According to 1 Samuel 31:3–6, Saul was wounded by archers after which he asked his armour-bearer to take his life. When his armour-bearer refused to do so, Saul fell on his own sword. He killed himself because he knew that the Philistines would rejoice to capture him alive and torture him/present him as a prize of victory. It is possible that the Amalekite might have inflicted the final blow which killed Saul or that his death was hastened by the Amalekite in some way.1 The fact that the narrator presents Saul’s death as suicide, however, should cause us to doubt what the Amalekite said.2
9 And he said to me, ‘Stand beside me and kill me, for anguish has seized me, and yet my life still lingers.’