Saul

VIEW:31 DATA:01-04-2020

demanded; lent; ditch; death
(same as Shaul)
Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary


SAUL.—1. Son of Kish, a Benjamite, the first king of Israel. We first meet him about to abandon the search for his father’s asses, when his servant suggested consulting Samuel. As it was customary to bring a present to a seer, and the wallet was empty, Saul hesitated till the servant produced the fourth part of a shekel of silver to give to the man of God. The seer, Divinely prepared for their arrival, met them as he was on his way to the high place to sacrifice. A banquet was made ready, and special honour paid to Saul by Samuel. The seer told the seekers that the asses had been found, and broached the matter of the kingdom to Saul, and anointed him as he was leaving. Saul was given certain signs in attestation of Samuel’s message, and after leaving the seer’s house, where he and his servant spent the night, he met a band of prophets, and soon was prophesying among them, to the marvel of his acquaintances (1Sa_10:10). This narrative gives no hint that the people asked for a king, or that his selection would be displeasing to either Samuel or Jehovah.
The account is interrupted at 1Sa_10:17 by one of a different temper. The people demand a king, which Samuel interprets to be a rejection of Jehovah, their true king, and Saul, after protest, is elected by lot at Mizpah. He remained quietly at home till Nahash’s cruel demand that the men of Jabesh-gilead should surrender to him, and each one lose the right eye, roused him. He was ploughing in the field when the news reached him, and immediately sacrificed the oxen, sending out parts of the sacrifice to his brethren with the command that they should follow him. When the army was mustered he marched to Jabesh-gilead and administered a crushing defeat to Nahash, after which his grateful countrymen made him king at Gilgal (ch. 11). A still greater necessity for a king appears in the encroachments of the Philistines. Saul and Jonathan, his son, were encamped in Michmash and Gibeah (Geba), when Jonathan smote the ‘garrison’ (?) of the Philistines in Geba, thus precipitating the struggle. The plan of the Philistines was to send out plundering parties, and Jonathan threw the whole camp into confusion by surprising one of its guerilla headquarters (1Sa_13:1-3, 1Sa_14:1 f.). When Saul heard of the flight of the enemy he inquired of the oracle what to do, but the rout was so apparent that he joined pursuit without the answer. The destruction of the enemy would have been greater had not Saul put a taboo on food. In the evening the famished warriors fell upon the cattle, and ate without sacrificing till the reported impiety reached the ears of Saul, who legitimated the meal by sacrificing at a great stone. As he failed to receive an answer from the oracle, when he Inquired whether he should pursue the Philistines farther, Saul concluded that some one had sinned. An inquiry was taken to the oracle, and the fault was found to lie with Jonathan, who confessed to having tasted honey. He was, however, delivered by the people from the penalty, for Saul had sworn that he should die (1Sa_14:17-45).
This narrative (chs. 13, 14) is interrupted at 1Sa_13:8 to 1Sa_15:35 by an account which represents Samuel as taking issue with Saul for sacrificing at the end of an appointed period of seven days, and announcing his rejection (See art. Samuel, p. 823n). We have from another source (ch. 15) a story of the encounter with Amalek, against whom Samuel sent Saul with instructions to destroy men, women, children, and spoil. Saul, however, spares Agag, and part of the booty. This is now assigned as the reason for his rejection. Saul acknowledged his fault, but begged Samuel to honour him before the people by sacrificing with him. In his importunity he lays hold of Samuel’s garment, which is rent, and becomes the symbol of the kingdom wrested from Saul. Samuel relents and worships with him.
The second stage of Saul’s life concerns his relations with David. Saul is advised to employ music as a relief from a deep-seated mental trouble, called ‘an evil spirit from the Lord.’ David, a skilled harper and celebrated soldier, is engaged. Saul loves him, and makes him his armour-bearer (1Sa_16:14-23). The Philistines again assemble, this time at Socoh; Goliath issues his challenge, but no one responds. The lad David, who had come to the camp to visit his brethren, learns of the proffered reward, meets the boaster in single combat, and kills him. In this story Saul seems weak, irresolute, and unacquainted with David (ch. 17). David’s growing popularity and prowess lead Saul to attempt his life. Michal, Saul’s daughter, is offered to him in marriage in return for one hundred Philistines. The hazard involved failed to accomplish his death. Then David’s house is surrounded, but Michal manages David’s escape through a window (1Sa_18:6-9, 1Sa_20:29, 1Sa_19:11-17). Merab, Saul’s elder daughter, was also offered to David, but withdrawn when he should have had her. This seems to be an effort to explain why David did not receive Saul’s daughter after he had slain the giant. David flees to Ramah, and Saul, seeking him there, is seized with the prophetic frenzy and rendered powerless (1Sa_19:18-24). David again flees, and receives help from the priests at Nob. So enraged was Saul that he ordered the slaughter of the entire priesthood there (chs. 20–21). Saul had David all but captured in the hills of Ziph, when a raid of the Philistines called him away (1Sa_23:14-29). Twice Saul was in the power of David, who refused to harm the Lord’s anointed (chs. 24, 26).
The circumstances connected with Saul’s death are told in a dramatic way. The Philistines had gathered together at Aphek, while Saul held the fateful plains of Megiddo at Jezreel. Answer came from neither prophet nor priest. Then in despair he applied to the necromancer at Endor, but received only a hopeless message. The battle joins; Saul’s sons are slain; sore pressed, he calls on his armour—bearer to slay him, but being refused he falls upon his sword and dies. The following day the Philistines severed the heads of Saul and his sons, and exposed the bodies on the walls of Beth-shan, whence the grateful Jabesh-gileadites brought them away by night (chs. 28, 31). An Amalekite, who brought the story of Saul’s death to David, claimed that he himself slew him, and was promptly executed by David (2Sa_1:1-16).
2. Saul of Tarsus. See Paul.
J. H. Stevenson.
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible
Edited by James Hastings, D.D. Published in 1909

