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Danny Neumann

The Hebrew Scriptures

Dr. Platt

November 2, 2021

Saul and the Amalekites.

Kingship in Israel began when the prophet Samuel anointed Saul to be the first king. In l

Samuel 15:1, Samuel goes to Saul and states “The Lord sent me to anoint you king over His

people, over Israel”. Prior to this the Israelites have never had a king rule over them. Even so,

Saul had proven himself to be a worthy leader and a renowned general. For example, Saul was

able to gather the people of Israel and defeat the Ammonites. Following this great victory, the

people called for Saul to be named King, which he refused at first.

A growing threat to the Israelites where the Philistines. The Philistines were a force to

be reckoned with and were destroying nearby cities. The goal of the Israelites in stopping the

Philistines was to unite the nearby area as one big Israel, and to stop the attacks from the

Philistines. This would be very difficult, as the Philistines had a massive army with many

horsemen and chariots. Although the threat of the Philistines always loomed, they would not

be finally defeated until the reign of King David, who would follow after Saul.

Saul would not be named king until God needed him to unite the people of Israel once

more to annihilate the Amalekites. God had grown a great resentment for the Amalekites for

how they attack the Israelites when they were trying to escape Egypt in the book of Exodus. It

was because of that God decided to punish the Amalekites for what they had done to His

people. He would do so by having Saul being named the first king and lead the Israelites into
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battle against. In l Samuel 15:2, God says to Saul (through Samuel) “I will punish Amalek for

what he did to Israel, how he ambushed him on the way to when he came up from Egypt”. He

goes on to say “Now go and attack Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and do not

spare them. But kill both men and women, infant and nursing child, ox and sheep, camel and

donkey”. Here, God instructs Saul to absolutely destroy the Amalekites, and to show absolutely

no mercy when doing so. This order by God seems very cruel, as he specifically instructs Saul to

not even spare the women or children. This was very surprising to hear for the first time, as it

seemed very uncharacteristic of God to do. It is expected that God would not react this way and

to be driven with so much vengeance. Nevertheless, the now King Saul carries out these orders

(for the most part).

Saul assembles the Israelites, totaling “two hundred thousand foot soldiers and ten

thousand men of Judah”. On the journey to the Amalekites, Saul comes across the Kenites. He

does not attack them because of how they showed kindness to the Israelites while they were

exiting Egypt. However, Saul warns them not to intervene in the battle that is about to take

place, and if they do he will destroy them as well.

Saul and his army lay in wait in a valley to ambush the Amalekites. When they finally

attacked, they destroyed the army and sent the survivors scattering. Like how God ordered him

to do, he let none of them live and hunted down the survivors, chasing them all the way to Shur

which is east of Egypt.

However, Saul did not follow God’s instructions completely. Saul was instructed to leave

no survivors and to destroy all the livestock that the Amalekites had. In l Samuel 15:9 it is said

that “Saul and the people spared Agag (the king of the Amalekites) and the best of the sheep,
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the oxen, the flatlings, the lambs, and all that was good, and were unwilling to utterly destroy

them”. Here, Saul decides to take the king of the Amalekites prisoner instead of killing him, and

to save all the healthy livestock that they found to be of value. This is directly against God’s

orders, as he instructed Saul to absolutely destroy all the Amalekites and everything they had.

This act would make God very angry at Saul.

God says to Samuel that he “greatly regrets setting Saul up as king, for he has turned

back from following me, and has not performed my commandments”. This seems to be slightly

harsh from God, seeing as Saul was just saving the lives of the king and all the livestock, and not

unnecessarily slaughtering them. Samuel then goes to Saul and scolds him on not following

God’s commands. Samuel says to Saul “Now the Lord sent you on a mission and said, ‘Go, and

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?” Saul then tries to defend himself by saying

why he did utterly destroy the Amalekites how and kept the healthy livestock so that he could

sacrifice them to God.

After this, Samuel said something to Saul that he would never want to hear. Samuel says

that “Because you have rejected the word of the Lord, He has also rejected you from being

king”. Saul broke down after this, pleading for forgiveness and praying to God, to no avail.

Samuel then called upon Agag, the king of the Amalekites, and killed him, finishing God’s

command.

The story of Saul and the Amalekites show what kind of king he was, but does that make

him a good king? Being the first king of Israel, Saul had a lot expected out him. By looking at the

laws of kingship you can determine if Saul had been ruling how he was supposed to.
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The first law of kingship in Israel is that the king must be chosen by God. Saul was

anointed king by Samuel, who was following the directions from God. So Saul followed the first

law of Kingship.

The second law of kingship states that you “may not put a foreigner over you, who is not

your brother”. Saul was indeed an Israelite, and not from a foreign nation.

The third and fourth law of kingship state that they shall not acquire many horses or go

back to Egypt to acquire horses. In the case of Saul and the attack against the Amalekites, he

followed this law, as he did not have a standing army at the time and only called upon the

Israelites when it was time. However, it would be later stated that Saul gathered a small

standing army of three thousand men.

With these things being considered, Saul did a decent job of following the laws of

kingship. When it comes to the fight against the Amalekites, it must also be noted if Saul had

followed the laws governing holy war.

Holy war is called on by God and is conducted in his name. It is believed by Israelites

that when they fought in a holy war God was by their side and that they could not lose. With

this being the case, there were laws that had to be followed to constitute a conflict as being

part of a holy war.

To start, the first law of holy war states that there may not be a standing army. In the

battle against the Amalekites, Israel had no standing army at the time and Saul had to call upon

the people of Israel to fight for their God. The soldiers that made up the army were to

volunteers. This brings us to the second law of holy war. The men that fought for Israel were

not to be paid, as that would constitute them as being professional and standing soldiers, which
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is not their job. In addition to this, the third aspect of holy war states that they were not

allowed to keep plunders or spoils from the wars. This is where Saul and his men broke the laws

of holy war. Following the destruction of the Amalekites, the Israelites kept the healthiest of

the livestock. The animals constitute as being spoils, and the Israelites keeping them is against

the third law of holy war.

The fourth law governing holy war states that it must only be conducted in defense or

expansion of the promised land. When looking at Saul and the Amalekites, he partially followed

this law. His destruction of the Amalekites did indeed allow Israel to expand, but that was only

part of the reason for the battle. Another main reason that Saul was sent by God to destroy the

Amalekites was to get revenge for how they attacked the Israelites on their way out of Egypt. So

Saul partially followed this law.

The fifth law of holy war is that it must be declared by God himself. In this instance, the

battle against the Amalekites was indeed commanded by God. God told Samuel to instruct Saul

to go to war against the Amalekites.

In conclusion, God anointed Saul as king of the Israelites and also instructed him to

annihilate the Amalekites for attacking God’s people on their exodus from Egypt. Saul carried

out this command, but did absolutely destroy everything of the Amalekites, thus disobeying

God. This left God regretful that he ever anointed Saul as king.

With this war against the Amalekites, Saul also broke laws of kingship and laws

governing holy war. He did not abide by every law that he was supposed to follow as king and

as someone waging holy war. With all of these things considered, it can be thought that Saul

may have been a good king to his people, but not in the eyes of God.