What exactly did Saul do wrong by sacrificing after seven days

[jubalsqaud]

Samuel commanded Saul to do the following

"8 And you shall go down ahead of me to Gilgal; and behold, I will be coming down to you to offer burnt offerings and sacrifice peace offerings. You shall wait seven days until I come to you and inform you of what you should do.”

This plays out like this

"8 Now he waited for seven days, until the appointed time that Samuel had set, but Samuel did not come to Gilgal; and the people were scattering from him. 9 So Saul said, “Bring me the burnt offering and the peace offerings.” And he offered the burnt offering. 10 But as soon as he finished offering the burnt offering, behold, Samuel came; and Saul went out to meet him and to [e]greet him. "

Samuel the complains

" 11 But Samuel said, “What have you done?” And Saul said, “Since I saw that the people were scattering from me, and that you did not come at the appointed [f]time, and that the Philistines were assembling at Michmash, 12 I [g]thought, ‘Now the Philistines will come down against me at Gilgal, and I have not [h]asked the favor of the Lord.’ So I worked up the courage and offered the burnt offering.”

As you can see Samuel was speaking with divine authority, which is why Saul is punished.
It seems as if Saul would have been justified in thinking Samuel had spoken wrong.
God himself gives this permission in duet 18:20-22

"20 But the prophet who speaks a word presumptuously in My name, a word which I have not commanded him to speak, or which he speaks in the name of other gods, [i]that prophet shall die.’ 21 And if you say in your heart, ‘How will we recognize the word which the Lord has not spoken?’ 22 When the prophet speaks in the name of the Lord, and the thing does not happen or come true, that is the thing which the Lord has not spoken. The prophet has spoken it presumptuously; you are not to be afraid of him."
My intuition is Samuel order to wait was something like "on the seventh day wait for Samuel." with no additional time criteria.

or perhaps there was a offscreen order like "we will do it about noon"
But it does say that Saul "waited for seven days until the appointed time Samuel had set " and that the public started to bail on the ceremony.

I find it hard to believe the public was like "its 12:01 looks like he aint coming"

Which seems to imply Samuel set a time and was delayed significantly.

 

[pgwolv]

I see Matthew Henry does believe Saul "staid till the seventh day, yet had not patience to wait till the end of the seventh day. "

Nothing that Saul says implies that he thought Samuel must be a false prophet. In fact, I think Samuel had a track record, so that Saul could hardly doubt his authenticity.

Henry also says "He presumed to offer sacrifice without Samuel, and nothing appears to the contrary but that he did it himself, though he was neither priest nor prophet, as if, because he was a king, he might do any thing, a piece of presumption which king Uzziah paid dearly for, 2 Chron. 26:16-23." Samuel did say that he would make the offerings.

 

[Charles Johnson]

Under the law of Moses, only a priest can sacrifice. It is forbidden for anyone else to do so. It's like how in our churches only a minister can administer the sacraments.

 

[TheInquirer]

Affirm what Charles said. Kings are disciplined for taking on priestly duties. See Uzziah 2 Cor. 26:16-21. The priestly and kingly duties are united in Christ. Until then, must be separate under the Levitical priesthood. One reason why Jesus is of the Melchizedek priest-king line and not Levitical.

 

[Contra_Mundum]

It is the case that sacrifice was conducted lawfully by other than a priest upon extraordinary circumstances--for example, 1Ki.18, where Elijah (not a Levite or priest) famously ministered at the altar of the Lord. It was, by all accounts, a truly extraordinary event; from which we may gather that God is free to call for mediation of the sacrificial kind from a prophet or a king, perhaps.

Saul had no such call; in fact, he had the express statement from Samuel (who was from Levi, and had a unique association with the high priest of Israel from childhood) whose authorization to sacrifice was undoubted, that he would come and do the deed. It is noted twice in the text, 1Sam.13:8,11, "the people were scattering from him," "... from me," i.e. from Saul. It is this observation that prompted Saul to bend to his impatience. He was jealous for his own power and influence, only comparing his relatively small force (beginning with 3,000, 1Sam.13:2) to the many thousands of Philistines, v5.

Saul had given the word to the people as their king to stay in place for a full week (following Samuel's instruction), at which time there would be a sacrifice. This moment was for invoking the Lord's help in overcoming the Philistines, who had massed for a decisive attack to subdue the Israelites. Saul's reign had begun with some significant doubt of his fitness, 1Sam.10:27; which doubt by the end of 1Sam.11 had been much dispelled. The people were still susceptible to fear, and many viewed the army of Philistines as an existential threat, hiding themselves or fleeing over Jordan to the east. Having waited, and seeing no act of deliverance by the king, there began a trickling away of the force Saul had collected and counted on to stand up to the Philistines.

Saul, thinking that soon the trickle would be a flood, attempted a decisive act to stem the tide. He executed the sacrifice without Samuel, in defiance of the guidance given him by the Lord through his prophet. His assumptions were entirely wrong, and driven not by faith but fear. When we get to 1Sam.14:23, we read, "the Lord saved Israel that day," following a battle and a great Israelite triumph--one accomplished with only 600 troops on hand to start; the rout actually began with only 2 men (Jonathan and his armorbearer) taking on a company of Philistines.