Hebrew SHAUL
1. An early king of Edom (Gen_36:37-38).
2. Gen_46:10.
3. 1Ch_6:24.
4. First king of Israel. The names Kish and Ner, Nadab and Abi-nadab, Baal and Mephibosheth, recur in the genealogy in two generations. The family extends to Ezra's time. If the Zimri of 1Ch_9:42 be the Zimri of 1 Kings 16 it is the last stroke of the family of Saul for the kingdom. Saul was son of Kish, son of Ner, son of Abiel or Jehiel. 1Sa_9:1 omits Ner, the intermediate link, and makes Kish son of Abiel; 1Ch_8:33 supplies the link, or Ner in 1 Chronicles is not father but ancestor of Kish (1Ch_9:36-39), and Ner son of Abi-Gibeon (father or founder of Gibeon, 1Ch_8:29) is named only because he was progenitor of Saul's line, the intermediate names mentioned in 1 Samuel 9 being omitted. The proud, fierce, and self willed spirit of his tribe, Benjamin, is conspicuous in Saul (see Judges 19; 20; 21). Strong and swift fooled (2Sa_1:23), and outtopping the people by head and shoulders (1Sa_9:2), he was the "beauty" or "ornament of Israel," "a choice young man," "there was none goodlier than he."
Above all, he was the chosen of the Lord (1Sa_9:17; 1Sa_10:24; 2Sa_21:6). Zelah was Kish's burial place. Gibeah was especially connected with Saul. The family was originally humble (1Sa_11:1-21), though Kish was "a mighty man of substance." Searching for Kish's donkeys three days in vain, at last, by the servant's advice, Saul consulted Samuel, who had already God's intimation that He would send at this very time a man of Benjamin who should be king. God's providence, overruling man's free movements to carry out His purpose, appears throughout the narrative. Samuel gave Saul the chiefest place at the feast on the high place to which he invited him, and the choice portion. Setting his mind at ease about his asses, now found, Samuel raised his thoughts to the throne as one "on whom was all the desire of Israel." "Little then in his own sight" (1Sa_15:17), and calling himself "of the smallest of the tribes, and his family least of all the families of Benjamin" (1Sa_9:21), Saul was very different from what he afterward became in prosperity; elevation tests men (Psa_73:18).
Samuel anointed and kissed Saul as king. On his coming to the oak ("plain") of Tabor, three men going with offerings to God to Bethel gave him two of three loaves, in recognition of his kingship. Next prophets met him, and suddenly the Spirit of God coming upon him he prophesied among them, so that the proverb concerning him then first began, "is Saul also among the prophets?" The public outward call followed at Mizpeh, when God caused the lot to fall on Saul. So modest was he that he hid himself, shunning the elevation, amidst the baggage. A band whose hearts God had touched escorted him to Gibeah, while the worthless despised him, saying "how shall this man save us?" (compare Luk_14:14, the Antitype, meekly "He held His peace"; Psa_38:13). NAHASH'S cruel threat against Jabesh Gilead, which was among the causes that made Israel desire a king (1Sa_8:3; 1Sa_8:19; 1Sa_12:12), gave Saul the opportunity of displaying his patriotic bravery in rescuing the citizens and securing their lasting attachment.
His magnanimity too appears in his not allowing any to be killed of those whom the people desired to slay for saying "shall Saul reign over us?" Pious humility then breathed in his ascription of the deliverance to Jehovah, not himself (1Sa_11:12-13). Samuel then inaugurated the kingdom again at Gilgal. In 1Sa_13:1 read "Saul reigned 40 years"; so Act_13:21, and Josephus "18 years during Samuel's life and 22 after his death" (Ant. 16:14, section 9). Saul was young in beginning his reign (1Sa_9:2), but probably verging toward 40 years old, as his son Jonathan was grown up (1Sa_13:2). Ishbosheth his youngest son (1Ch_8:33) was 40 at his death (2Sa_2:10), and as he is not mentioned among Saul's sons in 1Sa_14:49 he perhaps was born after Saul's accession. In the second year of his reign Saul revolted from the Philistines whose garrison had been advanced as far as Geba (Jehu, N.E. of Rama), (1Sa_10:5; 1Sa_13:3) and gathered to him an army of 3,000.
Jonathan smote the garrison, and so brought on a Philistine invasion in full force, 30,000 chariots. 6,000 horsemen, and a multitude as the sand. The Israelites, as the Romans under the Etruscan Porscna, were deprived by their Philistine oppressors of all smiths, so that no Israelite save Saul and Jonathan had sword or spear (1Sa_13:19-21). Many hid in caves, others fled beyond Jordan, while those (600: 1Sa_13:15) who stayed with Saul followed trembling. Already some time previously Samuel had conferred with Saul as to his foreseen struggle against the Philistines, and his going down to Gilgal (not the first going for his inauguration as king, 1Sa_11:14-15; but second after revolting from the Philistines) which was the most suitable place for gathering an army.
Samuel was not directing Saul to go at once to Gilgal, as seen as he should go from him, and wait there seven days (1Sa_10:8); but that after being chosen king by lot and conquering Ammon and being confirmed as king at Gilgal, he should war with the Philistines (one main end of the Lord's appointing him king, 1Sa_9:16, "that he may save My people out of the hand of the Philistines, for I have looked upon My people, because their cry is come unto Me"), and then go down to Gilgal, and "wait there seven days, until I come, before offering the holocaust." The Gilgal meant is that in the Jordan valley, to which Saul withdrew in order to gather soldiers for battle, and offer sacrifices, and then advance again to Gibeah and Geba, thence to encounter the Philistines encamped at Michmash. Now first Saul betrays his real character. Self will, impatience, and the spirit of disobedience made him offer without, waiting the time appointed by Jehovah's prophet; he obeyed so far and so long only as obedience did not require crossing of his self will.
Had he waited but an hour or two, he would have saved his kingdom, which was now transferred to one after God's own heart; we may forfeit the heavenly kingdom by hasty and impatient unbelief (Isa_28:16). Saul met Samuel's reproof "what hast thou done?" with self justifying excuses, as if his act had been meritorious not culpable: "I saw the people scattered from me, and thou camest not within the days appointed (Samuel had come before their expiration), and the Philistines gathered themselves. ... Therefore said I, The Philistines will come down now upon me to Gilgal, and I have not made supplication unto Jehovah; I forced myself therefore (he ought to have forced himself to obey not disobey; necessity, is often the plea for sacrificing principle to expediency) and offered." Jonathan's exploit in destroying the Philistine garrison (1 Samuel 14) eventuated in driving the Philistines back to their own land. (See JONATHAN.)
The same reckless and profane impatience appears in Saul; he consults Jehovah by the priest Ahiah (1Sa_14:18 read with Septuagint, "bring here the ephod, for he took the ephod that day in the presence of Israel"; for the ark was not usually taken out, but only the ephod, for consultation, and the ark was now at Kirjath Jearim, not in Saul's little camp); then at the increasing tumult in the Philistine host, impatient to join battle, interrupted the priest, "withdraw thine hand," i.e. leave off. Contrast David's patient and implicit following of Jehovah's will, inquired through the priest, in attacking in front as well as in taking a circuit behind the Philistines (2Sa_5:19-25). Saul's adjuration that none should eat until evening betrayed his rash temper and marred the victory (1Sa_14:29-30). His scrupulosity because the people flew upon the spoil, eating the animals with the blood (1Sa_14:32-35), contrasts with true conscientiousness which was wanting in him at Gilgal (1 Samuel 13).
Now he built his first altar. Jonathan's unconscious violation of Saul's adjuration, by eating honey which revived him (1Sa_13:27-29, "enlightened his eyes," Psa_13:3), was the occasion of Saul again taking lightly God's name to witness that Jonathan should die (contrast Exo_20:7). But the guilt, which God's silence when consulted whether Saul should follow after the Philistines implied, lay with Saul himself, for God's siding "with Jonathan" against the Philistines ("he hath wrought with God this day") was God's verdict acquitting him. Thus convicted Saul desisted from further pursuit of the Philistines. His warlike prowess appears in his securing his regal authority (1Sa_14:47, "took the kingdom over Israel") by fighting successfully against all his enemies on every side, Moab, Ammon, Edom, Zobah, the Philistines, and Amalek (summarily noticed 1Sa_14:48, in detail in 1 Samuel 15).
Saul's second great disobedience at his second probation by God was (1 Samuel 15) his sparing the Amalekite Agag and the best of the sheep, oxen, etc., and all that was good; again self will set up itself to judge what part of God's command it chose to obey and what to disobey. The same self complacent blindness to his sin appears in his words to Samuel, "I have performed the commandment of Jehovah." "What meaneth then tills bleating of the sheep?" Saul lays on the people the disobedience, and takes to himself with them the merit of the obedience: "they have brought them from the Amalekites, for the people spared the best of the sheep ... to sacrifice ... and the rest we have utterly destroyed." True obedience observes all the law and turns not to the right or left (Jos_1:7; Deu_5:32). The spirit of self will shows its nonsubmission to God's will in small but sure indications. Saul had zeal for Israel against the Gibeonites where zeal was misplaced, because not according to God's will (2 Samuel 21); he lacked zeal here, where God required it.
He shifts the blame on "the people" and makes religion a cloak, saying the object was "to sacrifice unto Jehovah, thy God." We must not do evil that good may come (Rom_3:8). Samuel tears off the pretext: "behold, to obey is better than sacrifice, ... for rebellion is as the silt of witchcraft," the very sin which Saul fell into at last (1 Samuel 28). As Saul rejected Jehovah's word so He rejected Saul "from being king." In 1Ch_10:13 "Saul died for his transgression (Hebrew maal, 'prevarication,' shuffling, not doing yet wishing to appear to do, God's will) against Jehovah, and also for asking counsel of one that had a familiar spirit." The secret of Saul's disobedience he discloses, "because I feared the people and obeyed their voice," instead of God's voice (Exo_23:2; Pro_29:25). Even in confession, while using the same words as David subsequently, "I have sinned" (2Sa_12:13), he betrays his motive, "turn again with me ... honour me now, I pray thee, before the elders of my people and before Israel" (Joh_5:44; Joh_12:43).
Man's favor he regarded more than God's displeasure. Henceforth Samuel, after tearing himself from the king, to the rending of his garment (the symbol of the transference of the kingdom to a better successor), came to Saul no more though mourning for him. As the Spirit of Jehovah came upon David from the day of his anointing (1Sa_16:13-14), so an evil spirit from (it is never said OF) Jehovah troubled Saul, and the Spirit of Jehovah departed from hint. David then first was called in to soothe away with the harp the evil spirit; but music did not bring the good Spirit: to fill his soul, so the evil spirit returned worse than ever (Mat_12:43-45; 1Sa_28:4-20). No ritualism or sweet melody, though pleasing the senses, will change the heart; the Holy Spirit alone can attune the soul to purity and peace.
Like his tribe, which should "ravin as a wolf, in the morning devouring the prey and at night ... the spoil" (Gen_49:27), Saul was energetic, choleric, and impressible, now prophesying with the prophets whose holy enthusiasm infected him, now jealous to madness of David whom he had loved greatly and brought permanently to court (1Sa_16:21; 1Sa_18:2) and made his armour bearer; and all because of a thoughtless expression of the women in meeting the conquerors after the battle with Goliath, "Saul hath slain his thousands, David his ten thousands" (1 Samuel 17; 1Sa_18:7). A word was enough to awaken suspicion, and suspicion was wrested into proof of treason, "what can he have more but the kingdom?" (see Ecc_4:4; Pro_27:4). But David's wise walk made Saul fear him (1Sa_18:12; 1Sa_18:14-15; 1Sa_18:29; Psa_101:2; Psa_5:8). God raised up to David a friend, Michal, in his enemy's house, which made Saul the more afraid. So, not daring to lay his own hand on him, he exposed him to the Philistines (1Sa_18:17-27); in righteous retribution, it was Saul himself who fell by them (Psa_9:15-16).
For a brief time a better feeling returned to Saul through Jonathan's intercession for David (1Sa_19:4-6); but again the evil spirit returned, and Saul pursued David to Michal's house, and even to Samuel's presence at Naioth in Ramah. But Jehovah, "in whose hand the king's heart is, to turn it wheresoever He will" (Pro_21:1), caused him who came to persecute to prophesy with the prophets. Yet soon after, because Jonathan let David go, Saul cast a javelin at his noble unselfish son, saying, "thou hast chosen the son of Jesse to thine own confusion, for as long as he liveth thou shalt not be established, nor thy kingdom" (1Sa_20:28-33). Saul's slaughter of the priests at Nob, on Doeg's information, followed (1 Samuel 22), Saul upbraiding his servants as if conspiring with David and feeling no sorrow for the king; "yet can David, as I can (1Sa_8:14, compare 1Sa_22:7), give every one of you fields and vineyards?" etc., thus answering to David's picture of him (Psa_53:7), "this is the man that trusted in the abundance of his riches," etc.(See DOEG; DAVID.)
By slaying the priests, so that Abiathar alone escaped to David, Saul's sin recoiled on himself, for Saul thereby supplied him whom he hated with one through whom to consult Jehovah, and deprived himself of the divine oracle, so that at last he had to have recourse to witchcraft, though he had himself tried to extirpate it (1Sa_23:2; 1Sa_23:9; 1Sa_28:3-7, etc.). The Philistines, by whom Saul thought to have slain David, were the unconscious instruments of saving him from Saul at Mann (1Sa_23:26-27). David's magnanimity at the cave of Engedi in sparing his deadly foe and only cutting off his skirt, when in his power, moved Saul to tears, so that his better feelings returned for the moment, and he acknowledged David's superiority in spirit and deed, and obtained David's promise not to destroy his seed (1 Samuel 24). Once again (1 Samuel 26), at Hachilah David spared Saul, though urged by Abishai to destroy him; the Altaschith of Psalm 57; 58; 59; refers to David's words on this occasion, "destroy not." (See ALTASCHITH.)
David would not take vengeance out of God's hands (Psa_35:1-3; Psa_17:4; Psa_94:1-2; Psa_94:23; Rom_12:19). His words were singularly prophetic of Saul's doom, "his day shall come to die, or be shall descend into battle and perish." The "deep sleep from Jehovah" on Saul enabled David unobserved to take spear and cruse from Saul's bolster. From a hill afar off David appealed to Saul, "if thy instigation to (i.e. giving up to the manifestation of thine own) evil be from Jehovah, through His anger against thee for sin, let Him smell sacrifice" (Hebrew), i.e. appease God's wrath by an acceptable sacrifice; "but if thy instigators be men, they drive me out from attaching (Hebrew) myself to the inheritance of Jehovah (the Holy Land); now therefore let not my blood fall to the earth far away from the face of Jehovah," i.e. do not drive me to perish in a heathen land; contrast Psa_16:4-6. Saul acknowledged his sinful "folly" (meaning "wickedness" in Scripture: see MUTH-LABBEN), and promised no more to seek his hurt, and blessed him.
The consultation with the witch at Endor preceded the fatal battle of Gilbea. Saul had "put away out of the land wizards," etc. But the law forbad them to live (Lev_19:31; Lev_20:27; Deu_18:10, etc.). He only took half measures, as in sparing the Amalekite king; "rebellion" ended in "witchcraft" (1Sa_15:23). He had driven away the only man, David, who could have saved him from the Philistines (1 Samuel 17; 2Sa_5:17-22). He had killed all by whom he could have consulted Jehovah (1 Samuel 21; 22). How men's own wickedness, by a retributive providence (Jer_2:19), corrects them! She was mistress of a "spirit" (baalath-ob) with which the dead were conjured up to inquire of them the future. Either she merely pretended this, or if there was a demoniacal reality Samuel's apparition differed so essentially from it that she started at seeing him, and then (what shows her art to be something more than jugglery) she recognized Saul; probably she fell into a state of clairvoyance in which she recognized persons, as Saul, unknown to her by face.
Saul did not himself see Samuel with his eyes, but recognized that it was he from her description, and told him his distress; but Samuel told him it was vain to ask of a friend of God since Jehovah was become his enemy. Saul should be in Hades by the morrow for his disobeying as to the Amalekites, while David, Amalek's destroyer (1Sa_30:17), should succeed. On the morrow the Philistines followed hard upon Saul, the archers hit him; then Saul having in vain begged his armour bearer to slay him (1Sa_31:4) fell on his own sword, but even so still lingered until an Amalekite (of the very people whom he ought to have utterly destroyed) stood upon and slew him, and brought his crown and bracelet to David (2Sa_1:8-10).
The Philistines cut off his head and fastened his body to the wall of Bethshan. The armour they put in the temple of Ashtaroth, the head in the temple of Dagon (1Sa_31:9-10; 1Ch_10:10); the tidings of the slaughter of their national enemy they sent far and near to their idols and to the people. The inhabitants of Jabesh Gilead showed their gratitude to their former deliverer by bravely carrying off the bodies of him and his sons, and burning them, and burying the bones under a tree. His life is a sadly vivid picture of declension and deterioration until suicide draws a dark curtain over the scene. In his elegy David brings out all his good qualities, bravery, close union with Jonathan, zeal for Israel whose daughters Saul clothed in rich spoils; David generously overlooks his faults (2 Samuel 1). Years after he had the bones of Saul and Jonathan buried in Zelah in the tomb of Kish (2Sa_21:12-14). 2Sa_21:5. Paul's original name. He was proud of his tribe Benjamin and the name Saul (Act_13:21).
Fausset's Bible Dictionary
By Andrew Robert Fausset, co-Author of Jamieson, Fausset and Brown's 1888.

