1 Samuel 8
Butler7 2 And it came to pass, from the day that the ark abode in Kirjath-jearim, that the time was long; for it was twenty years: and all the house of Israel lamented after the LORD. And Samuel spake unto all the house of Israel, saying, If ye do return unto the LORD with all your heart, then put away the strange gods and the Ashtaroth from among you, and prepare your hearts unto the LORD, and serve him only: and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines. Then the children of Israel did put away the Baalim and the Ashtaroth, and
5 served the LORD only. And Samuel said, Gather all Israel to Mizpah, and I will pray for you 6 unto the LORD. And they gathered together to Mizpah, and drew water, and poured it out before the LORD, and fasted on that day, and said there, We have sinned against the LORD. And Samuel judged the children of Israel in Mizpah. 7 And when the Philistines heard that the children of Israel were gathered together to Mizpah, the lords of the Philistines went up against Israel. And when the children of Israel heard it, 8 they were afraid of the Philistines. And the children of Israel said to Samuel, Cease not to cry 9 unto the LORD our God for us, that he will save us out of the hand of the Philistines. And Samuel took a sucking lamb, and offered it for a whole burnt offering unto the LORD: and 10 Samuel cried unto the LORD for Israel; and the LORD answered him. And as Samuel was offering up the burnt offering, the Philistines drew near to battle against Israel: but the LORD thundered with a great thunder on that day upon the Philistines, and discomfited them; and 11 they were smitten down before Israel. And the men of Israel went out of Mizpah, and pur- 12 sued the Philistines, and smote them, until they came under Beth-car. Then Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpah and Shen, and called the name of it Eben-ezer, saying, Hith- 13 erto hath the LORD helped us. So the Philistines were subdued, and they came no more within the border of Israel: and the hand of the LORD was against the Philistines all the days 14 of Samuel. And the cities which the Philistines had taken from Israel were restored to Israel, from Ekron even unto Gath; and the border thereof did Israel deliver out of the hand of the 15 Philistines. And there was peace between Israel and the Amorites. And Samuel judged 16 Israel all the days of his life. And he went from year to year in circuit to Beth-el, and Gilgal, 17 and Mizpah; and he judged Israel in all those places. And his return was to Ramah, for there was his house; and there he judged Israel: and he built there an altar unto the LORD. § 1 And it came to pass, when Samuel was old, that he made his sons judges over Israel. 2 Now the name of his firstborn was Joel; and the name of his second, Abijah: they were judges 3 in Beer-sheba. And his sons walked not in his ways, but turned aside after lucre, and took bribes, and perverted judgment. 4 Then all the elders of Israel gathered themselves together, and came to Samuel unto Ramah: 5 and they said unto him, Behold, thou art old, and thy sons walk not in thy ways: now make 6 us a king to judge us like all the nations. But the thing displeased Samuel, when they said, 7 Give us a king to judge us. And Samuel prayed unto the LORD. And the LORD said unto Samuel, Hearken unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee: for they have 8 not rejected thee, but they have rejected me, that I should not be king over them. According to all the works which they have done since the day that I brought them up out of Egypt even unto this day, in that they have forsaken me, and served other gods, so do they also unto thee. 9 Now therefore hearken unto their voice: howbeit thou shalt protest solemnly unto them, and shalt shew them the manner of the king that shall reign over them. 10 And Samuel told all the words of the LORD unto the people that asked of him a king. 11 And he said, This will be the manner of the king that shall reign over you: he will take your sons, and appoint them unto him, for his chariots, and to be his horsemen; and they shall 12 run before his chariots: and he will appoint them unto him for captains of thousands, and captains of fifties; and he will set some to plough his ground, and to reap his harvest, and to 13 make his instruments of war, and the instruments of his chariots. And he will take your 14 daughters to be confectionaries, and to be cooks, and to be bakers. And he will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your oliveyards, even the best of them, and give them to his 15 servants. And he will take the tenth of your seed, and of your vineyards, and give to his 16 officers, and to his servants. And he will take your menservants, and your maidservants, and 17 your goodliest young men, and your asses, and put them to his work. He will take the tenth 18 of your flocks: and ye shall be his servants. And ye shall cry out in that day because of your 19 king which ye shall have chosen you; and the LORD will not answer you in that day. But the people refused to hearken unto the voice of Samuel; and they said, Nay; but we will have a 20 king over us; that we also may be like all the nations: and that our king may judge us, and 21 go out before us, and fight our battles. And Samuel heard all the words of the people, and he 22 rehearsed them in the ears of the LORD. And the LORD said to Samuel, Hearken unto their voice, and make them a king. And Samuel said unto the men of Israel, Go ye every man unto his city.
