1 Samuele 8:7 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 the Lord said unto Samuel,.... He appeared to him in a vision or dream, and by an articulate voice delivered to him what follows: hearken unto the voice of the people in all that they say unto thee; not as approving of what they said, but permitting and allowing what they asked, as a punishment of them for their disloyalty and ingratitude, and as resenting their ill behaviour to him; for it was in anger he assented to their request, Hos 13:11. for they have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me that I should not reign over them; most interpreters supply the word "only", as if the sense was, that they had not only rejected Samuel from judging them, but the Lord also from reigning over them; and which is spoken to comfort Samuel, and to alleviate the pressure on his mind for the ill treatment he had met with; for since they had served the Lord after this manner, it was no wonder he should be ill used, and might bear it with great patience: but I see no reason why the word may not be taken absolutely, that they had not rejected Samuel from all share in the government, at least from judging the people; for so he continued all the days of his life, even after they had a king over them; but they entirely rejected the sole and peculiar government of God over them.

And that we may know that this voice of God came forth with His true and highest majesty to honour and avenge His priests; when three of the ministers -Korah, Dathan, and Abiram-dared to deal proudly, and to exalt their neck against Aaron the priest, and to equal themselves with the priest set over them; they were swallowed up and devoured by the opening of the earth, and so immediately suffered the penalty of their sacrilegious audacity. Nor they alone, but also two hundred and fifty others, who were their companions in boldness, were consumed by a fire breaking forth from the Lord, that it might be proved that God's priests are avenged by Him who makes priests. In the book of Kings also, when Samuel the priest was despised by the Jewish people on account of his age, as you are now, the Lord in wrath exclaimed, and said, "They have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me." And that He might avenge this, He set over them Saul as a king, who afflicted them with grievous injuries, and trod on the people, and pressed down their pride with all insults and penalties, that the despised priest might he avenged by divine vengeance on a proud people.

To some, indeed, who lack patience, the Lord God, in his wrath, grants them what they ask, just as, on the other hand, he refused it to his apostle, in his mercy. We read what and how the Israelites asked and received, but, when their lust had been satisfied, their lack of patience was severely punished. And when they asked, he gave them a king, as it is written, according to their heart, but not according to his heart.… These things are written that no one may think well of himself if his prayer is heard, when he has asked impatiently for what it would be better for him not to receive, and that no one may be cast down and may despair of the divine mercy toward him if his prayer has not been heard, when he has, perhaps, asked for something which would bring him more bitter suffering if he received it or would cause his downfall if he were ruined by prosperity. In such circumstances, then, we know not what we should pray for as we ought.

It is becoming, therefore, that you also should be obedient to your bishop and contradict him in nothing; for it is a fearful thing to contradict any such person. For no one does [by such conduct] deceive him that is visible but does [in reality] seek to mock him that is invisible, who, however, cannot be mocked by anyone. And every such act has respect not to man but to God. For God says to Samuel, “They have not mocked you, but me.”