Saul, by waiting on Samuel, might have begun his fight with fewer men still than the 600. His victory would then have been even more lopsided than it was in the end, something like a redux of Gideon's defeat of Midian; and perhaps just as decisive. even final. As it was, 1Sam.14:52, "There was hard fighting against the Philistines all the days of Saul." Saul was not the king Israel needed, 1Sam.13:14. Someone else, one who trusted the Lord and obeyed his word, would deliver the people under the Lord's direction, and refer the glory to God.

As a point of note, Saul afterward called for priests to accompany him (1Sam.14:3, cf. v35), a pattern David also kept. Thus, we have confirmation of the principle that the ordinary means of sacrifice was understood to be the exclusive purview of them authorized in the Law, which should never have been misunderstood or ignored. After Saul decimated the priesthood by the edge of the sword (1Sam.22:18), his break with the altar/ark/ephod of Israel was complete, the word and Spirit of the Lord being utterly and manifestly departed from him.

 

[TheInquirer]

It is the case that sacrifice was conducted lawfully by other than a priest upon extraordinary circumstances--for example, 1Ki.18, where Elijah (not a Levite or priest) famously ministered at the altar of the Lord. It was, by all accounts, a truly extraordinary event; from which we may gather that God is free to call for mediation of the sacrificial kind from a prophet or a king, perhaps.

Good point Bruce and I am more wondering aloud here and more than willing to be corrected - The Mount Carmel confrontation seems to be an outlier in that it doesn't seem to fit any prescribed time, place, or purpose for worship connected to the Mosaic law though does it? (though perhaps the Saul incident doesn't either and there is a closer connection than I realize and I am overlooking a sacrificial law in Moses that would mandate or allow such sacrifice). I have always taken Carmel to be a visual test of religious authenticity though the presence of sacrifice and reception by God cannot be ignored either.

 

[iainduguid]

As Menachem Haran pointed out, there is a difference in category between offerings at open air altars, which can be offered by a variety of people, and offerings at sanctuaries, which are restricted to the priests who serve there. As Bruce noted, the text makes it clear that the problem was not so much that Saul wasn't a priest, but that he deliberately disobeyed Samuel's explicit instructions to wait until he came; it is this that revealed the heart problems that made Saul unfit to be king - the same heart problems that emerge again in 1 Samuel 15 (esp. vv. 22-23).

 

[Contra_Mundum]

Good point Bruce and I am more wondering aloud here and more than willing to be corrected - The Mount Carmel confrontation seems to be an outlier in that it doesn't seem to fit any prescribed time, place, or purpose for worship connected to the Mosaic law though does it? (though perhaps the Saul incident doesn't either and there is a closer connection than I realize and I am overlooking a sacrificial law in Moses that would mandate or allow such sacrifice). I have always taken Carmel to be a visual test of religious authenticity though the presence of sacrifice and reception by God cannot be ignored either.

I tried to be abundantly clear that king Saul had no call, no allowance to sacrifice, and had clearly an unequivocal instruction from the Lord through a true prophet; which word he set aside in his own self-interest. The OP offered the suggestion that perhaps Saul was justified in entertaining a doubt of Samuel's status as a true prophet, further implying that Saul was steeped in concern for the Law (hence the specter of uncertainty).

So fully had Samuel's status as God's legitimate spokesman been fixed in the minds of the whole nation, 1Sam.3:20, 4:1; that even after they had turned away from his leadership, they were moved to beg him to intreat the Lord for them, 1Sam.12:18-19. Saul had no excuse for his folly. Nor was he one who gives any sign he had habits of knowledge in the Law, or made it his guide.

 

[TheInquirer]

Bruce, I think you are missing the aim and sincerity of my comment as I am not doubting or questioning any of that. I was about to post a question for Dr. Duguid as well - I am interested in where in Scripture I am missing the allowance for non-priests to offer sacrifices as aparently I have an incomplete paradigm in my head and would like to see what part of the Mosaic law I am missing that allows for it. I am not doubting it is there, I am doubting my memory and would like to have a reference for my sake and for anyone I teach going forward.

 

[Contra_Mundum]

Bruce, I think you are missing the aim and sincerity of my comment as I am not doubting or questioning any of that. I was about to post a question for Dr. Duguid as well - I am interested in where in Scripture I am missing the allowance for non-priests to offer sacrifices as aparently I have an incomplete paradigm in my head and would like to see what part of the Mosaic law I am missing that allows for it. I am not doubting it is there, I am doubting my memory and would like to have a reference for my sake and for anyone I teach going forward.

Not doubting you at all, brother. I think Dr. Duguid will have a better response than any I could present.

 

[TheInquirer]

Thank you. I just didn't want you to think I was criticizing what you were saying as I genuinely do think you were helping me look at it from an angle I hadn't considered. I sincerely don't want to say things about God's word that are not accurate so I truly do appreciate Biblical correction. As an aside, I value your understanding and knowledge a great deal and you are one of those guys that when you speak, I pay attention.