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Study the Word. Meditate on it and let it be your delight and holy guide.
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Ninth Month
1 Samuel
This month’s reading gives us a glimpse of the time of transition from the judges to the Israelite monarchy. It all begins with Hannah. Between the story of the Judges and the stories of the new monarchy stand two stories about women: Ruth and Hannah. Hannah lived in central Palestine, and like Ruth, rejected her circumstances and refused to accept her assumed, cultural lot in life. Hannah was barren and pled with the Lord to intervene. God intervened indeed! God intervened in a way that would change not only Hannah’s life, but all of Israel’s, and subsequently, all of history.
Perhaps Hannah had been inspired by the holy story of a barren women before her -Sarah (see Gen. 16 & 18). God had acted through barren women before. Sarah had laughed at the impossible suggestion that she could bear a child. Hannah cried. Even though her husband, Elkanah, gently reminded her of his love, whether or not she bore him a child, even though he let her know she was precious in her own right and not just as a potential mother, she cried to God. And when her son, Samuel, was born, she dedicated him to God. Samuel, Hannah and Elkanah’s son, a judge, priest and prophet, was the one who anointed Israel’s first king, Saul.
Israel’s young nation was threatened from the start by the Philistines, who were larger, stronger and more powerful. Their superior iron weapons made them a constant military threat to the nascent nation. The story of David and Goliath bluntly reminds Israel that their only hope is God. David trusts that one hope whereas Saul falls back on his military, and fails. As you read the book, you may want to reflect on our own nation’s reliance on military. Do we really trust in God, or do we primarily trust in military solutions?
Much like many of the mid-eastern countries today, Israel was a loose federation of tribes. The Philistine empire sought to expand into Israelite territory c 1000 BCE (1 Sam. 4:1) and the loose tribal federation saw no real way of addressing the crisis. The book of Judges ended with the condemning criticism, “there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes” (Judge. 17:6). As Israel lacked stability and unity, the Philistines threatened the very existence of the new nation.
Like the amazing transformation in the birth of our own country, by the end of 2 Samuel, Israel was transformed socially as well as politically. This transformation included the creation of a strong centralized government and accompanying governmental structures which united the tribes, enabling them to confront their national emergency. Economically, Israel moved from being a primarily agrarian country to a nation savoring prosperity through trade and emerging wealth.
King Saul, King David, Jerusalem and the Temple all had a role in stabilizing the country. At the same time as the narrative recognizes these roles, however, it critics them. There was considerable theological resistance to the new centralized government and its economic structures. Although creating a monarchy may have been a wise political move, the people placed their trust in the monarchy and the military rather than in God. Therefore, God opposed the monarchy (1 Samuel 8:1), and when Saul crossed some religious lines by usurping the role of a priest, God moved against him. On the other hand, King David, for all his foibles, captured God’s heart. As you read the narrative, you will recognize that King David also captured the heart of the Israelite people. Remember as you read this story that you’re reading it from the “winner’s” perspective. It’s like reading a story written by Republicans about Democrats; it is not totally objective, and some of the opinions of the minority do not appear in the text. Those minority opinions appear in the larger text of Scripture, however. King Saul gets portrayed in a significantly bad light in 1 Samuel, however generations later good Hebrew parents named their son Saul, and this Saul we’ve come to know as St. Paul. Saul must have had some redeeming qualities for Paul to have been his namesake!
As you read through the book, you’ll realize the characters are portrayed not only in terms of their significance for the nation, but in terms of their role as models of faith (models to follow or models to avoid!). Their inner motives and personal, theological struggles are described alongside their actions.
It is clear that to the writer, God’s hand was behind everything, whether or not the people immediately obeyed God’s will. It was clear that God opposed the monarchy, yet God did not withdraw His hand from Israel. God did not give up ultimately guiding history. Hannah’s song in 1 Samuel 2:1-10 and David’s in 2 Samuel 22:2-51 provide a sort of artistic framework announcing the divine purpose at work, overturning worldly power when necessary and redirecting the course of history. The themes of life where life seems impossible and hope in the face of hopelessness dance off the pages. A barren woman gives birth to a future prophet for Israel (1 Sam. 1:1); a devastating defeat by the Philistines turns into Israel’s defeat of the Philistines (1 Sam. 4:1-6); the king demanded by the people and opposed by God nevertheless becomes God’s anointed one through whom blessings will flow; anointed kings can be rejected if they are unfaithful (1 Sam. 13:1,15) and yet the nation will survive; the youngest son of an obscure family can become the future hope of Israel (1 Sam. 16:1) and be the seed for the greatest blessing given mankind. Human free will is alive and well, but God’s will for Israel to survive overcomes the tragic mistakes of shortsighted humans.[1]
See also: 1 Samuel & Chronicles; Themes; Summary
[1] The New Interpreter's Bible , v. 2: Numbers, Deuteronomy, Intro to Narratives, Joshua, Judges, Ruth, 1 & 2 Samuel; THE FIRST AND SECOND BOOKS OF SAMUEL: CRITICAL ASSUMPTIONS
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