GIONATA (Heb. Jönäthän, “Jahweh has given”). — Saul (v.), and one of the most heroic and attractive figures in the Bible. He was perhaps 20 years old when he appears beside his father, who had probably been reigning for 15 years. The Philistine yoke was to be shaken off, and it was G. who, by killing a garrison commander, gave the signal for the revolt (I Sam. 13). Immediately afterward, with only his armor-bearer, he defeated another Philistine garrison, climbing up sheer cliffs that seemed impossible to scale: an exploit that led to a dazzling Israelite victory (I Sam. 14). Only slightly older than David, as soon as he met him after the duel with Goliath (v.), he “loved him as his own soul.” And even when he learned that David, not he, would be king of Israel, he continued to love him and to defend him from his father, although this drew upon him his anger and insults (I Sam. 18-20; 23, 15-18). He died valiantly, beside Saul, on the mountains of Gelboe, fighting against the Philistines.
David mourned, in a celebrated lament, “the bow of G., which never retreated,” his anguish for “brother G.,” who was “very dear” to him, whose love was “more precious to him than the love of a woman” (II Sam. 1, 19-27). G. left, at his death, a five-year-old son, Miphiboseth (v.), whom David, in memory of his friend, would later make his perpetual table companion (II Sam. 9).
Other biblical figures: V. SWIFT, JONATHAN.