman,’ this is the woman who engaged in conjuring.”

Saul, feeling cornered by the Philistines and abandoned by God, seeks guidance from a forbidden source. As Rabbi Levi states in the name of Rabbi Ḥama bar Ḥanina, referencing (Deuteronomy 28:13), “You will be only above [and you will not be below].” Saul should have consulted the Urim and Tumim – a sort of divine oracle worn by the High Priest – "from above," but instead, he goes "below" to a conjurer. Saul, the king, the one who had previously banished all the conjurers and necromancers from the land, now finds himself seeking their help. It’s a stunning act of hypocrisy and desperation. He even disguises himself! The text says, "Saul disguised himself [vayitḥapess]" – meaning, he became free [ḥofshi] of the kingship. This act, the Etz Yosef commentary points out, effectively ended his reign.

Reish Lakish offers a powerful analogy: a king orders all the roosters slaughtered, then later asks for one to crow to signal the dawn. Saul, having outlawed necromancy, now begs for its services.

He even takes two men with him, Avner and Amasa. Rabbi Aivu points out the importance of proper conduct, noting that a person shouldn't travel alone with fewer than two companions. He illustrates this with examples of Abraham and Saul, both taking two attendants on important journeys.

They arrive at the woman’s dwelling at night. Now, here's an interesting detail: necromancy was believed to be ineffective at night! So why then? The text explains that "the hour was dark for them like night," meaning the light of God did not shine upon him. He was spiritually lost.

Saul, under oath, assures the woman she will not be blamed. Reish Lakish compares this to a woman swearing by her husband’s life while with her lover. A profound betrayal of trust.

The woman asks whom she should raise from the dead. Should it be someone who defied God, like Pharaoh, or someone who praised Him, like the Israelites at the Red Sea? Saul asks her to raise Samuel.

What follows is…intense. The woman is frightened when she sees Samuel, recognizing Saul despite his disguise. Why? Because, the text explains, spirits ascend differently for commoners and kings. A king ascends face up.

Saul, hearing the woman describe the figure as elohim (a term sometimes used for divine beings or powerful figures), grows frightened. Some say righteous men ascended with Samuel, indicated by the plural verb "ascending" [olim].

Now, there's a curious aside here about raising the dead with…well, let's just say intimate body parts. The text notes that the one who raises the dead sees them but doesn't hear their voice, and the one who needs them hears their voice but doesn't see them. In this case, the woman sees Samuel, but doesn’t hear him. Saul hears Samuel, but doesn’t see him. Avner and Amasa neither see nor hear him.

Samuel, understandably irritated, asks Saul, "Why have you irritated me to raise me?" Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi would weep when he reached this verse, thinking of (Amos 4:13), "For behold the former of mountains, and creator of wind, who tells man what his conversation is." Even the smallest, most insignificant conversations are recorded and judged.

Samuel rebukes Saul, reminding him that God has departed from him. Saul tries to explain his dire situation, but Samuel cuts him off, declaring that God has become his adversary and will give the kingdom to David.

Saul tries to argue that Samuel’s words are harsher than before. Samuel replies that he is now in the world of truth, no longer bound by the fear of Saul's power. He lays out the consequences of Saul's disobedience, specifically his failure to destroy Amalek.

The prophecy is grim: Saul and his sons will die in battle. But there's a sliver of solace: if Saul accepts his fate, he will be "with" Samuel, meaning he will share a place in the afterlife.

Saul, terrified, collapses. He lies to Avner and Amasa, telling them Samuel predicted victory and high positions for his sons. He then marches his sons to their deaths.

Reish Lakish paints a heartbreaking picture: God points out Saul to the angels, marveling that a man would knowingly take his sons to their deaths, embracing the divine judgment.

Rabbi Yehoshua of Sikhnin, again quoting Rabbi Levi, says God showed Moses each generation, including Saul and his sons falling by the sword. Moses is horrified that the first king of Israel will die such a violent death. God tells him to speak to the priests Saul murdered, as they are the ones condemning him.

The text concludes by listing Saul's sins: killing the priests of Nov, sparing Agag, disobeying Samuel, consulting a necromancer, and failing to seek counsel from God. As (Job 34:11) says, "For He repays a person for his action, and according to the conduct of a man He will provide for him."

So, what are we left with? A chilling reminder that even kings are not above the law, and that desperation can lead us down paths we should never tread. Saul's story is a cautionary tale about the importance of obedience, the dangers of seeking forbidden knowledge, and the ultimate consequences of turning away from God. It makes you wonder: when facing difficult choices, where do we turn for guidance? And what price are we willing to pay?

Full source
Exempla of the Rabbis, No. 259Exempla of the Rabbis (Gaster, 1924)

Hillel the Elder was famous for his patience. The Talmud records that no one ever saw him angry, no one ever heard him raise his voice, and no situation, however absurd or provocative, could shake his composure. The story of the belated meal put this reputation to the ultimate test.

In Massekhet Kallah and Derekh Eretz Rabbah (chapter 6), Hillel was once hosting a meal for guests. Everything was prepared. The food was ready. The table was set. But one of the guests arrived late. Very late. So late that the food had gone cold, the other guests had grown restless, and any reasonable host would have started without him.

Hillel did not start. He waited. When the tardy guest finally appeared, making excuses and apologies, Hillel received him with the same warmth he would have shown if the man had arrived first. No reproach. No passive aggression. No pointed comments about the time. Hillel simply served the meal as though nothing unusual had happened.

The other guests watched in amazement. Some were furious, they had been sitting there hungry for hours because of one person's inconsideration, and the host was acting as though this were perfectly acceptable behavior.

But Hillel understood something the others did not. Embarrassing a guest, even a guilty one, is a greater sin than any inconvenience caused by lateness. The Talmud teaches that shaming someone publicly is equivalent to shedding blood. Hillel would rather let his food go cold and his other guests go hungry than allow a single person to feel unwelcome at his table.

The tale became a model for Jewish hospitality across the medieval world: the measure of a host is not the quality of the meal, but the warmth of the welcome.

Full source