2 Now, behold, the king walks before you; and I am old and gray-headed; and, behold, my sons are with you: and I have walked before you from my youth to this day.
and they said to him, Behold, you are old, and your sons don't walk in your ways: now make us a king to judge us like all the nations.
It happened, when Samuel was old, that he made his sons judges over Israel.
who may go out before them, and who may come in before them, and who may lead them out, and who may bring them in; that the congregation of Yahweh not be as sheep which have no shepherd.
Samuel grew, and Yahweh was with him, and did let none of his words fall to the ground. All Israel from Dan even to Beersheba knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet of Yahweh.
Now Eli was very old; and he heard all that his sons did to all Israel, and how that they lay with the women who served at the door of the tent of meeting.
Why kick you at my sacrifice and at my offering, which I have commanded in [my] habitation, and honor your sons above me, to make yourselves fat with the best of all the offerings of Israel my people?
Then Eli called Samuel, and said, Samuel, my son. He said, Here am I.
Yes, even when I am old and gray-haired, God, don't forsake me, Until I have declared your strength to the next generation, Your might to everyone who is to come.
Listen to me, house of Jacob, and all the remnant of the house of Israel, that have been borne [by me] from their birth, that have been carried from the womb; and even to old age I am he, and even to gray hairs will I carry you. I have made, and I will bear; yes, I will carry, and will deliver.
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Commentary on 1 Samuel 12 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 12
1Sa 12:1-5. Samuel Testifies his Integrity.
1-4. Samuel said unto all Israel—This public address was made after the solemn re-instalment of Saul, and before the convention at Gilgal separated. Samuel, having challenged a review of his public life, received a unanimous testimony to the unsullied honor of his personal character, as well as the justice and integrity of his public administration.
5. the Lord is witness against you, and his anointed is witness—that, by their own acknowledgment, he had given them no cause to weary of the divine government by judges, and that, therefore, the blame of desiring a change of government rested with themselves. This was only insinuated, and they did not fully perceive his drift.
1Sa 12:6-16. He Reproves the People for Ingratitude.
7-16. Now therefore stand still, that I may reason with you—The burden of this faithful and uncompromising address was to show them, that though they had obtained the change of government they had so importunely desired, their conduct was highly displeasing to their heavenly King; nevertheless, if they remained faithful to Him and to the principles of the theocracy, they might be delivered from many of the evils to which the new state of things would expose them. And in confirmation of those statements, no less than in evidence of the divine displeasure, a remarkable phenomenon, on the invocation of the prophet, and of which he gave due premonition, took place.
11. Bedan—The Septuagint reads "Barak"; and for "Samuel" some versions read "Samson," which seems more natural than that the prophet should mention himself to the total omission of the greatest of the judges. (Compare Heb 11:32).
1Sa 12:17-25. He Terrifies Them with Thunder in Harvest-time.
17-25. Is it not wheat harvest to-day?—That season in Palestine occurs at the end of June or beginning of July, when it seldom or never rains, and the sky is serene and cloudless. There could not, therefore, have been a stronger or more appropriate proof of a divine mission than the phenomenon of rain and thunder happening, without any prognostics of its approach, upon the prediction of a person professing himself to be a prophet of the Lord, and giving it as an attestation of his words being true. The people regarded it as a miraculous display of divine power, and, panic-struck, implored the prophet to pray for them. Promising to do so, he dispelled their fears. The conduct of Samuel, in this whole affair of the king's appointment, shows him to have been a great and good man who sank all private and personal considerations in disinterested zeal for his country's good and whose last words in public were to warn the people, and their king, of the danger of apostasy and disobedience to God.