Some visible bond must be found to unite into a solid mass the scattered tribes which could not as yet be firmly bound together into one by the invisible tie of a common allegiance to Jehovah. Material and political means must prepare the way for the spiritual and religious end. Otherwise the nation must cease to exist, ground to pieces between the enemies which surrounded it on all sides. In order to make solid advance, retrogression was inevitable. At this critical juncture God raised up Samuel, “a prophet second only to Moses,” to guide the nation through this crisis in its existence, and effect the transition to the second stage of its education. A. F. K.—This was his great achievement, the crowning point of his service to Israel and the God of Israel: the scattered and disunited tribes became again a nation. The rival tribes Ephraim and Judah make common cause against the common enemy; and the more distant tribes do not seem to withhold their allegiance. Milman.—He thus, in a marked manner, stood between the new and old, and prepared the way for the establishment of the monarchy. The recognition of Saul as king of all Israel would have been an impossibility had not the judgeship of Samuel already brought about a cohesion between the disorganized members of the Jewish commonwealth. E. V.
After Moses, Samuel was the first character in ancient Jewish history who centred in himself the elements of political and religious authority. He was the last and the greatest of the judges whose official power succeeded that of the law-giver; and he was the first of that long line of prophets whose function and influence came to be superior to that of the priesthood itself. Moreover, his life marked a transition-period in the nation; for he anointed, first Saul, and afterward David, to this office. He was a person of rare dignity, beauty, and integrity of character. J. P. T.—The events of Samuel’s administration are so briefly narrated, that we are in danger of failing to take in their full importance. Eli’s death left Israel under oppression, a humiliated and ravaged country. Samuel’s reign began by a swift, well-ordered, and entirely successful blow for independence, and then kept Israel in a condition of peace, territorial integrity, and prosperity. W. J. B.
2. And it came to pass, etc. Better, And it came to pass, from the day when the ark rested in Kirjath-jearim, that a long time elapsed, even twenty years. Twenty years was not the whole duration of the ark’s sojourn at Kirjath-jearim, but the time that elapsed before the reformation now to be recorded. The period here passed over in silence was a dark page in Israel’s history, politically and religiously. They were vassals of the Philistines, reduced apparently to abject submission. The public worship of Jehovah was intermitted; for the Tabernacle seems to have been dismantled, and the ark was in a private house. The people sank into gross idolatry. But meanwhile Samuel was growing in strength and influence, and when the right moment came and the desire for better things sprang up as the fruit of his prophetic labor, he was ready to take his place as the leader of the nation.
Lamented after the Lord. As a child follows the father who has been forced to turn away in anger, and with sighs and tears entreats for reconciliation. A. F. K.—They were stirred up to it, probably, by the preaching of Samuel, with which an extraordinary working of the Spirit of God set in. A general disposition to repentance and reformation now appears throughout all Israel. Dr. Lightfoot thinks this was a matter and time as remarkable as any we read of in Scripture. H.
4. It was the high privilege of Samuel to effect two greatly needed reunions. He reunited the tribes among themselves; he made united Israel once more at one with Jehovah. Under his leadership even Judah and Ephraim work together; at his urgent exhortation “the children of Israel did put away Baalim and Ashtoreth, and served the Lord only.” Plummer.
