Charles Ellicott Commentary 1 Samuel 7:5

"And Samuel said, Gather all Israel to Mizpah, and I will pray for you unto Jehovah." — 1 Samuel 7:5 (ASV)

Mizpeh. —Or, as it should be spelled, Mizpah, a common name for high places. It signifies a “watchtower,” a place from which an enemy's advance could be observed.

Now, the assembly of the tribes at Mizpeh marked a new beginning for Israel. It was the result of more than twenty years of labor undertaken by the greatest reformer and statesman the chosen people ever knew. The great gathering pertained to both religion and war. Its first object was to solemnly assure the Lord that the heart of His people, so long estranged from Him, was His once more. Its second was to implore Jehovah to again restore a repentant and sorrowful people to the land of their inheritance. What is more likely than that the prophet-statesman—who at that solemn juncture represented priest, judge, and seer to Israel—devised on that momentous day new symbolic rites, signifying Israel’s new dedication to the Eternal for the future and Israel’s repentance for the sad past?

The solemn pouring out of water before the Lord symbolized, for a people trained so carefully to discern the meaning and significance of symbols and imagery, the heart and whole inner life being poured out before the Lord; the fasting represented the repentant, humble sinner bowed down in grief before the one true God. Is it not at least probable that the strange, mysterious custom we hear of in later days—the high priest filling the golden vessel with the waters of Siloam and then silently pouring it out before the Lord—was the record of one of the holiest memories of the people—their reconciliation with their God-Friend at Mizpeh? Now, after years of estrangement, they repented and were forgiven. The fasting of Mizpeh, being a favorite practice, always much observed by the worshipers in the Temple and synagogue, needed no special record or reminder.