162 | Martin Buber’s Theopolitics
and the crackdown fails. This happens concurrently with Samuel’s sacrifice and
prayer for deliverance from the Philistines, and he interprets the momentary re-
prieve from attack as evidence of the efficacy of his prayerful intervention—he
believes that YHVH has “answered him.” Here he is out of touch with the people,
who have less patience than he: “They, mourning, who moaned ‘after YHVH,’
intended only his power of victory, not his sovereignty. The Palladium does not
come home, the supremacy of the enemy continues, the answer given for the hour
is not enough for the hours that follow... the invisible, merely audible does not
satisfy... what one calls the kingship of YHVH, they reject, since it is not tan-
gible and not effective enough.”^39
Following these events, Samuel attempts to stabilize his own charismatic
authority by recommending his sons as his successors. This is an unwarranted
overreach on two levels: first, since he and his nevi’im had yet to really solve the
problem of the Philistine military threat; second, because his own power was
rooted in the primitive-theocratic understanding of divine rule which “did not
tolerate any extra-cultic dynasty formation.”^40 His attempt to establish a dynasty
undermines the basis of his own authority. There is thus a late Samuelic politics,
divergent from the theopolitical vision of the nevi’ish movement, and Samuel
becomes responsible for a second hierocratizing effort following the folly of the
house of Eli: “This only adds to the outer crisis an inner one. Together, the lack of
foreign policy achievement and the inner-political attempt at a dynasty provide
the background for the desire of the people—or better, of the people’s representa-
tives [Volksvertretungs].”^41
Samuel’s overreach frustrates the elders of the people, or “sheikhs” as Buber
sometimes calls them, who were already suffering Philistine dominance with no
end in sight. Sociologically, they belong to the class of Israelites with the greatest
contact with “civilization,” and furthest along the path of de-nomadizing (Buber
compares them to the Spartan Gerousia). Nonetheless, the offense to the old an-
tidynastic bias and their “Bedouin” passion for freedom moves them to action.
They demand that Samuel find a melekh who can win a war of liberation against
the Philistines. If there is going to be centralization, it must at least accomplish
the liberation war and achieve stability and order in the land. This request, of
course, goes far beyond Samuel’s own missteps: “They are searching for a captive
charisma. They invert the Gideon-motif (Judges 8:22): the offer precedes the deed;
they take the Jephthah-motif (Judges 11:6) once more to a wider folk plane—but
the invitation is issued to one who has yet to be found. This is what is new. They
would offer the crown, as is often assumed, to the first victor.”^42 The form of the
request indicates a secularization of divine rulership, in the sense established by
Kingship of God. The “religious” preeminence of Samuel’s house remains unques-
tioned; in fact, the address to Samuel presumes its continued validity. However,
he is asked to separate his cultic functions from political leadership (a demotion