1 Samuel 15:17

SAUL STUBBORNLY MAINTAINS HIS INNOCENCE

"And Samuel Said, "Though you are little in your own eyes, are you not the head of the tribes of Israel? The Lord anointed you king over Israel. And the Lord sent you on a mission and said, `Go, utterly destroy the sinners, the Amalekites, and fight against them until they are consumed.' Why then, did you not obey the voice of the Lord? And Saul said to Samuel, "I have obeyed the voice of the Lord. I have gone on the mission on which the Lord sent me, I have brought Agag the king of Amalek, and I have utterly destroyed the Amalekites. But the people took of the spoil, sheep and oxen, the best of the things devoted to destruction, to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal." And Samuel said.

"Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings

and sacrifices.

As in obeying the voice of the Lord?

Behold to obey is better than sacrifice, and to

hearken than the fat of rams.

For rebellion is as the sin of divination,

And stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry.

Because you have rejected the word of the Lord,

He has also rejected you from being king."

"Though you are little in your own eyes" (1 Samuel 15:17). The KJV; ASV and NIV emend this passage making it read,

"Although you were once small in your own eyes," etc. This would then contrast with the arrogant pride and conceit Saul manifested here. Our own view is that no emendation is necessary. Samuel spoke sarcastically. "Do you mean that you were so small and helpless in your own eyes that you felt that the people were in charge instead of yourself?. Ridiculous. You are the one whom God anointed King." H. P. Smith agreed "That this verse seems to be a rebuke of Saul's self-confessed subservience to the people."[14]

"The Lord anointed you king over Israel" (1 Samuel 15:17). This was Samuel's unanswerable argument against Saul's claim that, "the people" were to blame for saving the cattle. There was no possibility whatever that the people would have spared the cattle without the permission of their king. There even seems to be an implication in Saul's word to Samuel here, "That he wanted to let Samuel know that he was now king, and that he would carry on affairs after his own fashion."[15]

"I have utterly destroyed the Amalekites ... I have brought Agag the king" (1 Samuel 15:20). Could Saul have meant that the king was not an Amalekite? His words made no sense at all. There can be no wonder that Samuel commanded him to, `Shut up'!

"But the people took ... to sacrifice to the Lord your God in Gilgal" (1 Samuel 15:21). Saul, in this, was saying that he was only doing what God had commanded his people to do in the matter of offering sacrifices; but as Keil stated it:

"He overlooked the fact that what was banned (devoted) to the Lord could not be offered as a burnt offering, because being most holy, it belonged to God already, and according to Deuteronomy 13:16 was to be put to death exactly as Samuel had commanded him in 1 Samuel 15:3."[16]

"Behold to obey is better than sacrifice

And to hearken than the fat of rams" (1 Samuel 15:22)

This passage is one of the best known in the entire O.T., and R. P. Smith explains why:

"This saying marks the high moral tone of the prophets and soon became a fundamental principle with them. It was reproduced by Hosea (Hosea 6:6); Psalms 50:8-14; 51:16-17; Isaiah 1:11; Jeremiah 6:20; Micah 6:6-8, and finally received our Lord's special approval (Matthew 9:13; 12:7)."[17]

"The Lord has rejected you from being king" (1 Samuel 15:23). This powerful word from the very prophet who had anointed him and set in motion the events that crowned him finally got Saul's attention.