Saul. (desired). More accurately, Shaul.
1. One of the early kings of Edom, and successor of Samlah. Gen_36:37-38; 1Ch_1:48. (B.C. after 1450).
2. The first king of Israel, the son of Kish, and of the tribe of Benjamin. (B.C, 1095-1055). His character is, in part, illustrated by the fierce, wayward, fitful nature of the tribe, and, in part, accounted for by the struggle between the old and new systems, in which he found himself involved. To this, we must add a taint of madness, which broke out in violent frenzy, at times, leaving him with long lucid intervals.
He was remarkable for his strength and activity, 2Sa_1:25 and, like the Homeric heroes, of gigantic stature, taller by head and shoulders than the rest of the people, and of that kind of beauty denoted by the Hebrew word "good," 1Sa_9:2, and which caused him to be compared to the gazelle, "the gazelle of Israel." His birthplace is not expressly mentioned; but, as Zelah in Benjamin was the place of Kish's sepulchre, 2Sa_21:14, it was, probably, his native village.
His father, Kish, was a powerful and wealthy chief, though the family to which he belonged was of little importance. 1Sa_9:1; 1Sa_9:21. A portion of his property consisted of a drove of asses. In search of these asses, gone astray on the mountains, he sent his son, Saul. It was while prosecuting this adventure that Saul met with Samuel, for the first time, at his home in Ramah, five miles north of Jerusalem. A divine intimation had made known to him, the approach of Saul, whom he treated with special favor, and, the next morning, descending with him to the skirts of the town, Samuel poured over Saul's head, the consecrated oil, and with a kiss of salutation announced to him that he was to be the ruler of the nation. 1Sa_9:25; 1Sa_10:1.
Returning homeward, his call was confirmed by the incidents which, according to Samuel's prediction, awaited him. 1Sa_10:9-10. What may be named, the public call, occurred at Mizpeh, when lots were cast to find the tribe and family which was to produce the king, and Saul, by a divine intimation was found hid in the circle of baggage which surrounded the encampment. 1Sa_10:17-24. Returning to Gibeah, apparently to private life, he heard the threat issued by Nahash, king of Ammon, against Jabesh-gilead. He speedily collected an army, and Jabesh was rescued. The effect was instantaneous on the people, and the monarchy was inaugurated anew at Gilgal. 1Sa_11:1-15. It should be, however, observed that according to 1Sa_12:12, the affair of Nahash preceded and occasioned the election of Saul.
Although king of Israel, his rule was, at first, limited; but in the second year of his reign, he began to organize an attempt to shake off the Philistine yoke, and an army was formed. In this crisis, Saul, now on the very confines of his kingdom at Gilgal, impatient at Samuel's delay, whom he had directed to be present, offered sacrifice himself. Samuel, arriving later, pronounced the first curse, on his impetuous zeal. 1Sa_13:5-14. After the Philistines were driven back to their own country occurred the first appearance of Saul's madness in the rash vow which all but cost the life of his soil. 1Sa_14:24; 1Sa_14:44.
The expulsion of the Philistines, although not entirely completed, 1Sa_14:52, at once, placed Saul in a position higher than that of any previous ruler of Israel, and he made war upon the neighboring tribes. In the war with Amalek, 1Sa_14:48; 1Sa_15:1-9, he disobeyed the prophetical command of Samuel, which called down the second curse, and the first distinct intimation of the transference of the kingdom to a rival. The rest of Saul's life is one long tragedy.
The frenzy which had given indications of itself before now, at times, took almost entire possession of him. In this crisis, David was recommended to him. From this time forward, their lives are blended together. See David. In Saul's better moments, he never lost the strong affection which he had contracted for David. Occasionally, too, his prophetical gift returned, blended with his madness. 2Sa_19:24. But his acts of fierce, wild zeal increased. At last, the monarchy itself broke down under the weakness of his head. The Philistines re-entered the country, and just before giving them battle Saul's courage failed, and he consulted one of the necromancers, the "Witch of Endor," who had escaped his persecution.
At this distance of time, it is impossible to determine the relative amount of fraud or of reality in the scene which follows, though the obvious meaning of the narrative itself tends to the hypothesis of some kind of apparition. 2Sa_19:28. On hearing the denunciation which the apparition conveyed, Saul fell the whole length of his gigantic stature on the ground, and remained motionless till the woman and his servants forced him to eat. The next day, the battle came on. The Israelites were driven up the side of Gilboa. The three sons of Saul were slain. Saul was wounded. According to one account, he fell upon his own sword, 1Sa_31:4, and died. The body on being found by the Philistines was stripped slid decapitated, and the headless trunk hung over the city walls, with those of his three sons. 1Sa_31:9-10. The head was deposited, (probably at Ashdod), in the temple of Dagon, 1Ch_10:10. The corpse was buried at Jabesh-gilead. 1Sa_31:13.
3. The Jewish name of St. Paul.
Smith's Bible Dictionary
By Dr. William Smith.Published in 1863

the son of Kish, of the tribe of Benjamin, the first king of the Israelites, 1Sa_9:1-2, &c. Saul's fruitless journey when seeking his father's asses; (See Ass;) his meeting the Prophet Samuel; the particulars foretold to him, with his being anointed as king, about A.M. 2909; his prophesying along with the young prophets; his appointment by the lot; his modesty in hiding himself; his first victory over the Ammonites; his rash sacrifice in the absence of Samuel; his equally rash curse; his victories over the Philistines and Amalekites; his sparing of King Agag with the judgment denounced against him for it; his jealousy and persecution of David; his barbarous massacre of the priests and people of Nob; his repeated confessions of his injustice to David, &c, are recorded in 1 Samuel 9-31. He reigned forty years, but exhibited to posterity a melancholy example of a monarch, elevated to the summit of worldly grandeur, who, having cast off the fear of God, gradually became the slave of jealousy, duplicity, treachery, and the most malignant and diabolical tempers. His behaviour toward David shows him to have been destitute of every generous and noble sentiment that can dignify human nature; and it is not an easy task to speak with any moderation of the atrocity and baseness which uniformly mark it. His character is that of a wicked man, “waxing worse and worse;” but while we are shocked at its deformity, it should be our study to profit by it, which we can only do by using it as a beacon to warn us, “lest we also be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.”
Biblical and Theological Dictionary by Richard Watson
PRINTER 1849.

sôl (שׁאוּל, shā'ūl; Σαούλ, Saoúl):
(1) The first king of Israel.
I. EARLY HISTORY
1. Name and Meaning
2. Genealogy
3. Home and Station
4. Sources for Life
5. Election as King
6. Reasons for It
II. REIGN AND FALL
1. His First Action
2. Army Reorganized
3. Battle of Michmash
4. Defeats the Amalekites
5. Deposition Pronounced
6. David Introduced to Saul
7. Two Accounts
8. Saul's Envy of David
9. Attempts to Get Rid of David
10. David Spares Saul
11. Saul's Divided Energies
12. Consults a Necromancer
13. Battle of Gilboa
14. Double Accounts
15. Saul's Posterity
III. CHARACTER
1. Book of Chronicles
2. Saul's Failings
3. His Virtue
4. David's Elegy

I. Early History.
1. Name and Meaning:
The name Saul is usually regarded as simply the passive participle of the verb ?to ask,? and so meaning ?asked? (compare 1Sa_8:4 ff), but the gentilic adjective shā'ūlı̄ (Num_26:13) would point to its having also an intensive connotation, ?the one asked importunately,? or perhaps, ?the one asking insistently,? ?the beggar.?

2. Genealogy:
Saul was the son of Kish, a Benjamite. His genealogical tree is given in 1Sa_9:1 (compare Septuagint 1Sa_10:21). In 1Sa_9:1 his grandfather is Abiel, but in 1Ch_8:33; 1Ch_9:39, Ner, who appears as his paternal uncle in 1Sa_14:50, 1Sa_14:51.
The last verse contains a very curious scribal error, a yodh having slipped out of one word in it into another. It states that both Abner and Ner were sons of Abiel. These apparent inconsistencies are to be explained by the fact that in Hebrew, as in Arabic, ?son? is often used in the sense of grandson. Also, with the facility of divorce then prevalent, by ?brother? and ?sister? we must in most cases understand half-brother and half-sister. Moreover, Saul's mother might have been the wife at different times of Kish and of his brother Ner (compare 1Sa_20:30). This was quite common, and in some cases compulsory (Deu_25:5-9).

3. Home and Station:
Saul's home was at GIBEAH (which see), which is also called Gibeah of Saul, i.e. Saul's Hill (1Sa_11:4; compare also 1Sa_10:5, God's Hill, or simply The Hill, 1Sa_10:10; Hos_5:8, etc.), or the Hill of Benjamin or of the Benjamites (1Sa_13:15; 2Sa_23:29). It is usually identified with Tell el-Fûl, but perhaps its site is marked rather by some ruins near but beneath that eminence. The tribe of Benjamin was the fighting tribe of Israel, and Kish seems to have been one of its most important members. Saul's remarks in depreciation (1Sa_9:21) are not to be taken literally.

4. Sources for Life:
The circumstances of Saul's career are too well known to require recapitulation. It will be sufficient to refer to some of the recognized difficulties of the narrative. These difficulties arise from the fact that we appear to have two distinct biographies of Saul in the present Books of Samuel. This may well be the case as it is the practice of the Semitic historian to set down more than one tradition of each event, without attempting to work these up into one consistent account. We shall call the duplicated narratives A and B, without postulating that either is a continuous whole. See SAMUEL, BOOKS OF.

5. Election as King:
According to A, Saul was anointed king of Israel at Ramah by the prophet Samuel acting upon an inspiration from Yahweh, not only without consulting anyone, but in the strictest secrecy (1 Sam 9:1 through 10:16). According to B, the sheiks of the tribes demanded a king. Samuel in vain tried to dissuade them. They would not listen, and a king was chosen by lot at Mizpah. The lot fell upon Saul, and Samuel immediately demitted office (1 Sam 8; 1Sa_10:17-27, omitting the last clause; and chapter 12).

6. Reasons for It:
There are three distinct reasons given in the text for the abolition of theocracy and institution of an elective or hereditary monarchy: first, the incapacity of Samuel's sons (1Sa_8:1 ff); second, an invasion of the Ammonites (1Sa_12:12); and third, the Philistines (1Sa_9:16). These three motives are not mutually exclusive. The Philistines formed the standing menace to the national existence, which would have necessitated the creation of a monarchy sooner or later. The other two were temporary circumstances, one of which aggravated the situation, while the other showed the hopelessness of expecting any improvement in it in the near future.

II. Reign and Fall.
1. His First Action:
The election of Saul at Mizpah was conducted in the presence of the chieftains of the clans; it is not to be supposed that the whole nation was present. As soon as it was over, the electors went home, and Saul also returned to his father's farm and, like Cincinnatus, once more followed the plow. ?Within about a month,? however (1Sa_10:27 the Septuagint, for Massoretic Text ?But he held his peace?), the summons came. A message from the citizens of JABESH-GILEAD (which see) was sent round the tribes appealing for help against the Ammonites under Nahash. They, of course, knew nothing about what had taken place at Mizpah, and it was only by chance that their messengers arrived at Gibeah when they did. Saul rose to the occasion, and immediately after he was acclaimed king by the whole body of the people (1Sa_11:1-15). This double election, first by the chiefs and then by the people, is quite a regular proceeding.

2. Army Reorganized:
This first success encouraged Saul to enter upon what was to be the mission of his life, namely, the throwing off of the Philistine suzerainty. From the first he had had the boldest spirits upon his side (1Sa_10:26, the Septuagint, the Revised Version margin); he was now able to form a standing army of 3,000 men, under the command of himself and his son JONATHAN (which see). The Philistines, the last remnant of the Minoan race, had the advantage of the possession of iron weapons. It was, in fact, they who introduced iron into Palestine from Crete - the Israelites knowing only bronze, and having even been deprived of weapons of the softer metals. They seem to have armed themselves - with the exception of the king and his son - with mattocks and plowshares (1Sa_13:19 ff).

