The armies meet on Mount Gilboa, and Israel breaks. The Philistines cut down Jonathan and his brothers, then close on Saul. Wounded by the archers, he asks his armourbearer to run him through; the man will not, and Saul falls on his own sword. The first king of Israel dies by his own hand — and the men of Jabesh-Gilead march all night to take his body down from the wall and bury it. So Saul died, and his three sons.
A study in 1 Samuel 31 · Arthur Baldwin · StandUp4Jesus.Org · 8 min read
The Battle Went Sore Against Saul
“Now the Philistines fought against Israel: and the men of Israel fled from before the Philistines, and fell down slain in mount Gilboa. And the Philistines followed hard upon Saul and upon his sons; and the Philistines slew Jonathan, and Abinadab, and Malchi-shua, Saul’s sons. And the battle went sore against Saul, and the archers hit him; and he was sore wounded of the archers.”
1 Samuel 31:1-3
Jonathan dies here, on his father’s losing field — the man who should have been king, and gladly was not. Gilboa borders the same plain where Gideon and three hundred men once routed Midian by faith. The ground has not changed; the king has. Saul goes into this battle already knowing, from the night at Endor, that he has lost it.
Draw Thy Sword, And Thrust Me Through
“Then said Saul unto his armourbearer, Draw thy sword, and thrust me through therewith… But his armourbearer would not; for he was sore afraid. Therefore Saul took a sword, and fell upon it.”
1 Samuel 31:4
Even Saul’s armourbearer will not raise a hand against the LORD’s anointed — the very thing David twice refused to do. Saul does it himself. The reign that began with a modest man hiding among the baggage ends with a proud man on the point of his own sword.
“Though the fearful scene in the cave of Endor had driven all hope from his heart, Saul fought with desperate valor for his throne and his kingdom… When the man refused to lift his hand against the Lord’s anointed, Saul took his own life by falling upon his sword.”
Ellen G. White · Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 681
So Saul Died, And His Three Sons
“And when his armourbearer saw that Saul was dead, he fell likewise upon his sword, and died with him. So Saul died, and his three sons, and his armourbearer, and all his men, that same day together.”
1 Samuel 31:5-6
The epitaph is one sentence: his life had been a failure, and he went down in dishonour and despair, because he set his own will against God’s. He had every advantage — chosen, anointed, Spirit-given, prophet-guided — and lost all of it one refusal at a time. The tragedy of Saul is not that grace was withheld from him, but that he kept declining it until there was no more time to accept.
“Thus the first king of Israel perished, with the guilt of self-murder upon his soul. His life had been a failure, and he went down in dishonor and despair, because he had set up his own perverse will against the will of God.”
Ellen G. White · Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 682
The Men Of Jabesh-Gilead Went All Night
“And when the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead heard of that which the Philistines had done to Saul; All the valiant men arose, and went all night, and took the body of Saul and the bodies of his sons from the wall of Beth-shan, and came to Jabesh, and burnt them there. And they took their bones, and buried them under a tree at Jabesh, and fasted seven days.”
1 Samuel 31:11-13
Forty years earlier, Saul’s first act as king had been to rescue Jabesh-Gilead from the Ammonites (1 Samuel 11). Now the men of that town cross the Jordan by night, take his abused body off the Philistine wall, and give him an honourable burial and a seven-day fast. One good deed, four decades old, still bore fruit in his darkest hour. David, when he hears of it, sends the town his blessing — and the story of Saul closes not on the suicide but on an act of loyal kindness.
“But the brave men of Jabesh-gilead, remembering Saul’s deliverance of their city in his earlier and happier years, now manifested their gratitude by rescuing the bodies of the king and princes, and giving them honorable burial… Thus the noble deed performed forty years before, secured for Saul and his sons burial by tender and pitying hands in that dark hour of defeat and dishonor.”
Ellen G. White · Patriarchs and Prophets, p. 682
