King living at the time of United Monarchy
Agag, king of the Amalekites, was spared by Saul but killed by Samuel.
🗺 Places mentioned alongside Agag on the map →
Also known as Agagite · Bougeon
Agag was the king of the Amalekites during the reign of King Saul of Israel. God commanded Saul to attack the Amalekites and totally destroy everything, including Agag. Saul defeated the Amalekites but spared Agag and the best of the livestock. The prophet Samuel rebuked Saul for his disobedience and told him that God had rejected him as king. Samuel then summoned Agag and "hewed him in pieces before the Lord." (1Sa.15.8,9,20,32,33)
The book of Esther mentions that Haman, the enemy of the Jews, was an Agagite, which suggests he may have been a descendant of Agag the Amalekite. (Est.3.1,10; 8.3,5; 9.24).
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10 verses in 2 books · English text: BSB (change it from the menu at the top) · Strong’s H0090
He captured Agag king of Amalek alive, but devoted all the others to destruction with the sword.
Saul and his troops spared Agag, along with the best of the sheep and cattle, the fat calves and lambs, and the best of everything else. They were unwilling to devote them to distruction, but they devoted to destruction all that was despised and worthless.
“But I did obey the LORD,” Saul replied. “I went on the mission that the LORD gave me. I brought back Agag king of Amalek and devoted the Amalekites to destruction.
Then Samuel said, “Bring me Agag king of the Amalekites.” Agag came to him cheerfully, for he thought, “Surely the bitterness of death is past.”
But Samuel declared: “As your sword has made women childless, so your mother will be childless among women.” And Samuel hacked Agag to pieces before the LORD at Gilgal.
After these events, King Xerxes honored Haman son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, elevating him to a position above all the princes who were with him.
So the king removed the signet ring from his finger and gave it to Haman son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, the enemy of the Jews.
And once again, Esther addressed the king. She fell at his feet weeping and begged him to revoke the evil scheme of Haman the Agagite, which he had devised against the Jews.
“If it pleases the king,” she said, “and if I have found favor in his sight, and the matter seems proper to the king, and I am pleasing in his sight, may an order be written to revoke the letters that the scheming Haman son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, wrote to destroy the Jews in all the kingʼs provinces.
For Haman son of Hammedatha, the Agagite, the enemy of all the Jews, had plotted against the Jews to destroy them and had cast the Pur (that is, the lot) to crush and destroy them.
Names, family links and references: STEPBible TIPNR (Tyndale House Cambridge, CC BY 4.0). Short descriptions were drafted with AI assistance by STEPBible. Family links follow STEPBible’s scholarly decisions where genealogies are ambiguous.