1 Samuele 8:14 Commento

Things went so very well with Israel, in the chapter before, under Samuel's administration, that, methinks, it is a pity to find him so quickly, as we do in this chapter, old, and going off, and things working towards a revolution. But so it is; Israel's good days seldom continue long. We have here, I. Samuel decaying (Sa1 8:1). II. His sons degenerating (Sa1 8:2, Sa1 8:3). III. Israel discontented with the present government and anxious to see a change. For 1. They petition Samuel to set a king over them (Sa1 8:4, Sa1 8:5). 2. Samuel brings the matter to God (Sa1 8:6). 3. God directs him what answer to give them, by way of reproof (Sa1 8:7, Sa1 8:8), and by way of remonstrance, setting forth the consequences of a change of the government, and how uneasy they would soon be under it (Sa1 8:9-18). 4. They insist upon their petition (Sa1 8:19, Sa1 8:20). 5. Samuel promises them, from God, that they shall shortly be gratified (Sa1 8:21, Sa1 8:22). Thus hard is it for people to know when they are well off.

INTRODUCTION TO FIRST SAMUEL 8 This chapter relates, how that Samuel being old, and his sons behaving ill, the people desired to have a king set over them, Sa1 8:1, which case Samuel laid before the Lord, and he was directed by him to yield to the people's desire, but at the same time to set before them all the disadvantages and ill consequences that would arise from thence, which he did, Sa1 8:6, but they insisting upon it, nevertheless, he gave them reason to expect that their request would be granted, Sa1 8:19.

And he will take your fields, and your vineyards, and your oliveyards,.... Which includes the whole increase of their land, their corn, and wine, and oil; and it is these, the fruits of their fields, vineyards, and oliveyards, which are here meant; for otherwise kings might not, and did not by their absolute authority, take away those from their subjects; otherwise Ahab would have taken away Naboth's vineyard at once, nor would Jezebel have needed to have taken such a method she did, to put Ahab into the possession of it: even the best of them, and give them to his servants; for their service; and which some restrain to times of war, when necessity obliged to use such methods.

And observe the wisdom of the prophet, or rather the lovingkindness of God. For because he wished to turn them from their desire, bringing together a number of difficult things he asserted what would be true of their future king, as, for instance, that he would make their wives grind at the mill, require the men to serve as shepherds and drivers of mules; for he described all the service appertaining to the kingdom in minute detail.

Account these worthy to be esteemed your rulers and your kings, and bring them tribute as to kings; for by you they and their families ought to be maintained. As Samuel made constitutions for the people concerning a king, in the first book of Kings, and Moses did so concerning priests in Leviticus, so do we also make constitutions for you concerning bishops. For if there the multitude distributed the inferior services in proportion to so great a king, ought not therefore the bishop much more now to receive of you those things which are determined by God for the sustenance of himself and of the rest of the clergy belonging to him? But if we may add somewhat further, let the bishop receive more than the other received of old: for he only managed the affairs of the soldiery, being entrusted with war and peace for the preservation of men's bodies; but the other is entrusted with the exercise of the priestly office in relation to God, in order to preserve both body and soul from dangers. By how much, therefore, the soul is more valuable than the body, so much the priestly office is beyond the kingly. For it binds and looses those that are worthy of punishment or of remission. Wherefore you ought to love the bishop as your father, and fear him as your king, and honour him as your lord, bringing to him your fruits and the works of your hands, for a blessing upon you, giving to him your first-fruits, and your tithes, and your oblations, and your gifts, as to the priest of God; the first-fruits of your wheat, and wine, and oil, and autumnal fruits, and wool, and all things which the Lord God gives thee. And thy offering shall be accepted as a savour of a sweet smell to the Lord thy God; and the Lord will bless the works of thy hands, and will multiply the good things of the land. "For a blessing is upon the head of him that giveth."

9. When subjection is sought by carnal men, assuredly whatever is commanded them is burdensome, even if it is not difficult: because since they have it from the swelling of pride that they follow the judgment of their own will, whatever opposes their deliberation they consider most grievous. But indeed when harsh and contrary things are commanded, what a weight of burden is that! What swelling of heart! When they could scarcely bear even pleasant and light things unwillingly—things which, if they had been willing, they would have borne most easily. Let us therefore see how the pious dispensation of the Creator worthily answers the foolish audacity of man. The laws of men are set before those who despise the laws of God; and upon those who had spurned the mild and salutary counsels of the Divinity, the harsh and unbearable burdens of human servitude are proclaimed: so that from these things they might reckon with themselves how intolerable the commands of man would be for those who had refused to obey the counsels of God—who was not so much commanding as advising them not to seek this. But the hearts of carnal men possess recklessness from the increase of audacity, and hardness from the nature of pretense. From recklessness indeed they deliberate upon things easy to do; but because they do not understand what they wrongly propose, they cannot be helped by the counsels of those who are wiser. Wherefore here too it is added: (Verse 19.) The people refused to listen to the voice of Samuel. And they said: By no means: for a king shall be over us, and we also shall be like all the nations, and our king shall judge us, and shall go out before us, and shall fight our battles for us.