5. Mizpeh, where this solemn convocation was held, was a remarkable place in Jewish history. It was in its neighborhood that Samuel set up the stone of help—Ebenezer—saying, “Hitherto hath the Lord helped us” (verses 6-12). Here, too, the people assembled to choose their first king. Dr. Robinson and Mr. Porter are of opinion that the modern “Neby Samwil” is the ancient Mizpeh. It is a hill 500 or 600 feet high, about four miles northwest from Jerusalem, which commands a wider view than any other peak in the south of Palestine. From its summit, “Central Palestine is spread out round us, like an embossed map. On the north, at our feet, is Gibeon, encircled by its plain. To the right is the rock Rimmon; and more to the eastward the conical tell, crowned by the village Er-Ram, the Ramah of Benjamin. Farther to the right we see the bare top of Tuleil el-Fû, on which “Gibeah of Saul” once stood. Over the bleak gray ridge on the southeast are the domes and minarets of Jerusalem, looking as if sunk in a valley. Southward the eye ranges over the summits of the Judean hills, as far as the environs of Hebron. On the west, at the base of the mountains, is the plain of Philistia, on which we can distinguish Ramleh, Lydda, and even Joppa, washed by the waves of the Mediterranean.” Marray’s Handbook.
5. I will pray for you.** The help which brings deliverance comes in answer to prayer. The people make humble confession of sin and call upon God for deliverance. They entreat Samuel that he will “cease not to cry unto the Lord God” for them. While he stands before the altar lifting up his cry in their behalf the Divine interposition takes place and deliverance is effected. The whole record shows the efficacy of prayer. Witherspoon.
6. The Chaldee reads it, They poured out their hearts in repentance before the Lord. They wept rivers of tears, and sorrowed after a godly sort; for it was before the Lord, and with an eye to him. H.—8. The peace, which Israel had made with God, was true, but tender. They durst not trust their own innocency, so much as the prayers of Samuel; “Cease not to cry to the Lord our God for us.” Bp. H.—9. Samuel intercedes with God for them, and does it by sacrifice. He took a sucking lamb, and offered it for a burnt-offering, a whole burnt-offering, to the Lord, and while the sacrifice was in burning, with the smoke of it his prayers ascended up to heaven for Israel. H.—Samuel officiated, not because he was a regular priest, nor by virtue of his being a Levite, which would have given him no legal right to offer sacrifice; but in his prophetic character as God’s ambassador and representative. But that this function was an extraordinary one appears from the fact that it was limited to Samuel alone (1 S. 9 : 13). Samuel is plainly the centre of the religious life of the period. The presence of God, so far as its gracious manifestation to Israel is concerned, is for the time linked with the Prophet, not with the Ark. W. H. G.
10,11. In answer to Samuel’s prayer the Philistines were totally routed, and that in such a manner as highly magnified the prayer of Samuel, the power of God, and the valor of Israel. The prayer of Samuel was honored, for at the very time when he was offering up his sacrifice and his prayer with it, the battle began and turned immediately against the Philistines. Thus while he was yet speaking God heard and answered in thunder (Is. 65 : 24). God showed that it was Samuel’s prayer and sacrifice that he had respect to, and hereby let Israel know that as in a former engagement with the Philistines he had justly chastised their presumptuous confidence in the presence of the ark, so now he graciously accepted their humble dependence upon the prayer of faith, from the mouth and heart of a pious prophet. The power of God was greatly honored; for he took the work into his own hand, and discomfited them with a great thunder which frightened them, and put them into such terror and consternation that they fainted away, and became a very easy prey to the sword of Israel, before whom, being thus confounded, they were smitten. Honor was put upon the hosts of Israel; they were made use of for the completing of the victory; they pursued the Philistines, and smote them. How soon did they find the benefit of their repentance, and reformation, and return to God! Now that they have thus engaged him for them, none of their enemies can stand before them.
