good.

19 And Samuel grew, and the LORD was with him, and did let none of his words fall to the ground.

20 And all Israel from Dan even to Beersheba knew that Samuel was "established to be a prophet of the LORD.

21 And the LORD appeared again in Shiloh for the LORD revealed himself to Samuel in Shiloh by the word of the LORD.

Verse 1. The child Samuel ministered unto the Lord.' -Josephus says that Samuel was, at this time, about twelve years of age. His ministry doubtless consisted of such Levitical duties as at his age he was capable of performing. It is perhaps scarcely necessary to explain that the transactions of this chapter did not take place in the tabernacle. It is evident that at a proper distance around this fabric were established such tents, cells, or other dwellings, as were requisite for the accommodation of the priests and Levites engaged in the sacred ministrations, and in which were also deposited the utensils employed in the services of the tabernacle. It seems as if

CHAPTER IV.

1 The Israelites are overcome by the Philistines at Eben-ezer. 3 They fetch the ark, to the terror of the Philistines. 10 They are smitten again, the ark taken, Hophni and Phinehas are slain. 12 Eli at the news, falling backward, breaketh his neck. 19 Phinehas wife, discouraged in her travail with I-chabod, dieth.

2

AND the word of Samuel' came to all Israel. Now Israel went out against the Philistines to battle, and pitched beside Eben-ezer and the Philistines pitched in Aphek.

2 And the Philistines put themselves in array against Israel: and when they joined battle, Israel was smitten before the Philistines and they slew of the army in the field about four thousand men.

3 ¶ And when the people were come into the camp, the elders of Israel said, Wherefore hath the LORD smitten us to day before the Philistines? Let us 'fetch the ark of the covenant of the LORD out of Shiloh unto us, that, when it cometh among us, it may save us out of the hand of our enemies.

4 So the people sent to Shiloh, that they might bring from thence the ark of the covenant of the LORD of hosts, which dwelleth between the cherubims: and the two sons of

1 Or, came to pass.

11 Or, faithful.

Samuel lodged in some part of Eli's abode, or of one next or near to it; as it is evident that he was within call, or he would not else have supposed that Eli had called him. Indeed, as the lad was thus within call, and appears to have been accustomed to the call, we may infer that part of his duty consisted in some degree of personal attendance upon the high-priest. It is very probable that the remarkable circumstances of his birth led Eli to feel such a peculiar interest about the young Samuel, as might induce him to take him under his immediate care and protection.

Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were there with the ark of the covenant of God.

5 And when the ark of the covenant of the LORD came into the camp, all Israel shouted with a great shout, so that the earth rang again.

6 And when the Philistines heard the noise of the shout, they said, What meaneth the noise of this great shout in the camp of the Hebrews? And they understood that the ark of the LORD was come into the camp.

7 And the Philistines were afraid, for they said, God is come into the camp. And they said, Woe unto us! for there hath not been such a thing 'heretofore.

8 Woe unto us! who shall deliver us out of the hand of these mighty Gods? these are the Gods that smote the Egyptians with all the plagues in the wilderness.

9 Be strong, and quit yourselves like men, O ye Philistines, that ye be not servants unto the Hebrews, as they have been to you: quit yourselves like men, and fight.

10 ¶ And the Philistines fought, and Israel was smitten, and they fled every man into his tent: and there was a very great slaughter; for there fell of Israel thirty thousand foot

men.

11 And the ark of God was taken; and

5 Heb. take unto us.

the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, 'were slain.

12 ¶ And there ran a man of Benjamin out of the army, and came to Shiloh the same day with his clothes rent, and with earth upon his head.

13 And when he came, lo, Eli sat upon a seat by the wayside watching: for his heart trembled for the ark of God. And when the man came into the city, and told it, all the city cried out.

14 And when Eli heard the noise of the crying, he said, What meaneth the noise of this tumult? And the man came in hastily, and told Eli.

15 Now Eli was ninety and eight years old; and his eyes were dim, that he could

not see.

1

11

Phinehas, are dead, and the ark of God is taken.

18 And it came to pass, when he made mention of the ark of God, that he fell from off the seat backward by the side of the gate, and his neck brake, and he died: for he was an old man, and heavy. And he had judged Israel forty years.

13

19 And his daughter in law, Phinehas' wife, was with child, near to be delivered : and when she heard the tidings that the ark of God was taken, and that her father in law and her husband were dead, she bowed herself and travailed; for her pains "came upon her.