8. There follows: "He will also take your fields, and your vineyards, and your olive groves, and give them to his servants." What are the fields of good men, if not the devoted minds of their subjects? For while they willingly hear their words, they yield an abundant fruit of good works. And what are their vineyards, if not the minds of those who so advance by imitating the proficient that they even offer the word of life to others, and those whom they set ablaze by speaking into love of the Creator, they make drunk, as it were, by giving them drink? And what are the olive groves, if not the hearts of listeners who, by the example and exhortation of good men, advance in the work of mercy? But when a king is established, the fields are taken away: because when carnal men reach the height of governance, some of the good listeners take up examples of wickedness. The fields are therefore taken away when recently devoted hearts are led astray, when from the seed of wickedness they yield fruit in evil conduct. The olive groves and vineyards are taken away when, by the example of a wicked superior, works of mercy and the words of holy preaching that ought to be displayed and spoken are abandoned. And rightly it is recorded that the taken fields, vineyards, and olive groves are given to the king's servants. For servants are those who, always subject to the authority of their masters, cannot escape the yoke of domination. The servants of the king, therefore, are those who through abundant iniquity so bind themselves to the wills of tyrants that they no longer depart from them. The servants therefore receive the taken fields, vineyards, and olive groves: because the reprobate supporters of carnal prelates, when they transfer deceived hearts to the purpose of wicked work, impose the title of tyrannical power, as it were, upon the fields, vineyards, and olive groves of the elect.

What are the fields, what are the vineyards, what are the olive groves that are taken from us by the right of rulers? But the holy preachers, when they speak for the correction of sinners, rebuke the pleasures of the flesh, the lusts of the mind, and the pretenses of good works. For if the pleasures of the flesh were not the fields of wicked possession, the Apostle would never say: "He who sows in the flesh, from the flesh shall reap corruption" (Gal. 6:8). To sow in the flesh, indeed, is to bury the purpose of the mind in the pleasures of the body. And they truly reap corruption from the flesh, because in the resurrection of the elect they shall in no way receive the renewal of eternal incorruption. By the name of vineyards, the lusts of the mind are also rightly represented, because they intoxicate the hearts of the reprobate and estrange them from the knowledge of truth. Criticizing the fruit of this vine, Moses says: "Their vine is of the vine of Sodom, and of the suburbs of Gomorrah; their grape is a grape of gall, and their cluster most bitter" (Deut. 32:32). For he draws his vine from the vineyard of Sodom and his shoot from Gomorrah, who fills his mind with the most abominable lusts. For he makes, as it were, a vineyard, who thereby forgets eternal things, by which he is also intoxicated through lusts; and he who refreshes himself as if under the shade of a vineyard and the pleasantness of depraved delight, prepares for himself the retribution of eternal fire. Hence, most fittingly setting forth the fruit of that same vineyard, he called it a grape of gall and a cluster of bitterness. For the grape is pleasing to the sight but gall to the taste — delighting the eye, embittering the palate — because indeed what it lusts after greatly pleases the reprobate mind, but in eternal punishment what is now sweet to it turns bitter. The king, therefore, takes away our fields when the chosen preacher by his words removes the joyful impulses of our flesh in its delight. He takes away the vineyards when he utterly cuts off the intoxicating lusts from our heart. He also takes away the olive groves when he rebukes the works of false mercy, when by rightly exhorting he suggests that there is no merit in a work unless it proceeds from the purpose of a good intention. But it must be earnestly inquired why these things are said to be given to the servants of the king. For if these things are justly taken from us, who will there be to whom they may not be unworthily assigned? Yet if we examine this more carefully, we find that our holy preachers are great in their dominions. Who then are these servants, if not those of whose head the Lord says to blessed Job: "Will you take him as a servant forever?" (Job 40:23) For evil spirits are the servants of holy men — in this life perpetual servants, and in the next life eternal servants. For daily they bring about that by which holy men are crowned. For since from the battle of this life the victory of eternal glory is granted to us, those who renew against us those wars by which we are led to eternal rest assuredly render us great services. They are also the servants of the victors, as the Truth testifies: "By whom a man is overcome, of the same he is made a servant" (2 Peter 2:19). For while they stir up battles against those who will be victorious, they serve those who are thereby crowned, inasmuch as these for a time valiantly withstand their attacks. But because what advances the glory of the saints increases for evil spirits as an addition to their damnation, the fields, vineyards, and olive groves that are taken away are assigned to the servants. Indeed, demons will be punished with eternal punishment for all their wickedness. In the encounter of the hidden contest, when the elect conquer, they assign the evils which they repel to their enemies: because the former are tested as gold in the furnace (Wisdom 3:6), while the latter are punished for their wicked suggestion. Therefore the servants receive the fields, vineyards, and olive groves: because when sinners return to life through the preaching of teachers, this also contributes to the heap of damnation for the demons — that the penitent were held so long in past sin by their deceit. These things are also given to the servants when sinners, converted to the Lord through the office of the preacher, recognize that they were held in love of their past crimes by the deceit of demons.