3. Battle of Michmash:
The first encounter was the attack upon the Philistine post at Michmash (1 Sam 13; 14). The text of the narrative is uncertain, but the following outline is clear. On hearing that the Hebrews had revolted (1Sa_13:3, the Septuagint), the Philistines gathered in great force, including 3,000 chariots (1Sa_13:5, the Septuagint; the Massoretic Text has 30,000) at Michmash. In dismay, Saul's troops deserted (1Sa_13:6 f), until he was left with only 600 (1Sa_14:2). In spite of this, Jonathan precipitated hostilities by a reckless attack upon one of the outposts. This was so successful that the whole Philistine army was seized with panic, and the onset of Saul and the desertion of their Hebrew slaves completed their discomfiture. Saul followed up his victory by making predatory excursions on every side (1Sa_14:47).

4. Defeats the Amalekites:
Saul's next expedition was against the Amalekites under Agag, who were likewise completely defeated. The fight was carried out with all the remorselessness common to tribal warfare. Warning was sent to the friendly Kenites to withdraw out of danger; then the hostile tribe was slaughtered to a man, their chief alone being spared for the time being. Even the women and children were not taken as slaves, but were all killed (1 Sam 15).

5. Deposition Pronounced:
It is not clear what was the precise attitude of Samuel toward Saul. As the undoubted head of theocracy he naturally objected to his powers being curtailed by the loss of the civil power (1Sa_8:6). Even after the elections of Saul, Samuel claimed to be the ecclesiastical head of the state. He seems to have objected to Saul's offering the sacrifice before battle (1Sa_13:10 ff), and to have considered him merely as his lieutenant (1Sa_15:3) who could be dismissed for disobedience (1Sa_15:14 ff). Here again there seem to be two distinct accounts in the traditional text, which we may again call A and B. In A, Saul is rejected because he does not wait long enough for Samuel at Gilgal (1Sa_13:8; compare 1Sa_10:8). ?Seven days,? of course, means eight, or even more, in short, until Samuel should come, whenever that might be. The expression might almost be omitted in translating. In B Saul is rejected because he did not carry out Samuel's orders (1Sa_15:3) to the letter. The two narratives are not mutually exclusive. The second offense was an aggravation of the first, and after it Samuel did not see Saul again (1Sa_15:35).

6. David Introduced to Saul:
He had good reason for not doing so. He had anointed a rival head of the state in opposition to Saul, an act of treason which, if discovered, would have cost him his head (compare 2Ki_9:6, 2Ki_9:10). Saul did not at once accept his deposition, but he lost heart. One cannot but admire him, deserted by Samuel, and convinced that he was playing a losing game, and yet continuing in office. To drive away his melancholy, his servants introduced to him a musician who played until his spirits revived (1Sa_16:14 ff; compare 2Ki_3:15).

7. Two Accounts:
By a strange coincidence (compare I, 5, above) the minstrel was the very person whom Samuel had secretly anointed to supplant Saul. According to what looks like another account, however, it was his encounter with Goliath which led to the introduction of David to Saul (1Sa_17:1 ff; see DAVID). In spite of all that has been said to the contrary, the two narratives are not incompatible, since we are not told the order of the events nor over how many years these events were spread. The theory of duplicate narratives rests upon the assumption that all statements made by the dramatis personae in the Bible are to be taken at their face value. If 1 Samuel 16 and 17 had formed part of a play of Shakespeare, they would have been considered a fine example of his genius. Treatises would have been written to explain why Saul did not recognize David, and why Abner denied all knowledge of him. Septuagint, however, omits 1 Sam 17:12-31, 1Sa_17:41, 1Sa_17:50, 55 through 18:5.

8. Saul's Envy of David:
Whether Saul actually discovered that David had been anointed by Samuel or not, he soon saw in him his rival and inevitable successor, and he would hardly have been human if he had not felt envious of him. His dislike of David had two motives. The first was jealousy, because the women preferred the military genius of David to his own (1Sa_18:7 f). His consequent attempt upon the life of David (1Sa_18:8-11) is omitted in the Septuagint. Not least was the love of his own daughter for David (1Sa_18:20; in 1Sa_18:28 read with Septuagint ?all Israel?). The second cause was his natural objection to see his son Jonathan supplanted in his rights to the throne, an objection which was aggravated by the devotion of that son to his own rival (1Sa_20:30). See also DAVID; JONATHAN.

9. Attempts to Get Rid of David:
Saul could not believe that David could remain loyal to him (1Sa_24:9); at the first favorable opportunity he would turn upon him, hurl him from the throne, and exterminate his whole house. In these circumstances, it was his first interest to get rid of him. His first attempt to do so (omitting with Septuagint 1Sa_18:8-11) was to encourage him to make raids on the Philistines in the hope that these might kill him (1Sa_18:21 ff); his next, assassination by one of his servants (1Sa_19:1), and then by his own hand (1Sa_19:9 f). When David was compelled to fly, the quarrel turned to civil war. The superstitious fear of hurting the chosen of Yahweh had given place to blind rage. Those who sheltered the fugitive, even priests, were slaughtered (1Sa_22:17 ff). From one spot to another David was hunted, as he says, like a partridge (1Sa_26:20).

10. David Spares Saul:
It is generally maintained that here also we have duplicate accounts; for example, that there are two accounts of David taking refuge with Achish, king of Gath, and two of his sparing Saul's life. The latter are contained in 1 Samuel 24 and 26, but the points of resemblance are slight. Three thousand (1Sa_24:2; 1Sa_26:2) was the number of Saul's picked men (compare 1Sa_13:2). David uses the simile of ?a flea? in 1Sa_24:14, but in 1Sa_26:20 for ?a flea? Septuagint has ?my soul,? which is no doubt original. The few other expressions would occur naturally in any narrative with the same contents.

11. Saul's Divided Energies:
Obviously Saul's divided energies could not hold out long; he could not put down the imaginary rebellion within, and at the same time keep at bay the foreign foe. No sooner had he got the fugitive within his grasp than he was called away by an inroad of the Philistines (1Sa_23:27 f); but after his life had been twice spared, he seemed to realize at last that the latter were the real enemy, and he threw his whole strength into one desperate effort for existence.

12. Consults a Necromancer:
Saul himself saw that his case was desperate, and that in fact the game was up. As a forlorn hope he determined to seek occult advice. He could no longer use the official means of divination (1Sa_28:6), and was obliged to have recourse to a necromancer, one of a class whom he himself had taken means to suppress (1Sa_28:3). The result of the seance confirmed his worst fears and filled his soul with despair (1Sa_28:7 ff).

13. Battle of Gilboa:
It says much for Saul that, hopeless as he was, he engaged in one last forlorn struggle with the enemy. The Philistines had gathered in great force at Shunem. Saul drew up his army on the opposing hill of Gilboa. Between the two forces lay a valley (compare 1Sa_14:4). The result was what had been foreseen. The Israelites, no doubt greatly reduced in numbers (contrast 1Sa_11:8), were completely defeated, and Saul and his sons slain. Their armor was placed in the temple of Ashtaroth, and their bodies hung on the wall of Bethshan, but Saul's head was set in the temple of Dagon (1Ch_10:10). The citizens of Jabesh-gilead, out of ancient gratitude, rescued the bodies and, in un-Semitic wise, burned them and buried the bones.

14. Double Accounts:
Once more we have, according to most present-day critics, duplicate accounts of the death of Saul. According to one, which we may name A, he fell, like Ajax whom he much resembles, upon his own sword, after being desperately wounded by the archers (1Sa_31:4). According to the second (2Sa_1:2 ff), an Amalekite, who had been by accident a witness of the battle, dispatched Saul at his own request to save him from the enemy. But B is simply the continuation of A, and tells us how David received the news of the battle. The Amalekite's story is, of course, a fabrication with a view to a reward. Similar claims for the reward of assassination are common (2Sa_4:9 ff).

15. Saul's Posterity:
With Saul the first Israelite dynasty began and ended. The names of his sons are given in 1Sa_14:49 as Jonathan, Ishvi and Malchishua. Ishvi or Ishyo (Septuagint) is Eshbaal, called in 2Sa_2:8 ISH-BOSHETH (which see). 1Ch_8:33 adds Abinadab. Jonathan left a long line of descendants famous, like himself, as archers (1Ch_8:34 ff). The rest of Saul's posterity apparently died out. Malchishua and Abinadab were slain at Gilboa (1Sa_31:6; 1Ch_10:2), and Ish-bosheth was assassinated shortly after (2Sa_4:2 ff). Saul had also two natural sons by Rizpah who were put to death by David in accordance with a superstitious custom, as also were the five sons of Saul's daughter Merab (2Sa_21:8, not Michal; compare 1Sa_18:19). Saurs other daughter Michal apparently had no children. Saul had, it seems, other wives, who were taken into the harem of David in accordance with the practice of the times (2Sa_12:8), but of them and their descendants we know nothing.

III. Character.
1. Book of Chronicles:
Saul's life and character are disposed of in a somewhat summary fashion by the Chronicler (1Ch_10:1-14, especially 1Ch_10:13, 1Ch_10:14). Saul was rejected because he was disloyal to Yahweh, especially in consulting a necromancer. The major premise of this conclusion, however, is the ancient dictum, ?Misfortune presupposes sin.? From a wider point of view, Saul cannot be dismissed in so cavalier a manner.

2. Saul's Failings:
Like everyone else, Saul had his virtues and his failings. His chief weakness seems to have been want of decision of character. He was easily swayed by events and by people. The praises of David (1Sa_18:7 f) at once set his jealousy on fire. His persecution of David was largely due to the instigation of mischievous courtiers (1Sa_24:9). Upon remonstrance his repentance was as deep as it was short-lived (1Sa_24:16; 1Sa_26:21). His impulsiveness was such that he did not know where to stop. His interdict (1Sa_14:24 ff) was quite as uncalled for as his religious zeal (1Sa_15:9) was out of place. He was always at one extreme. His hatred of David was only equal to his affection for him at first (1Sa_18:2). His pusillanimity led him to commit crimes which his own judgment would have forbidden (1Sa_22:17). Like most beaten persons, he became suspicious of everyone (1Sa_22:7 f), and, like those who are easily led, he soon found his evil genius (1Sa_22:9, 1Sa_22:18, 1Sa_22:22). Saul's inability to act alone appears from the fact that he never engaged in single combat, so far as we know. Before he could act at all his fury or his pity had to be roused to boiling-point (1Sa_11:6). His mind was peculiarly subject to external influences, so that he was now respectable man of the world, now a prophet (1Sa_10:11; 1Sa_19:24).

3. His Virtues:
On the other hand, Saul possessed many high qualities. His dread of office (1Sa_10:22) was only equaled by the coolness with which he accepted it (1Sa_11:5). To the first call to action he responded with promptitude (1Sa_11:6 ff). His timely aid excited the lasting gratitude of the citizens of Jabesh-gilead (1Sa_31:11 ff) If we remember that Saul was openly disowned by Samuel (1Sa_15:30), and believed himself cast off by Yahweh, we cannot but admire the way in which he fought on to the last. Moreover, the fact that he retained not only his own sons, but a sufficient body of fighting men to engage a large army of Philistines, shows that there must have been something in him to excite confidence and loyalty.

4. David's Elegy:
There is, however, no question as to the honorable and noble qualities of Saul. The chief were his prowess in war and his generosity in peace. They have been set down by the man who knew him best in what are among the most authentic verses in the Bible (2Sa_1:19 ff).
(2) Saul of Tarsus. See PAUL.

International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
PRINTER 1915.

