_SAUL AT ENDOR._
1 SAMUEL xxviii. 3-25.
For a considerable time Saul had been drifting along like a crippled
vessel at sea, a melancholy example of a man forsaken of God. But as his
decisive encounter with the Philistines drew on, the state of
helplessness to which he had been reduced became more apparent than
ever. He had sagacity enough to perceive that the expedition which the
Philistines were now leading against him was the most formidable that
had ever taken place in his day. It was no ordinary battle that was to
be fought; it was one that would decide the fate of the country. The
magnitude of the expedition on his part is apparent from an expression
in the fourth verse--"Saul gathered all Israel together." The place of
encounter was not any of the old battle-fields with the Philistines.
Usually the engagements had taken place in some of the valleys that ran
down from the territories of Dan, or Benjamin, or Judah into the
Philistine plain, or on the heights above these. But such places were
comparatively contracted, and did not afford scope for great bodies of
troops. This time the Philistines chose a wider and more commanding
battlefield. Advancing northwards along their own maritime plain, and
beyond it along the plain of Sharon, they turned eastwards into the
great plain of Esdraelon or Jezreel, and occupied the northern side of
the plain. The troops of Saul were encamped on the southern side,
occupying the northern slope of Mount Gilboa. There the two armies faced
each other, the wide plain stretching between.
It was a painful moment for Saul when he got his first view of the
Philistine host, for the sight of it filled him with consternation. It
would appear to have surpassed that of Israel very greatly in numbers,
in resources, as it certainly did in its confident spirit. Yet, if Saul
had been a man of faith, none of these things would have moved him. Was
it not in that very neighbourhood that Barak, with his hasty levies, had
inflicted a signal defeat on the Canaanites? And was it not in that very
plain that the hosts of Midian lay encamped in the days of Gideon, when
the barley cake rolling into their camp overturned and terrified the
host, and a complete discomfiture followed? Why should not the Lord work
as great a deliverance now? If God was with them, He was more than all
that could be against them. Might not this be another of the days
foretold by Moses, when one should chase a thousand, and two put ten
thousand to flight?
Yes, _if_ God was with them. All turned upon that _if_. And Saul felt
that God was not with them, and that they could not count on any such
deliverance as, in better times, had been vouchsafed to their fathers.
And why, O Saul, when you felt thus, did you not humble yourself before
God, confess all your sins, and implore Him to show you mercy? Why did
you not cry, "Return, O Lord, how long? And let it repent Thee
concerning Thy servants"? Would you have found God inexorable? Would His
ear have been heavy that it could not hear? Don't you remember how
Moses said that when Israel, in sore bondage, should cry humbly to God,
the Lord would hear his cry, and have mercy on him? Why, O Saul, do you
not fall in the dust before Him?
Somehow Saul felt that he could not. Among other effects of sin and
rebellion, one of the worst is a stiffening of the soul, making it hard
and rigid, so that it cannot bend, it cannot melt, it cannot change its
course. The long career of wilfulness that Saul had followed had
produced in him this stiffening effect; his spirit was hardened in its
own ways, and incapable of all exercise of contrition or humiliation, or
anything essentially different from the course he had been following.
There are times in the life of a deeply afflicted woman when the best
thing she could do would be to weep, but that is just the thing she
cannot do. There are times when the best thing an inveterate sinner
could do would be to fling himself before God and sob for mercy, but
fling himself before God and sob he cannot. Saul was incapable of that
exercise of soul which would have saved him and his people. Most
terrible effect of cherished sin! It dries up the fountains of
contrition and they will not flow. It stiffens the knees and they will
not bend. It paralyses the voice and it will not cry. It blinds the eyes
and they see not the Saviour. It closes the ears and the voice of mercy
is unheard. It drives the distressed one to wells without water, to
refuges of lies, to trees twice dead, to physicians who have no
medicines, to gods who have no salvation; all he feels is that his case
is desperate, and yet somewhere or other he must have help!
Saul did not neglect the outward means by which in other days God had
been accustomed to direct the nation. He tried every authorized way he
could think of for getting guidance from above. He believed in a
heavenly power, and he asked its guidance and its help. But God took no
notice of him. He answered him neither by dreams, nor by Urim, nor by
prophets. Men, though in heart rebellious against God's will, will go
through a great deal of mechanical service in the hope of securing His
favour. It is not their muscles that get stiffened, but their souls.
