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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.comKeil and Delitzsch Commentary - 1 Samuel 9:1 - 9:1
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When the Lord had instructed Samuel to appoint a king over the nation, in accordance with its own desire, He very speedily proceeded to show him the man whom He had chosen. Saul the Benjaminite came to Samuel, to consult him as a seer about his father's she-asses, which had been lost, and for which he had been seeking in all directions in vain (1Sa 9:1-14). And the Lord had already revealed to the prophet the day before, that He would send him the man who had been set apart by Him as the king of Israel; and when Samuel met with Saul, He pointed him out as the man to whom He had referred (1Sa 9:15-17). Accordingly, Samuel invited Saul to be his guest at a sacrificial meal, which he was about to celebrate (1Sa 9:18-24). After the meal he made known to him the purpose of God, anointed him as king (1Sa 9:25-27; 1Sa 10:1), and sent him away, with an announcement of three signs, which would serve to confirm his election on the part of God (1Sa 10:2-16). This occurrence is related very circumstantially, to bring out distinctly the miraculous interposition of God, and to show that Saul did not aspire to the throne; and also that Samuel did not appoint of his own accord the man whom he was afterwards obliged to reject, but that Saul was elected by God to be king over His people, without any interference on the part of either Samuel or himself.
(Note: There is no tenable ground for the assumption of Thenius and others, that this account was derived from a different source from 1 Samuel 8, 1Sa 10:17-27, and 1Sa 10:11.; for the assertion that 1Sa 10:17-27 connects itself in the most natural way with 1 Samuel 8 is neither well-founded nor correct. In the first place, it was certainly more natural that Samuel, who was to place a king over the nation according to the appointment of God, should be made acquainted with the man whom God had appointed, before the people elected him by lot. And secondly, Saul's behaviour in hiding himself when the lots were cast (1Sa 10:21.), can only be explained on the supposition that Samuel had already informed him that he was the appointed king; whereas, if this had not been the case, it would be altogether incomprehensible.)
1Sa 9:1-2
Saul searches for his father's asses. - 1Sa 9:1, 1Sa 9:2. The elaborate genealogy of the Benjaminite Kish, and the minute description of the figure of his son Saul, are intended to indicate at the very outset the importance to which Saul attained in relation to the people of Israel, Kish was the son of Abiel: this is in harmony with 1Sa 14:51. But when, on the other hand, it is stated in 1Ch 8:33; 1Ch 9:39, that Ner begat Kish, the difference may be reconciled in the simplest manner, on the assumption that the Ner mentioned there is not the father, but the grandfather, or a still more remote ancestor of Kish, as the intervening members are frequently passed over in the genealogies. The other ancestors of Kish are never mentioned again. חַיִל גִּבֹּור refers to Kish, and signifies not a brave man, but a man of property, as in Rth 2:1. This son Saul (i.e., “prayed for:” for this meaning of the word, comp. 1Sa 1:17, 1Sa 1:27) was “young and beautiful.” It is true that even at that time Saul had a son grown up (viz., Jonathan), according to 1Sa 13:2; but still, in contrast with his father, he was “a young man,” i.e., in the full vigour of youth, probably about forty or forty-five years old. There is no necessity, therefore, to follow the Vulgate rendering electus. No one equalled him in beauty. “From his shoulder upwards he was higher than any of the people.” Such a figure as this was well adapted to commend him to the people as their king (cf. 1Sa 10:24), since size and beauty were highly valued in rulers, as signs of manly strength (see Herod. iii. 20, vii. 187; Aristot. Polit. iv. c. 24).
1Sa 9:3-5
Having been sent out by his father to search for his she-asses which had strayed, Saul went with his servant through the mountains of Ephraim, which ran southwards into the tribe-territory of Benjamin (see at 1Sa 1:1), then through the land of Shalishah and the land of Shaalim, and after that through the land of Benjamin, without finding the asses; and at length, when he had reached the land of Zuph, he determined to return, because he was afraid that his father might turn his mind from the asses, and trouble himself about them (the son and servant). מִן חָדֵל, to desist from a thing, to give it up or renounce it.