Saul, son of Kish, of the tribe of Benjamin, was the first king of the Israelites. The corrupt administration of justice by Samuel's sons furnished an occasion to the Hebrews for rejecting that theocracy, of which they neither appreciated the value, nor, through their unfaithfulness to it, enjoyed the full advantages (1 Samuel 8). An invasion by the Ammonites seems also to have conspired with the cause just mentioned, and with a love of novelty, in prompting the demand for a king (1Sa_12:12)?an officer evidently alien to the genius of the theocracy, though contemplated as an historical certainty, and provided for by the Jewish lawgiver (1Sa_12:17-20; Deu_17:14-20). An explanation of the nature of this request, as not only an instance of ingratitude to Samuel, but of rebellion against Jehovah, and the delineation of the manner in which their kings?notwithstanding the restrictions prescribed in the law?might be expected to conduct themselves (1Sa_8:11; 1Sa_10:25), having failed to move the people from their resolution, the Lord sent Saul, who had left home in quest of his father's asses, which had strayed, to Samuel, who having informed Saul of the divine purpose regarding him, and having at a feast shown him a preference, which, no doubt the other guests understood, privately anointed him king, and gave him various tokens, by which he might be assured that his designation was from, Jehovah (1 Samuel 9-10). Moved by the authority of Samuel, and by the fulfillment of these signs, Saul's reluctance to assume the office to which he was called was overcome. On his way home, meeting a company of prophets, he was seized with the prophetic afflatus, and so gave occasion to a proverb afterwards in use among the Jews. Immediately after, Saul was elected at Mizpah in a solemn assembly by the determination of the miraculous lot?and both previously to that election (1Sa_10:16), and subsequently, when insulted by the worthless portion of the Israelites, he showed that modesty, humility, and forbearance which seem to have characterized him till corrupted by the possession of power. The person thus set apart to discharge the royal function, possessed at least those corporeal advantages which most ancient nations desiderated in their sovereigns. His person was tall and commanding, and he soon showed that his courage was not inferior to his strength (1Sa_9:1; 1Sa_10:23). His belonging to Benjamin also, the smallest of the tribes, though of distinguished bravery, prevented the mutual jealousy with which either of the two great tribes, Judah and Ephraim, would have regarded a king chosen from the other; so that his election was received with general rejoicing, and a number of men, moved by the authority of Samuel (1Sa_10:20), even attached themselves to him as a body-guard, or as counselors and assistants. In the mean time the Ammonites, whose invasion had hastened the appointment of a king, having besieged Jabesh in Gilead, and Nahash their king having proposed insulting conditions to them, the elders of that town, apparently not aware of Saul's election (1Sa_11:3), sent messengers through the land imploring help. Saul acted with wisdom and promptitude; summoning the people, en masse, to meet him at Bezek, at the head of a vast multitude he totally routed the Ammonites. He and the people then betook themselves, under the direction of Samuel, to Gilgal, there with solemn sacrifices to reinstall the victorious leader in his kingdom (1 Samuel 11). At Gilgal Saul was publicly anointed, and solemnly installed in the kingdom by Samuel, who took occasion to vindicate the purity of his own administration?which he virtually transferred to Saul?to censure the people for their ingratitude and impiety, and to warn both them and Saul of the danger of disobedience to the commands of Jehovah (1 Samuel 12) [SAMUEL].
The restrictions on which he held the sovereignty had (1Sa_10:25) been fully explained as well to Saul as to the people, so that he was not ignorant of his true position as merely the lieutenant of Jehovah, king of Israel, who not only gave all the laws, but whose will, in the execution of them, was constantly to be consulted and complied with. The first occasion on which his obedience to this constitution was put to the test brought out those defects in his character which showed his unfitness for his high office, and incurred a threat of that rejection which his subsequent conduct confirmed (1Sa_13:13).
Having organized a small standing army, part of which, under Jonathan, had taken a fort of the Philistines, Saul summoned the people to withstand the forces which their oppressors, now alarmed for their dominion, would naturally assemble. But so numerous a host came against Saul, that the people, panic-stricken, fled to rocks and caverns for safety?years of servitude having extinguished their courage, which the want of arms, of which the policy of the Philistines had deprived them, still further diminished. Apparently reduced to extremity, and the seventh day being come, but not being ended, the expiration of which Samuel had enjoined him to wait, Saul 'offered a burnt offering,' thus intruding into the priest's office. Samuel having denounced the displeasure of Jehovah and its consequences, left him, and Saul returned to Gibeah. Left to himself, Saul's errors multiplied apace. Jonathan, having assaulted a garrison of the Philistines (apparently at Michmash, 1Sa_14:31, which, therefore, must have been situated near Migron in Gibeah, 1Sa_14:1, and within sight of it, 1Sa_14:15), Saul, aided by a panic of the enemy, an earthquake, and the co-operation of his fugitive soldiers, effected a great slaughter; but by a rash and foolish denunciation, he (1) impeded his success (1Sa_14:30), (2) involved the people in a violation of the law (1Sa_14:33), and (3), unless prevented by the more enlightened conscience of the people, would have ended with putting Jonathan to death for an act which, being done in ignorance, could involve no guilt.
Another trial was afforded Saul before his final rejection, the command to extirpate the Amalekites, whose hostility to the people of God was inveterate (Deu_25:18; Exo_17:8-16; Num_14:42-45; Jdg_3:13; Jdg_6:3), and who had not by repentance averted that doom which had been delayed 550 years (1Sa_14:48). A second time Saul willfully violated the divine commission with which he had been entrusted. This stubbornness in persisting to rebel against the directions of Jehovah was now visited by that final rejection of his family from succeeding him on the throne, which had before been threatened (1Sa_14:23; 1Sa_13:13-14). After this second and flagrant disobedience, Saul received no more public countenance from the venerable prophet, who now left him to his sins and his punishment; 'nevertheless, he mourned for Saul,' and the Lord repented that he had made Saul king (1Sa_15:35).
The denunciations of Samuel sunk into the heart of Saul, and produced a deep melancholy, which either really was, or which his physicians (1Sa_16:14-15; comp. Gen_1:2) told him, was occasioned by an evil spirit from the Lord. By the advice of his servants, music was employed for the purpose of removing the deep melancholy into which he had fallen, and David was recommended to his notice as one 'cunning in playing.' Some critics have supposed, however, and apparently with good reason, that this event occurred subsequently to the transactions recorded in 1 Samuel 18.
Though not acquainted with the unction of David, yet having received intimation that the kingdom should be given to another, Saul soon suspected from his accomplishments, heroism, wisdom, and popularity, that David was his destined successor; and, instead of concluding that his resistance to the divine purpose would only accelerate his own ruin, Saul, in the spirit of jealousy and rage, commenced a series of murderous attempts on the life of his rival (1Sa_18:10-11; 1Sa_19:10), that must have lost him the respect and sympathy of his people which they secured for the object of his malice and envy, whose noble qualities also they both exercised and rendered more conspicuous. The slaughter of Ahimelech the priest (1 Samuel 22), under pretence of his being a partisan of David, and of eighty-five other priests of the house of Eli, to whom nothing could be imputed, as well as the whole inhabitants of Nob, was an atrocity perhaps never exceeded.
Having compelled David to assume the position of an outlaw, around whom gathered a number of turbulent and desperate characters, Saul might persuade himself that he was justified in bestowing on another the hand of his younger daughter whom he had given David to wife, and in making expeditions to apprehend and destroy him. A portion of the people were base enough to minister to the evil passions of Saul (1Sa_23:19; 1Sa_26:1), and others, perhaps, might color their fear by the pretence of conscience (1Sa_23:12). But his sparing Saul's life twice, when he was completely in his power, must have destroyed all color of right in Saul's conduct in the minds of the people, as it also did in his own conscience (1Sa_24:3-7; 1 Samuel 26). Though thus degraded and paralyzed by the indulgence of malevolent passions, Saul still acted with vigor in repelling the enemies of his country, and in other affairs wherein his jealousy of David was not concerned (1Sa_23:27-28).
The measure of Saul's iniquity, now almost full, was completed by an act of direct treason against Jehovah the God of Israel (Exo_22:18; Lev_19:31; Lev_20:27; Deu_18:10-11), in consulting a woman that had a familiar spirit. [The question as to the character of the apparition evoked by the Witch of Endor, falls more properly to be considered under the article WITCHCRAFTS]. Assured by this woman of his own death the next day, and that of his sons; of the ruin of his army, and the triumph of his most formidable enemies, whose invasion had tempted him to try this unhallowed expedient; Saul, in a state of dejection which could not promise success to his followers, met the enemy next day in Gilboa, on the extremity of the great plain of Esdraelon; and having seen the total rout of his army, and the slaughter of his three sons, of whom the magnanimous Jonathan was one; and, having in vain solicited death from the hand of his armor-bearer, Saul perished at last by his own hand (1Sa_31:1-7; 1Ch_10:13-14).
When the Philistines came on the morrow to plunder the slain, they found Saul's body and the bodies of his sons, which, having beheaded them, they fastened to the wall of Bethshan; but the men of Jabesh-gilead, mindful of their former obligation to Saul (1 Samuel 11), when they heard of the indignity, gratefully and heroically went by night and carried them off, and buried them under a tree in Jabesh, and fasted seven days. From Jabesh the bones of Saul and of his sons were removed by David, and buried in Zelah, in the sepulcher of Kish his father.




The Popular Cyclopedia of Biblical Literature
by John Kitto.

