Was Saul a king according to God’s law for the kings in Deuteronomy 17?
Deuteronomy 17:14–20 (ESV)
14“When you come to the land that the LORD your God is giving you, and you possess it and dwell in it and then say, ‘I will set a king over me, like all the nations that are around me,’
No, King Saul was disobedient. He had rejected the Word of the Lord and the Lord has rejected him as king (see for example 1 Samuel 15:26–29).
14 “When you come to the land that the LORD your God is giving you, and you possess it and dwell in it and then say, ‘I will set a king over me, like all the nations that are around me,’