1 Samuel 13:15 Commentary and Bible Study

Samuel doesn't seem to take any further part. He knows exactly what is going to happen: that Saul will dither, and that Jonathan will get on with it. ‘And Saul numbered the people that were present with him about six hundred men.’ And Saul, and Jonathan his son, and the rest of the party, and who they were and what they did, are named in due course.The garrison of the Philistines went out to the passage of Michmash, in other words they had forced Saul out of his own camp and out of his own position, and everybody was totally and completely stuck. So here in a nutshell is the position: the Philistines are everywhere. They have pitched their camp where Saul previously had his; the people are demoralised with nowhere to move, and most of the troops are being hidden in people's attics, or in holes in the ground; troops just being hidden everywhere, because the Philistines were scouring the land, and Saul with just a small group around him doesn't know what to do. He is completely and utterly stuck. There is total occupation and the Philistines hold the whole of the pass and the whole area. ‘The spoilers came out of the camp of the Philistines in three companies.’ There is a lot of them. These spoilers might be doing anything: burning the fields, destroying property, causing what trouble they could, disturbing the Israelites even more. It may be that they, actually, were imposing this regulation which took away all the arms from the Israelites, but it is more likely that that had already been done. ‘Now there was no smith found throughout all the land of Israel: for the Philistines said, Lest the Hebrews make them swords or spears.’ Possibly this happened after the defeat of the Ammonites, and the Philistines said, We may be next on the list, so while we have supreme power around here, we are going to execute all Israelites smiths, and therefore they will have to come to us to sharpen their implements, and they will be unable to make weapons of war.‘But all the Israelites went down to the Philistines, to sharpen every man his share, and his coulter,’ his ploughshare, ‘and his axe, and his mattock.’ There is a curious verse, verse 21, ‘Yet they had a file for the mattocks and for the coulters.’ But there is a dispute over the Hebrew word translated ‘file’, and it is thought nowadays to be a kind of fee which the Philistine troops charged to sharpen the agricultural implements of the Israelites. But that is what they had to do. They had to go to the Philistines to get their agricultural equipment sharpened, and they were not allowed anything that would enable them to make implements for themselves. So they had no weapons except those with the parties of Saul and Jonathan. Here is really the climax of this whole event. ‘So it came to pass in the day of battle, that there was neither sword nor spear found in the hand of any of the people that were with Saul and Jonathan.’ The Israelites were barely armed. No swords or spears, save those with Saul and Jonathan, and probably those immediately around them: the inner nucleus of soldiers. Such was the demoralising state of affairs due to the failure of Saul’s leadership, but God was about to work through the man of faith nearby.