12. Took a stone and set it.** Samuel himself took care to set up this monument; he had been instrumental by prayer to obtain the mercy, and therefore he thought himself in a special manner obliged to make this grateful acknowledgment of it. The reason he gives for the name is, Hitherto hath the Lord helped us; in which he speaks thankfully of what was past, giving the glory of the victory to God only, who had added this to all his former favors. H.—It is a memorable fact, which gave a touching emphasis to this memorial, that this was the very place where, twenty years before, the Israelites were defeated, and the ark of God was taken. The stone of help thus became a two-fold monument. Kit.
Neither Samuel’s intercession nor any soldier’s valor is graven there; one name only is associated with it. “The Lord hath helped us.” That is the highest use we can make of memory. Many and blessed are its offices, in teaching wisdom, in enriching experience, in bringing sweet odors from the far-off fields of the past, and preserving forever as in a finer spirit joys that in an outward form were evanescent. Some, indeed, only remember in order to indulge a sentimental melancholy. Others live in a bright past in order to nourish self-complacency. But the highest use of memory is to mark more plainly than could be seen at the moment the manifest Divine help which has filled our lives. Many parts of our lives that seemed unmarked by such help in passing, flash up into clearness when seen through the revealing light of memory. So the stone that we rear should bear no
(Photo of E. L. Wilson.)
name but one. That is the main lesson we should bring from the past, and, thank God, we may write Ebenezer on our sorrows no less than on our joys. He helps us by griefs and losses, by disappointments and defeats; for whatever brings us closer to His heart is helpful beyond all other joy, and strength-giving above all other gifts. And such remembrance and voice of praise has in it a half-uttered prayer and hope for the future. “Hitherto hath the Lord helped” looks forward as well as backward, seeing the future in the past. So memory passes into hope, and the radiance in the sky behind us throws brightness on the path in front. God’s past reveals His to come. He has helped, therefore He will help. Such is the argument of that faith which must needs ask for more as long as God can give or man can need. A. M.
13-17. A summary view of the rest of Samuel’s life is introduced here, not because it chronologically belongs before ch. 8, but because the writer here, as uniformly throughout the book, formally concludes one theme before proceeding to another. With this rapid survey of the judgeship and life of Samuel, which in point of time extends down to 1 S. 25 : 1, he winds up what he has to say of it separately, and then passes to the reign of Saul, detailing in ch. 8 the circumstances which led to his appointment as king. W. H. G.
13. In all probability the Philistine oppression of forty years mentioned in Ju. 13 : 1 was that which was brought to an end by the battle of Ebenezer. A. F. K.—The independence from the Philistines continued “all the days of Samuel.” The natural meaning of this is not all the days of his life, but of his administration as chief magistrate. After Saul’s accession, and before Samuel’s death, there was a time of Philistine oppression worse than those that had preceded it (13 : 5-22). But the magnitude of the preparations made by the Philistines for this conquest shows what a formidable enemy Israel had become, under Samuel. W. J. B.
16,17. Samuel went from year to year in circuit to the ancient sanctuaries within his own immediate neighborhood—“Bethel, and Gilgal, and Mizpeh”—and “judged Israel in all those places.” But “his return” was always to Ramah; “for there was his house, and there he judged Israel, and there he built an altar unto the Lord.” Stanley. (For cut of Ramah, see Sec. 243)
The person of Samuel, moved as he was by the prophetic spirit, was now the centre of the nation’s life. The sanctuary being rejected, and the agency of the high-priesthood suspended, the mediatorship between God and His people rested with the prophet, who, though not of the priestly race, but by descent a Levite of the region of Ephraim, now performed sacrificial services in the presence of the people. The central sanctuary no longer existing, we now also find various places of sacrifice, as the high places at Ramah, Bethel and Gilgal. Thus were the bounds imposed by the Mosaic ritual for the first time broken through. Israel attained to the experience that the presence of God is not confined to an appointed and material symbol, but that wherever He is sincerely invoked, He bestows His abundant blessing. Samuel was henceforth judge of the whole nation; and the prophetic office began from this time to develop its agency, on which account the history of Prophetism, properly speaking, dates from Samuel. O.
