1 Samuel 22:19. "And Nob, the city of the priests, he put to the sword; both men and women, children and sucklings, oxen, asses and sheep, he put to the sword."

The "he" here is Doeg, a herdsman, and the only of Saul's servants who would obey Saul's command to kill the priests who had fed and provisioned David and his men. Saul's order to Doeg was "You turn and fall upon the priests", which Doeg had done - he killed all eighty-five priests who, at Saul's command, had come from Nob to be questioned about their interaction with David. The priest Ahimelech, who had met with David, answered Saul that he had known David as a servant of Saul, and captain of his bodyguard, he knew nothing of anything else going on between Saul and David. Saul ordered all the priests killed anyway, and when his guards would not do it, he ordered Doeg to do it. Not only did Doeg kill the priests, he then went to Nob, the city of the priests, and killed everyone and everything in it.

There is nothing indicating that Saul told Doeg to kill everyone in Nob, so it seems as though Doeg took the massacre of Nob upon himself. It sounds like he was filled with blood lust and went on a rampage against an entire town he saw as his king's enemies. However, while there is no indication that Saul ordered this slaughter, he had ordered the slaughter of the priests, and he did not stop to think when his guards wouldn't do it, but instead just found someone who would. There's also no indication that Saul was upset by the slaughter in Nob, nor that Doeg was reprimanded in any way. It seems to me that Doeg shared his king's tendency toward wickedness. Doeg was the one who told Saul that David had been with the priests in Nob, he clearly was trying to please a king who was, pretty obviously, on an unhinged vendetta against David.

There are several lessons here. First, when those around you who you consider loyal will not go along with you, like Saul's guard, that is a good time to reevaluate what you are doing. Often we can become so single minded in pursuit of something that everything else falls away. We stop considering the morality of what we are doing to achieve a goal that has become an obsession. The devil loves getting us to this state - we become so blind that he can convince us to do almost anything and tell ourselves that it was necessary and acceptable in this situation. But God will be giving us signs and warnings to keep us from going down this path, we just have to notice them. Here, Saul had a pretty obvious sign when his servants would not raise a hand against the priests despite a direct order. Unfortunately, Saul allowed his obsession and his anger to blind him to that sign.

Another lesson is that not only does the devil love getting us into this state, but he will try his best to put people in our lives who are in, or can be led to, the same state. Doeg does not appear to have shared Saul's hatred for David, but Doeg had other weaknesses that came into play, being overly obsequious among them. In his desire to please Saul, Doeg ended up "catching" Saul's rage and it led him to some horrific behavior. If Saul had any wisdom, he would have seen the outcome of all this, repented, and disciplined Doeg, but Saul was too far gone, and he took Doeg with him.

If we have loyal friends who refuse to go along with us on something, that should be a cause for us to examine what we are doing, and where we are going. If we refuse to do this, and instead cast about for the one person who will go along with us, we are doing neither ourselves nor that person any favors. We are allowing both of us to be led into sin, and that sin can get pretty deep, indeed, as we see here with Saul and Doeg.