What a strange conception they must have of God when they fancy that
mere external services will please Him! How little Saul knew of God when
he supposed that, overlooking all the rebellion of his heart, God would
respond to a mechanical effort or efforts to communicate with Him! Don't
you know, O Saul, that your iniquities have separated between you and
your God, and your sins have hid His face from you that He will not
hear? Nothing will have the least effect on Him till you own your sin.
"I will go and return unto My place, until they acknowledge their
offence and seek My face." And this is just what you will not, cannot
do! How infinitely precious would one tear of genuine repentance have
been in that dark hour! It would have saved thousands of the Israelites
from a bloody death; it would have saved the nation from defeat and
humiliation; it would have removed the obstacle to fellowship with the
Hope of Israel, who would have stood true to His ancient
character,--"the Saviour thereof in time of trouble."
But Saul's day of grace was over, and accordingly we find him driven to
the most humbling expedient to which a man can stoop--seeking counsel
from a quarter against which, in his more prosperous days, he had
directed his special energies, as a superstitious, demoralizing agency.
He had been most zealous in exterminating a class of persons, abounding
in Eastern countries, who pretend to know the secrets of the future, and
to have access to the inhabitants of the unseen world. Little could he
have dreamt in those days of fiery zeal that a time would come when he
would rejoice to learn that one poor wretch had escaped the vigilance of
his officers, and still carried on, or pretended to carry on, a
nefarious traffic with the realms of the departed! It shows how little
man is acquainted with the inner feelings of other men--how little he
knows even himself. Doubtless he thought, in the days of exterminating
zeal, that it was sheer folly and drivelling superstition that
encouraged these sorcerers, and that by clearing them away he would be
ridding the land of a mass of rubbish that could be of service to no
one. He did not consider that there are times of wretchedness and
despair when the soul that knows not God will seek counsel even of men
with a familiar spirit--he little dreamt that such would be the case
with himself. "Is thy servant a dog that he should do this thing?" he
would have asked with great indignation in those early days, if it had
been insinuated that he would ever be tempted to resort to such
counsellors. "What better could I ever be of anything they could tell
me? Surely it would be wiser to meet any conceivable danger full in the
face than to seek after such counsel as they could give!" He did not
consider that when man's spirit is overwhelmed within him, and his
craving for help is like the passion of a madman, he will clutch like a
drowning man at a straw, he will even resort to a woman with a familiar
spirit, if, peradventure, some hint can be got to extricate him from his
misery.
But to this complexion it came at last. With dreadful sacrifice of
self-respect, Saul had to ask his advisers to seek out for him a woman
of this description. They were able to tell him of such a woman residing
at Endor, about ten miles from where they were. With two attendants he
set out after nightfall, disguised, and found her. Naturally, she was
afraid to do anything in the way of business in the face of such
measures as the king had taken against all of her craft, nor would she
stir until she had got a solemn promise that she would not be molested
in any way. Then, when all was ready, she asked whom she should call up.
"Call up Samuel," said Saul. To the great astonishment of the woman
herself, she sees Samuel rising up. A shriek from her indicates that she
is as much astonished and for the moment frightened as anyone can be.
Evidently she did not expect such an apparition. The effect was much too
great for the cause. She sees that in this apparition a power is
concerned much beyond what she can wield. Instinctively she apprehends
that the only man of importance enough to receive such a supernatural
visit must be the head of the nation. "Why did you deceive me?" she
said, "for thou art Saul." "Never mind that," is virtually Saul's reply;
"but tell me what you have seen." The Revised Version gives her answer
better than the older one--"I saw a god arise out of the earth." "What
is his appearance?" earnestly asks Saul. "He is an old man, and he is
covered with a mantle." And Saul sees that it is really Samuel.
But what was it that really happened, and how did it come about? That
the woman was able, even if she really had the aid of evil spirits, to
bring Samuel into Saul's presence we cannot believe. Nor could she
believe it herself. If Samuel really appeared--and the narrative assumes
that he did--it must have been by a direct miracle, God supernaturally
clothing his spirit in something like its old form, and bringing him
back to earth to speak to Saul. In judgment it seemed good to God to let
Saul have his desire, and to give him a real interview with Samuel. "He
gave him his request, but sent leanness to his soul." So far from having
his fears allayed and his burden removed, Saul was made to see from
Samuel's communication that there was nothing but ruin before him; and
he must have gone back to the painful duty of the morrow staggering
under a load heavier than before.