Saul
(Heb. Shaill', שָׁאוּל, desired; Sept. and New Test. Σαούλ; Josephus, Σάουλος), the name of several men, the following three of whom are thus known in the A.V. For the others SEE SHAUL.
1. An early king of the Edomites, successor of Samlah at Rehoboth (Gen_36:37-38), elsewhere called “Shaul” (1Ch_1:4 p. 49). B.C. post 1618.
2. The first king of Israel (B.C. 1093-1053). As such his career possesses a peculiar interest in the history and relations of the chosen people.
I. The Name. — This first becomes prominent here in the history of Israel, though found before in the Edomitish prince already mentioned, and in a son of Simeon (Gen_46:10; A.V. “Shaul”). It also occurs among the Kohathites in the genealogy of Samuel (1Ch_6:24, “Shaul”), and in Saul, like the king, of the tribe of Benjamin, better known as the apostle Paul (see below). Josephus (War, 2, 18, 4) mentions a Saul, father of one Simon who distinguished himself at Scythopolis in the early part of the Jewish war. The name in its application to the present character seems almost like a mockery of his history.
II. His Family. — On the following page is a general view of Saul's pedigree.
In this genealogy may be observed —
1. The repetition in two generations of the names of Kish and Ner, of Nadab and Abi-nadab, and of Mephibosheth.
2. The occurrence of the name of Baal in three successive generations; possibly in four, as there were two Mephibosheths.
3. The constant shiftings of the names of God, as incorporated in the proper names: (a) Ab-iel=Jehiel; (b) Malchi-shua=Je-shua; (c) Esh- baal=Ishbosheth; (d) Mephi- (or Meri-) baal=Mephi-bosheth.
4. The long continuance of the family down to the times of Ezra.
5. Is it possible that Zimri (1Ch_9:42) can be the usurper of 1 Kings 16 --if so, the last attempt of the house of Saul to regain its ascendency? The time would agree.
There is a disagreement between the pedigree in 1Sa_9:1; 1Sa_14:51, which represents Saul and Abner as the grandsons of Abiel. and 1Ch_8:33; 1Ch_9:39, which represents them as his great- grandsons. If we adopt the more elaborate pedigree in the Chronicles, we must suppose either that a link has been dropped between Abiel and Kish, in 1Sa_9:1, or that the elder Kish, the son of Abiel (1Ch_9:36), has been confounded with the younger Kish, the son of Ner (1Ch_9:39). The pedigree in 1 Chronicles 8 is not free from confusion, as it omits among the sons of Abiel, Ner, who in 1Ch_9:36 is the fifth son, and who in both is made the father of Kish. SEE ABIEL.
Saul's more particular genealogy and lineage (so far as given) is as follows:
III. Saul's History. —
1. Up to his Coronation. — The birthplace of Saul is not expressly mentioned; but as Zelah was the place of Kish's sepulchre (2 Samuel 21), it was probably his native village. There is no warrant for saying that it was Gibeah, though, from its subsequent connection with him, it is called often “Gibeah of Saul.” SEE GIBEAH. (When Abiel, or Jehiel [1Ch_8:29; 1Ch_9:35], is called the father of “Gibeon,” it probably means founder of Gibeah.)
His father, Kish, was a powerful and wealthy chief, though the family to which he belonged was of little importance (1Sa_9:1; 1Sa_9:21). A portion of his property consisted of a drove of asses. In search of these asses, gone astray on the mountains, he sent his son Saul, accompanied by a servant (נִעִר) who acted also as a guide and assistant of the young man (1Sa_9:3-10). After a three days' journey (1Sa_9:20), which it has hitherto proved impossible to track with certainty, SEE RAMAH, through Ephraim and Benjamin, SEE SHALIM; SEE SHALISHA; SEE ZUPH, they arrived at the foot of a hill surrounded by a town, when Saul proposed to return home, but was deterred by the advice of the servant, who suggested that before doing so they should consult “a man of God,” “a seer,” as to the fate of the asses, securing his oracle by a present (backshish) of a quarter of a silver shekel. They were instructed by the maidens at the well outside the city to catch the seer as he came out of the city to ascend to a sacred eminence, where a sacrificial feast was waiting for his benediction (1Sa_9:11-13). At the gate they met the seer for the first time — it was Samuel.
A divine intimation had indicated to him the approach and the future destiny of the youthful Benjamite. Surprised at his language, but still obeying his call, they ascended to the high place, and in the inn or caravansary at the top (Sept. τὸ κατάλυμα, 1Sa_9:27) found thirty or (Sept. and Josephus, Ant. 6, 4, 1) seventy guests assembled, among whom they took the chief place. In anticipation of some distinguished stranger, Samuel had bidden the cook reserve a boiled shoulder, from which Saul, as the chief guest, was bidden to tear off the first morsel (Sept. 1Sa_9:22-24). They then descended to the city, and a bed was prepared for Saul on the housetop. At daybreak Samuel roused him. They descended again to the skirts of the town, and there (the servant having left them) Samuel poured over Saul's head the consecrated oil, and with a kiss of salutation announced to him that he was to be the ruler and (Sept.) deliverer of the nation (1Sa_9:25 to 1Sa_10:1). From that moment, as he turned on Samuel the huge shoulder which towered above all the rest (Sept. 10:9), a new life dawned upon him. He returned by a route which, like that of his search, it is impossible to make out distinctly; and at every step homeward it was confirmed by the incidents which, according to Samuel's prediction awaited him (10:9, 10). At Rachel's sepulchre he met two men, who announced to him the recovery of the asses — his lower cares were to cease. At the oak of Tabor, SEE PLAIN, TABOR, he met three men carrying gifts of kids and bread and a skin of wine, as an offering to Bethel. Two of the loaves were offered to him as if to indicate his new dignity. At “the hill of God” (whatever may be meant thereby, possibly his own city, Gibeah) he met a band of prophets descending with musical instruments, and he caught the inspiration from them as a sign of his new life (Ewald, 3, 28-30).
This is what may be called the private, inner view of his call. The outer call, which is related independently of the other, was as follows. An assembly was convened by Samuel at Mizpeh, and lots (so often practiced at that time, see Aristot. Polit. 6, 11; Virgil, En. 2) were cast to find the tribe and the family which was to produce the king. Saul was named, and, by a divine intimation, found hidden in the circle of baggage which surrounded the encampment (1Sa_10:17-24). His stature at once conciliated the public feeling, and for the first time the shout was raised, afterwards so often repeated in modern times, “Long live the king!” (1Sa_10:23-24) and he returned to his own Gibeah, accompanied by the fighting part (הִחִיַל) of the people, of whom he was now to be the especial head. The murmurs of the worthless part of the community who refused to salute him with the accustomed presents were soon dispelled by an occasion arising to justify the selection of Saul. The words which close 1Sa_10:27 are, in the Hebrew text, “he was as though he were deaf;” in Josephus, Ant. 6, 5,1, and the Sept. (followed by Ewald), “and it came to pass after a month that.”
The corrupt administration of justice by Samuel's sons furnished an occasion to the Hebrews for rejecting that theocracy of which they neither appreciated the value, nor, through their unfaithfulness, to it, enjoyed the full advantages (1 Samuel 8). The prospect of the event related below seems also to have conspired with the cause just mentioned and with a love of novelty in prompting the demand for a king (1Sa_12:12) — an officer evidently alien to the genius of the theocracy, though contemplated as a historical certainty, and provided for by the Jewish lawgiver (1Sa_12:17-20; Deu_17:14-20; on which see Grotius's note; also De Jure Belli, etc. 1, 4, 6, with the remarks of Gronovius, who [as Puffendorf also does] controverts the views of Grotius). An explanation of the nature of this request, as not only an instance of ingratitude to Samuel, but of rebellion against Jehovah, and the delineation of the manner in which their kings — notwithstanding the restrictions prescribed in the law — might be expected to conduct themselves (מַשְׁסִּט הִמֶּלֶ,ִ Sept. δικαίωμα τοῦ βασιλέως; 1Sa_8:11; 1Sa_10:25), failed to move the people from their resolution. SEE SAMUEL.
Both previously to that election (1Sa_10:16), and subsequently, when insulted by the worthless portion of the Israelites, he showed that modesty, humility, and forbearance which seem to have characterized him till corrupted by the possession of power. The person thus set apart to discharge the royal function possessed, at least, those corporal advantages which most ancient nations desiderated in their sovereigns — what Euripides calls the worthy form of royalty. His person was tall and commanding, and he soon showed that his courage was not inferior to his strength (1Sa_9:1; 1Sa_10:23). His belonging to Benjamin also, the smallest of the tribes, though of distinguished bravery, prevented the mutual jealousy with which either of the two great tribes, Judah and Ephraim, would have regarded a king chosen from the other.
2. Confirmation of Saul's Appointment. — He was (having, apparently, returned to his private life) on his way home, driving his herd of oxen, when he heard one of those wild lamentations in the city of Gibeah, such as mark in Eastern towns the arrival of a great calamity. It was the tidings of the threat issued by Nahash, king of Ammon, against Jabesh-gilead. SEE AMMON. For, in the meantime, the Ammonites, whose invasion had hastened the appointment of a king, having besieged Jabesh in Gilead, and Nahash their king having proposed insulting conditions to them, the elders of that town, apparently not aware of Saul's election (1Sa_11:3), sent messengers through the land imploring help. The inhabitants of Jabesh were connected with Benjamin by the old adventure recorded in Judges 21. It was as if this one spark was needed to awaken the dormant spirit of the king. ‘The Spirit of the Lord came upon him,' as on the ancient judges. The shy, retiring nature which we have observed vanished never to return. In this emergency, he had recourse to the expedient of the earlier days by the message of the flesh of two of the oxen from the herd which he was driving. Saul thus acted with wisdom and promptitude, summoning the people, en masse, to meet him at Bezek; and having, at the head of a vast multitude, totally routed the Ammonites (Jdg_21:11) and obtained a higher glory by exhibiting a new instance of clemency, whether dictated by principle or policy — “Novum imperium inchoantibus utilis clementiae fama” (Tacitus, Hist. 4, 63), “For lowliness is young ambition's ladder” — he and the people betook themselves, under the direction of Samuel, to Gilgal, there with solemn sacrifices to reinstall the victorious leader in his kingdom (1 Samuel 11). If the number set down in the Hebrew text of those who followed Saul (1Sa_11:8) can be depended on (the Sept. more than doubles them, and Josephus outgoes even the Sept.), it would appear that the tribe of Judah was dissatisfied with Saul's election, for the soldiers furnished by the other tribes were 300,000, while Judah sent only 30,000; whereas the population of the former, compared with that of Judah, appears, from other passages, to have been as about five to three (2Ki_24:9). Yet it is strange that this remissness is neither punished (1Sa_11:7) nor noticed. At Gilgal Saul was publicly anointed and solemnly installed in the kingdom by Samuel, who took occasion to vindicate the purity of his own administration — which he virtually transferred to Saul — to censure the people for their ingratitude and impiety, and to warn both them and Saul of the danger of disobedience to the commands of Jehovah (1 Samuel 12). The effect of this military success was instantaneous on the people; the punishment of the murmurers was demanded, but refused by Saul, and the monarchy was inaugurated anew (1Sa_11:1-15). It should be observed, however, that, according to 1Sa_12:12. the affair of Nahash preceded and occasioned the election of Saul. He became king of Israel. But he still so far resembles the earlier judges as to be virtually king only of his own tribe, Benjamin, or of the immediate neighborhood. Almost all his exploits are confined to this circle of territory or associations.
These were the principal transactions that occurred during the first decade of Saul's reign (which we venture to assign as the meaning of the first clause of ch. 13 — “the son of a year was Saul in his reigning;” the emendation of Origen, “Saul was thirty years old,” being required by the chronology, for he seems, at the next event, to have been forty years old); and the subsequent events happened in the second decade, which may be the meaning of the latter clause.
3. Saul's First Trial and Transgression. — Samuel, who had up to this time been still named as ruler with Saul (1Sa_11:7; 1Sa_11:12; 1Sa_11:14), now withdrew, and Saul became the acknowledged chief. The restrictions on which he held the sovereignty had (1Sa_10:25) been fully explained as well to Saul as to the people, so that he was not ignorant of his true position as merely the lieutenant of Jehovah, king of Israel, who not only gave all the laws, but whose will, in the execution of them, was constantly to be consulted and complied with. The first occasion on which his obedience to this constitution was put to the test brought out those defects in his character which showed his unfitness for his high office, and incurred a threat of that rejection which his subsequent conduct confirmed (1Sa_13:13). Saul could not understand his proper position, as only the servant of Jehovah speaking through his ministers, or confine himself to it; and in this respect he was not, what David with many individual and private faults and crimes was a man after God's own heart, a king faithful to the principles of the theocracy.