20 And about the time of her death, the women that stood by her said unto her, Fear not; for thou hast born a son. But she answered not, neither did she regard it.

21 And she named the child I-chabod, saying, The glory is departed from Israel: because the ark of God was taken, and because of her father in law and her husband.

22 And she said, The glory is departed from Israel: for the ark of God is taken.

14 Heb. were turned.

Verse 1. Ebenezer . "

Aphek.-The name Ebenezer is here mentioned proleptically, as it was not given to the spot till the occasion mentioned in chap. vii. 12 (see the note there). The Aphek is probably the same as the Aphekah, enumerated among the towns in the mountains of Judah in Josh. xv. 53. As the two places were obviously at no great distance from each other, and as Ebenezer was on the northern border of Judah, we are obliged to place Aphek also towards the northern frontier, and (if it be the same as Aphekah) among the central mountains of the country-perhaps on their western declivities-because to place Aphek, as it usually is placed, away eastward between the central mountains and the Dead Sea, is incompatible with that proximity to Ebenezer which the present chapter assigns.

3. Let us fetch the ark.'-This very unhappy idea seems to have been borrowed by the Israelites from their neighbours; as we know that some of the ancient idolaters carried their idols or most sacred symbols with them in their wars, under the apparent idea that the efficient power of their gods was more concentrated, or more intense, in association with their images or symbols. In fact, the Israelites seem to have had the same notion of the matter as that which the Philistines themselves manifested when they heard the news.

8. Woe unto us -The ancient systems of idolatry had 'gods many and lords many.' The nations did not deny that the gods which others worshipped were gods, or that the worship rendered to them was right. They did not limit the number of the gods; but they thought that among them all there were some who took particular nations under their peculiar care and protection, and who were therefore entitled to pre-eminent worship from the protected nation. This is the origin of national gods. Perhaps no ancient nation denied that the Jehovah of the Jews was a god; but He alone claimed to be the only God,

and this claim they denied. So now, the Philistines fully allow Jehovah to be a god, and a powerful god-but not considering him to be the only god, they were not deterred from fighting against him (as they understood), trusting that their own national god or gods might yet deliver them from the national God of the Hebrews. To correct the notions of the Israelites, which tended to limit and localize his power, the Lord allowed the ark to be taken; but when it had been captured, he neglected not to vindicate his own honour upon the exulting Philistines and their supposed triumphant god.

18. He fell from off the seat. . . . and his neck brake.' -Eli therefore sat on an elevated seat. Seats from which even a man old and heavy could fall and injure himself, are not now employed in the East, and do not appear to have been in use among the Hebrews. Eli's seat would appear to have been a sort of throne-seat, peculiar to him as a mark of his dignity. Indeed the word (ND or ADP) is never used but to denote the seat of some dignified person, as of a king, high-priest, judge, or prophet, as may be seen by comparing the following passages in which it occurs-2 Sam. vii. 13; 1 Kings x. 19; 2 Kings iv. 10; 1 Chron. xxii. 10; Job xxvi. 9; Ps. cxxii. 5; Neh. iii. 7. It includes therefore the throne, and all raised seats of authority. From the absence of any mention of other than such seats, as well as from many direct intimations, it appears sufficiently probable that the Israelites sat, as the Orientals now do, on mats, rugs, etc., laid upon the ground, or, indeed, seated themselves on the bare ground. But from the frequent allusion to a seat in a definite sense, it is clear that the Israelites had the use of chairs or stools, and consequently that they sat less exclusively upon the ground, or on mats, carpets, and cushions placed on the ground, than do the modern Orientals. This indeed is also shewn by the mention of sitting on the ground' as a distinctive act; for it would not be such if the people always sat on