He will also take your fields and vineyards, etc. Also taking from you the most abundant stores of your spiritual virtues, and the fruits of fervent love, not to mention the sweetest gifts of shining mercy, he will subject them rather to the pleasures of unclean spirits.

Samuel, grown old, makes his sons judges in Beer-sheba, Sa1 8:1, Sa1 8:2. They pervert judgment; and the people complain, and desire a king, Sa1 8:3-5. Samuel is displeased, and inquires of the Lord, Sa1 8:6. The Lord is also displeased; but directs Samuel to appoint them a king, and to show them solemnly the consequences of their choice, Sa1 8:7-9. Samuel does so; and shows them what they may expect from an absolute monarch, and how afflicted they should be under his administration, Sa1 8:10-18. The people refuse to recede from their demand; and Samuel lays the matter before the Lord, and dismisses them, Sa1 8:19-22.

OCCASIONED BY THE ILL-GOVERNMENT OF SAMUEL'S SONS, THE ISRAELITES ASK A KING. (1Sa. 8:1-18) when Samuel was old--He was now about fifty-four years of age, having discharged the office of sole judge for twelve years. Unable, from growing infirmities, to prosecute his circuit journeys through the country, he at length confined his magisterial duties to Ramah and its neighborhood (Sa1 7:15), delegating to his sons as his deputies the administration of justice in the southern districts of Palestine, their provincial court being held at Beer-sheba. The young men, however, did not inherit the high qualities of their father. Having corrupted the fountains of justice for their own private aggrandizement, a deputation of the leading men in the country lodged a complaint against them in headquarters, accompanied with a formal demand for a change in the government. The limited and occasional authority of the judges, the disunion and jealousy of the tribes under the administration of those rulers, had been creating a desire for a united and permanent form of government; while the advanced age of Samuel, together with the risk of his death happening in the then unsettled state of the people, was the occasion of calling forth an expression of this desire now.

he will take your fields, &c.--The circumstances mentioned here might be illustrated by exact analogies in the conduct of many Oriental monarchs in the present day.

