1 Samuel 7:2

THE GREAT DELIVERANCE AND REFORM UNDER SAMUEL, 1 Samuel 7:2-17.

2. Twenty years A period of silence in the history of Israel. What notable events occurred and what Samuel did during these twenty years are largely matters of conjecture. Some suppose that this period was nearly simultaneous with the twenty years of Samson’s judgeship. Judges 15:20. This opinion claims no certain proof in the biblical record; only it is probable that the forty years of Philistine oppression (Judges 13:1) from which Samson began to deliver Israel is the same oppression which was completely removed by the instrumentality of Samuel, as recorded in this chapter. Samson’s authority as judge was confined to southwestern Israel, and probably never came in contact with that of either Eli or Samuel. There is nothing at war with the supposition that two or more judges in Israel were contemporary. In our Introduction to Judges we have shown that the officers of Israel bearing that title, and raised up of God from time to time to deliver the people from their oppressors, were not regular national governors, whose authority extended over all the land.

During these twenty years Samuel was not idle. He was known to be a prophet of Jehovah, and often acted as judge, but probably most of his time was spent in retirement and in founding the schools of the prophets. See on 1 Samuel 10:5. When Shiloh was made desolate he probably took care to preserve the precious records of the law, of which he doubtless made much use in teaching the younger prophets who gathered around him. Of Samuel’s marriage and domestic life we know nothing; but we know that his sons walked not after the pattern of their father’s piety. 1 Samuel 8:3. The worship of Baal and Ashtaroth crept in among the people, and the ark remained in obscurity at Kirjath-jearim.

Lamented after the Lord This both Gesenius and Furst render, assembled themselves after Jehovah. But no sufficient reason is given for taking the Hebrew word נהה in this sense of assembling together. To be sure, the Niphal form occurs here only, but the Kal form, in Ezekiel 32:18, and Micah 2:4, means to wail, to lament, and, therefore, with Thenius and Keil, we adhere to the common translation. The people remembered how gloriously the Lord had manifested himself to Israel in former years, and therefore they lamented after the Lord, that is, longed for his glory to appear again.