_A.M. 2948. B.C. 1056._ The conference between Achish and David, 1 Samuel 28:1; 1 Samuel 28:2. The preparation of the Philistines, and the distress of Saul, 1 Samuel 28:3. He applies to a woman that had a familiar spirit, to raise Samuel, 1 Samuel 28:7. Samuel appears, and foretels his defeat and d... [ Continue Reading ]
_The Philistines gathered their armies together_ Sir Isaac Newton judges that they were recruited about this time by vast numbers of men driven out of Egypt by Amasis. This probably was one reason why they resolved on a new war with Israel, to which, however, Samuel's death and David's disgrace were... [ Continue Reading ]
_David said, Surely thou shalt know what thy servant can do_ He answered ambiguously, as he did before. _Achish said, Therefore will I make thee keeper of my head_ That is, he promised to make him captain of his life-guard, which, we find by the sequel, he accordingly did. Achish evidently understoo... [ Continue Reading ]
_Now Samuel was dead_, &c. This was observed before, 1 Samuel 25:1, but is repeated here again to show that Saul was now sensible of his loss, wanting his advice in a time of great distress. _Saul had put away those that had familiar spirits_ According to the divine command, Leviticus 20:27, which p... [ Continue Reading ]
_His heart greatly trembled_ When he saw their numbers, their orders, and their appointments, he judged himself to be greatly overpowered, and fell into great terror upon the prospect. Had he kept close to God he needed not to have feared all the armies of the Philistines.... [ Continue Reading ]
_When Saul inquired of the Lord_ This seems to contradict what is affirmed 1 Chronicles 10:14, that _he did not inquire of the Lord_, which is assigned as the reason why the Lord slew him. But Rabbi Kimchi, and others, thus reconcile these two places. That since he did not continue to inquire of him... [ Continue Reading ]
_Seek me a woman that hath a familiar spirit_ That converses with evil spirits, or hath power to call up, or make to appear, the spirits of dead persons, in order to answer questions, or give information of what may be inquired of them: see on Deuteronomy 18:10. Saul mentions a _woman_ rather than a... [ Continue Reading ]
_Saul disguised himself_ Both because he was ashamed to be known, or thought guilty of this practice, and because he suspected the woman, if she knew him, would not practise her art before him. _And he went_ In all haste that very night, stripped of his regal apparel, and attended only by two compan... [ Continue Reading ]
_He said, Bring me up Samuel_ As he had formerly experienced Samuel's kindness and compassion, so now he expected it in his deep distress.... [ Continue Reading ]
_And when the woman saw Samuel_ The particle _when_, which our translators have inserted here, and which is not in the original text, embarrasses the sense, and is calculated to give the reader a wrong idea of this transaction, leading him to think that some space of time intervened between Saul's r... [ Continue Reading ]
_The woman said, I saw gods ascending_ The original word here used is _elohim;_ and is with equal propriety rendered _God, a god, or gods;_ when spoken of Jehovah it is translated _God_ in the Scriptures; but when meant of the false gods of the heathen, of angels or of magistrates, which it sometime... [ Continue Reading ]
_An old man coming up_ Although this appearance of Samuel is represented by the woman _as coming up out of the earth_, there is no reason to think that it did so in fact. Rather, the woman spoke according to the prevailing notion of both Jews and heathen of those days, that the place of abode of sep... [ Continue Reading ]
_Why hast thou disquieted me?_ “Houbigant observes very justly, that Samuel complains not of the woman, but of Saul, for disquieting him; from whence it follows that Samuel was not raised up by her magic arts, but by the will of God. Samuel's disquiet plainly arose from Saul's hardened impenitence.... [ Continue Reading ]
_The Lord hath rent the kingdom out of thy hand_, &c. Here the prophet foretels that Saul should that day be stripped of the kingdom, and that it should be given to David. Then follows what nothing but infinite, unerring prescience could predict; an exact, minute, precise account of all the circumst... [ Continue Reading ]
_Moreover, the Lord will also deliver_, &c. Samuel here predicts three things: 1st, That the Lord would deliver Israel, with Saul, into the hand of the Philistines. 2d, That Saul and his sons (namely, the three that were with him in the camp) should be _with him_, that is, should, like him, be in th... [ Continue Reading ]
_Then Saul fell straightway all along on the earth_ Struck to the heart, as if the archers of the Philistines had already hit him, at the hearing this dreadful sentence pronounced upon himself, his family, and people; and overcome with astonishment and terror. _And was sore afraid because of the wor... [ Continue Reading ]
_They arose up and went away that night_ “What remorse,” says Delaney, “what desolation of mind, what horrors of guilt, what terrors and anticipations of divine wrath haunted him by the way, may no reader ever learn from his own experience!” Some have expressed a hope, that as, no doubt, his past s... [ Continue Reading ]