John Gill Commentary 1 Samuel 15

Samuel also said to Saul
When and where he said to him what follows, it is not easy to determine, perhaps at Gilgal, where they after met again:

the Lord sent me to anoint you to be king over his people, over
Israel ;
that is, he gave him orders to anoint him king of Israel, otherwise Saul was in providence sent to Samuel to be anointed, and not Samuel to Saul:

now therefore hearken you to the voice of the words of the Lord ;
for so great a favour, and such high honour he has conferred on him, laid him under great obligation to obey the commands of the Lord; and whereas he had been deficient in one instance before, for which he had been reproved, he suggests, that now he should take care to observe and do, particularly and punctually, what should be enjoined him.

Thus saith the Lord of hosts
Of the celestial host of angels, and of the army of Israel, yea, of all the armies of the earth: this is premised to engage the attention of Saul:

I remember that which Amalek did to Israel ;
four hundred years ago:

how he laid wait for him in the way when he came up from Egypt ;
in the valley of Rephidim, just before they came to Mount Sinai, and fell upon the rear of them, and smote the feeble, and faint, and weary, see (Exodus 17:8) (Deuteronomy 25:17–19)

Now go and smite Amalek
This was one of the three things the Israelites were obliged to do when they came into the land of Canaan, as Kimchi observes; one was, to appoint a king over them, another, to build the house of the sanctuary, and the third, to blot out the name and memory of Amalek, see (Deuteronomy 25:19) and this work was reserved for Saul, their first king:

and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare them not ;
all were to be devoted to destruction, and nothing remain to be made use of in any way, to any profit and advantage; living creatures were to be put to death, and everything else burnt and destroyed:

but slay both men and women, infant and suckling ;
neither sex nor age were to be regarded, no mercy and pity shown to any; they had shown none to Israel when weak and feeble, and by the law of retaliation none was to be exercised on them:

ox and sheep, camel and ass ;
though useful creatures, yet not to be spared; as not men, women, and children, through commiseration, so neither these through covetousness, and neither of them on any pretence whatsoever. Children suffered for their parents, and cattle because of their owners, and both were a punishment to their proprietors; an ox, or any other creature, might not be spared, lest it should be said, as Kimchi observes, this was the spoil of Amalek, and so the name and memory of Amalek would not be blotted out.

And Saul gathered the people together
Or "made them to hear" ^F18 , by the sound of a trumpet; or by sending heralds into all parts of the land to proclaim the above order of the Lord, and summon them to come to him, perhaps at Gilgal; so the Septuagint version, and Josephus ^F19 :

and numbered them in Telaim ;
thought to be the same with Telem, a place in the tribe of Judah, (Joshua 15:24) , the word signifies "lambs"; hence the Vulgate Latin version is,

``he numbered them as lambs;'' and the Jews ^F20 say, because it was forbid to number the children of Israel, which was the sin of David; therefore every man had a lamb given him, and so the lambs were numbered, by which it was known what was the number of the people; and the Targum says, this was done with the passover lambs, it being now the time of the passover; but the numbering here made was not of the people of the land in general, and so there was no occasion of such a precaution, only a numbering and mustering of the army when got together and rendezvoused in one place: the sum of which is here given,

two hundred thousand footmen and ten thousand men of Judah ;
which last were reckoned separately, as distinct from the other tribes of Israel, to show their obedience to Saul, who was of another tribe, though the kingdom was promised to theirs; but R. Isaiah observes, that the reason why so few of the men of Judah came, in comparison of the other tribes, was, because they envied the government being in one of the tribe of Benjamin, when they thought it should have been in one of theirs; the number is greatly increased in the Septuagint version, which makes the whole to be 400,000, and 30,000 men of Judah; and so Josephus ^F21 .

FOOTNOTES:

• F18: (emvyw) "audire fecit", Vatablus, Drusius.
• F19: Antiqu. l. 6. c. 7. sect. 2.
• F20: T. Bab. Yoma, fol. 22. 2. Jarchi in loc.
• F21: Ut supra. (Antiqu. l. 6. c. 7. sect. 2.)

And Saul came to a city of Amalek With his army, perhaps the nearest city of it to the land of Israel; though some think that Amalek was the name of the city, and was the metropolis of the nation, and had its name from thence.

And laid wait in the valley; which was near the city, to intercept the inhabitants when they should come out against him: or "he contended" ^F23 as some render it, he fought with them there; the Targum, ``he ordered his army,'' set them in battle array, or pitched his camp there.

FOOTNOTES:

• F23: (bryw) "et certavit Pagninus"; "ut contenderet with eo", Junius & Tremellius.