Crossword-Solution: JABESH 6 letters, 4 clues 🏆 scrabble score: 18

For the men of Jabesh burnt the body of Saul; and by no prohibited practice, to avoid contagion or pollution, in time of pestilence, burnt the bodies of their friends.[AJ] And when they burnt not their dead bodies, yet sometimes used great burnings near and about them, deducible from the expressions concerning Jehoram, Zedechias, and the sumptuous pyre of Asa.

Then they that dwell beyond the flats and fens Of sullen Jordan, and in gelid glens Of Jabesh-Gilead--chosen chiefs and few-- Around their loins the hasty girdle drew, And faced the forests, huddled fold on fold, And dells of glimmering greenness manifold.

From Jabesh then the weeping virgins came; In Jabesh then they built the funeral flame; With costly woods they piled the lordly pyre, Brought yellow oils and fed the perfect fire; While round the crescent stately elders spread The flashing armour of the mighty dead, With crown and spear, and all the trophies won From many wars by Israel's dreadful son.

God's reply was: "Was not Saul a king anointed with holy oil, did he not abolish idolatry, is he not the companion of Samuel in Paradise? Yet, while you all dwell in the land of Israel, he is 'outside of the land.'" David, accompanied by the scholars and the nobles of his kingdom, at once repaired to Jabesh-gilead, disinterred the remains of Saul and Jonathan, and in solemn procession bore them through the whole land of Israel to the inheritance of the tribe of Benjamin.

But, "when the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead heard of that which the Philistines had done to Saul, all the valiant men arose and went all night and took the body of Saul and the bodies of his sons from the wall of Bethshan and came to Jabesh and burnt them there.