Listen to the audio of today’s Reflection:
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1 Samuel 8:1-22
Israel Asks for a King
1When Samuel grew old, he appointed his sons as Israel’s leaders. 2The name of his firstborn was Joel and the name of his second was Abijah, and they served at Beersheba. 3But his sons did not follow his ways. They turned aside after dishonest gain and accepted bribes and perverted justice.
4So all the elders of Israel gathered together and came to Samuel at Ramah. 5They said to him, “You are old, and your sons do not follow your ways; now appoint a king to lead us, such as all the other nations have.”
6But when they said, “Give us a king to lead us,” this displeased Samuel; so he prayed to the Lord. 7And the Lord told him: “Listen to all that the people are saying to you; it is not you they have rejected, but they have rejected me as their king. 8As they have done from the day I brought them up out of Egypt until this day, forsaking me and serving other gods, so they are doing to you. 9Now listen to them; but warn them solemnly and let them know what the king who will reign over them will claim as his rights.”
10Samuel told all the words of the Lord to the people who were asking him for a king. 11He said, “This is what the king who will reign over you will claim as his rights: He will take your sons and make them serve with his chariots and horses, and they will run in front of his chariots. 12Some he will assign to be commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties, and others to plow his ground and reap his harvest, and still others to make weapons of war and equipment for his chariots. 13He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. 14He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive groves and give them to his attendants. 15He will take a tenth of your grain and of your vintage and give it to his officials and attendants. 16Your male and female servants and the best of your cattle and donkeys he will take for his own use. 17He will take a tenth of your flocks, and you yourselves will become his slaves. 18When that day comes, you will cry out for relief from the king you have chosen, but the Lord will not answer you in that day.”
19But the people refused to listen to Samuel. “No!” they said. “We want a king over us. 20Then we will be like all the other nations, with a king to lead us and to go out before us and fight our battles.”
21When Samuel heard all that the people said, he repeated it before the Lord.
22The Lord answered, “Listen to them and give them a king.”
You might remember that when we first encountered a reading from First Samuel in our lectionary a week or so ago, I mentioned that, although this book recounts events that took place more than 3000 years ago, it has some themes that seem surprisingly relevant to our lives in the digital age. I suppose it almost goes without saying that the passage that’s our listed Old Testament passage for today is a perfect example of that.
Depending on your political party loyalties, you might think that our current president wants to operate with the powers of a king, or that he is demonstrating the proper functioning the strong executive branch. But whatever your take on the current political situation, it’s hard to deny that today’s reading shows that the question of the appropriate uses of political power is one that has been the source of discussion and debate for over three millennia.
This passage tells about a moment in the ancient history of the Hebrew people, a moment in which a substantial part of the population had come to believe that their current form of political organization was no longer serving them well. Up until this time, the Hebrew people had been organized in a tribal structure, with the tribes being led by chieftains who are identified as “judges” in the Old Testament. Whenever an external threat was presented by the nation’s enemies, the tribes would have to agree among themselves to cooperate in the national defense.
As you might imagine, this arrangement could be problematic. If an external enemy invaded one tribe’s territory, the other tribes might or might not be inclined to join in their neighbors’ defense. There was even occasional hostility among the tribes, so instead of functioning as a single unified people, the Hebrews sometimes acted like squabbling children.
At some point, the Hebrew people came to the conclusion that their neighbors had a better system, one led by kings who could unify the people for the common defense. So, as today’s reading relates, they went to the prophet Samuel and asked for a king of their own. Samuel took this request as a personal affront. But God told the prophet that the people were rejecting his leadership, not Samuel’s. So God instructed the prophet to grant the people’s request for a king.
But first, God commanded Samuel to make sure that people understood what having a king would mean to them. A king is not a public servant. The king is a ruler, who holds his own interests above those of the people he rules. God commanded Samuel to tell the people that the king they were asking for would consider everything they owned, included in their flocks and herds, and even their children and their lives, to be his own personal property.
Having heard that warning, the people persisted in their call for a king, and through the prophet Samuel, God arranged for them to have one.
There’s a powerful message here, one that goes beyond just being careful of what you ask for. Everything God had done in his relationship with his people, every action and commandment, had been for the welfare of the people. Once they began to be ruled by kings, those kings would subject the people to the problems that arose out of their own self-interest. The first king was Saul, who started out well but then became mentally unbalanced and plunged the country into civil war. The second king was David, who was better, but whose sins with Bathsheba led to even more violent civil war. The third king was Solomon, who taxed the country so heavily to support his extravagant lifestyle that the country split in two and was never reunited.
And it went downhill from there. God’s warning was fully realized in the life of the covenant people. Supreme executive power always looks better before you surrender your freedom to it.
There’s one other message in this passage that seems worth noting. God did not want his people to be ruled by an earthly king. But when they refused to be influenced by his warning, God acceded to their demand, and arranged for Samuel to find them a king. It seems that God is sometimes willing to give us what we want, even when it’s not what is best for us. So that probably turns up the urgency on our need to hear and pay attention to the commandments of our God. It’s only by following them that we can avoid the disasters that can come when we get what we want, when what we want is not what’s good for us.
Let’s pray. Lord, we thank you for the opportunity to learn from the mistakes your people have made throughout history. Move us to seek your wisdom as it’s presented in scripture, and to seek in all things your guidance on how best to live happy and healthy lives. In your holy name we pray. Amen.
Grace and peace,
Henry
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