History of king saul and david
Samuel marks the end of the period of the Judges. Saul marks the beginning of the period of the Kings. Their lives — along with the life of King David — are inextricably intertwined.
Samuel was the one who introduced the idea of monarchy to the people. It was he whom God chose to anoint the first kings (Saul and David). Yet it was he who was most against the idea.
Samuel was such a force that as he long lived he was the real power. The king existed in his shadow. He had a greater influence on Saul than Saul had on him. In fact, Samuel’s hold on Saul was so great that even after Samuel died Saul felt compelled to violate Torah law and visit a sorceress to raise him from the dead to get his advice (I Samuel 28).
Who was Saul?
There are personalities that a person gets one impression from the biblical account but a very different impression from Jewish tradition. Saul was such a person.
In the Book of Samuel, Saul does not come across as a very sympathetic figure. His weaknesses are portrayed in a stark fashion, including his unwarranted jealousy and persecution of David, as well as his melancholy and violence.
However, he had another side. That side only comes into true focus through the writings of the Sages, who preserved the oral traditions. In reality, Saul was a great person, and in some ways even greater than David.
Even before he became king, Saul was a national hero. He led the daring raid to rescue the Tablets of the Ten Commandments from the Philistines, who had captured them along with the Ark. After he became king, in his short two-and-a-half-year reign, he freed the Jewish people of all their enemies except the Philistines. It remained for David to ultimately triumph over the Philistines and destroy them, but the army that Saul built laid the foundation for that military victory.
Saul was charismatic and physically gifted, as well as extremely tall and handsome (I Samuel 9:2). He was charitable and selfless. Tradition records
Saul
Biblical figure and Israelite monarch
This article is about King Saul, the biblical figure found in the Hebrew Bible. For the New Testament figure known as Saul of Tarsus, see Paul the Apostle. For other uses, see Saul (disambiguation).
Saul (; Hebrew: שָׁאוּל, Šāʾūl; Greek: Σαούλ, Saoúl; transl. "asked/prayed for") was a monarch of ancient Israel and Judah and, according to the Hebrew Bible and Old Testament, the first king of the United Monarchy, a polity of uncertain historicity. His reign, traditionally placed in the late eleventh century BCE, supposedly marked the transition of the Israelites from a scattered tribal society ruled by various judges to organized statehood.
The historicity of Saul and the United Kingdom of Israel is not universally accepted, as what is known of both comes exclusively from the Hebrew Bible. According to the text, he was anointed as king of the Israelites by Samuel, and reigned from Gibeah. Saul is said to have committed suicide when he fell on his sword during a battle with the Philistines at Mount Gilboa, in which three of his sons were also killed. Saul's son Ish-bosheth succeeded him to the throne, reigning for only two years before being murdered by his own military leaders. Saul's son-in-law David then became king.
The biblical narrative of Saul's rise to kingship and his death contains several textual inconsistencies and plays on words that scholars have discussed. These issues include conflicting accounts of Saul's anointing and death, changes in the portrayal of Saul from positive to negative following David's introduction, and etymological discrepancies in the birth-narrative of Samuel, which some scholars believe originally described Saul's birth.
Biblical account
The biblical accounts of Saul's life are found in the Books of Samuel:
House of King Saul
According to the Hebrew text of the Bible, Saul reigned for two years, STEM Publishing : Magazines : The Bible Treasury : Volume 12 : Saul and David or, The Responsible Man, and The Man of God's Choice. 1879 202 etc. In the Book of Deuteronomy (Deut. 17:15–20) God made provision for the day when Israel should desire a king. From whence he was to be taken, what he was not to do, as well as what he was to do — these were set forth by the Lawgiver in that book, and in that portion of it (Deut. 12 – 29) which treats of laws to be observed by the people when in the enjoyment of their land. Israel entered Canaan; Joshua, and the elders who survived him, passed away; judges were raised up as needed; but as yet no king was appointed over Israel, the only attempt to set one up, which was made previous to the days of Samuel, having proved a miserable failure. (Judges 9) A king, however, was clearly contemplated by God; and His purposes could not, and cannot, be accomplished without one. Hannah spake of the king (1 Sam. 2:10), but she never saw him. Her firstborn, Samuel, however, was commissioned to anoint David in the house of his father Jesse, and in the presence of his brethren, to be the first king on that throne (1 Chron. 29:23) which is yet to be filled publicly by the Lord Jesus Christ. But ere God marked out David for this office, there was one reigning, by divine permission, over the twelve tribes of Israel. Saul had been anointed by Samuel to be captain over God's people Israel, to save them out of the hand of the Philistines, for God had looked upon His people, because their cry had come unto Him. (1 Sam. 9:16.) Saul was given to Israel in answer to their request. But was this request unforeseen by God? A sceptic may affirm that the portion of Deuteronomy above referred to could not have been extant, or known, to the prophet, else why did he seek to turn the people from their purpose? The fact was that they asked for a king through unbelief. The motive first put forward, that Samuel was old, and his As we approach 1000 B.C., God’s ‘Story’ shifts from the turmoil of Judges to the potential of Kings. In our survey of 1 and 2 Samuel, we encounter three main characters: We begin with a woman named Hannah who is childless—a condition that was disgraceful in that culture. Yet this woman is nobler than the high priest, Eli (1 Samuel 1). She prays for a son, and the LORD answers her. Her son is named Samuel, whom she dedicates: “I give him to the LORD. For his whole life, he will be given over to the LORD” (1:28). Take time to hear her prayer. It is a hymn of rich praise and prophetic insight (2:1-10). As we follow Samuel’s growth, we are introduced to a man who becomes a focus of blessing and revival to Israel (3:17-4:1a). Much later, when Samuel is Israel’s judge, his sons are appointed under him, but “[they] did not walk in his ways. They turned aside after dishonest gain and accepted bribes and perverted justice” (8:1-3). The behavior of Samuel’s sons is the trigger for Israel to demand “a king to lead us, such as all the other nations have” (8:5). On one hand, we might rationalize their demand—but in reality, they were rejecting the LORD as their king (8:6-9). This demand marks the shift from theocracy (God’s rule) to the monarchy (a human king’s rule) in Israel. Saul was Israel’s first king. He was big and strong but deeply flawed. He was dark and moody, hesitant and faltering: hiding among baggage (10:22-27), failing to fight the Philistines (13:1-10), and paralyzed before Goliath (chapter 17). Samuel declares God’s word to Saul: You acted foolishly … you have not kept the command the LORD your God gave you; if yo Saul and David:
Samuel
Saul