Here ends the first division of the book, which records Samuel’s life and work as the last of the Judges, in connection with the old order of things. The next division opens by relating the steps which led to the establishment of a monarchy, and shows us Samuel as the Mediator between the old and the new régime, effecting a political change of the utmost importance in the history of Israel without the shock of revolution. A. F. K.—The whole of the rest of the book, while adding many interesting particulars about Samuel, is occupied with the establishment of the kingdom and with Saul. With Samuel and Saul we come to the time when the prophet and the king take their due place in the development of Israel. They were both essential to its progress, and the accomplishment of its Divine mission, and in De. 17:14-20, and again, 28:36, the establishment of the monarchy is spoken of as a virtual necessity. R. P. S.
1. When Samuel was old. A considerable time, probably not much less than twenty years, must have elapsed since the victory of Ebenezer, before Samuel required the help of his sons on the ground of old age, and some years more before their misgovernment became so flagrant as to give occasion for the request of the elders. A. F. K.
3. Samuel is not blameworthy for not knowing his sons better, for the misconduct into which they fell was of a nature which could only have been developed by the possession of power. They made haste to be rich, and fell into the temptation which ever attends the inordinate pursuit of worldly gain. The easy way of doing this was to sell justice, and they sold it. “They took bribes, and perverted justice.” It is highly creditable to the Hebrews that, from this offence, so common throughout the ancient and modern East, their history is signally and memorably free, though it crept in at a later and more corrupt age, and is sometimes rebuked by the prophets. It must, at this time, have appeared particularly heinous, as contrasted with the spotless administration of Samuel himself. Kit.
6. To the priestly office, which had existed since the time of Moses, and to the prophetic office, which had been instituted by Samuel, the kingly office was to be added; and no doubt this was in accordance with the Divine will. These three offices were types of the Messiah, and were to serve the purposes of God’s kingdom. It could only be the motives, therefore, which induced the people to ask for a king that were sinful and objectionable. C. G. B.—Wherein lay the criminality of this desire for a king? The pride of power and vanity of display are both blameworthy. But, more than this, the desire embraced a change in that administration which sprung from Divine wisdom, and reposed on Divine authority. Further, this change was a displacement of God. “They have rejected Me.” He had been their king. Their legislation was from Him. Tithes were a royal impost. Priests were His palace guards. Their desire, then, was a revolt from His government P. Richardson.
11-18. Samuel now declared to the people all the words of the Lord, stating what a king would demand of them: that he would take their sons for charioteers and horsemen, for captains of his forces, for laborers to till his ground and reap his crops, for mechanics to make his armor and carriages—their daughters, as makers of ointment and perfumes, as cooks and bakers; that he would give the best of their land to his servants, and take the tenth of the produce of their fields and vineyards for his dependents; that he would execute his work with their slaves, their goodliest young men, and their asses; and that he would appropriate the tenth of their herds; and moreover, that the Lord would not listen to their complaints against the king of their own choice. C. G. B.
20. We may be like all the nations.
The whole course of things, from the time of Joshua to that of Samuel, demonstrated the necessity of a kingdom. There was need of a strong and permanent central government, if the unity of the people was to be preserved, if they were to be protected from invasion, if law and order were to be established, if Israel was to possess that peace and prosperity which was essential to their development in their proper character as the people of God. It was accordingly the purpose of God that a kingdom should be established in Israel; this was necessary to the accomplishment of the Divine plans concerning them; and this would afford a new and expressive type of the coming Saviour, as the king of his people. Nevertheless, the necessity for this, after all, arose out of the culpable weakness of the people, and their inability to realize as yet the true Mosaic ideal. If the people had continued faithful to God, theirs would have been the strongest and most beneficent government on the face of the earth. All their weakness and oppressions were the direct result of their disloyalty and sin. It was the glory of Israel that they “dwelt alone,” and that they were “separated” in character and destiny from all the nations of the world. And for them to hanker after a likeness to other nations was disowning and renouncing their high prerogative. W. H. G.