Samuel begins the conversation; and he does so by reproaching Saul for
having disquieted him, and brought him back from his peaceful home above
to mingle again in the strife and turmoil of human things. Nothing can
exceed the haggard and weird desolation of Saul's answer. "I am sore
distressed; for the Philistines make war against me, and God is departed
from me and answereth me no more, neither by prophets nor by dreams:
therefore I have called thee, that thou mayest make known unto me what I
shall do." Was ever a king in such a plight? Who would have thought,
when Samuel and Saul first came together, and Saul listened so
respectfully to the prophet counselling him concerning the kingdom, that
their last meeting should be like this? In all Saul's statement there is
no word that carries such a load of meaning and of despair as this--"God
is departed from me." It is the token of universal confusion and
calamity. And Saul felt it, and as no one understood these things like
Samuel, he had sought Samuel to counsel his wayward son, to tell him
what to do.
It is not every sinner that makes the discovery in this life what awful
results follow when God is departed from him. But if the discovery does
not dawn on one in this life, it will come on him with overwhelming
force in the life to come. Men little think what they are preparing for
themselves when they say to God, "Depart from us, for we desire not the
knowledge of Thy ways." The service of God is irksome; the restraints of
God's law are distressing; they like a free life, freedom to please
themselves. And so they part company with God. The form of Divine
service may be kept up or it may not: but God is not their God, and
God's will is not their rule. They have left God's ways, they have
followed their own. And when conscience has sometimes given them a
twinge, when God has reminded them by the silent monitor of His claims,
their answer has been, Let us alone, what have we to do with Thee?
Depart from us, leave us in peace. Ah! how little have you considered
that the most awful thing that could happen to you is just for God to
depart from you! If we could conceive the earth a sensitive being, and
somehow to get a dislike for the sun, and to pray the sun to depart from
her, how awful would be the fulfilment! Losing all the genial influences
that brighten her surface, that cover her face with beauty and enrich
her soil with abundance, all the foul and slimy creatures of darkness
would creep out, all the noxious influences of dissolution and death
would riot in their terrible freedom! And is not this but a poor faint
picture of man forsaken by God! O sinner, if ever thy wish should be
fulfilled, how wilt thou curse the day in which thou didst utter it!
When vile lusts rise to uncontrollable authority--when those whom you
love turn hopelessly wicked, when you find yourselves joyless, helpless,
hopeless, when you try to repent and cannot repent, when you try to pray
and cannot pray, when you try to be pure and cannot be pure--what a
terrible calamity you will then feel it that God is departed from you!
Trifle not, O man, with thy relation to God; and let not thy history be
such that it shall have to be written in the words of the prophet--"But
they rebelled and vexed His Holy Spirit; therefore He was turned to be
their enemy and He fought against them" (Isaiah lxiii. 10).
There was no comfort for Saul in Samuel's reply, but much the contrary.
Why should he have asked advice of the Lord's servant, when he owned
that he was forsaken by the Lord Himself? What could the servant do for
him if the Master was become his enemy? What can a priest or a minister
do for any man if God has turned His face away from him? Can he make God
deny Himself, and become favourable to one who has scorned or sinned
away His Holy Spirit? Saul was experiencing no more than he had just
reason to expect since that fatal day when he had first deliberately set
up his own will above God's will in the affair of Amalek. In the course
which he began then, he had persistently continued, and God was now just
executing the threatenings which Saul had braved. And next day would
witness the last of his sad history. The Lord would deliver Israel into
the hands of the Philistines; in the collision of the armies he and his
sons would be slain; disaster to his arms, death to himself, and
destruction to his dynasty would all come together on that miserable
day.
