The Pulpit Commentary — 1 Samuel — Section 145

THE E~TABLISHMENT OF SAUL'S KINGDOM (CBS. VIII.-XV.). REJECTION OF SAMUEL'S SONS (vers. 1-5). of h.is f~ith-Joel meaning Jehovah is God, Yer. 1.-When Samuel was old. As Samuel and Abiah Jah is Father. The name given lived for very many years after this time, in 1 Chron. vi. 28, Vashni, is a mistake, till towards the close of Saul's reign, he was It means, " nnd the second," the name of probal,ly not more than sixty when this Joel the firstborn having somehow been happened. The dates are all very uncertain, omitted. The names of_ Saul's .sons, and but he was probably between twenty and even of J onathan's, unlike those in. Samuel's thirty when Shiloh was captured, and no family, bear witness to their religion ha.ving doubt, according to Israelite custom, had been of a cmiously mixed charac.ter. In married as soon as he arrived at manhood. Beer-sheba. Not, therefore, in. _any of Jh~ Then came the most important and active places to :w}iich Samuel went in pm:son, a_nd period of his life, during which the ark which were all. near Rarnah, his home. Beer- rested for twenty years in the house of sheba was in the extreme south of tHe tribe Abinadab, and Samuel was traversing every of Judah (see on Gen. xxi. 31 ), on the Philis part of the country, preaching repentance, tine border, and his being able to place his and preparing the people for a revolt from sons there in authority prC1vcs, ·n'ot merely the tyranny of the Philistines. Upon this that his rule was acknowledged throughout followed the victory at Mizpah, and the the whole country, but also that the Philis- establishment of Samuel as judge. Now tines did not interfere much with the internal 5ome considerable time w•u]d elapse before arrangements of the Israelites. Josephus Samuel so felt the weight of increasing years (' Antiq.,' vi. 3, 2) represents only one son as to delegate a part of his authority to his as placed at Beer-sheba, and says that .the sons, and more again before the national dis- other was judge at Dan, but it may be content at their covetousness became general. doubted whether the northern tribes were "The Talmud, however, represents Samuel as sufficiently under control to submit to be being at this time only fifty-two years of governed by a southern judge. ' ~e, while Abravanel says seventy, and the Ver. 3.-His sons . . . took bribes. Thie latter number is by no means impossible ; sin was expressly forbidden in Exod. xxiii. for as a Nazarite Samuel wou]d lead a life 6, 8 ; Deut. xvi. 19, and it marks the high ,of perfect temperance, and his predecessor spirit of the nation that it was so indignant Eli lived to be ninety-eight, and died then at justice being thus perverted. They wa.lked by an aceident. Still, probably, Abravanel's not in hie wa.y (singular-so the written -calcwation is too high, and we must remem- text); for Samuel's own administration of ber that uesides the misconduct of Samuel's justice had been most upright (eh. xii. 4), soJJs, there was the growing danger of the nor is it laid to his charge that he connived re-<establishment of the domination of the at the misconduct of his sons. On the co11-. l'hilistines to quicken the people's move- trary after remonstrance indeed, not for_ hi3 ments. They had garrisons again in Israel sons''sake, but for the honour of the theo- wl1en Saul was chosen king, and it was this cracy, and that the p-eople might be on the_ir d1ich ma.de the nation long for a change, but guard against a despotic exerciEe of ~he power tiieir choice would probably have fallen upon with which they were about to mtrust a 011c of Samuel's sons had either of them been single man, he superseded not _them _only, ~ut worthy. A king they had long wished for; also himself. His conduct m this trymg it is only when they saw that none of Samuel's conjuncture was most admirable, and few race would give them internal ,Peace and commentators have done justice to the man, security that they took public act10n for the who, possessed of what was virtually kingly appointment of some one else. power, yet gave it over for the nation's good Ver. 2.-The name of his firstborn we.a into the hands of another. J'oel. The names of Samuel's sons are pledges Vers. 4, 5.-The elders of brael. Here, aa <JH. VIII. 1-22.] 'Ilrn FIHST DOOK OF SA:\IGEL. l-13