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Did all Saul’s house die with him at Gilboa?
Hard question · Israel’s history: Joshua to Esther · raised by 1 of the lists sceptics circulate
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“So Saul died, and his three sons, and all his house died together.”
So Saul died, and his three sons, and all his house died together.
“So Saul died, and his three sons, and his armourbearer, and all his men, that same day together.”
So Saul died, and his three sons, and his armourbearer, and all his men, that same day together.
Abner made Saul’s son Ish-bosheth king over Israel, and he reigned two years.
But Abner the son of Ner, captain of Saul’s host, took Ish–bosheth the son of Saul, and brought him over to Mahanaim; And made him king over Gilead, and over the Ashurites, and over Jezreel, and over Ephraim, and over Benjamin, and over all Israel. Ish–bosheth Saul’s son was forty years old when he began to reign over Israel, and reigned two years. But the house of Judah followed David.
Years later David handed two sons of Saul by Rizpah, and five of Saul’s grandsons, to the Gibeonites.
But the king took the two sons of Rizpah the daughter of Aiah, whom she bare unto Saul, Armoni and Mephibosheth; and the five sons of Michal the daughter of Saul, whom she brought up for Adriel the son of Barzillai the Meholathite:
Just before his account of Gilboa, the Chronicler lists Saul’s sons, among them Esh-baal, and traces Jonathan’s line through Merib-baal for generations.
And Ner begat Kish; and Kish begat Saul; and Saul begat Jonathan, and Malchi–shua, and Abinadab, and Esh–baal. And the son of Jonathan was Merib–baal: and Merib–baal begat Micah. And the sons of Micah were, Pithon, and Melech, and Tahrea, and Ahaz. And Ahaz begat Jarah; and Jarah begat Alemeth, and Azmaveth, and Zimri; and Zimri begat Moza; And Moza begat Binea; and Rephaiah his son, Eleasah his son, Azel his son. And Azel had six sons, whose names are these, Azrikam, Bocheru, and Ishmael, and Sheariah, and Obadiah, and Hanan: these were the sons of Azel.
The objection
1 Chronicles 10:6 says that when Saul died at Gilboa “all his house died together”. But Saul’s son Ish-bosheth reigned over Israel after him, Jonathan’s son Mephibosheth lived on, and years later David handed seven of Saul’s sons and grandsons to the Gibeonites. So Saul’s whole house did not die with him.
The answer
‘All his house’ here means Saul’s household as it went to war with him, not every descendant he had, and the Chronicler shows that he knew this. The verses just before his account of Gilboa end the family list of Saul. They name his son Esh-baal, which is Ish-bosheth’s other name, and trace Jonathan’s line through Merib-baal, that is Mephibosheth, for many generations (1 Chronicles 9:39–44; compare 8:33–40). A writer who has just listed Saul’s surviving descendants did not mean that none survived.
The parallel in 1 Samuel 31:6 shows what is meant: Saul died “and his three sons, and his armourbearer, and all his men, that same day together”. Saul’s house as a fighting force, the sons and retainers who stood with him, fell together on the mountain. The Chronicler’s phrase also looks ahead, as his next verses show: with Saul’s death his house came to an end as the ruling house, for the Lord “turned the kingdom unto David the son of Jesse” (1 Chronicles 10:14). Ish-bosheth’s two years as a rival king, kept in power by Abner (2 Samuel 2:8–10), did not change that. In Hebrew, as in English, ‘all’ is often used of the whole of a group in view rather than of every individual, as Poole notes on this verse.
From the classic commentators
In either passage the moral is plain, that the end and ruin of Saul's family as a whole had arrived, rather than literally that the whole, including every member, of that family had perished.The Pulpit Commentary, on 1 Chronicles 10
Sources
- Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers: 1 Chronicles 10, at Bible Hub
- The Pulpit Commentary: 1 Chronicles 10, at Bible Hub
- Matthew Poole, Commentary on 1 Chronicles 10 (1685), at Bible Hub