Leadership or Unlimited Power Goes to Emperor Palpatine's Head

Not to point out the obvious, but the book of Samuel isn’t named after its most talked about character, David. The Israelite legend is still a generation out when the book begins. Instead, chapter 1 kicks off by introducing us to Elkanah, a playa with two wives in the hizouse (v. 2). The first is Hannah, a woman more desperate to have a baby than Georgina Salt. Hannah’s biological clock is ticking louder than Big Ben. But despite buying a sex swing and trying every position in the Kama Sutra, she remains childless. As Manjula Nahasapeemapetilon would say, “All that sex for nothing.” To make matters worse, Elkanah’s other wife, Peninnah, is a regular baby factory who can’t resist rubbing Hannah’s nose in a dirty diaper every chance she gets (v. 6). As a result, Hannah stays in a more fragile emotional state than Edwina McDunnough. Finally, during a trip to the Tabernacle, she resorts to bargaining with God. Hannah vows to raise her firstborn as a Nazirite (see Numbers 6) and “give him to Hashem all the days of his life” (v. 11). Eli the priest sees her praying, but, thanks to the dark days of the judges, he’s become accustomed to a lower class of congregants. He automatically assumes she’s stone drunk and throws a broom at her. But the misunderstanding is quickly resolved and before Hannah leaves Eli blesses her uterus in name of Florence Arizona. And by divine intervention or sheer coincidence, it isn’t too long before Hannah is knocked up (v. 20). She names the child Samuel. But what’s even more impressive is she remains true to her word and delivers the boy to Eli at a young age (v. 24). Samuel is raised in the church—literally. He only sees his mom when she brings him new threads once a year.

Samuel is now under the tutelage of Eli the priest, an obese man of God known for serving the people and never missing a potluck. He’s essentially the Friar Tuck of Scripture. But chapter 2 reveals his good track record is overshadowed by his two sons, Hophni and Phinehas, who aren’t nearly as dedicated to the ministry. The text labels them criminals in league with the Bishop of the Black Canons (v. 12). The only thing they’ve inherited from their old man is his appetite. They eat like they’ve been infected by a Symbiote. According to Scripture, their two favorite pastimes are playing Chesterfield rugby with female parishioners and swiping consecrated food from the altar. This doesn’t fly in God’s kitchen and he goes full Gordon Ramsay, announcing the impending elimination of Eli’s entire family from the priesthood (vv. 29-34).

Samuel, on the other hand, continues to impress everyone. He’s the Doogie Howser of altar boys, quickly mastering the teachings of his superiors and earning the respect of the people. God takes notice, too. In chapter 3, while Samuel is still young, he makes contact one night without the use of any special effects—he just straight up starts talking to Samuel while he’s lying in bed. But, like Edgar Witherspoon, Samuel assumes the voice of God would sound deeper and runs to Eli’s bedroom, thinking the old priest has called him (v. 5). This repeats three times before Eli realizes either Chris Knight has implanted a transmitter in Samuel’s molar as a prank or God is actually speaking to him. He settles on the latter and instructs Samuel to respond accordingly (v. 9). This leads to God telling Samuel about his plan to fire Eli. Passing a pink slip to your mentor is a tough way to start a career, but Eli takes the news like a champ: “He is Hashem; He will do what is good in his eyes” (v. 18).

Sure enough, the wheels come off in chapter 4 when Israel once again goes up against the Philistines. According to their trading card, their arch-nemesis status never drops below 10. Israel may be Starfleet, but the Philistines are the Borg, Cardassians, Klingons and Romulans all rolled into one. Israel has apparently forgotten these Viking warriors are as nasty on land as they are at sea and take a round one beating before breaking out the Ark of the Covenant to assist them in a comeback win (v. 3). The Philistines react like they’ve been doused with Dr. Jonathan Crane’s fear gas when they hear the Ark is on its way (v. 7). Like everyone else, they’ve heard the stories about what happened to the Egyptians and know you don’t mess with the Zohan. Once the Ark is on the scene, Eli’s sons lead Israel back into battle, but God doesn’t intervene on their behalf and the Philistines score a decisive round two victory. Hophni and Phinehas are killed as predicted and the Ark is captured (v. 10). When a messenger returns with the judges’ scorecards Eli is already sitting down, but when the obese priest hears the news he falls out of his chair harder than Sherman Klump and breaks his neck (v. 18).

