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1 Samuel 12

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Samuel's Farewell and Defense of Integrity 1–5

1
And Samuel said unto all Israel, Behold, I have hearkened unto your voice in all that ye said unto me, and have made a king over you. ​
2
And now, behold, the king walketh before you: and I am old and grayheaded; and, behold, my sons are with you: and I have walked before you from my childhood unto this day. ​
3
Behold, here I am: witness against me before the LORD, and before his anointed: whose ox have I taken? or whose ass have I taken? or whom have I defrauded? whom have I oppressed? or of whose hand have I received any bribe to blind mine eyes therewith? and I will restore it you. ​
4
And they said, Thou hast not defrauded us, nor oppressed us, neither hast thou taken ought of any man's hand.
5
And he said unto them, The LORD is witness against you, and his anointed is witness this day, that ye have not found ought in my hand. And they answered, He is witness. ​

God's Faithful Acts and Israel's Sin 6–12

6
And Samuel said unto the people, It is the LORD that advanced Moses and Aaron, and that brought your fathers up out of the land of Egypt. ​
7
Now therefore stand still, that I may reason with you before the LORD of all the righteous acts of the LORD, which he did to you and to your fathers. ​
8
When Jacob was come into Egypt, and your fathers cried unto the LORD, then the LORD sent Moses and Aaron, which brought forth your fathers out of Egypt, and made them dwell in this place.
9
And when they forgat the LORD their God, he sold them into the hand of Sisera, captain of the host of Hazor, and into the hand of the Philistines, and into the hand of the king of Moab, and they fought against them.
10
And they cried unto the LORD, and said, We have sinned, because we have forsaken the LORD, and have served Baalim and Ashtaroth: but now deliver us out of the hand of our enemies, and we will serve thee.
11
And the LORD sent Jerubbaal, and Bedan, and Jephthah, and Samuel, and delivered you out of the hand of your enemies on every side, and ye dwelled safe. ​
12
And when ye saw that Nahash the king of the children of Ammon came against you, ye said unto me, Nay; but a king shall reign over us: when the LORD your God was your king. ​

The Conditions for the New Monarchy 13–15

13
Now therefore behold the king whom ye have chosen, and whom ye have desired! and, behold, the LORD hath set a king over you. ​
14
If ye will fear the LORD, and serve him, and obey his voice, and not rebel against the commandment of the LORD, then shall both ye and also the king that reigneth over you continue following the LORD your God: ​
15
But if ye will not obey the voice of the LORD, but rebel against the commandment of the LORD, then shall the hand of the LORD be against you, as it was against your fathers.

God Confirms the Message with a Sign 16–19

16
Now therefore stand and see this great thing, which the LORD will do before your eyes. ​
17
Is it not wheat harvest to day? I will call unto the LORD, and he shall send thunder and rain; that ye may perceive and see that your wickedness is great, which ye have done in the sight of the LORD, in asking you a king. ​
18
So Samuel called unto the LORD; and the LORD sent thunder and rain that day: and all the people greatly feared the LORD and Samuel. ​
19
And all the people said unto Samuel, Pray for thy servants unto the LORD thy God, that we die not: for we have added unto all our sins this evil, to ask us a king. ​

Samuel's Final Exhortation and Promise 20–25

20
And Samuel said unto the people, Fear not: ye have done all this wickedness: yet turn not aside from following the LORD, but serve the LORD with all your heart; ​
21
And turn ye not aside: for then should ye go after vain things, which cannot profit nor deliver; for they are vain. ​
22
For the LORD will not forsake his people for his great name's sake: because it hath pleased the LORD to make you his people. ​
23
Moreover as for me, God forbid that I should sin against the LORD in ceasing to pray for you: but I will teach you the good and the right way: ​
24
Only fear the LORD, and serve him in truth with all your heart: for consider how great things he hath done for you. ​
25
But if ye shall still do wickedly, ye shall be consumed, both ye and your king.

Bible text: King James Version (1769 Blayney text) · Public domain

Study Notes for 1 Samuel 12

Verse 1

I have hearkened unto your voice — This repeats the LORD’s own word to Samuel, ‘Hearken unto their voice, and make them a king’ (1 Sam 8:22). The word qol, voice, then runs through the chapter: Samuel obeyed the people’s voice, and the people are told to obey ‘his voice’, the LORD’s (vv.14–15).

Verse 2

the king walketh before you — The same verb, halak, is used of the king (‘walketh’) and of Samuel (‘have walked’), who as a child had ministered ‘before the LORD’ (1 Sam 2:18). ‘My sons are with you’ recalls the elders’ reason for asking a king: ‘thy sons walk not in thy ways’ (1 Sam 8:5).

Verse 3

whose ox have I taken? — Moses made a like declaration: ‘I have not taken one ass from them’ (Num 16:15). The ‘bribe’ (kopher) ‘to blind mine eyes’ recalls the law, ‘the gift blindeth the wise’ (Ex 23:8), and answers the charge made of Samuel’s sons, who ‘took bribes, and perverted judgment’ (1 Sam 8:3). ‘His anointed’ is the king.