It is no wonder that Saul was utterly prostrated: "He fell straightway
all along on the earth, and was sore afraid, because of the words of
Samuel; and there was no strength in him; for he had eaten no bread all
the day, nor all the night." He could not have expected that the
interview with Samuel would be a pleasant one, but he never imagined
that it would announce such awful calamities. Have you not known
sometimes the terrible sensation when you had heard there was something
wrong with some of your friends, and on going to inquire, discovered
that the calamity was infinitely worse than you had ever dreamt of? A
momentary paralysis comes over one; you are stunned and made helpless by
the tidings. We may even be tempted to think that surely Samuel was too
hard on Saul; might he not have tempered his awful message by some
qualifying word of hope and mercy? The answer is, Samuel spoke the
truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. We are all prone to
the thought that when evil men get their doom there will surely be
something to modify or mitigate its rigour. Samuel's words to Saul
indicate no such relaxation. Moral law will vindicate itself as natural
law vindicates itself--"Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also
reap."
The last incident in the chapter is interesting and pleasing. We might
have thought that such a calling as that followed by the witch of Endor
would have destroyed all the humanities in her nature; that she would
have looked on the king's distress with a cold, stoical eye, and that
her only concern would be to obtain for herself a fee adapted to the
occasion. But she shows much of the woman left in her after all. When
she rehearses her service, and the peril of her life at which it has
been rendered, to prepare the way for her asking a favour, the favour
which she does ask is not for herself at all,--it is on Saul's own
behalf, that she might be permitted the honour of preparing for him a
meal. Saul's mind is too much occupied and too much agitated to care
for anything of the kind. Still prostrate on the ground he says, "I will
not eat." Men overwhelmed by calamity hate to eat, they are too excited
to experience hunger. It was only when his servants, thinking how much
he had gone through already, how much more he had to go through on the
morrow, and how utterly unfit his exhausted body was for the strain--it
was then only that he yielded to the request of the woman. And the woman
showed that, for all her sinister business, she was equal to the
occasion of entertaining a king. The "fat calf in the house"
corresponded to the "fatted calf" in the parable of the prodigal son. It
was not the custom even in families of the richer class to eat meat at
ordinary meals; it was reserved for feasts and extraordinary occasions;
and in order to be ready for any emergency a calf was kept close to the
house, whose flesh, from the delicate way in which it was reared and
fed, was tender enough to be served even at so hasty a meal. With cakes
of unleavened bread, this dish could be presented very rapidly, and,
unlike the hasty meals which are common among us, was really a more
substantial and nourishing entertainment than ordinary. It is touching
to mark these traces of womanly feeling in this unhappy being, reminding
us of the redeeming features of Rahab the harlot. What effect the whole
transaction had on the woman we are not told, and it would be vain to
conjecture.
And now Saul retraces his dark and dreary way southward to the heights
of Gilboa. We can hardly exaggerate his miserable condition. He had much
to think of, and he would have needed a clear, unclouded mind. We can
think of him only as miserably distracted, and unable to let his mind
settle on anything. It would have needed his utmost resources to
arrange for the battle of to-morrow, a battle in which he knew that
defeat was coming, but which he might endeavour, nevertheless, to make
as little disastrous as possible. Moreover, he knew it was to be the
last day of his life, and troubled thoughts could not but steal in on
him as to what should happen when he stood before God. No doubt, too,
there were many sad thoughts about his sons, who were to be involved in
the same fate as himself. Was there no way of saving any of them? The
arrangement of his temporal effects, too, would claim attention, for,
restless and excitable as he had been, it was not likely that his
private affairs would be in very good order. Anon his thoughts might
wander back to his first interview with Samuel, and bitter remorse would
send its pang through him as he thought how differently he might have
left the kingdom if he had faithfully followed the counsels of the
prophet. Possibly amid all these gloomy thoughts one thought of a
brighter order might steal into his mind--how thoroughly David, who
would come to the throne after him, would retrieve his errors and
restore prosperity, and make the kingdom what it had never been under
him, a model kingdom, worthy to shadow forth the glories of Messiah's
coming reign. Poor distracted man, he was little fitted either to fight
a battle with the Philistines or to encounter the last enemy on his own
account. What a lesson to be prepared beforehand! On a deathbed,
especially a sudden one, distractions can hardly fail to visit us--this
thing and the other thing needing to be arranged and thought of. Happy
they who at such a moment can say, "I am now ready to depart." "Into Thy
hands I commend my spirit, for Thou hast redeemed me, O Lord God of
truth."