Meanwhile, in chapter 5, the Philistines return home with the Ark and unwittingly place it in their trophy room next to the statue of their god, Dagon. Two gods in one room sounds like the recipe for Ragnarök, but what ensues doesn’t exactly classify as a clash of the titans. Every day the Philistines discover their prized statue has fallen and can’t get up. And yeah, eventually it even breaks a hip (v. 4). But while Dagon is bowing before the Hebrew God, the Philistines don’t start taking the Ark seriously until they all wake up with a bad case of hemorrhoids that affects them worse than Kyle Broflovski (v. 6). They start shuffling the Ark from town to town, but everywhere it goes stores run out of Preparation H overnight. According to chapter 6, the Philistines spend seven months on a donut cushion before finally deciding to ship the Ark back to Israel with a gift basket filled with—wait for it—golden hemorrhoids (v. 5). They load up a Radio Flyer and hitch it to a couple of dairy cows with better directional sense than David Freeman and, without any guidance, they cross the border into Israelite territory in record time (v. 12). The Israelites are so stoked to have the Ark back in their possession they celebrate by performing the Mamushka (v. 13). But the celebration is cut short when René Belloq and a few curious Israelites decide to crack open the Ark and peek inside. God is so pissed at them for breaking into his camper he immediately starts melting faces (v. 19). In the aftermath, the community recognizes they lack the proper facilities and qualified staff to keep the Ark and hand it over to Flynn Carsen at the Metropolitan Public Library for safekeeping.

Once the Ark is relocated, things slowly start to fall in place for Israel. With Samuel as their guide, the long era of the judges comes to an end. In chapter 7, Samuel’s first course of action is to get Israel back on the straight and narrow. The Israelites have replaced God with Billy Idol (again), so Samuel instructs them to toss out all their copies of Rebel Yell (v. 3). The Israelites agree and get together for a big-tent revival, but when the Philistines hear about it they immediately head over to make Israel say uncle. No surprise there. The Philistines bully Israel more often than Biff Tannen. But when Samuel prays on Israel’s behalf, God greets their enemy with 180 decibels and all that’s left for the Israelites to do is chase them out of town (v. 10).

Soon after this, the fast forward button gets stuck. Chapter 8 opens by announcing that Samuel has grown old and his two sons are now judges in their own right. The problem is his boys are easier to bribe than Gotham City cops and no one takes them seriously (v. 3). This leads to the elders approaching Samuel to request a king. To be clear, this isn’t a rabble of discontent jackholes. It’s the Jedi High Council. Samuel takes offence to their request, but God plays it cool. He doesn’t defend his record or hit the campaign trail with a catchy slogan to win Israel back. In fact, he already has a concession speech prepared: “Listen to the voice of the people in all that they say to you, for it is not you whom they have rejected, but it is Me they have rejected” (v. 7). Ouch. Samuel relays the message and warns Israel their decision will come with Game of Thrones consequences. The future king(s) will take produce, animals, land and even draft their sons and daughters into his service to be soldiers, farmers and chefs. But Israel stands firm: “There shall be a king over us, and we will be like all the other nations” (vv. 19, 20). One thing is for sure, God is no Neil Gallagher. He’s comfortable enough to sit back and let Israel make their own choices—even if that means watching them surpass Todd Margaret in the increasingly poor decisions department.

Chapter 9 gets right to it by introducing Saul, the guy destined to be Israel’s first king, a humble Benjamite rancher and, according to the text, People magazine’s sexiest man alive: “no one in Israel was handsomer than he” (v. 2). The scene opens with Saul searching for some of his dad’s missing livestock. When he doesn’t find them, he goes to see Samuel for a little divine tracking advice. But before he arrives, God has the Precogs alert Samuel so he can greet Saul with more foreknowledge than John Anderton (v. 16). And, sure enough, when Saul shows up the old prophet discloses the location of the livestock without ever being asked. He also makes Saul the guest of honor at his exclusive dinner party and drops more hints than Sahasrahla about his royal promotion. But Saul isn’t easy to convince. He dismisses all of the flattery with his crippling George McFly insecurities (v. 21). Samuel finally lays everything out plainly the next morning and makes Saul’s kingship official in chapter 10 by dousing him with a quart of Pennzoil (v. 1). A week later, he calls together all of Israel without mentioning Saul and sets up a lottery to single out the tribe, family and individual that will be king. And yeah, Saul’s name is the Powerball pick. His tall, dark and handsome features do the rest. When the people see him, they agree he looks like a leading man (v. 24).

Saul’s first chance to prove himself comes in chapter 11 when the Ammonites show up in small town Israel threatening to give citizens the Elle Driver treatment (v. 2). When word gets around to Saul at the Ponderosa, the mild-mannered rancher immediately rolls up his sleeves like Hoss Cartwright preparing for a fight. He drafts an impressive army overnight and makes the Ammonites look like F Troop. After the easy victory, the Israelites are ready to do more than compliment his good looks. Thankful to still have both eyes, the people come together and coronate Saul on the spot (v. 15). The epic party puts Delta House on notice until Samuel steps in and kills the mood with exposition. His monologue takes up the entirety of chapter 12, where he spends most of his time slamming Israel for requesting a king in the first place: “But Hashem, your God, is your King” (v. 12). Samuel drives his point home with some Mark Mardon weather wizardry that has the Hebrews kissing the concrete and admitting their mistake (vv. 18, 19). But there’s no going back now.