the ground, or if they did not often sit on raised seats. In the present case, Eli manifestly sat on a raised seat, and probably on one that had no back, for it was by falling backward that he broke his neck. Upon the whole, on this rather curious subject of domestic antiquities, it seems possible to collect that the practice of the Hebrews, instead of being limited to an identity with the existing usages of Asia, offered something of that variety which certainly existed in Egypt, and which combined the several usages which Europe and Asia now offer. The various postures of sitting on the ground now observed in the East-and which we will on another occasion separately notice-are all exhibited in the Egyptian sculptures and paintings, but appear chiefly to have been assumed by the common people, and in the presence of superiors. But they had also stools, chairs, fauteuils, couches, sofas, ottomans, footstools, in as great a variety as our own or any other modern European country can offer. But, although Solomon probably had most of these, yet before his time, and among the people generally at any time, we do not suppose that the Hebrews refined this matter to the same extent as the Egyptians, and therefore we have derived our present illustrations from the ruder forms of the chairs and stools in use among that people. Of these, not merely representations, but actual specimens, have been found, and are among the most curious articles in the Egyptian Room of the British Museum. There are other examples in different collections. With respect to this class of subjects, Sir J. G. Wilkinson states that (speaking first of the chairs) they are of an inferior description to those represented in the sculptures, as compared with which they are deficient both in elegance of form and in the general style of their construction. The seat is only from eight to fourteen inches high. In some the seat is of wood, in others of interlaced strings or leathern thongs, in appearance, as well as in rank, not very unlike our own rush-bottomed chairs; and, among the Egyptians, they probably belonged to persons of inferior station, or to those rooms which were set apart for casual visitors.

Some of the chairs in use among the Egyptians were on the principle of our camp-stools, furnished with a cushion,

or covered with the skin of a leopard or other animal, which could easily be removed when the chair was folded up, and it was not unusual to make other seats, and wooden head-stools or pillows, in the same manner. They were adorned in various ways, being bound with metal plates, or inlaid with ivory or foreign woods; and, even in some ordinary chairs, sycamore, or other native wood, was painted to imitate that of a more rare and valuable quality. The seat was frequently of leather, painted with flowers or fancy devices; and (as already remarked) the figure of a captive or of a conquered foe was frequently represented at the side or among the ornaments of a chair. Sometimes the seat was formed of interlaced work of string, carefully and neatly arranged, which, like our Indian cane chairs, appears to have been particularly adapted for a hot climate; but over this even they occasionally placed a leathern cushion, painted in the manner already mentioned.

Most of the chairs and stools were about the ordinary height of those now used in Europe, the seat being nearly in a line with the bend of the knee; but others were very low; while chairs of state or thrones were so high as to require the addition of a foot-stool: but the higher class of seats must be reserved for a distinct notice. The skill of the Egyptian cabinet-makers had, even in the early era of Joseph, already done away with the necessity of uniting the legs with bars. Stools, however, and more rarely chairs, were occasionally made with these strengthening members, as is still the case in our own country. The stools used in the saloons were of the same style and elegance as the chairs, and often only differed from then in the absence of a back. Some of a more ordinary kind had solid sides, and were generally very low; and others with three legs, not unlike those among the peasants of England, were used by persons of inferior rank.

Such were some of the commoner forms of the seats which the Egyptians offered to the imitation of the Hebrews. To what precise extent they were imitated, it is impossible to say; although that the Hebrews had to a certain extent seats framed on similar principles seems unquestionable. We shall soon have occasion to point out obvious imitations of the higher class of Egyptian seats by King Solomon.

CHAPTER V.

1 The Philistines having brought the ark into Ashdod, set it in the house of Dagon. 3 Dagon is smitten down and cut in pieces, and they of Ashdod smitten with emerods. 8 So God dealeth with them of Gath, when it was brought thither: 10 and so with them of Ekron, when it was brought thither. AND the Philistines took the ark of God, and brought it from Eben-ezer unto Ashdod.

2 When the Philistines took the ark of God, they brought it into the house of Dagon, and set it by Dagon.

3¶ And when they of Ashdod arose early on the morrow, behold, Dagon was fallen upon his face to the earth before the ark of the LORD. And they took Dagon, and set him in his place again.

4 And when they arose early on the mor

And they carried the ark of the God of Israel about thither.

9 And it was so, that, after they had carried it about, the hand of the LORD was against the city with a very great destruction: and he smote the men of the city, both small and great, and they had emerods in their secret parts.

10 T Therefore they sent the ark of God to Ekron. And it came to pass, as the ark of God came to Ekron, that the Ekronites cried out, saying, They have brought about the ark of the God of Israel to us, to slay us and our people.

11 So they sent and gathered together all the lords of the Philistines, and said, Send away the ark of the God of Israel, and let it go again to his own place, that it slay us not, and our people for there was a deadly destruction throughout all the city; the hand of God was very heavy there.