5. Because it is said to the prophet as he prays, "Set a king over them," it is clearly shown that he asked for it to be revealed to him whether this should be done. And because He adds, saying, "They have not rejected you, but me, that I should not reign over them," it is fittingly shown how displeasing to Him was the request which is reported to have been displeasing in the eyes of Samuel. This harmony of judgment arises in the saints from the power of charity: because while they love the Creator with their whole mind and devoutly strive to obey His will, they receive as a reward of heavenly recompense that they do not diverge in their thinking from that same will of almighty God, which they always hold fast in good works. For it is written: "He who clings to God is one spirit" (1 Cor. 6:17). For he clings to the Lord who always strives to carry out the commands of His will. But he becomes one spirit with Him: because through long devotion of pious work he is raised to such a degree of grace of divine knowledge that he can no longer dissent from the fairness of His inner judgment through the error of a worldly spirit. But it is very difficult to answer if it is asked why almighty God both complains that He was rejected in the request for a king, and yet decrees that what was requested should come to pass; and again, if royal dignity was to be established, why it was permitted as though by an offended divine majesty; and when a foreseen king is decreed to be chosen, why one who would be rejected is chosen. What else can we answer to these things except what the apostle Paul would answer to those daring to search the ineffable abyss of God's judgments: "O man," he says, "who are you to answer back to God?" (Rom. 9:20). But if we cannot resolve this effectively, we can touch upon it by inquiring. Perhaps He complains that He was rejected in the request for a king? On account of the reprobate will of the people asking wrongly, the requested king is granted as a punishment. If this is said reasonably, since He put forward both things, He showed both the fault and the retribution together. For he who is shown to have rejected the Creator by his asking is convicted of having made an unjust demand out of a reprobate will. Therefore the penalty of strict justice followed upon the fault of the wicked request. For great indeed is the punishment that proceeds from the severity of the inner examination, when a reprobate mind is so cast away that it is permitted to carry out what it wrongly decides. Those, therefore, who were convicted of having rejected the Lord in asking for a king—since they were permitted to do that by which they would cast the Lord away from themselves—there was no heavier punishment with which they ought to have been struck here. 6. In this place it should be noted that the Lord makes the rejection of the prophet His own. For He does not simply say, "They have rejected me, that I should not reign over them," but rather, "They have not rejected you, but me, that I should not reign over them." So as to clearly show that in the person of the chosen bishop, He Himself presides over His subjects; and when a carnal ruler is raised to the spiritual summit of the elect, He Himself is seen to be rejected whose precepts are cast aside. Therefore, how worthy of reverence the best pastors of the holy Church are is plain. For behold, while they faithfully serve God, they are joined to Him by so great a bond of love that whatever is inflicted upon them is ascribed as an injury to God. Whence also in the Gospel He says to the first pastors of the Church: "He who despises you despises me" (Luke 10:16). Where something even graver is perceived: because when He complains that the pastor has been rejected, all the sins of those who reject him are recalled, and even the evils of their forefathers are mentioned. "According to all their works," He says, "which they have done from the day when I brought them out of the land of Egypt." For the supreme crime is recognized, for whose examination all past sins are brought back into the memory of God. And so the Lord complains that He has been rejected, and yet grants that one to be ordained in whom He is rejected: because when He executes the power of His strict justice, the desires of carnal men are by no means prevented from being fulfilled through His mercy. But also that dignity which could have been granted as a punishment ought not to have been granted with the tranquil majesty of divinity, but as if with indignation. However, we do not assert that the indignant majesty of God is indignant in itself, which is not subject to passion: but because when He examines faults, He speaks words of indignation through the Scriptures. Likewise, because a king is taken up as a type of carnal prelates, a king destined for rejection is chosen, not an elect one. Or perhaps a reprobate king is chosen for this reason, that his elect successor, King David, might learn from him what he ought to have guarded against. Thus indeed we also read concerning that court of angels, because of the first apostate angel it is written: "He is the beginning of the ways of God" (Job 40:14); but he who was created before all things fell through pride, and in his ruin the holy angels learned by what virtue they could have stood firm. Which indeed, whoever can behold with the open eyes of right faith equally observes: that Almighty God bestows the gifts of great mercy even when He inflicts punishment; because while He punishes the reprobate, He instructs the saints, so that from where those fall, these may be aided in their progress. 7. By strict judgment indeed He permits evils to be done, but mercifully He provides from those evils which He inflicts through judgment, things which He arranges to make into good. For what greater fault is there than that by which we all die? And what greater goodness than that by which we are freed from death? And indeed, if Adam had not sinned, it would not have been necessary for our Redeemer to take on our flesh. For He came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance (Mark 2:17). If therefore He came for sinners, if sins were lacking, it would not have been necessary for Him to come. If the sins, which He is believed to have come to destroy, are understood to have been permitted by the justice of God: since God was to be born as man for sinners, almighty God had foreseen that from that evil by which they were to die, He would bring about a good that would overcome that evil. The greatness of this good—what faithful person does not see how wonderfully it excels? Great indeed are the evils we suffer through the desert of the first sin, but what elect person would not prefer to endure worse things rather than not have so great a Redeemer? Let a king therefore be chosen—but one to be rejected; let him be chosen as if by the indignation, not the will, of God. Let there then follow a king after God's own heart, so that from the severity of His judgment the evil of vengeance may proceed against the reprobate, and the good which He was to bring about from evil may, through the bounty of divine grace, overflow upon the pious, while those others are permitted to fall into the evil they desire. But from what those men cast themselves down, it is brought about that others may not fall at all. But since by these words the judgment of divine severity is affirmed, let us now see how great a dispensation He employs, lest those deliberating wrongly do that for which they would be punished. For there follows: (Verse 9) Now therefore hear their voice; yet solemnly warn them, and declare to them the right of the king who shall reign over them.

But the Lord said to Samuel: “Listen to the voice of the people,” etc. Do not take away their free will, but give the power to become children of God, to those who were unwilling to believe, and do not grieve the reproach of men resulting from the rejection of the people. For they have not rejected your teaching in the person speaking, but my divine teaching operating through you, so that I may not grant them an eternal kingdom in you. This is similar to what he himself said: "My teaching is not mine, but his who sent me" (John VII).

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.

They have rejected me - They wish to put that government in the hands of a mortal, which was always in the hands of their God. But hearken unto their voice - grant them what they request. So we find God grants that in his displeasure which he withholds in his mercy.

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.

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.