Verse 5

his anointed is witness — Samuel names the same two witnesses he called in v.3, the LORD and the king, and says that nothing has been ‘found’ in his hand. The people’s answer, ‘He is witness’, settles the matter of his conduct as a judge in the presence of both.

Verse 6

advanced Moses and Aaron — ‘Advanced’ renders asah, to make or appoint. The verb recurs through the speech: the LORD ‘did’ righteous acts (v.7), the people ‘have done’ wickedness (v.17), and it pleased the LORD ‘to make you his people’ (v.22).

Verse 7

reason with you — Shaphat is to judge or plead a case, and Samuel ‘judged Israel’ (1 Sam 7:15). ‘Righteous acts’ (tsedaqot) is the phrase of Judg 5:11, where the people ‘rehearse the righteous acts of the LORD’. He sets out the record in order: Egypt (v.8), the oppressions and deliverers (vv.9–11), and then the request for a king (v.12).

Verse 11

Jerubbaal, and Bedan, and Jephthah, and Samuel — Jerubbaal is Gideon, so named for ‘Let Baal plead against him’ (Judg 6:32). Jephthah delivered Gilead from Ammon (Judg 11). Bedan is not named in the book of Judges; the name occurs only here and in 1 Chr 7:17, among the sons of Gilead’s line in Manasseh. Samuel names himself last.

Verse 12

a king shall reign over us — Seeing Nahash ‘the king of the children of Ammon’ come against them (the attack of 1 Sam 11:1), they said ‘Nay; but a king shall reign over us’, though ‘the LORD your God was your king’. Their reason in 1 Sam 8:20 was ‘that we also may be like all the nations’, and the LORD had said of it, ‘they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them’ (1 Sam 8:7).

Verse 13

whom ye have desired — ‘Desired’ is shaal, to ask, the root of the name Saul, ‘asked’. The same verb is behind ‘asking you a king’ (v.17) and ‘ask us a king’ (v.19). ‘Chosen’ (bachar) and ‘desired’ describe the people’s act, yet ‘the LORD hath set a king over you’.

Verse 14

fear the LORD, and serve him, and obey his voice — The conditions cover ‘both ye and also the king’, who is elsewhere commanded to read the law ‘that he may learn to fear the LORD his God’ (Deut 17:19). ‘Commandment’ is literally the ‘mouth’ (peh) of the LORD, and ‘voice’ (qol) is the word of v.1.

Verse 16

stand and see this great thing — ‘Stand’ is yatsab, the verb of Moses at the sea, ‘stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD’ (Ex 14:13), and of ‘stand still’ in v.7. The people are to watch what the LORD will do ‘before your eyes’.

Verse 17

thunder and rain — ‘Thunder’ is qol, the word for voice, used also of the LORD’s ‘voice’ in vv.14–15. It is wheat harvest, and rain in that season was out of place; Prov 26:1 uses ‘rain in harvest’ as a picture of what is unseemly. The sign is given ‘that ye may perceive and see’ how great their wickedness is in asking a king.

Verse 18

feared the LORD and Samuel — After the Red Sea Israel ‘feared the LORD, and believed the LORD, and his servant Moses’ (Ex 14:31). Here Samuel stands in the same place beside the LORD, as later Scripture pairs the two: ‘Though Moses and Samuel stood before me’ (Jer 15:1).

Verse 19

Pray for thy servants — At Sinai the people asked Moses to speak to them, ‘lest we die’ (Ex 20:19); here they ask Samuel to pray, ‘that we die not’. They say ‘the LORD thy God’. Their confession names the request itself as the evil: ‘to ask us a king’ (shaal, as in vv.13, 17).

Verse 20

Fear not — The people who have done ‘all this wickedness’ are told not to be afraid, and the instruction that follows is to ‘turn not aside’ and serve ‘with all your heart’, as Samuel had called them earlier to ‘return unto the LORD with all your hearts’ (1 Sam 7:3) and as the law requires (Deut 10:12).

Verse 21

vain things — Tohu, the word translated ‘without form’ in Gen 1:2 and ‘vanity’ of idols in Isa 44:9, where their ‘delectable things shall not profit’. It is used twice in this verse: they ‘cannot profit nor deliver; for they are vain’.

Verse 22

for his great name’s sake — The promise rests on the LORD himself: ‘it hath pleased the LORD to make you his people.’ Joshua pleaded the same ground, ‘what wilt thou do unto thy great name?’ (Josh 7:9), and the psalm says ‘he saved them for his name’s sake’ (Ps 106:8).

Verse 23

ceasing to pray for you — ‘God forbid’ is chalilah, far be it. Samuel counts it a sin against the LORD to stop praying for them, and Scripture names him among those who called upon the LORD (Ps 99:6). ‘I will teach’ is yarah, to point out; the ‘good and the right way’ is close to the ‘good way wherein they should walk’ of 1 Kgs 8:36, which uses the same verb for teaching.

Verse 24

serve him in truth — ‘Truth’ is emet, as in Joshua’s charge to ‘serve him in sincerity and in truth’ (Josh 24:14). ‘Consider’ is raah, to see, the verb in ‘stand and see’ (v.16): the people are sent to look at what the LORD has done for them.