That our king may go out before us and fight our battles.
Other nations on every side—the Philistines, the Hittites, Syria, Ammon, Moab, and Edom—seemed to them prosperous and strong under their kings. So, overlooking the fact that the Lord was their King, or, at least, making far too little account of it, they thought to rival their neighbors to better purpose if they too had a king. It is not altogether strange that the experience of several hundred years under the judges and without any judge should have made this political reasoning seem to them plausible. Their mistake had its roots in their leaving God out of the account and in overlooking their peculiar relations to him as their Sovereign, Redeemer, and Father. But [as already noted] there were some good reasons for the change. The tribes of Israel, whether considered politically or religiously, needed more consolidation. Their national experience, from Joshua to Samuel, bore this testimony. In the midst of so many powerful enemies, the most effective union would give them none too much strength. And it had become manifest that the Mosaic religious system needed for its best results a great national capital which might become the religious as well as the political centre of the whole people. H. C.
Samuel’s Work, and Fitness for R.
Samuel, next to Moses the lawgiver, may be called the reformer of Israel. He it was who aroused the nation as with lightning strokes, and who produced an awakening like that of Pentecost. As from Moses the prophet, so from Samuel the seer went forth a power which brought many into the sphere of his own Divine enthusiasm. Delitsch.—The whole of his work and influence, in opposition to the dead legitimacy of the house of Eli the high-priest, rested on his character and his personal relation to Jehovah. This is manifest in the fact, that he on one side is a prophet, on the other is an intercessor. As prophet, he comes before the people in the name of God; as intercessor, he comes before God in the name of the people. The Word of God and prayer are correlates. Samuel was recognized by the people not simply as prophet, but also on the ground of many actual occurrences, as intercessor. We see how deeply the picture of Moses and Samuel, with their wonderful power in prayer, was imprinted on the mind of the nation, from Ps. 99 : 6, where we read, “Moses and Aaron (leaders of the choir) among His priests, and Samuel (superintendent overseer, in front place) among those who call on His name: they called on the Lord, and He answered them.” We thus are, unsought, permitted to behold, as it were looking into a most ancient temple, a living, personal intercourse with God and the heavenly world, to which a whole nation points as the basis of its life. Auberlen.
Loyalty to God and to God’s nation was the very foundation of Samuel’s life. Anything like self-seeking was unknown to him. He had early undergone that momentous change when God is substituted for self as the pivot of one’s life. The claims of the great King were ever paramount in his eyes. What would please God and be honoring to Him, was the first question that rose to his mind. And as Israel was God’s people, so the interest and the welfare of Israel were ever dear to him. And thus it was that Samuel might be relied on not to think of himself, not to think of his own wishes or interests, except as utterly subordinate to the wishes and interests of his God and his nation. It was this that gave such solidity to Samuel’s character, and made him so invaluable to his people. That Samuel attained the highest reputation for sanctity, intercourse with God and holy influence, is plain from various passages of Scripture. In Jer. 15 : 1, his name is coupled with that of
Moses alone as a powerful intercessor, " Though Moses and Samuel stood before me, yet my mind could not be toward this people." W. G. B.
SAUL, PROVIDENTIALLY BROUGHT TO SAMUEL, IS ENTERTAINED AND ANOINTED BY HIM. SAUL RECEIVES THE PROPHETIC SPIRIT. SCHOOLS OF THE PROPHETS.