Why is the Bible not explicit about David and Jonathan?

by Thomas
(San Francisco)

Wilderness of Engedi, <br>where David hid from King Saul

Wilderness of Engedi,
where David hid from King Saul

Rick Brentlinger Answers -


Jump to Thomas' original question. Thanks for asking a question that has intrigued believers for hundreds of years. The David and Jonathan story is THE most explicit human love story in the Bible.

No other human love story in the Bible, and certainly no Bible story about love between opposite sex partners, is told at such length, chapter after chapter, with as much detail and pathos as the true love story of Jonathan and David.

5 Important Facts
About David and Jonathan


  1. God emphasizes the incredible love between Jonathan and David, four times using, ahab, the Hebrew word for love, to describe their affection. Gay people did not insert this story into scripture. God put it there.

  2. God contrasts the happy, soul-satisfying love match of Crown Prince Jonathan and David with the unhappy marriage of David and Princess Michal. God further contrasts the visceral hatred King Saul demonstrated for David, and Saul’s insane attempts to kill both David and Jonathan, with the soulful love between David and Jonathan.

    The Bible portrays God as blessing the happy Jonathan-David partnership in contrast to the David-Michal and David-Saul relationships which were tempestuous and unhappy.

  3. Jonathan and David’s partnership was public from start to finish. At a time when Saul had put a contract on David’s life and offered huge rewards to anyone who would help him kill David, Jonathan and David are able to meet whenever they want, without King Saul ever finding David to kill him. The warriors of Saul, Jonathan and David enabled their intimate loving relationship for fifteen years.

  4. Saul testifies to the sexual nature of the Jonathan and David partnership in I Samuel 20:30, when he uses a Hebrew vulgarism which indicates Saul thought Jonathan and David had a sexual relationship. Saul was an eye witness to the closeness of their partnership and the Holy Spirit, also an eye witness, carefully records Saul's testimony for our edification.

  5. David alludes to the sexual nature of his partnership with Jonathan in 2 Samuel 1:26, publicly testifying before his army that Jonathan’s love was better to him than the love of his many wives. David was a polygamist.

    He had many wives in addition to his original partnership with Jonathan, 2 Samuel 3:2-5, 13-14, 11:27, 12:7-8, 19:5, 1 Chronicles 14:3. David partnered with Jonathan BEFORE he or Jonathan had married wives.

Related information
at these Links


1. Why did God put the focus on the intimate David and Jonathan partnership?

2. Does the fact that David loved Jonathan indicate they were same sex partners?

3. Why does God make it clear in the Bible that Jonathan loved David?

4. Is it possible that there are gay couples in the Bible?

5. If Jonathan and David were gay, why were they not put to death?

6. Did David have wives before or after his partnership with Jonathan?

7. Why didn't David kill Saul when he had the opportunity?

Thomas' Original Question:

"The Bible was blatant about the good and bad of David - extremely blatant about Bathsheba and David's murder of Uriah. Why would the writer not explicitly write of a homosexual relationship between David and Jonathan?

The Bible would have stated it if it were true, but it is not."

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