II. The Monarchy of Saul from His Election Till His Ultimate Rejection - 1 Samuel 8-15 The earthly monarchy in Israel was established in the time of Samuel, and through his mediation. At the pressing desire of the people, Samuel installed the Benjaminite Saul as king, according to the command of God. The reign of Saul may be divided into two essentially different periods: viz., (1) the establishment and vigorous development of his regal supremacy (1 Samuel 8-15); (2) the decline and gradual overthrow of his monarchy (1 Samuel 16-31). The establishment of the monarchy is introduced by the negotiations of the elders of Israel with Samuel concerning the appointment of a king (1 Samuel 8). This is followed by (1) the account of the anointing of Saul as king (1 Samuel 9:1-10:16), of his election by lot, and of his victory over the Ammonites and the confirmation of his monarchy at Gilgal (1 Samuel 10:17-11:15), together with Samuel's final address to the nation (1 Samuel 12); (2) the history of Saul's reign, of which only his earliest victories over the Philistines are given at all elaborately (1 Samuel 13:1-14:46), his other wars and family history being disposed of very summarily (Sa1 14:47-52); (3) the account of his disobedience to the command of God in the war against the Amalekites, and the rejection on the part of God with which Samuel threatened him in consequence (1 Samuel 15). The brevity with which the history of his actual reign is treated, in contrast with the elaborate account of his election and confirmation as king, may be accounted for from the significance and importance of Saul's monarchy in relation to the kingdom of God in Israel. The people of Israel traced the cause of the oppression and distress, from which they had suffered more and more in the time of the judges, to the defects of their own political constitution. They wished to have a king, like all the heathen nations, to conduct their wars and conquer their enemies. Now, although the desire to be ruled by a king, which had existed in the nation even from the time of Gideon, was not in itself at variance with the appointment of Israel as a kingdom of God, yet the motive which led the people to desire it was both wrong and hostile to God, since the source of all the evils and misfortunes from which Israel suffered was to be found in the apostasy of the nation from its God, and its coquetting with the gods of the heathen. Consequently their self-willed obstinacy in demanding a king, notwithstanding the warnings of Samuel, was an actual rejection of the sovereignty of Jehovah, since He had always manifested himself to His people as their king by delivering them out of the power of their foes, as soon as they returned to Him with simple penitence of heart. Samuel pointed this out to the elders of Israel, when they laid their petition before him that he would choose them a king. But Jehovah fulfilled their desires. He directed Samuel to appoint them a king, who possessed all the qualifications that were necessary to secure for the nation what it looked for from a king, and who therefore might have established the monarchy in Israel as foreseen and foretold by Jehovah, if he had not presumed upon his own power, but had submitted humbly to the will of God as made known to him by the prophet. Saul, who was chosen from Benjamin, the smallest but yet the most warlike of all the tribes, a man in the full vigour of youth, and surpassing all the rest of the people in beauty of form as well as bodily strength, not only possessed "warlike bravery and talent, unbroken courage that could overcome opposition of every kind, a stedfast desire for the well-being of the nation in the face of its many and mighty foes, and zeal and pertinacity in the execution of his plans" (Ewald), but also a pious heart, and an earnest zeal for the maintenance of the provisions of the law, and the promotion of the religious life of the nation. He would not commence the conflict with the Philistines until sacrifice had been offered (Sa1 13:9.); in the midst of the hot pursuit of the foe he opposed the sin committed by the people in eating flesh with the blood (Sa1 14:32-33); he banished the wizards and necromancers out of the land (Sa1 28:3, Sa1 28:9); and in general he appears to have kept a strict watch over the observance of the Mosaic law in his kingdom. But the consciousness of his own power, coupled with the energy of his character, led his astray into an incautious disregard of the commands of God; his zeal in the prosecution of his plans hurried him on to reckless and violent measures; and success in his undertakings heightened his ambition into a haughty rebellion against the Lord, the God-king of Israel. These errors come out very conspicuously in the three great events of his reign which are the most circumstantially described. When Saul was preparing for war against the Philistines, and Samuel did not appear at once on the day appointed, he presumptuously disregarded the prohibition of the prophet, and offered the sacrifice himself without waiting for Samuel to arrive (Sa1 13:7.). In the engagement with the Philistines, he attempted to force on the annihilation of the foe by pronouncing the ban upon any one in his army who should eat bread before the evening, or till he had avenged himself upon his foes. Consequently, he not only diminished the strength of the people, so that the overthrow of the enemy was not great, but he also prepared humiliation for himself, inasmuch as he was not able to carry out his vow (Sa1 14:24.). But he sinned still more grievously in the war with the Amalekites, when he violated the express command of the Lord by only executing the ban upon that nation as far as he himself thought well, and thus by such utterly unpardonable conduct altogether renounced the obedience which he owed to the Lord his God (1 Samuel 15). All these acts of transgression manifest an attempt to secure the unconditional gratification of his own self-will, and a growing disregard of the government of Jehovah in Israel; and the consequence of the whole was simply this, that Saul not only failed to accomplish that deliverance of the nation out of the power of its foes which the Israelites had anticipated from their king, and was unable to inflict any lasting humiliation upon the Philistines, but that he undermined the stability of his monarchy, and brought about his own rejection on the part of God. From all this we may see very clearly, that the reason why the occurrences connected with the election of Saul as king as fully described on the one hand, and on the other only such incidents connected with his enterprises after he began to reign as served to bring out the faults and crimes of his monarchy, was, that Israel might learn from this, that royalty itself could never secure the salvation it expected, unless the occupant of the throne submitted altogether to the will of the Lord. Of the other acts of Saul, the wars with the different nations round about are only briefly mentioned, but with this remark, that he displayed his strength and gained the victory in whatever direction he turned (Sa1 14:47), simply because this statement was sufficient to bring out the brighter side of his reign, inasmuch as this clearly showed that it might have been a source of blessing to the people of God, if the king had only studied how to govern his people in the power and according to the will of Jehovah. If we examine the history of Saul's reign from this point of view, all the different points connected with it exhibit the greatest harmony. Modern critics, however, have discovered irreconcilable contradictions in the history, simply because, instead of studying it for the purpose of fathoming the plan and purpose which lie at the foundation, they have entered upon the inquiry with a twofold assumption: viz., (1) that the government of Jehovah over Israel was only a subjective idea of the Israelitish nation, without any objective reality; and (2) that the human monarchy was irreconcilably opposed to the government of God. Governed by these axioms, which are derived not from the Scriptures, but from the philosophical views of modern times, the critics have found it impossible to explain the different accounts in any other way than by the purely external hypothesis, that the history contained in this book has been compiled from two different sources, in one of which the establishment of the earthly monarchy was treated as a violation of the supremacy of God, whilst the other took a more favourable view. From the first source, 1 Samuel 8, Sa1 10:17-27, Sa1 10:11-12, and Sa1 10:15 are said to have been derived; and 1 Samuel 9-10:17, Sa1 10:13, and Sa1 10:14 from the second.