And the people rushed upon the spoil, and took sheep, and oxen, and calves, and slew them on the ground: and the people did eat them with the blood.
All Commentaries on 1 Samuel 14:32 Go To 1 Samuel 14
Bede
AD 735
When it is said that the people ate the animals with their blood, one ought not the think that they ate the meat bloody and raw. After all, it is not human nature but the nature of wild animals to do that. Rather, once the herds had been killed, they began cooking or roasting the meat before it had been properly drained, and so they ate meat not yet fully purged of blood. This practice, however, refers to lazy teachers who, just as we see today, are wearied by the time-consuming task of catechizing, offer to God through their teaching a number of people whom they have delivered by their preaching from demonic errors and pagan rituals. They attempt to imitate him to whom it was said, when animals of every sort were lowered from the heavens, “Kill and eat.” But just as the Israelites slaughtered animals on the ground and ate them with the blood, so these teachers do not draw them from earthly senses and the allurements of flesh and blood. Perhaps they are less than perfect teachers; perhaps they see virtue less than perfectly. They hasten to incorporate into the members of the church people who are still accustomed to vice and not yet well grounded in performing virtues. They do this contrary to the example of the first pastor of the church who, seated in the upper room, that is, at the highest pinnacle of his living and teaching, was ordered to kill and eat offerings purified by God. And one should note how less than perfect and weak is the perfection of the human mind. Jonathan achieved so many and so great works and was the instigator of such a great victory, but in ignorance [he] committed a fault by letting his stomach steal food. After all the people had with due deliberation observed the time of fasting and after they had overcome their enemies in one day, the Israelites themselves were overcome in turn by gluttony. But because the temptation of the stomach is manifold, it enticed Jonathan, who ate before he should have, and it persuaded the Israelites to eat what is not appropriate, although it was an appropriate time.