12 And the men that died not were smitten with the emerods: and the cry of the city went up to heaven.

2 Psalm 78. 66.

Verse 1. Ashdod.'-This town, called also Azotus, and now Shdood or Ezdoud, was the capital of one of the five Philistine states; as one of these, it was situated between Ekron on the north and Askelon on the south. It was nearer to the sea than the former, but not so near as the latter, which seems to have been the only one of the five that stood close out to the shore. Ashdod appears to have been famous above all the towns of this country for its strength. It was, however, taken by Uzziah, king of Judah, who dismantled it and built towns in the territory (2 Chron. xxvi. 6). It must, however, have been afterwards again fortified, as we find it sustaining repeated sieges from the Assyrians and Egyptians, who seem to have coveted it greatly as a frontier town. Herodotus mentions that the Egyptian king Psammetichus, besieged it for twenty-nine years (in the time of Manasseh, king of Judah), being the longest siege any city was known to have sustained. The town was ultimately demolished by Jonathan the Jewish prince, whose brother, the famous Judas Maccabæus, had been slain on Mount Azotus.' It was rebuilt under the Romans, and in the New Testament is mentioned as the place to which the evangelist Philip went after he had baptised the Ethiopian eunuch (Acts viii. 40). It became the seat of a bishopric in the early ages of Christianity; and continued to be a neat town in the time of Jerome. It is at present an inconsiderable place, surrounded by a wall in which there are two gates; the most conspicuous object being a mosque in the centre of the town, above which rises a very beautiful minaret. There does not appear to be any ruin, properly speaking; but the town contains abundant fragments of marble columns, capitals, cornices, etc. It stands on the summit of a grassy hill, around which the ground is beautifully undulated, and covered with luxuriant pasture. See the Travels of Sandys, Captains Irby and Mangles, Dr. Richardson, Pliny Fisk, etc.

2. Dagon. This was the tutelary deity of the Philistines, and, as such, is frequently mentioned in the Scriptures. There has been considerable discussion about the form, sex, and identity of this idol. The common opinion

is that it was represented half human and half fish-that is, with a human bust and fish-like termination; and the more the subject has been investigated, the more reasonable this conclusion appears. The figures of such beings

are represented on medals of Philistine towns; ancient writers speak of such deities as worshipped in the same towns; the essential part of the word Dagon, dag (17) means a fish, in Hebrew; and the text itself of verses 4, 5, favours the same conclusion, for it is said, that when the image fell before the ark of God, its head and hands were broken off, and only the ji dagon, or fish, remained. We think this evidence outweighs all that has been adduced to show that dagan meant wheat' in the Phoenician language, and that Dagon was the Phoenician god of agriculture. The Philistines, moreover, were not the same people as the Phoenicians. It might be possible indeed to combine both notions, by supposing that this Dagon was a deified mortal, who had come in a ship to the coast, and had taught the people agriculture and other useful arts; and that, as with the Oannes of the Chaldeans, his maritime arrival was figured by a combination in his images of the human and fishy nature. In Sir William Ouseley's Miscellaneous Plate (xxi.) there is, as copied from a Babylonian cylinder, a representation of what seems to be this Oannes, as a bearded personage, fish from the waist

downward. In fact, there were many of these personages who came from the sea to instruct men in arts, and who were deified as men-fish. One of these was called Odakon (addxwv), whoin Selden regards as this fish-god Dagon.

The Dagon of the Scriptures seems to have been represented of the male sex; whereas the statements of the ancient writers, as well as the medals, represent the idol worshipped by the Philistines as a female in the human part. From this difference we must infer, either that the same being was represented sometimes as a male, and sometimes as a female; or else we may allow that the female was a distinct deity, and must then speak of her merely as affording a kindred illustration, shewing the fishy idolatries of the Philistines, and the probability that Dagon, even if not the same being, was represented under a similar form. In point of fact, the difference of sex does not essentially affect the question of identity: for there was little consistency in the sexes which the ancient idolaters assigned to their gods, many of whom they made of either sex, or of neither, according to their minds. In common history, the Philistine idol is spoken of under the names of Derceto, Athara, and Atargatis, but most usually the first, which is evidently a Syriac name by its termination. Diodorus relates, that near the city of Askelon in Syria, there was a deep lake abounding with fish, not far from which stood a temple dedicated to a famous goddess, called by the Syrians Derceto. She had the head and face of a woman, but the rest of the body was that of a fish. He then proceeds to relate her fable, which amounts to this, that Derceto, having given birth to a daughter (who was the famous Semiramis), killed its father, exposed the child, and threw herself into the lake, where she was changed into a fish. The historian adds that on this account the Syrians ate no fish, but rather adored them as gods; and for this reason also Derceto was represented under the form we have described. Ovid allades obviously to the same fable as believed by the Philistines:

⚫ And knew not whether she should first relate
The poor Dircetis and her wondrous fate.