In the twentieth year of his reign (as the age of Jonathan evidently requires; the text being corrupt; see Keil, ad loc.) Saul began to organize an attempt to shake off the Philistine yoke which pressed on his country; not least on his own tribe, where a Philistine officer had long been stationed even in his own field (1Sa_10:5; 1Sa_13:3). Having collected a small standing army, part of which, under Jonathan, had taken a fort (or slain the officer) of the Philistines, Saul summoned the people to withstand the forces which their oppressors, now alarmed for their dominion, would, upon this signal, naturally assemble. But so numerous a host came against Saul that the people, panic stricken, fled to rocks and caverns for safety — years of servitude having extinguished their courage, which the want of arms, of which the policy of the Philistines had deprived them, still further diminished. The number of chariots, 30,000, seems a mistake; unless we suppose, with Le Clerc, that they were not war chariots, but baggage wagons (an improbable supposition), so that 3000 may be the true number. ‘Apparently reduced to extremity, and the seventh day having come, but not being ended, the expiration of which Samuel had enjoined him to wait, Saul at least ordered sacrifices to be offered — for the expression (1Sa_13:9) does not necessarily imply that he intruded into the priest's office (2Sa_6:13; 1Ki_3:2-4), though that is the most obvious meaning of the text. Whether that which Saul now disregarded was the injunction referred to (1Sa_10:8) or one subsequently addressed to him, this is evident, that Saul acted in the full knowledge that he sinned (1Sa_13:12); and his guilt, in that act of conscious disobedience, was probably increased by its clearly involving an assumption of authority to conduct the war according to his own judgment and will. But just after the sacrifice was completed Samuel arrived and pronounced the first curse on his impetuous zeal (1Sa_13:5-14). Samuel, having denounced the displeasure of Jehovah and its consequences, left him, and Saul returned to Gibeah (the addition made to the text of the Sept. 1Sa_13:15, where, after “from Gilgal,” the clause, “and the rest of the people went up after Saul to meet the enemy from Gilgal to Gibeah,” etc., being required apparently by the sense, which, probably, has been the only authority for its insertion). Left to himself, Saul's errors multiplied apace. SEE SAMUEL.
Meanwhile the adventurous exploit of his son brought on the crisis which ultimately drove the Philistines back to their own territory. Jonathan, having assaulted a garrison of the Philistines (apparently at Michmash [1Sa_14:31], which therefore must have been situated near Migron in Gibeah [1Sa_14:1], and within sight of it [1Sa_14:15]), Saul, aided by a panic of the enemy, an earthquake, and the cooperation of his fugitive soldiers, effected a great slaughter; but by a rash and foolish denunciation, he (1) impeded his success (1Sa_14:30), (2) involved the people in a violation of the law (1Sa_14:33), and (3), unless prevented by the more enlightened conscience of the people, would have ended with putting Jonathan to death for an act which, being done in total ignorance, could involve no guilt. SEE JONATHAN.
This campaign was signalized by two remarkable incidents in the life of Saul. One was the first appearance of his madness in the above rash vow which all but cost the life of his son (1Sa_14:24; 1Sa_14:44). The other was the erection of his first altar, built either to celebrate the victory, or to expiate the savage feast of the famished people (1Sa_14:35). This success against the Philistines was followed, not only by their retirement for a time within their own territory, but by other considerable successes against the other enemies of his country. Moab, Ammon, Edom, the kings of Zobah, the Amalekites, and the Philistines — all of whom he harassed. but did not subdue. These wars may have occupied two or three years, about the middle of Saul's reign (B.C. 1073-71).
4. Saul's Second Transgression. — The expulsion of the Philistines (although not entirely completed [1Sa_14:52]) at once placed Saul in a position higher than that of any previous ruler of Israel. Probably from this time was formed the organization of royal state, which contained in germ some of the future institutions of the monarchy. The host of 3000 has been already mentioned (1 Samuel 13; 1Sa_24:2; 1Sa_26:2; comp. 1Ch_12:29). Of this Abner became captain (1Sa_14:50). A bodyguard of young, tall, and handsome Benjamites (Josephus, Ant. 6, 6, 6; 7, 14) was also formed of runners and messengers (see 1Sa_16:15; 1Sa_16:17; 1Sa_22:14; 1Sa_22:17; 1Sa_26:22). Of this David was afterwards made the chief. These two were the principal officers of the court, and sat with Jonathan at the king's table (20:25). Another officer is incidentally mentioned the keeper of the royal mules — the comes stabuli, the “constable” of the king — such as appears in the later monarchy (1Ch_27:30). He is the first instance of a foreigner employed about the court — being an Edomite or (Sept.) Syrian, of the name of Doeg (1Sa_21:7; 1Sa_22:9). According to Jewish tradition (Jerome, Qu. Hoeb. ad loc.) he was the servant who accompanied Saul in his pursuit of his father's asses — who counseled him to send for David (1Sa_9:16), and whose son ultimately killed him (2Sa_1:10). The high priest of the house of Ithamar (Ahimelech or Ahijah) was in attendance upon him with the ephod, when he desired it (1Sa_14:3), and felt himself bound to assist his secret commissioners (21:1-9; 22:14). The king himself was distinguished by a state not before marked in the rulers. He had a tall spear of the same kind as that described in the hand of Goliath, and the same that now marks the Bedouin sheik. This never left him — in repose (18:10; 19:9), at his meals (20:33), at rest (26:11), in battle (2Sa_1:6). In battle he wore a diadem on his head and a bracelet on his arm (1:10). He sat at meals on a seat of his own facing his son (1Sa_20:25; Sept.). He was received on his return from battle by the songs of the Israelitish women (18:6), among whom he was on such occasions specially known as bringing back from the enemy scarlet robes, and golden ornaments for their apparel (2Sa_1:24).
The warlike character of his reign naturally still predominated, and he was now able not merely, like his temporary predecessors, to act on the defensive, but to attack the neighboring tribes of Moab, Ammon, Edom, Zobah, and finally Amalek (1Sa_14:47). The war with Amalek is twice related, first briefly (1Sa_14:48), and then at length (15:1-9). Its chief connection with Saul's history lies in the disobedience to the prophetical command of Samuel, shown in the sparing of the king, and the retention of the spoil (B.C. 1070). In this event another trial was afforded Saul before his final rejection namely, by the command to extirpate the Amalekites, whose hostility to the people of God was inveterate (Deu_25:18; Exo_17:8-16; Num_14:42-45; Jdg_3:13; Jdg_6:3), and who had not by repentance averted that doom which had been delayed 550 years (1Sa_14:48). The extermination of Amalek and the subsequent execution of Agag belong to the general question of the moral code of the Old Test. SEE AGAG.
There is no reason to suppose that Saul spared the king for any other reason than that for which he retained the spoil — namely, to make a more splendid show at the sacrificial thanksgiving (1Sa_15:21). Such was the Jewish tradition preserved by Josephus (Ant. 6, 7, 2), who expressly says that Agag was spared for his stature and beauty, and such is the general impression left by the description of the celebration of the victory. Saul rides to the southern Carmel in a chariot (Sept.), never mentioned elsewhere, and sets up a monument there (Heb. “a hand” [2Sa_18:18]), which in the Jewish traditions (Jerome, Qu. Hoeb. ad loc.) was a triumphal arch of olives, myrtles, and palms. In allusion to his crowning triumph, Samuel applies to God the phrase, “The victory (Vulg. trumphator) of Israel will neither lie nor repent” (1Sa_15:29; and comp. 1Ch_29:11). The apparent cruelty of this commission was not the reason why it was not fully executed, as Saul himself confessed when Samuel upbraided him, “I feared the people and obeyed their voice” (1Sa_15:24). This stubbornness in persisting to rebel against the directions of Jehovah was now visited by that final rejection of his family from succeeding him on the throne which had before been threatened (1Sa_13:13-14; 1Sa_15:23), and which was now significantly represented, or mystically predicted, by the rending of the prophet's mantle. The struggle between Samuel and Saul in their final parting is also indicated, as he tears himself away from Saul's grasp (for the gesture, see Josephus, Ant. 6, 7, 5), and by the long mourning of Samuel for the separation “Samuel mourned for Saul.” “How long wilt thou mourn for Saul?” (1Sa_14:35; 1Sa_16:1). After this second and flagrant disobedience, accordingly, Saul received no more public countenance from the venerable prophet, who now left him to his sins and his punishment; “nevertheless the Lord repented that he had made Saul king” (15:35). SEE SAMUEL.
5. Saul's Conduct towards David. — The rest of Saul's life is one long tragedy. The frenzy which had given indications of itself before now at times took almost entire possession of him. It is described in mixed phrases as “an evil spirit of God” (much as we might speak of “religious madness”), which, when it came upon him, almost choked or strangled him from its violence (1Sa_16:14; Sept.; Josephus, Ant. 6:8, 2). The denunciations of Samuel sank into the heart of Saul, and produced a deep melancholy, which either really was, or which his physicians (1Sa_16:14-15; comp. Genesis 1, 2) told him was, occasioned by a supernatural influence; unless we understand the phrase רוּחִ רָעָה, an evil spirit, subjectively, as denoting the condition itself of Saul's mind, instead of the cause of that condition (Isa_29:10; Num_5:14; Rom_11:8). We can conceive that music might affect Saul's feelings, might cheer his despondency, or divert his melancholy; but how it should have the power to chase away a spiritual messenger whom the Lord had sent to chasten the monarch for his transgressions is not so easily understood. Saul's case must probably be judged of by the same principles as that of the daemoniacs mentioned in the New Test. SEE DAEMONIAC. In this crisis David was recommended to him by one of the young men of his guard (in the Jewish tradition groundlessly supposed to be Doeg [Jerome, Qu. Hoeb. ad loc.]) on account of his skill as a musician (1Sa_16:16-23). But the narrative of his introduction to Saul, his subsequently killing Goliath, Saul's ignorance of David's person after he had been his attendant and armor bearer, with various other circumstances in the narrative (1Sa_16:14-23; 1 Samuel 17; 1Sa_18:1-4), present difficulties which neither the arbitrary omissions in the Sept. nor the ingenuity of subsequent critics has fully succeeded in removing, and which have led many eminent scholars to suppose the existence of extensive dislocations in this part of the Old Test. The change proposed by Hales and others seems to be the most ready, which would place the passage 1Sa_16:14-23 after 18:9; yet why should Saul's attendants need to describe so minutely a person whom he and all Israel knew so well already? Also, how can we conceive that Saul should love so much (1Sa_16:21) a person against whom his jealousy and hatred had been so powerfully excited as his probable successor in the kingdom? (1Sa_18:9). Besides, David had occupied already a much higher position (1Sa_18:5); and, therefore, his being made Saul's armor bearer must have been the very opposite of promotion, which the text (16:21) supposes it was. The most rational solution of the difficulty appears to be the supposition that David had in the interim grown so much that the monarch did not now recognize him. SEE DAVID.
Though not acquainted with the unction of David, yet having received intimation that the kingdom should be given to another, Saul soon suspected, from his accomplishments, heroism, wisdom, and popularity, that David was his destined successor; and, instead of concluding that his resistance to the divine purpose would only accelerate his own ruin, Saul, in the spirit of jealousy and rage, commenced a series of murderous attempts on the life of his rival that must have lost him the respect and sympathy of his people, which they secured for the object of his malice and envy, whose noble qualities also they both exercised and rendered more conspicuous. He attempted twice to assassinate him with his own hand (1Sa_18:10-11; 1Sa_19:10); he sent him on dangerous military expeditions (1Sa_18:5; 1Sa_18:13; 1Sa_18:17); he proposed that David should marry first his elder daughter, whom yet he gave to another, and then his younger, that the procuring of the dowry might prove fatal to David; and then he sought to make his daughter an instrument of her husband's destruction; and it seems probable that unless miraculously prevented he would have imbrued his hands in the blood of the venerable Samuel himself (1Sa_19:18), while the text seems to intimate (1Sa_20:33) that even the life of Jonathan was not safe from his fury, though the subsequent context may warrant a doubt whether Jonathan was the party aimed at by Saul. The slaughter of Ahimelech the priest (ch. 22), under pretence of his being a partisan of David, and of eighty-five other priests of the house of Eli, to whom nothing could be imputed, as well as the whole inhabitants of Nob, was an atrocity perhaps never exceeded; and yet the wickedness of the act was not greater than its infatuation, for it must have inspired his subjects not only with abhorrence of their king as an inhuman tyrant, but with horror of him as an impious and sacrilegious monster. This crime of Saul put David in possession of the sacred lot, which Abiathar, the only surviving member of Eli's priestly family, brought with him, and by which he was enabled to obtain oracles directing him in his critical affairs (1Sa_22:21-23; 1Sa_23:1-2).
