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Saul, the First King of Israel
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warning, the faithful prophet still tried to guard their liberties as far
as possible.
While most of the people were ready to make Saul their king,
there was a large group that was opposed. For a king to be chosen
from Benjamin, the smallest tribe of Israel—and to neglect both
Judah and Ephraim, the largest and most powerful—was an insult
that they could not accept. Those who had been most urgent in their
demand for a king were the ones who refused to accept the man God
had appointed.
Saul returned to Gibeah, leaving Samuel to administer the gov-
ernment as before. He made no attempt to use force to claim the
throne, and he quietly continued with his farm duties, leaving it
entirely to God to establish his authority.
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Soon after, the Ammonites invaded the territory east of Jordan
and threatened the city of Jabesh Gilead. The inhabitants tried to
secure peace by offering to pay tribute money to the Ammonites.
The cruel king would not agree except on condition that he put out
the right eye of everyone.
Messengers were sent at once to seek help from the tribes west
of Jordan. Saul, returning at night from the field, heard the loud
wail that told of some great calamity. When he learned the shocking
story, all his inactive powers were awakened. “The Spirit of God
came upon Saul. ... So he took a yoke of oxen and cut them in
pieces, and sent them throughout all the territory of Israel by the
hands of messengers, saying, ‘Whoever does not go out with Saul
and Samuel to battle, so shall it be done to his oxen.’”
Three hundred thirty thousand men gathered under the command
of Saul. By a rapid night march, Saul and his army crossed the
Jordan and arrived near Jabesh in “the morning watch.” Dividing his
force into three companies, he attacked the Ammonite camp at that
early hour, when they were not suspecting danger and were least
secure. In the panic that followed, they were defeated with great
slaughter. “Those who survived were scattered, so that no two of
them were left together.”
The promptness and bravery of Saul, as well as his generalship,
were qualities that the people of Israel wanted in a monarch, so that
they might cope with other nations. They now greeted him as their
king, giving the honor of the victory to human power and forgetting