1 Samuel 15:23
Good News Translation
Rebellion against him is as bad as witchcraft, and arrogance is as sinful as idolatry. Because you rejected the LORD's command, he has rejected you as king."

New Revised Standard Version
For rebellion is no less a sin than divination, and stubbornness is like iniquity and idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the LORD, he has also rejected you from being king.”

Contemporary English Version
Rebelling against God or disobeying him because you are proud is just as bad as worshiping idols or asking them for advice. You refused to do what God told you, so God has decided that you can no longer be king."

New American Bible
For a sin of divination is rebellion, and arrogance, the crime of idolatry. Because you have rejected the word of the LORD, the LORD in turn has rejected you as king.”

Douay-Rheims Bible
Because it is like the sin of witchcraft, to rebel: and like the crime of idolatry, to refuse to obey. Forasmuch, therefore, as thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, the Lord hath also rejected thee from being king.

Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

Because it is like the sin of witchcraft, to rebel: and like the crime of idolatry, to refuse to obey. Forasmuch, therefore, as thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, the Lord hath also rejected thee from being king.

rebellion

1 Samuel 12:14,15 If you will fear the Lord, and serve him, and hearken to his voice, and not provoke the mouth of the Lord: then shall both you, and the king who reigneth over you, be followers of the Lord your God. . . .

Numbers 14:9 Be not rebellious against the Lord: and fear ye not the people of this land, for we are able to eat them up as bread. All aid is gone from them: the Lord is with us, fear ye not.

Deuteronomy 9:7,24 Remember, and forget not how thou provokedst the Lord thy God to wrath in the wilderness. From the day that thou camest out of Egypt unto this place, thou hast always strove against the Lord. . . .

Joshua 22:16-19 Thus saith all the people of the Lord: What meaneth this transgression? Why have you forsaken the Lord the God of Israel, building a sacrilegious altar, and revolting from the worship of him? . . .

Job 34:37 Because he addeth blasphemy upon his sins, let him be tied fast in the mean time amongst us: and then let him provoke God to judgment with his speeches.

Psalm 107:11 Because they had exasperated the words of God: and provoked the counsel of the most High:

Jeremiah 28:16 Therefore thus saith the Lord: Behold I will send thee away from off the face of the earth: this year shalt thou die: for thou hast spoken against the Lord.

Jeremiah 29:32 Therefore thus saith the Lord: behold I will visit upon Semeias the Nehelamite, and upon his seed: he shall not have a man to sit in the midst of this people, and he shall not see the good that I will do to my people, saith the Lord: because he hath spoken treason against the Lord.

Ezekiel 2:5-8 If so be they at least will hear, and if so be they will forbear, for they are a provoking house: and they shall know that there hath been a prophet in the midst of them. . . .

witchcraft [heb] divination

Exodus 22:18 Wizards thou shalt not suffer to live.

Leviticus 20:6,27 The soul that shall go aside after magicians, and soothsayers, and shall commit fornication with them: I will set my face against that soul, and destroy it out of the midst of its people. . . .

Deuteronomy 18:10,11 Neither let there be found among you any one that shall expiate his son or daughter, making them to pass through the fire: or that consulteth soothsayers, or observeth dreams and omens, neither let there be any wizard, . . .

Isaiah 8:19 And when they shall say to you: Seek of pythons, and of diviners, who mutter in their enchantments: should not the people seek of their God, for the living of the dead?

Isaiah 19:3 And the spirit of Egypt shall be broken in the bowels thereof, and I will cast down their counsel: and they shall consult their idols, and their diviners, and their wizards, and soothsayers.

Revelation 22:15 Without are dogs and sorcerers and unchaste and murderers and servers of idols and every one that loveth and maketh a lie.

stubbornness

2 Corinthians 6:16 And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God: as God saith: I will dwell in them and walk among them. And I will be their God: and they shall be my people.

