1 Samuel 31

World English Bible 83 include this book

1 Now the Philistines fought against Israel; and the men of Israel fled from before the Philistines, and fell down slain on Mount Gilboa.

2 The Philistines overtook Saul and his sons; and the Philistines killed Jonathan, Abinadab, and Malchishua, the sons of Saul.

3 The battle went hard against Saul, and the archers overtook him; and he was greatly distressed by reason of the archers.

4 Then Saul said to his armor bearer, “Draw your sword, and thrust me through with it, lest these uncircumcised come and thrust me through and abuse me!” But his armor bearer would not, for he was terrified. Therefore Saul took his sword and fell on it.

5 When his armor bearer saw that Saul was dead, he likewise fell on his sword, and died with him.

6 So Saul died with his three sons, his armor bearer, and all his men that same day together.

7 When the men of Israel who were on the other side of the valley, and those who were beyond the Jordan, saw that the men of Israel fled and that Saul and his sons were dead, they abandoned the cities and fled; and the Philistines came and lived in them.

8 On the next day, when the Philistines came to strip the slain, they found Saul and his three sons fallen on Mount Gilboa.

9 They cut off his head, stripped off his armor, and sent into the land of the Philistines all around, to carry the news to the house of their idols and to the people.

10 They put his armor in the house of the Ashtaroth, and they fastened his body to the wall of Beth Shan.

11 When the inhabitants of Jabesh Gilead heard what the Philistines had done to Saul,

12 all the valiant men arose, went all night, and took the body of Saul and the bodies of his sons from the wall of Beth Shan; and they came to Jabesh and burned them there.

13 They took their bones and buried them under the tamarisk tree in Jabesh, and fasted seven days.

Go deeper in 1 Samuel

Go deeper in 1 Samuel on Amazon

5 places named in this chapter.

Where this was written

Jerusalem traditional Court traditions preserved and edited in Jerusalem.

When this was written

Traditions differ. Each position is shown rather than one asserted as settled.

Traditional: 1000 BC–950 BC Samuel, Nathan and Gad
Ascribed to the prophets named in Chronicles as recorders of the reign.
Critical: 630 BC–550 BC Deuteronomistic historians
Incorporates an early court narrative within a later framework.

Elsewhere in the world

Events overlapping the period this book is dated to (1000 BC–550 BC).

1200 BC–600 BC Zoroaster teaches in Persia Persia
Founder of Zoroastrianism, whose dating is disputed by as much as six centuries. His teaching on a cosmic struggle between good and evil later touched Jewish and Christian thought.
1200 BC–1000 BC Iron working spreads in the Levant Levant
Iron gradually displaced bronze for tools and weapons across the eastern Mediterranean.
1200 BC–400 BC Olmec civilisation Mesoamerica
The earliest major Mesoamerican civilisation, known for colossal stone heads and an early calendar.
1070 BC–350 AD The kingdom of Kush Africa
A Nubian power on the upper Nile that ruled Egypt itself as its twenty-fifth dynasty.
776 BC First recorded Olympiad Greece
The traditional starting point of Greek historical chronology.
753 BC Traditional founding of Rome Rome
The legendary date of Rome's founding, later used as the anchor of the Roman calendar.
745 BC–609 BC Neo-Assyrian empire at its height Mesopotamia
Assyria dominated the Near East, deporting conquered populations as policy, including the northern kingdom of Israel.
620 BC–560 BC Coinage invented in Lydia Anatolia
Stamped electrum coins of guaranteed weight, an idea that spread across the ancient world within a century.

Select a verse number to compare it across every translation.