1 Samuel 28:7-25 Then said Saul to his servants, Seek me a woman that has a familiar spirit, that I may go to her, and inquire of her… This narrative is unlike any other in the Bible, and therefore, as might have been expected, has received various explanations. Three of them may be briefly noticed:(1) That Samuel himself appeared to the mistress of necromancy in Endor, and predicted to Saul his death on the morrow; (2) That an evil spirit, or demon, personating Samuel, appeared to the woman and predicted to Saul his death. (3) That the woman, being a ventriloquist, described such an apparition as the king would suppose to be that of Samuel, and then made her words seem to come from the place where the apparition was imagined to be. 1. In favour of the first interpretation may be urged the prima facie meaning of the narrative. For the sacred writer says that "the woman saw Samuel" (ver. 12); that when she described the apparition seen by her "Saul knew it was Samuel" (ver. 14); that the prophet reproached Saul for "disquieting and bringing him up" (ver. 15); and that the prophet foretold the defeat of Israel and the death of Saul and his sons on the morrow (ver. 19), both of which came to pass. These are strong reasons, and if they are set aside, it should be in view of others that are stronger. What, then, are some of the arguments against this explanation of the narrative? God had forbidden the practice of necromancy in Israel, and had commanded those who practised the same to be stoned (Leviticus 20:27; Deuteronomy 18:10, 11). Again, Saul himself was acquainted with this law of Jehovah, and had attempted to execute it (ver. 3-9). Still further, God had rejected the king, and had refused to answer him by any of the usual and appointed ways of making known his will (ver. 6). And, besides, there is no indication in this narrative that Saul was now, at last, penitent, so that a message from God might be expected to control or benefit him. Certainly the refusal of God to answer Saul by dreams, by the Urim, or by the prophets, the wilful disobedience of the king in the act of consulting the women, and the close connection of Samuel's appearance (if real) with the agency of this evil woman, are moral objections to this view of the passage. Moreover, it will scarcely be denied that the words, "Why hast thou disquieted me, to bring me up?" do not seem perfectly natural as the language of a true prophet coming back from the Unseen with a Divine message, while they do seem entirely natural as words spoken in behalf of a pretended apparition by the enchantress herself. Again, if the woman was really and greatly amazed by the apparition of Samuel, as she well might be if it was real, it is somewhat singular that she was so prudent and self-collected afterwards. 2. In favour of the second explanation, that an evil spirit, personating Samuel, appeared to the woman, and predicted to Saul his defeat and death on the morrow, we can say but little of a positive character. It is, however, free from some of the objections which lie against the first. For on this hypothesis God does not connect a revelation of the future through his own prophet with an act of desperate disobedience on the part of Saul, or with a practice so solemnly prohibited as necromancy. For all the parties concerned are given up to evil. "That the devil, by the Divine permission, should be able to personate Samuel is not strange, since he can transform himself into an angel of light! Nor is it strange that he should be permitted do it upon this occasion, that Saul might be driven to despair, by enquiring of the devil, since he would not, in a right manner, inquire of the Lord, by which he might have had comfort. Had this been the true Samuel, he could not have foretold the event, unless God had revealed it to him; and, though it were an evil spirit, God might by him foretell it; as we read of an evil spirit that foresaw Ahab's fall at Ramoth-Gilead, and was instrumental in it." 3. In favour of the third explanation several things may be alleged. 1. The king was in a state of mind which would render deception on the part of the sorceress easy. He believed in necromancy, and in the testimony of his servants that this woman was a mistress of necromancy, he was also afraid and exceedingly anxious to obtain some clue to the future from the invisible world, especially by means of Samuel, whom he knew to be a prophet. 2. The woman of Endor was most likely to have known of the extraordinary stature of Saul, of the degeneracy of his character and fortunes, of the perilous condition of his army, and of the dress of Samuel in his old age. 3. With this knowledge she would have been tolerably sure to detect the person of Saul in spite of his disguise, and would have laid her plan of action accordingly. 4. It would have been easy for her as a ventriloquist to make the prostrate king suppose that her changed voice came from an unseen form at a slight remove from the place where she stood. 5. For Saul himself, it will be observed, did not see the alleged apparition of Samuel; he but inferred it from the woman's description of what she professed to see rising out of the earth. 6. The woman's animosity towards Saul, because of his "putting away the necromancers and wizards out of the land" may have led her to wish his death, and the circumstances in which he was now placed by the Philistines may have emboldened her to say what she did. But in declaring Saul's doom she was personating Samuel, and must therefore speak as he might have been expected to speak, reminding Saul of his past disobedience to God, of God's displeasure with him on that account, of God's giving the throne to David, and of the certain death which awaited Saul and his sons on the morrow. 7. The fulfilment of her words may have been partly due to the despair which they produced in the mind of Saul. At any rate, the fact of their fulfilment is not conclusive, in the circumstances, of their being a proper revelation beforehand of the purpose of God. (A. Hovey, D. D.) Parallel Verses KJV: Then said Saul unto his servants, Seek me a woman that hath a familiar spirit, that I may go to her, and inquire of her. And his servants said to him, Behold, there is a woman that hath a familiar spirit at Endor. |
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