Bible Commentaries

War with the Philistines. Loss of the Ark.

Death of Eli and His Sons - 1 Samuel 4

At Samuel's word, the Israelites attacked the Philistines, and were beaten(1 Samuel 4:1, 1 Samuel 4:2). They then fetched the ark of the covenant into the campaccording to the advice of the elders, that they might thereby make sure ofthe help of the almighty covenant God; but in the engagement whichfollowed they suffered a still greater defeat, in which Eli's sons fell and theark was taken by the Philistines (1 Samuel 4:3-11). The aged Eli, terrified at such aloss, fell from his seat and broke his neck (1 Samuel 4:12-18); and his daughter-in-law was taken in labour, and died after giving birth to a son (1 Samuel 4:19-22). With these occurrences the judgment began to burst upon the house of Eli. But the disastrous result of the war was also to be a source of deephumiliation to all the Israelites. Not only were the people to learn that theLord had departed from them, but Samuel also was to make the discoverythat the deliverance of Israel from the oppression and dominion of its foeswas absolutely impossible without its inward conversion to its God.

The two clauses, “The word of Samuel came to all Israel,” and“Israel went out,” etc., are to be logically connected together in thefollowing sense: “At the word or instigation of Samuel, Israel went outagainst the Philistines to battle.” The Philistines were ruling over Israel atthat time. This is evident, apart from our previous remarks concerning theconnection between the commencement of this book and the close of thebook of Judges, from the simple fact that the land of Israelwas the scene of the war, and that nothing is said about an invasion on thepart of the Philistines. The Israelites encamped at Ebenezer, and thePhilistines were encamped at Aphek. The name Ebenezer (“the stone ofhelp”) was not given to the place so designated till a later period, whenSamuel set up a memorial stone there to commemorate a victory that wasgained over the Philistines upon the same chosen battle-field after thelapse of twenty years (1 Samuel 7:12). According to this passage, the stonewas set up between Mizpeh and Shen. The former was not the Mizpeh inthe lowlands of Judah (Joshua 15:38), but the Mizpeh of Benjamin (Joshua 18:26), i.e., according to Robinson, the present Neby Samwil, two hoursto the north-west of Jerusalem, and half an hour to the south of Gibeon(see at Joshua 18:26). The situation of Aphek has not been discovered. Itcannot have been far from Mizpeh and Ebenezer, however, and wasprobably the same place as the Canaanitish capital mentioned in Joshua 12:18, and is certainly different from the Aphekah upon the mountains ofJudah (Joshua 15:53); for this was on the south or south-west of Jerusalem,since, according to the book of Joshua, it belonged to the towns that weresituated in the district of Gibeon.

1 Samuel 4:2

When the battle was fought, the Israelites were defeated by thePhilistines, and in battle-array four thousand men were smitten upon thefield. ערך, sc., מלחמה, as in Judges 20:20, Judges 20:22, etc. בּמּערכה, in battle-array, i.e., upon the field of battle, not inflight. “In the field,” i.e., the open field where the battle was fought.

On the return of the people to the camp, the elders held a council of war asto the cause of the defeat they had suffered. “Why hath Jehovah smittenus to-day before the Philistines?” As they had entered upon the war bythe word and advice of Samuel, they were convinced that Jehovah hadsmitten them. The question presupposes at the same time that theIsraelites felt strong enough to enter upon the war with their enemies, andthat the reason for their defeat could only be that the Lord, their covenantGod, had withdrawn His help. This was no doubt a correct conclusion; butthe means which they adopted to secure the help of their God incontinuing the war were altogether wrong. Instead of feeling remorse andseeking the help of the Lord their God by a sincere repentance andconfession of their apostasy from Him, they resolved to fetch the ark ofthe covenant out of the tabernacle at Shiloh into the camp, with thedelusive idea that God had so inseparably bound up His gracious presencein the midst of His people with this holy ark, which He had selected as thethrone of His gracious appearance, that He would of necessity come withit into the camp and smite the foe. In 1 Samuel 4:4, the ark is called “the ark of thecovenant of Jehovah of hosts, who is enthroned above the cherubim,”partly to show the reason why the people had the ark fetched, and partlyto indicate the hope which they founded upon the presence of this sacredobject. (See the commentary on Exodus 25:20-22). The remark introduced here,“and the two sons of Eli were there with the ark of the covenant of God,”is not merely intended to show who the guardians of the ark were, viz.,priests who had hitherto disgraced the sanctuary, but also to pointforward at the very outset to the result of the measures adopted.

On the arrival of the ark in the camp, the people raised so great a shout ofjoy that the earth rang again. This was probably the first time since thesettlement of Israel in Canaan, that the ark had been brought into thecamp, and therefore the people no doubt anticipated from its presence arenewal of the marvellous victories gained by Israel under Moses andJoshua, and for that reason raised such a shout when it arrived.