Having compelled David to assume the position of an outlaw, around whom gathered a number of turbulent and desperate characters, Saul might persuade himself that he was justified in bestowing the hand of David's wife on another, and in making expeditions to apprehend and destroy him. A portion of the people were base enough to minister to the evil passions of Saul (1Sa_23:19; 1Sa_26:1), and others, perhaps, might color their fear by the pretence of conscience (1Sa_23:12). But his sparing Saul's life twice, when he was completely in his power, must have destroyed all color of right in Saul's conduct in the minds of the people, as it also did in his own conscience (1Sa_24:3-7; 1 Samuel 26), which two passages, though presenting many points of similarity, cannot be referred to the same occasion without denying to the narrative all historic accuracy and trustworthiness. Though thus degraded and paralyzed by the indulgence of malevolent passions, Saul still acted with vigor in repelling the enemies of his country, and in other affairs wherein his jealousy of David was not concerned (1Sa_23:27-28). In Saul”s better moments, also, he never lost the strong affection which he had contracted for David. “He loved him greatly” (1Sa_16:21). “Saul would let him go no more home to his father”s house” (1Sa_18:2). “Wherefore cometh not the son of Jesse to meat?” (1Sa_20:27). “Is this thy voice, my son David? ... Return, my son David; blessed be thou, my son David” (1Sa_24:16; 1Sa_26:17; 1Sa_26:25). Occasionally, too, his prophetical gift returned, blended with his madness. He “prophesied” or “raved” in the midst of his house — “he prophesied and lay down naked all day and all night” at Ramah (1Sa_19:24). But his acts of fierce, wild zeal increased. The massacre of the priests, with all their families — the massacre, perhaps at the same time, of the Gibeonites (2Sa_21:1), and the violent extirpation of the necromancers (1Sa_28:3; 1Sa_28:9), are all of the same kind.
6. Saul”s Last Offense and Death. — At length the monarchy itself, which he had raised up, broke down under the weakness of its head. The Philistines reentered the country, and with their chariots and horses occupied the plain of Esdraelon. Their camp was I pitched on the southern slope of the range now called Little Hermon, by Shunem. On the opposite side, on Mount Gilboa, was the Israelitish army, clinging, as usual, to the heights which were their safety. It was near the spring of Gideon”s encampment, hence called the spring of Harod, or “trembling;” and now the name assumed an evil omen, and the heart of the king as he pitched his camp there “trembled exceedingly” (1Sa_28:5). The measure of Saul's iniquity, now almost full, was completed by an act of direct treason against Jehovah the God of Israel (Exo_22:18; Lev_19:31; Lev_20:27; Deu_18:10-11). Saul, probably in a fit of zeal and perhaps as some atonement for his disobedience in other respects, had executed the penalty of the law on those who practiced necromancy and divination (1Sa_28:3). Now, however, in the loss of all the usual means of consulting the divine will, he determined, with that wayward mixture of superstition and religion which marked his whole career, to apply to one of the necromancers who had escaped his persecution. Forsaken of God, who gave him no oracles, and rendered, by a course of wickedness, both desperate and infatuated, he requested his attendants to seek him a woman who had a familiar spirit (which is the loose rendering in the English Bible of the expression occurring twice in 1Sa_28:7, אֶשֶׁת בִּעֲלִת אוֹב, a woman a mistress of Ob; Sept. ἐγγαστρίμυθος, i.e. a ventriloquist; Vulg. habens Pythonem, i.e. a Pythoness, SEE NECROMANCY ), that he might obtain from her that direction which Jehovah refused to afford him. She was a woman living at Endor, on the other side of Little Hermon.. According to the Hebrew tradition mentioned by Jerome, she was the mother of Abner, and hence her escape from the general massacre of the necromancers (see Leo Allatius, De Engastrimutho, cap. 6 in Critici Sacri, vol. 2). Volumes have been written on the question whether in the scene that follows we are to understand an imposture or a real apparition of Samuel. Eustathius and most of the fathers take the former view (representing it, however, as a figment of the devil); Origen, the latter view. Augustine wavers (ibid. ut supra, p. 1062- 1114). The Sept. of 1Sa_27:7 (by the above translation) and the A.V. (by its omission of “himself” in 28:14, and insertion of “when” in 1Sa_27:12) lean to the former. Josephus (who pronounces a glowing eulogy on the woman, Ant. 6, 14, 2, 3) and the Sept. of 1Ch_10:13, to the latter. At this distance of time it is impossible to determine the relative amount of fraud or of reality, though the obvious meaning of the narrative itself tends to the hypothesis of some kind of apparition. She recognizes the disguised king first by the appearance of Samuel, seemingly from his threatening aspect or tone as towards his enemy. Saul apparently saw nothing, but listened to her description of a godlike figure of an aged man wrapped round with the royal or sacred robe. On hearing the denunciation which the apparition conveyed, Saul fell the whole length of his gigantic stature (see 1Sa_28:20, margin) on the ground, and remained motionless till the woman and his servants forced him to eat.
Assured of his own death in the coming engagement, and that of his sons, of the ruin of his army and the triumph of his most formidable enemies, whose invasion had tempted him to try this unhallowed expedient all announced to him by that same authority which had foretold his possession of the kingdom, and whose words had never been falsified — Saul, in a state of dejection which could not promise success to his followers (comp. Thomson, Land and Book, 2, 168), prepared as best he could to meet the enemy in Gilboa, on the extremity of the great plain of Esdraelon (on the localities of this battle, etc., see Hackett, Illustrations of Script. p. 178 sq.).
The next day the battle came on, and, according to Josephus (Ant. 6, 14,7), perhaps according to the spirit of the sacred narrative, his courage and self devotion returned. The Israelites were driven up the side of Gilboa. The three sons of Saul were slain (1Sa_31:2). Saul himself with his armor bearer was pursued by the archers and the charioteers of the enemy (1Sa_31:3; 2Sa_1:6). He was wounded in the stomach (Sept. 1Sa_31:3). His shield was cast away (2Sa_1:21). In his extremity, having in vain solicited death from the hand of his armor bearer (Doeg the Edomite — the Jews say, “a partner before of his master's crimes and now of his punishment”), Saul perished at last by his own sword (1Sa_31:4). According to another account (less trustworthy, or, perhaps, to be reconciled with the former by supposing that it describes a later incident), an Amalekite came up at the moment of his death wound (whether from himself or the enemy) and found him “fallen” but leaning on his spear (2Sa_1:6; 2Sa_1:10). The dizziness of death was gathered over him (2Sa_1:9), but he was still alive; and he was, at his own request, put out of his pain by the Amalekite, who took off his royal diadem and bracelet and carried the news to David (2Sa_1:7-10). Not till then, according to Josephus (Ant. 6, 14, 7), did the faithful armor bearer fall on his sword and die with him (1Sa_31:5). The body, on being found by the Philistines on the morrow, was stripped and decapitated. The armor was sent into the Philistine cities, as if in retribution for the spoliation of Goliath, and finally deposited in the temple of Astarte, apparently in the neighboring Canaanitish city of Bethshan; and over the walls of the same city was hung the naked, headless corpse with those of his three sons (1Sa_31:9-10). The head was deposited (probably at Ashdod) in the temple of Dagon (1Ch_10:10). The corpse was removed from Bethshan by the gratitude of the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead, who came over the Jordan by night, carried off the bodies, burned them, and buried them under the tamarisk at Jabesh (1Sa_31:13). It is pleasing to think that even the worst men have left behind them those in whom gratitude and affection are duties. Saul had those who mourned him, as some hand was found to have strewn flowers on the newly made grave of Nero. After the lapse of several years, his ashes and those of Jonathan were removed by David to their ancestral sepulchre at Zelah in Benjamin (2Sa_21:14).
IV. Saul's Character. — There is not in the sacred history, or in any other, a character more melancholy to contemplate than that of Saul. Naturally humble and modest, though of strong passions, he might have adorned a private station. In circumstances which did not expose him to strong temptation, he would probably have acted virtuously. But his natural rashness was controlled neither by a powerful understanding nor a scrupulous conscience; and the obligations of duty and the ties of gratitude, always felt by him too slightly, were totally disregarded when ambition, envy, and jealousy had taken possession of his mind. The diabolical nature of these passions is seen, with frightful distinctness, in Saul, whom their indulgence transformed into an unnatural and bloodthirsty monster, who constantly exhibited the moral infatuation, so common among those who have abandoned themselves to sin, of thinking that the punishment of one crime may be escaped by the perpetration of another. In him, also, is seen that moral anomaly or contradiction, which would be incredible did we not so often witness it, of an individual pursuing habitually a course which his better nature pronounces not only flagitious, but insane (1Sa_24:16; 1Sa_24:22). Saul knew that that person should be king whom yet he persisted in seeking to destroy, and so accelerated his own ruin. For it can hardly be doubted that the distractions and disaffection occasioned by Saul's persecution of David produced that weakness in his government which encouraged the Philistines to make the invasion in which himself and his sons perished. “I gave thee a king in mine anger, and took him away in my wrath” (Hos_12:11). In the prolonged troubles and disastrous termination of this first reign, the Hebrews were vividly shown how vain was their favorite remedy for the mischiefs of foreign invasion and intestine discord.
Saul's character is in part illustrated by the fierce, wayward, fitful nature of the tribe, SEE BENJAMIN, and in part accounted for by the struggle between the old and new systems in which he found himself involved. To this we must add a taint of madness, which broke out in violent frenzy at times, leaving him with long lucid intervals. His affections were strong, as appears in his love both for David and his son Jonathan, but they were unequal to the wild accesses of religious zeal or insanity which ultimately led to his ruin. He was, like the earlier Judges, of whom in one sense he may be counted as the successor, remarkable for his strength and activity (2Sa_1:23); and he was, like the Homeric heroes, of gigantic stature, taller by head and shoulders than the rest of the people, and of that kind of beauty denoted by the Hebrew word “good” (1Sa_9:2), and which caused him to be compared to the gazelle — “the gazelle of Israel.” It was probably these external qualities which led to the epithet which is frequently attached to his name, “chosen” — “whom the Lord did choose” — “See ye (i.e. Look at) him whom the Lord hath chosen” (1Sa_9:17; 1Sa_10:24; 2Sa_21:6).
V. Literature. — See the treatises referred to in Darling, Cyclop. Bibliograph. Colossians 290-302; Stanley, Jewish Ch. 2, lect. 21; Ewald, Hist. of Israel, 2, 15 sq.; Niemeyer, Charak. 5, 75 sq.; Hasse, König Saul (Gries. 1854); Richardson, Saul, King of Israel (Edinb. 1858); Miller, Saul, First King of Israel (2d ed., Lond. 1866); Brooks, King Saul ([a tragedy], N.Y. 1871); and the monographs on his interview with the witch cited by Fürst, Bibliotheca Judaica, 3, 236. SEE KING.
3. The Jewish name of Paul (q.v.). This was the most distinguished name in the genealogies of the tribe of Benjamin, to which the apostle felt some pride in belonging (Rom_11:1; Php_3:5). He himself leads us to associate his name with that of the Jewish king by the marked way in which he mentions Saul in his address at the Pisidian Antioch: “God gave unto them Saul the son of Cis, a man of the tribe of Benjamin” (Act_13:21). These indications are in harmony with the intensely Jewish spirit of which the life of the apostle exhibits so many signs. The early ecclesiastical writers did not fail to notice the prominence thus given by Paul to his tribe. Tertullian (Adv. Marc. 5, 1) applies to him the dying words of Jacob on Benjamin. And Jerome, in his Epitaphium Pauloe (§ 8), alluding to the preservation of the six hundred men of Benjamin after the affair of Gibeah (Judges 20:49), speaks of them as “trecentos [sic] viros propter Apostolum reservatos.” SEE BENJAMIN.
Nothing certain is known about the change of the apostle's name from Saul to Paul (Act_13:9). Two chief conjectures prevail concerning the change. (1) That of Jerome and Augustine, that the name was derived from Sergius Paulus, the first of his Gentile converts. (2) That which appears due to Lightfoot, that Paulus was the apostle's Roman name as a citizen of Tarsus, naturally adopted into common use by his biographer when his labors among the heathen commenced. The former of these is adopted by Olshausen and Meyer. It is also the view of Ewald (Gesch. 6, 419, 420), who seems to consider it self evident, and looks on the absence of any explanation of the change as a proof that it was so understood by all the readers of the Acts. However this may be, after Saul has taken his place definitively as the apostle to the Gentile world, his Jewish name is entirely dropped. Two divisions of his life are well marked by the use of the two names.

CYCLOPEDIA OF BIBLICAL, THEOLOGICAL AND ECCLESIASTICAL
press 1895.

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