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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - 1 Samuel 13:8 - 13:8
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Saul's untimely sacrifice. - 1Sa 13:8, 1Sa 13:9. Saul waited seven days for Samuel's coming, according to the time appointed by Samuel (see at 1Sa 10:8), before proceeding to offer the sacrifices through which the help of the Lord was to be secured for the approaching campaign (see 1Sa 13:12); and as Samuel did not come, the people began to disperse and leave him. The Kethib וייחל is either the Niphal וַיִּיָּחֶל, as in Gen 8:12, or Piel וַיְיַחֵל; and the Keri וַיֹּוחֶל (Hiphil) is unnecessary. The verb יָעַד may easily be supplied to שְׁמוּאֵל אֲשֶׁר from the word לַמֹּועֵד (see Ges. Lehrgeb. p. 851).
1Sa 13:9
Saul then resolved, in his anxiety lest the people should lose all heart and forsake him altogether if there were any further delay, that he would offer the sacrifice without Samuel. הָעֹולָה וַיַּעַל does not imply that Saul offered the sacrifice with his own hand, i.e., that he performed the priestly function upon this occasion. The co-operation of the priests in performing the duties belonging to them on such an occasion is taken for granted, just as in the case of the sacrifices offered by David and Solomon (2Sa 24:25; 1Ki 3:4; 1Ki 8:63).
1Sa 13:10-12
The offering of the sacrifice was hardly finished when Samuel came and said to Saul, as he came to meet him and salute him, “What hast thou done?” Saul replied, “When I saw that the people were scattered away from me, and thou camest not at the time appointed, and the Philistines were assembled at Michmash, I thought the Philistines will come down to me to Gilgal now (to attack me), before I have entreated the face of Jehovah; and I overcame myself, and offered the burnt-offering.” יי פְּנֵי חִלָּה: see Exo 32:11.
1Sa 13:13-14
Samuel replied, “Thou hast acted foolishly, (and) not kept the commandment of Jehovah thy God, which He commanded thee: for now (sc., if thou hadst obeyed His commandment) Jehovah would have established thy sovereignty over Israel for ever; but now (sc., since thou hast acted thus) thy sovereignty shall not continue.” The antithesis of הֵכִין עַתָּה and תָקוּם לֹא וְעַתָּה requires that we should understand these two clauses conditionally. The conditional clauses are omitted, simply because they are at once suggested by the tenor of the address (see Ewald, §358, a.). The כִּי (for) assigns the reason, and refers to נִסְכַּלְתָּ (“thou hast done foolishly”), the וגו שָׁמַרְתָּ לֹא being merely added as explanatory. The non-continuance of the sovereignty is not to be regarded as a rejection, or as signifying that Saul had actually lost the throne so far as he himself was concerned; but תָקוּם לֹא (shall not continue) forms the antithesis to עַד־עֹולָם הֵכִין (established for ever), and refers to the fact that it was not established in perpetuity by being transmitted to his descendants. It was not till his second transgression that Saul was rejected, or declared unworthy of being king over the people of God (1 Samuel 15). We are not compelled to assume an immediate rejection of Saul even by the further announcement made by Samuel, “Jehovah hath sought him a man after his own heart; him hath Jehovah appointed prince over His people;” for these words merely announce the purpose of God, without defining the time of its actual realization. Whether it would take place during Saul's reign, or not till after his death, was known only to God, and was made contingent upon Saul's further behaviour. But if Saul's sin did not consist, as we have observed above, in his having interfered with the prerogatives of the priests by offering the sacrifice himself, but simply in the fact that he had transgressed the commandment of God as revealed to him by Samuel, to postpone the sacrifice until Samuel arrived, the punishment which the prophet announced that God would inflict upon him in consequence appears a very severe one, since Saul had not come to the resolution either frivolously or presumptuously, but had been impelled and almost forced to act as he did by the difficulties in which he was placed in consequence of the prophet delaying his coming. But wherever, as in the present instance, there is a definite command given by the Lord, a man has no right to allow himself to be induced to transgress it, by fixing his attention upon the earthly circumstances in which he is placed. As Samuel had instructed Saul, as a direct command from Jehovah, to wait for his arrival before offering sacrifice, Saul might have trusted in the Lord that he would send His prophet at the right time and cause His command to be fulfilled, and ought not to have allowed his confidence to be shaken by the pressing danger of delay. The interval of seven days and the delay in Samuel's arrival were intended as a test of his faith, which he ought not to have lightly disregarded. Moreover, the matter in hand was the commencement of the war against the principal enemies of Israel, and Samuel was to tell him what he was to do (1Sa 10:8). So that when Saul proceeded with the consecrating sacrifice for that very conflict, without the presence of Samuel, he showed clearly enough that he thought he could make war upon the enemies of his kingdom without the counsel and assistance of God. This was an act of rebellion against the sovereignty of Jehovah, for which the punishment announced was by no means too severe.
1Sa 13:15
After this occurrence Samuel went up to Gibeah, and Saul mustered the people who were with him, about six hundred men. Consequently Saul had not even accomplished the object of his unseasonable sacrifice, namely, to prevent the dispersion of the people. With this remark the account of the occurrence that decided the fate of Saul's monarchy is brought to a close.