Lives of Scripture

Nahash, king of the Ammonites, besieged the Israelite town of Jabesh-gilead early in Saul's reign. When the town's elders sought terms of surrender, Nahash's demand was deliberately cruel: 'On this condition I will make it with you, that I will gouge out the right eye of every one of you, thus I will make it a reproach on all Israel' (1 Samuel 11:2). Word of the crisis reached Saul, who had just been anointed king, and it became the occasion for his first decisive royal act: he summoned Israel's tribes with a graphic call to arms, gathered a large army, and delivered Jabesh-gilead in a surprise attack that routed the Ammonites 'so that no two of them were left together' (11:3-11). This victory cemented popular support for Saul's kingship (11:12-15). Samuel later referenced Nahash's threat as part of Israel's history of God's deliverance when reviewing the nation's request for a king (12:12). Years later, in David's reign, it emerges that Nahash had shown David some unspecified kindness (2 Samuel 10:2), prompting David to send condolences and a delegation of respect to Nahash's son Hanun upon Nahash's death -- an overture Hanun humiliated, triggering a war between Israel and the Ammonites (10:1-19; 1 Chronicles 19:1-19).