19 All the people said to Samuel, "Pray for your servants to Yahweh your God, that we not die; for we have added to all our sins (this) evil, to ask us a king."
*Minor differences ignored. Grouped by changes, with first version listed as example.
Pray for thy servants - that we die not - As they knew they had rebelled against God, they saw that they had every thing to fear from his justice and power.
We have added unto all our sins this evil - It is no sin to have a king; a good king is one of the greatest blessings of God's providence; but it is a sin to put a man in the place of God. Is it not strange that they did not now attempt to repair their fault? They might have done it, but they did not; they acknowledged their sin, but did not put it away. This is the general way of mankind. "God help us, we are all sinners!" is the general language of all people: but though to be a sinner is to be in the most solemn and awful circumstances, yet they are contented to bear the character, heedless of the consequences!
And all the people said unto Samuel, Pray for thy servants unto the LORD thy God, that we die not: for we have added unto (l) all our sins [this] evil, to ask us a king.
(l) Not only at other times, but now chiefly.
And all the people said unto Samuel, During the tempest, and in the midst of it; it was the general cry of the people, they were unanimous in it:
pray for thy servants unto the Lord thy God, that we die not; though they had rejected him as their judge and supreme governor in desiring a king, now they were his humble servants, at least feignedly; and knowing what interest he had with God in prayer, they entreat him to make use of it on their behalf, who having sinned so greatly, had not the assurance to call the Lord their God, though they had no doubt of his being the God of Samuel, whose prayers he had heard, of which this tempest was a full proof; and was so violent, that if it continued, they were afraid they should be destroyed by the thunder and lightning, or they and their cattle, with the fruits of the earth, be washed away with the prodigious rain:
for we have added unto all our sins this evil, to ask us a king; though Samuel had laid before them the evils and inconveniences of having a king, and had in the name of the Lord charged them with rejecting God as their king; yet nothing convinced them of their evil till this storm came, and then all their sins came fresh to their minds; and this added to the weight of them, and lay heaviest on them, that they had rejected the Lord, and slighted his prophets, and, notwithstanding all remonstrances, resolved on having a king.
Thy God - Whom thou hast so great an interest in, while we are ashamed and afraid to call him our God.
*More commentary available at chapter level.