Galatians 5:20 Idolatry, witchcrafts, enmities, contentions, emulations, wraths, quarrels, dissensions, sects,

Revelation 21:8 But the fearful and unbelieving and the abominable and murderers and whoremongers and sorcerers and idolaters and all liars, they shall have their portion in the pool burning with fire and brimstone, which is the second death.

thou hast rejected

1 Samuel 2:30 Wherefore thus saith the Lord the God of Israel: I said indeed that thy house, and the house of thy father, should minister in my sight, for ever. But now saith the Lord: Far be this from me: but whosoever shall glorify me, him will I glorify: but they that despise me, shall be despised.

1 Samuel 13:14 But thy kingdom shall not continue. The Lord hath sought him a man according to his own heart: and him hath the Lord commanded to be prince over his people, because thou hast not observed that which the Lord commanded.

1 Samuel 16:1 And the Lord said to Samuel: How long wilt thou mourn for Saul, whom I have rejected from reigning over Israel? fill thy horn with oil, and come, that I may send thee to Isai, the Bethlehemite: for I have provided me a king among his sons.

2 Kings 17:15-20 And they rejected his ordinances, and the covenant that he made with their fathers, and the testimonies which he testified against them: and they followed vanities, and acted vainly: and they followed the nations that were round about them, concerning which the Lord had commanded them that they should not do as they did. . . .

1 Chronicles 28:9 And thou my son Solomon, know the God of thy father, and serve him with a perfect heart, and a willing mind: for the Lord searcheth all hearts, and understandeth all the thoughts of minds. If thou seek him, thou shalt find him: but if thou forsake him, he will cast thee off for ever.

Context
Samuel Denounces Saul
22And Samuel said: Doth the Lord desire holocausts and victims, and not rather that the voice of the Lord should be obeyed? For obedience is better than sacrifices: and to hearken rather than to offer the fat or rams. 23Because it is like the sin of witchcraft, to rebel: and like the crime of idolatry, to refuse to obey. Forasmuch, therefore, as thou hast rejected the word of the Lord, the Lord hath also rejected thee from being king.
Cross References
Acts 13:22
And when he had removed him, he raised them up David to be king: to whom giving testimony, he said: I have found David, the son of Jesse, a man according to my own heart, who shall do all my wills.

Genesis 31:19
At that time Laban was gone to shear his sheep, and Rachel stole away her father's idols.

Genesis 31:34
She, in haste, hid the idols under the camel's furniture, and sat upon them: and when he had searched all the tent, and found nothing,

Deuteronomy 18:10
Neither let there be found among you any one that shall expiate his son or daughter, making them to pass through the fire: or that consulteth soothsayers, or observeth dreams and omens, neither let there be any wizard,

1 Samuel 13:14
But thy kingdom shall not continue. The Lord hath sought him a man according to his own heart: and him hath the Lord commanded to be prince over his people, because thou hast not observed that which the Lord commanded.

1 Samuel 16:1
And the Lord said to Samuel: How long wilt thou mourn for Saul, whom I have rejected from reigning over Israel? fill thy horn with oil, and come, that I may send thee to Isai, the Bethlehemite: for I have provided me a king among his sons.

1 Samuel 28:3
Now Samuel was dead, and all Israel mourned for him, and buried him in Ramatha, his city. And Saul had put away all the magicians and soothsayers out of the land.

2 Samuel 7:15
But my mercy I will not take away from him, as I took it from Saul, whom I removed from before my face.

2 Samuel 12:9
Why therefore hast thou despised the word of the Lord, to do evil in my sight? Thou hast killed Urias the Hethite with the sword, and hast taken his wife to be thy wife, and hast slain him with the sword of the children of Ammon.

1 Chronicles 10:13
So Saul died for his iniquities, because he transgressed the commandment of the Lord, which he had commanded, and kept it not: and moreover consulted also a witch,

Jeremiah 16:12
And you also have done worse than your fathers: for behold every one of you walketh after the perverseness of his evil heart, so as not to hearken to me.

Hosea 3:4
For the children of Israel shall sit many days without king, and without prince, and without sacrifice, and without altar, and without ephod, and without theraphim.

1 Samuel 15:22
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