The Palestines believe it to a man,

And show the lake in which her scales began.
Metam. lib. iv. (EUSDEN.)

It is remarkable, in connection with what we have already said, that the same poet assigns a Babylonian origin to this fable.

Lucian (De Dea Syria) also states that he had seen this idol represented in Phoenicia (Philistia) as a woman with the lower half fish; but adds, that at Hierapolis (in Syria), where she was worshipped, her statue was in a female form throughout. He adds, however, that some thought this temple dedicated to Juno; and that it was built by Deucalion, after his escape from the flood, as a memorial of the waters of the Deluge having escaped through a fissure in the earth, over which the temple was built, and into which the worshippers on certain days poured water. This is remarkable for the corroboration it affords to the view entertained by those who think that the mythology of Derceto was founded, partly at least, on traditionary accounts of the deluge.

The consecration of fish and the abstinence from eating them, is attested by many writers besides those we have quoted, and seems referred to in the prohibition of fishidolatry by Moses. It was not only a Syrian but an Egyptian practice. Lakes or ponds of tame consecrated fish, like that which Diodorus mentions at Askelon, were common in other parts of Syria: and it was firmly believed that whoever ate the fish would be punished, by

the goddess to whom they were consecrated, with fatal diseases in the liver and bowels. The custom is, in some degree, still kept up in Western Asia, where lakes full of tame fish are consecrated to the Mohammedan saints and

venerable persons. Thus there is connected with the mosque of Abraham, at Urfah (supposed Ur of the Chaldees'), a lake stocked with fish consecrated to him, and which no Moslem would on any account molest, much less eat. So also at Shiraz, in the garden containing the tomb of Saadi, there is a fountain abounding with fish, some said to be decorated with gold rings, to molest which is considered an act of sacrilege, which the poet himself would not fail to avenge, and which the local authorities do not neglect to punish severely. Banier's Mythology and Fables Explained, B. vii.; Jahn's Biblische Archaeologie; Creuzer's Symbolik; Ouseley's Travels, vol. i. Appendix, No. 13. [On Assyrian Dagon, see APPENDIX, No. 29.] 5. Nor any that come into Dagon's house, tread on the threshold.'-Prostration at the threshold, in the East, implies the highest homage and reverence for the presence that dwells within: hence Dagon was brought into an intelligible posture of humiliation before the ark of God. In the East, particularly in Persia, the attention paid to the threshold of holy places and the palaces of royalty, is very observable, and tends to illustrate strikingly the text before us, as well as that in Ezek. xliii. 8; in which God complains that his holy name had been defiled by their setting of their threshold by my thresholds,' by which we understand, that idols being placed within his temple, or their thresholds approximated to or identified with his threshold, the acts of homage there performed by worshippers, were shared or appropriated by them, instead of being given to Him only. In Persia, the mosques consecrated to eminent saints therein entombed, are never entered without previous prostration at the threshold. Thus in front of the highly venerated mausoleum of Fatima at Koom, are inscribed the words: Happy and glorious is the believer who shall reverently prostrate himself with his head on the threshold of this gate, in doing which he will imitate the sun and the moon.' So also, at the mausoleum of Sheikh Seffi at Ardebil, Morier (vol. ii. p. 254) observes, Here we remarked the veneration of the Persians for the threshold of a holy place; a feeling which they preserve in some degree even for the threshold of their houses. Before they ventured to cross it they knelt down and kissed it, while they were very careful not to touch it with their feet. In writing to a prince, or a great personage, it is common for them to say, "Let me make the dust of your threshold into surmeh (collyrium) for my eyes."

6. Smote them with emerods.'-This disease (3·» aphalim) is the same that is mentioned in Deut. xxviii. 27. Some believe this to mean the dysentery; and Jahn, after Lichtenstein, is of opinion that the disorder arose from the bites of the venomous solpagus, which occasion swellings attended with fatal consequences. He supposes that these large vermin (of the spider class) were, by the special providence of God, multiplied in extraordinary numbers, and, being very venomous, were the means of destroying many individuals. But, after all, we incline to prefer the common opinion, that the disease was the hæmorrhoids, or bleeding piles, in a most aggravated form. It was by diseases affecting such parts of the body as the text indicates, that the gods were thought, in ancient times, particularly to punish offences against themselves; and therefore such a disorder would the more readily lead the Philistines to conclude that their calamity was from Him whose indignation had already been testified by the destruction of their idol.