The opinion that ל יחר is also used to signify deep distress cannot be established from 2Sa 4:8. “And he cried to Jehovah the whole night,” sc., praying for Saul to be forgiven. But it was in vain. This is evident from what follows, where Samuel maintains the cause of his God with strength and decision, after having wrestled with God in prayer.
Verse 12
The next morning, after receiving the revelation from God (1Sa 15:11), Samuel rose up early, to go and meet Saul as he was returning from the war. On the way it was told him, “Saul has come to Carmel” - i.e., Kurmul, upon the mountains of Judah to the south-east of Hebron (see at Jos 15:55) - “setting himself a memorial” (יד, a hand, then a memorial or monument, inasmuch as the hand calls attention to anything: see 2Sa 18:18), “and has turned and proceeded farther, and gone down to Gilgal” (in the valley of the Jordan, as in 1Sa 13:4).
Verse 13
When Samuel met him there, Saul attempted to hide his consciousness of guilt by a feigned friendly welcome. “Blessed be thou of the Lord” (vid., Rth 2:20; Gen 14:19, etc.) was his greeting to the prophet; “I have set up the word of Jehovah.”
Verses 14-15
But the prophet stripped his hypocrisy at once with the question, “What then is this bleating of sheep in my ears, and a lowing of oxen that I hear?” Saul replied (1Sa 15:15), “They have brought them from the Amalekites, because the people spared the best sheep and oxen, to sacrifice them to the Lord thy God; and the rest we have banned.” So that it was not Saul, but the people, who had transgressed the command of the Lord, and that with the most laudable intention, viz., to offer the best of the cattle that had been taken, as a thank-offering to the Lord. The falsehood and hypocrisy of these words lay upon the very surface; for even if the cattle spared were really intended as sacrifices to the Lord, not only the people, but Saul also, would have had their own interests in view (vid., 1Sa 15:9), since the flesh of thank-offerings was appropriated to sacrificial meals.