When the Philistines heard the noise, and learned on inquiry that the ark ofJehovah had come into the camp, they were thrown into alarm, for “theythought (lit. said), God (Elohim) is come into the camp, and said, 'Woeunto us! For such a thing has not happened yesterday and the day before(i.e., never till now). Woe to us! Who will deliver us from the hand ofthese mighty gods? These are the very gods that smote Egypt with allkinds of plagues in the wilderness.' “ The Philistines spoke of the God ofIsrael in the plural., האדּירים האלהים, as heathenwho only knew of gods, and not of one Almighty God. Just as all theheathen feared the might of the gods of other nations in a certain degree, sothe Philistines also were alarmed at the might of the God of the Israelites,and that all the more because the report of His deeds in the olden time hadreached their ears (see Exodus 15:14-15). The expression “in the wilderness”does not compel us to refer the words “smote with all the plagues”exclusively to the destruction of Pharaoh and his army in the Red Sea (Exodus 14:23.). “All the plagues” include the rest of the plagues which Godinflicted upon Egypt, without there being any necessity to supply thecopula ו before בּמּדבּר, as in the lxx and Syriac. By thisaddition an antithesis is introduced into the words, which, if it really wereintended, would require to be indicated by a previous בּארץ orבּארצם. According to the notions of the Philistines, all thewonders of God for the deliverance of Israel out of Egypt took place in thedesert, because even when Israel was in Goshen they dwelt on the borderof the desert, and were conducted thence to Canaan.

But instead of despairing, they encouraged one another, saying, “Showyourselves strong, and be men, O Philistines, that we may not be obligedto serve the Hebrews, as they have served you; be men, and fight!”

Stimulated in this way, they fought and smote Israel, so that every onefled home (“to his tent,” see at Joshua 22:8), and 30,000 men of Israel fell. The ark also was taken, and the two sons of Eli died, i.e., were slain whenthe ark was taken, - a practical proof to the degenerate nation, that Jehovah,who was enthroned above the cherubim, had departed from them, i.e., hadwithdrawn His gracious presence.

(Note: “It is just the same now, when we take merely a historicalChrist outside us for our Redeemer. He must prove His help chieflyinternally by His Holy Spirit, to redeem us out of the hand of thePhilistines; though externally He must not be thrown into the shade,as accomplishing our justification. If we had not Christ, we couldnever stand. For there is no help in heaven and on earth beside Him. But if we have Him in no other way than merely without us and underus, if we only preach about Him, teach, hear, read, talk, discuss, anddispute about Him, take His name into our mouth, but will not letHim work and show His power in us, He will no more help us than theark helped the Israelites.” - Berleburger Bible.)

The tidings of this calamity were brought by a Benjaminite, who came as amessenger of evil tidings, with his clothes rent, and earth upon his head - asign of the deepest mourning (see Joshua 7:6), - to Shiloh, where the aged Eliwas sitting upon a seat by the side (יך is a copyist's error for יד) of the way watching; for his heart trembled for the ark of God,which had been taken from the sanctuary into the camp without thecommand of God. At these tidings the whole city cried out with terror, sothat Eli heard the sound of the cry, and asked the reason of this loud noise(or tumult), whilst the messenger was hurrying towards him with thenews.

Eli was ninety-eight years old, and “his eyes stood,” i.e., were stiff, so thathe could no more see (vid., 1 Kings 14:4). This is a description of the so-called black cataract (amaurosis), which generally occurs at a very great agefrom paralysis of the optic nerves.

When the messenger informed him of the defeat of the Israelites, the deathof his sons, and the capture of the ark, at the last news Eli fell back fromhis seat by the side of the gate, and broke his neck, and died. The loss ofthe ark was to him the most dreadful of all - more dreadful than the death ofhis two sons. Eli had judged Israel forty years. The reading twenty in theSeptuagint does not deserve the slightest notice, if only because it isperfectly incredible that Eli should have been appointed judge of thenation in his seventy-eight year.

The judgment which fell upon Eli through this stroke extended still further. His daughter-in-law, the wife of Phinehas, was with child (near) to bedelivered. ללת, contracted from ללדת (from ילד: see Ges. §69, 3, note 1; Ewald, §238, c.). When she heard thetidings of the capture (אל־הלּקח, “with regard to the being taken away”)of the ark of God, and the death of her father-in-law and husband, she fellupon her knees and was delivered, for her pains had fallen upon her (lit. had turned against her), and died in consequence. Her death, however, wasbut a subordinate matter to the historian. He simply refers to it casually inthe words, “and about the time of her death,” for the purpose of giving herlast words, in which she gave utterance to her grief at the loss of the ark, asa matter of greater importance in relation to his object. As she lay dying, the women who stood round sought to comfort her, bytelling her that she had brought forth a son; but “she did not answer, andtook no notice (לב שׁוּת = לב שׂוּם, animum advertere;cf. Psalm 62:11), but called to the boy (i.e., named him), Ichabod (כבוד אי, no glory), saying, The glory of Israel is departed,”referring to the capture of the ark of God, and also to her father-in-law andhusband. She then said again, “Gone (גּלה, wandered away,carried off) is the glory of Israel, for the ark of God is taken.” Therepetition of these words shows how deeply the wife of the godlessPhinehas had taken to heart the carrying off of the ark, and how in herestimation the glory of Israel had departed with it. Israel could not bebrought lower. With the surrender of the earthly throne of His glory, theLord appeared to have abolished His covenant of grace with Israel; for theark, with the tables of the law and the capporeth, was the visible pledge ofthe covenant of grace which Jehovah had made with Israel.