1 Chronicles 10:1-14--The Death of Saul and His Sons

1 Chronicles 10
English Standard Version

The Death of Saul and His Sons
10 Now the Philistines fought against Israel, and the men of Israel fled before the Philistines and fell slain on Mount Gilboa. 2 And the Philistines overtook Saul and his sons, and the Philistines struck down Jonathan and Abinadab and Malchi-shua, the sons of Saul. 3 The battle pressed hard against Saul, and the archers found him, and he was wounded by the archers. 4 Then Saul said to his armor-bearer, “Draw your sword and thrust me through with it, lest these uncircumcised come and mistreat me.” But his armor-bearer would not, for he feared greatly. Therefore Saul took his own sword and fell upon it. 5 And when his armor-bearer saw that Saul was dead, he also fell upon his sword and died. 6 Thus Saul died; he and his three sons and all his house died together. 7 And when all the men of Israel who were in the valley saw that the army had fled and that Saul and his sons were dead, they abandoned their cities and fled, and the Philistines came and lived in them.

8 The next day, when the Philistines came to strip the slain, they found Saul and his sons fallen on Mount Gilboa. 9 And they stripped him and took his head and his armor, and sent messengers throughout the land of the Philistines to carry the good news to their idols and to the people. 10 And they put his armor in the temple of their gods and fastened his head in the temple of Dagon. 11 But when all Jabesh-gilead heard all that the Philistines had done to Saul, 12 all the valiant men arose and took away the body of Saul and the bodies of his sons, and brought them to Jabesh. And they buried their bones under the oak in Jabesh and fasted seven days.

​13 So Saul died for his breach of faith. He broke faith with the LORD in that he did not keep the command of the LORD, and also consulted a medium, seeking guidance. 14 He did not seek guidance from the LORD. Therefore the LORD put him to death and turned the kingdom over to David the son of Jesse.

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God raised up Saul to be king over Israel to deal with the Philistines that the Israelites had let live among them since the time of Joshua.  While the LORD did not give Saul complete and total victory over them (that would happen during the time of David), Saul had great victory over them, but the LORD also used the Philistines to kill Saul and his sons Jonathan, Abinadab, and Malchi-shua at Mount Giboa.  Saul's armor-bearer also died there after refusing to help Saul commit suicide, but out of great fear, the armor-bearer took his own life after he saw that his master was dead.  Thus, everyone who was "heir-apparent" to the throne of Saul died in that battle that one day.  Even though you might think that was a clear enough signal sent by the LORD, there were still some people that tried to make relatives of Saul king over all of Israel instead of following after David--for they were following after the example of the pagan kings that the kingship was something to inherit or to take by force.  We'll see the this is the way the northern ten tribes of Israel will behave in the Divided Kingdom.

After Saul had been killed, the Philistines hung the armor and body of Saul out as trophies and celebrated their victory over Isarel in the temple of their god named Dagon.  Some valiant men from Gilead took away Saul's body and buried it near the city of Jabesh so that his body would be treated with dignity.  Later David would bring Saul's remains back to his family in the land of the tribe of Benjamin near Jerusalem, and it was a sign of peace between the house of Saul and the house of David.  For the most part, the house of Saul and all of the tribe of Benjamin followed loyally after David from that point forward, even when the kingdom divided.

One other important item in the life of Saul is why the LORD judged him and sentenced him to death by the Philistines and told him that the kingdom was going to be taken away from him.  He disobeyed the LORD several times--making unauthorized sacrifices (stepping into the role of priest or prophet), refused to follow the LORD's command in destroying all the people and animals of the Amalekites as he was commanded, and after that event was told that the prophet Samuel would never see or talk to him again (because he was no longer the rightful king in the eyes of the LORD).  Shortly after that, Samuel died, and Saul desired to hear something from the LORD--anything was better than the silent-treatment he had been getting, but Saul did not repent during that whole time and instead decided to consort with a woman described in different translations as a witch, medium, or spiritist (she practiced divination).  Now Saul had been zealous in trying to kill all such people according to the Law of the LORD early in his reign, but when he asked his advisors where he could find someone who could reach out an speak to Samuel for him (remember, Samuel is dead), then they are all too happy to point him to the one woman they know of that is left in Israel.  It is during this encounter that Samuel's spirit is allowed to come back to Saul and prophecy to him one more time (the witch is as surprised and scared as Saul if you read the text, for she expected to speak on behalf of the spirits and tell Saul whatever she wanted to say).  Saul was told that he and his sons would die in this upcoming battle with the Philistines, and that his refusal to obey the LORD would lead in his descendants being cut off from the land of the living.  The kingdom would be torn away from him and given to David (who had already been anointed king by Samuel years earlier, but David has been waiting for Saul to die as David believed it was the LORD's responsibility to kill our enemies and not something that we should do ourselves--though he was all too happy to give his son Solomon a list of people that he should have killed and have Solomon take care of them for him).

This chapter on King Saul is now closed as far as the priests are concerned.  We'll come back next time to talk about the people anointing David as their king (they people make the choice that the LORD has already made), and we'll get the highlights of the reign of King David throughout the rest of 1 Chronicles (2 Chronicles will pick up with the reign of King Solomon and move forward from there).