flood of light, both directly and indirectly, on the theology of Saul's
countrymen--that is to say, upon their beliefs respecting the nature and
ways of spiritual beings.

Even without the confirmation of other abundant evidences to the same
effect, it leaves no doubt as to the existence, among them, of the
fundamental doctrine that man consists of a body and of a spirit, which
last, after the death of the body, continues to exist as a ghost. At the
time of Saul's visit to Endor, Samuel was dead and buried; but that his
spirit would be believed to continue to exist in Sheol may be concluded
from the well-known passage in the song attributed to Hannah, his
mother:--

Jahveh killeth and maketh alive;
He bringeth down to Sheol and bringeth up.
(1 Sam. ii. 6.)

And it is obvious that this Sheol was thought to be a place underground
in which Samuel's spirit had been disturbed by the necromancer's
summons, and in which, after his return thither, he would be joined by
the spirits of Saul and his sons when they had met with their bodily
death on the hill of Gilboa. It is further to be observed that the
spirit, or ghost, of the dead man presents itself as the image of
the man himself--it is the man, not merely in his ordinary corporeal
presentment (even down to the prophet's mantle) but in his moral and
intellectual characteristics. Samuel, who had begun as Saul's friend and
ended as his bitter enemy, gives it to be understood that he is annoyed
at Saul's presumption in disturbing him; and that, in Sheol, he is as
much the devoted servant of Jahveh and as much empowered to speak in
Jahveh's name as he was during his sojourn in the upper air.

It appears now to be universally admitted that, before the exile, the
Israelites had no belief in rewards and punishments after death, nor in
anything similar to the Christian heaven and hell; but our story proves
that it would be an error to suppose that they did not believe in the
continuance of individual existence after death by a ghostly simulacrum
of life. Nay, I think it would be very hard to produce conclusive
evidence that they disbelieved in immortality; for I am not aware that
there is anything to show that they thought the existence of the souls
of the dead in Sheol ever came to an end. But they do not seem to
have conceived that the condition of the souls in Sheol was in any way
affected by their conduct in life. If there was imm