As Saul started in any case from Gibeah of Benjamin, his own home (1Sa 10:10., 1Sa 10:26, 1Sa 11:4; 1Sa 15:34; 1Sa 23:19; 1Sa 26:1), i.e., the present Tuleil el Phul, which was an hour or an hour and a half to the north of Jerusalem (see at Jos 18:28), and went thence into the mountains of Ephraim, he no doubt took a north-westerly direction, so that he crossed the boundary of Benjamin somewhere between Bireh and Atarah, and passing through the crest of the mountains of Ephraim, on the west of Gophnah (Jifna), came out into the land of Shalishah. Shalishah is unquestionably the country round (or of) Baal-shalishah (2Ki 4:42), which was situated, according to Eusebius (Onom. s.v. Βαιθσαρισάθ: Beth-sarisa or Beth-salisa), in regione Thamnitica, fifteen Roman miles to the north of Diospolis (Lydda), and was therefore probably the country to the west of Jiljilia, where three different wadys run into one large wady, called Kurawa; and according to the probable conjecture of Thenius, it was from this fact that the district received the name of Shalishah, or Three-land. They proceeded thence in their search to the land of Shaalim: according to the Onom. (s.v.), “a village seven miles off, in finibus Eleutheropoleos contra occidentem.” But this is hardly correct, and is most likely connected with the mistake made in transposing the town of Samuel to the neighbourhood of Diospolis (see at 1Sa 1:1). For since they went on from Shaalim into the land of Benjamin, and then still further into the land of Zuph, on the south-west of Benjamin, they probably turned eastwards from Shalishah, into the country where we find Beni Mussah and Beni Salem marked upon Robinson's and v. de Velde's maps, and where we must therefore look for the land of Shaalim, that they might proceed thence to explore the land of Benjamin from the north-east to the south-west. If, on the contrary, they had gone from Shaalim in a southerly or south-westerly direction, to the district of Eleutheropolis, they would only have entered the land of Benjamin at the south-west corner, and would have had to go all the way back again in order to go thence to the land of Zuph. For we may infer with certainty that the land of Zuph was on the south-west of the tribe-territory of Benjamin, from the fact that, according to 1Sa 10:2, Saul and his companion passed Rachel's tomb on their return thence to their own home, and then came to the border of Benjamin. On the name Zuph, see at 1Sa 1:1.
1Sa 9:6
When Saul proposed to return home from the land of Zuph, his servant said to him, “Behold, in this city ('this,' referring to the town which stood in front of them upon a hill) is a man of God, much honoured; all that he saith cometh surely to pass: now we will go thither; perhaps he will tell us our way that we have to go” (lit. have gone, and still go, sc., to attain the object of our journey, viz., to find the asses). The name of this town is not mentioned either here or in the further course of this history. Nearly all the commentators suppose it to have been Ramah, Samuel's home. But this assumption has no foundation at all in the text, and is irreconcilable with the statements respecting the return in 1Sa 10:2-5. The servant did not say there dwells in this city, but there is in this city (1Sa 9:6; comp. with this 1Sa 9:10, “They went into the city where the man of God was,” not “dwelt”). It is still more evident, from the answer given by the drawers of water, when Saul asked them, “Is the seer here?” (1Sa 9:11), - viz., “He came to-day to the city, for the people have a great sacrifice upon the high place” (1Sa 9:12), - that the seer (Samuel) did not live in the town, but had only come thither to a sacrificial festival. Moreover, “every impartial man will admit, that the fact of Samuel's having honoured Saul as his guest at the sacrificial meal of those who participated in the sacrifice, and of their having slept under the same roof, cannot possibly weaken the impression that Samuel was only there in his peculiar and official capacity. It could not be otherwise than that the presidency should be assigned to him at the feast itself as priest and prophet, and therefore that the appointments mentioned should proceed from him. And it is but natural to assume that he had a house at his command for any repetition of such sacrifices, which we find from 2 Kings 4 to have been the case in the history of Elisha” (Valentiner). And lastly, the sacrificial festival itself does not point to Ramah; for although Samuel had built an altar to the Lord at Ramah (1Sa 7:17), this was by no means the only place of sacrifice in the nation. If Samuel offered sacrifice at Mizpeh and Gilgal (1Sa 7:9; 1Sa 10:8; 1Sa 13:8.), he could also do the same at other places. What the town really was in which Saul met with him, cannot indeed be determined, since all that we can gather from 1Sa 10:2, is, that it was situated on the south-west of Bethlehem.
1Sa 9:7-8
Saul's objection, that they had no present to bring to the man of God, as the bread was gone from their vessels, was met by the servant with the remark, that he had a quarter of a shekel which he would give.
1Sa 9:9-10
Before proceeding with the further progress of the affair, the historian introduces a notice, which was required to throw light upon what follows; namely, that beforetime, if any one wished to inquire of God, i.e., to apply to a prophet for counsel from God upon any matter, it was customary in Israel to say, We will go to the seer, because “he that is now called a prophet was beforetime called a seer.” After this parenthetical remark, the account is continued in 1Sa 9:10. Saul declared himself satisfied with the answer of the servant; and they both went into the town, to ask the man of God about the asses that were lost.