He captured Agag king of Amalek alive, but devoted all the others to destruction with the sword.
Parallel translations
- WEB He took Agag the king of the Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword.
- KJV And he took Agag the king of the Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword.
- NKJV He also took Agag king of the Amalekites alive, and utterly destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword.
- NASB He captured Agag the king of the Amalekites alive, and completely destroyed all the people with the edge of the sword.
- NLT He captured Agag, the Amalekite king, but completely destroyed everyone else.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Saul destroys the Amalekite people but takes their king Agag alive. The sparing of Agag is the first crack in his obedience.
Overview
Saul carries out the bulk of the command yet keeps Agag, the very king he was to destroy, alive. This single exception, alongside the spared livestock, becomes the basis of his condemnation. It illustrates how partial obedience that retains a favored exception is, in God's eyes, disobedience.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 9
- 1 Sam 30:1On the third day David and his men arrived in Ziklag, and the Amalekites had raided the Negev, attacked Ziklag, and burned it down.
- Num 24:7Water will flow from his buckets, and his seed will have abundant water. His king will be greater than Agag, and his kingdom will be exalted.
- Esth 3:1After these events, King Xerxes honored Haman son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, elevating him to a position above all the princes who were with him.
- 1 Kgs 20:30The rest of them fled into the city of Aphek, where the wall fell on twenty-seven thousand of the remaining men. Ben-hadad also fled to the city and hid in an inner room.
- 1 Kgs 20:34–42Ben-hadad said to him, “I will restore the cities my father took from your father; you may set up your own marketplaces in Damascus, as my father did in Samaria.” “By this treaty I release you,” Ahab replied. So he made a treaty with him and sent him away.
- 1 Sam 15:3Now go and attack the Amalekites and devote to destruction all that belongs to them. Do not spare them, but put to death men and women, children and infants, oxen and sheep, camels and donkeys.’”
- Josh 11:12Joshua captured all these kings and their cities and put them to the sword. He devoted them to destruction, as Moses the LORD’s servant had commanded.
- Josh 10:39And they captured Debir, its king, and all its villages. They put them to the sword and devoted to destruction everyone in the city, leaving no survivors. Joshua did to Debir and its king as he had done to Hebron and as he had done to Libnah and its king.
- 1 Sam 27:8–9Now David and his men went up and raided the Geshurites, the Girzites, and the Amalekites. (From ancient times these people had inhabited the land extending to Shur and Egypt.)
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Christ at the center
The rise of the anointed king after Israel's failed first choice points to the true Anointed One (Messiah means 'anointed'), the shepherd-king after God's own heart from Bethlehem.
How 1 Samuel 15:8 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
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