Once Saul is actively king, the Israelite militia is on call 24/7. Israel is now a nation lead by Tyler Durden and the ultimate goal is Project Mayhem. Samuel sets guidelines in an effort to make sure God is always involved, but Saul has trouble following orders and gets reprimanded more often than Maverick during TOPGUN training. The action ramps up in chapter 13 after Saul’s son, Jonathan, kills a top brass Philistine official (v. 3). Jonathan obviously isn’t interested in the third rule of Fight Club and the Philistines retaliate by showing up for battle like the Haradrim legion (v. 5). The distain these nations have for one another makes Seinfeld and Newman look like besties. As Optimus Prime would say, “This universe, no matter how vast, will never be big enough for you and I to coexist.” But when the Israelites see the endless waves of Philistine warriors advancing, all but six hundred fighters skip town (vv. 6 and 15). To make matters worse, the last time the Philistines beat up the Hebrews they killed off all of the blacksmiths, leaving Israel with no way to make weapons (v. 19). So while the Philistines dig in like hordes of Dothraki, the Israelites are left with only garden tools to defend themselves. The odds aren’t good.

Having received his orders, Saul summons his army and tears Amalek a new one, but spares all of the prime livestock and even Agog, their king (v. 9). This insubordination doesn’t go over well and God sends Samuel to reprimand Saul (again). Saul claims he saved the cattle to offer to God, but Samuel takes him to synagogue, saying, “[T]o obey is better than a choice offering” (v. 22). That’s right. God is more interested in the cook than the cookout. Turns out, the significance doesn’t rest on the quality of the offering, but the action of the individual who brings it. The odd ritual is actually about getting closer to God. But Saul doesn’t seem to grasp the concept and the slip-up costs him big time: “Because you have rejected the word of Hashem, He has rejected you as king” (v. 23). Saul pulls a Stu Macher and blames peer pressure for his goof, but the excuse falls flat. Samuel makes the break-up official by blocking Saul’s number and unfriending him on Facebook—then he takes the initiative to finish the job himself by killing Agog.

God’s decision isn’t easy to accept, but Samuel takes it especially hard. He mopes around his house for weeks. He has more difficulty accepting the break-up than Gary Grobowski. Chapter 16 starts with God literally telling him to get over it. God is ready to move on and has already chosen who will be the next king. He sends Samuel to Jesse (Ruth’s grandson) in Bethlehem to appoint one of his sons (v. 1). Jesse throws a party and Samuel is convinced the future king is in attendance when he sees Jesse’s hunky oldest son, Eliab, but God reminds him good looks didn’t do them any favors with Saul and it’s time to focus on character (v. 7). Jesse goes through the process of parading out seven sons, but when none of them make the cut it’s revealed his youngest son, David, wasn’t invited to the party. Instead, he’s out tending sheep. Apparently, no one considered him a likely candidate, but, like when Master Oogway picked Po as the Dragon Warrior, God surprises everyone by picking David as the future king of Israel (v. 12). Yep. He just chose a literal shepherd to watch over his people.

Saul is still officially king, but after Samuel gives David a Valvoline bath, the “spirit of Hashem departed from Saul” turning him to the dark side faster than Anakin Skywalker (v. 14). Saul’s intense mood swings leaves his advisors scrambling for remedies. When Zoloft doesn’t work, music is suggested and, by fate or coincidence, David’s name comes up. Turns out, the young shepherd is a regular Evan Taylor. David’s singer-songwriters chops are recorded extensively in the book of Psalms, where he pins at least 73 of the 150 tunes. You’ll find most of his work in the blues section at your local record store, but he produced a few pop hits, too. His most famous tune “Psalm 23” stayed on the Billboard Hot 100 for over a year and won two Grammys. Saul has no idea David is set to be his successor and unwittingly hires him to put on a concert whenever he’s affected by mood slime (v. 23). He doesn’t realize he’s being serenaded by the guy who is indirectly responsible for his discontent.

At the same time Saul is trying to figure out how to manage his depression, those pesky Philistines assemble in Israel for another faceoff. These guys just won’t go away. They show up with world domination plans more often than Ernst Stavro Blofeld. In chapter 17, the Philistines setup camp in Socoh and propose single-warrior combat to settle their differences once and for all. Of course, their best fighter just so happens to be a giant named Goliath. As Tony Stark would say, “We have a Hulk.” Some historians and medical experts speculate the legendary giant might’ve suffered from acromegaly, which would account for his super-sized physique. Whatever the case, no one in Israel is volunteering to take on the big guy. The scene plays out in the valley of Elah, where Goliath stomps out every day and trash-talks the Israelite army harder than Clubber Lang (vv. 8-10). But despite his daily insults, no one takes the bait. Even Saul offering his daughter as a victory prize doesn’t do any good. Israel is totally freaked out by Goliath’s size and refuses to engage (v. 11). As Detective James Carter would say, “I don’t know what the hell you’re feeding him, but he’s too damn big!”