And Saul said, They have brought them from the Amalekites: for the people spared the best of the sheep and of the oxen, to sacrifice unto the Lord thy God; and the rest we have utterly destroyed. (1 Samuel 15:15)
Like Adam and Eve, Saul sought to blame someone else. Would not the people now have been as loyal to Saul’s command to destroy everything belonging to the Amalekites as they had been previously in abstaining from food on the day they put the Philistines to rout (ch. 14:24)? For anyone of Saul’s nature and intelligence to seek refuge in such an excuse is clear evidence of spiritual breakdown.