Deuteronomy 17 · a question people ask
Deuteronomy 17 allows a king. So why does 1 Samuel 8 treat asking for one as rejecting the LORD?
Here Moses says, "you shall surely set him whom the LORD your God chooses as king over yourselves" (17:15). Later, when the elders of Israel asked Samuel, "Now make us a king to judge us like all the nations" (1 Samuel 8:5), "the thing displeased Samuel" (1 Samuel 8:6), and the LORD said, "they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me as the king over them" (1 Samuel 8:7). Yet the LORD also said, "Listen to their voice, and make them a king" (1 Samuel 8:22). Christians read the two passages in two main ways. Both agree that the king was to be the one the LORD chose (17:15; 1 Samuel 10:24), and that king and people alike were to follow the LORD (17:19-20; 1 Samuel 12:14).
How Christians read it
Where Christians differ, Favor sets out the main views side by side and doesn't pick one.
A king was allowed; the way they asked was wrong
Those who hold this view note that 17:15 gives the terms for a king without forbidding one, and that kings were promised before: God told Jacob, "kings will come out of your body" (Genesis 35:11). They read the wrong in 1 Samuel 8 as the reason given: "that we also may be like all the nations; and that our king may judge us, and go out before us, and fight our battles" (1 Samuel 8:20), and Samuel's words, "you said to me, 'No, but a king shall reign over us,' when the LORD your God was your king" (1 Samuel 12:12). Later the LORD says to Samuel, "I have provided a king for myself among his sons" (1 Samuel 16:1).
Deuteronomy 17:15 · Genesis 35:11 · 1 Samuel 8:20 · 1 Samuel 12:12 · 1 Samuel 16:1
Moses was allowing for what would come
Those who hold this view note that in 17:14 the wish for a king is the people's own, "I will set a king over me, like all the nations that are around me", and that the elders later use nearly the same words, "make us a king to judge us like all the nations" (1 Samuel 8:5). They point to the people's own confession, "we have added to all our sins this evil, to ask for a king" (1 Samuel 12:19), and to Hosea: "I have given you a king in my anger" (Hosea 13:11). They read 17:14-20 as the LORD setting limits around a request he knew Israel would make.
Deuteronomy 17:14 · 1 Samuel 8:5 · 1 Samuel 12:17-19 · Hosea 13:10-11
The verses
“When you have come to the land which the LORD your God gives you, and possess it and dwell in it, and say, “I will set a king over me, like all the nations that are around me,” you shall surely set him whom the LORD your God chooses as king over yourselves. You shall set as king over you one from among your brothers. You may not put a foreigner over you, who is not your brother.”
“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.” But the thing displeased Samuel when they said, “Give us a king to judge us.” Samuel prayed to the LORD. The LORD said to Samuel, “Listen to the voice of the people in all that they tell you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me as the king over them.”
“The LORD said to Samuel, “Listen to their voice, and make them a king.” Samuel said to the men of Israel, “Everyone go to your own city.””
“Samuel said to all the people, “Do you see him whom the LORD has chosen, that there is no one like him among all the people?” All the people shouted and said, “Long live the king!””