The LORD separated the tribe of Levi, to bear the ark of the covenant of the LORD (2Sam 6)

In chapter 6, David decides that it's time to send for the ark and bring it to Jerusalem. This prompts a question of timing of this event, about which I have already given an opinion.

Now, the manner in which this happens is important. As the Philistines did when they had the ark and wanted to get rid of it, the Israelites get a new cart, load it up, and bring it along. This is a problem. When the ark is to be moved, the proper method of transport is supposed to be having it carried on foot by Levites. The Philistines, between the fact of their being (relatively) ignorant pagans and perhaps the more important fact of them not having Levites were able to get away with loading the thing on a cart. For the Israelites, handling the ark of God in such a cavalier manner led to God's wrath striking down Uzzah.

Where exactly was it that Uzzah was struck down? I don't see this as a problem the way the SAB does. While we are given two names for the location of this event, the fact that this account and the one in 1Chronicles 13 were written far apart in time may mean that the place was known differently at the later date. Childon was probably a descendant of Nachon, and both of them at various times owned a threshing floor at the place called Perezuzzah. (Edited to add that the name "Perezuzzah" was clearly a name given to the place because Uzzah was struck down there, so the name came after the incident.)

So eventually, they seem to get it figured out, and they transport the ark on foot, making sacrifices to God along the way. David comes along with the procession, dancing as it goes. Now, I'll admit that what's going on here is not completely clear, but I don't agree with the SAB's reading, neither that there might have been something wrong with David dancing, nor that David was somehow nude. Note that it does not say that David was naked, but rather that he was clothed in an ephod, which was a priestly garment. I think Michal was simply, for some reason, feeling that David was making a fool of himself by the way he was acting, which she felt was improper for a king. David's reply is that he doesn't care what people think, he just loves God.

Now the final note of this chapter says that Michal "had no child unto the day of her death." The SAB makes a surprising evaluation of this fact, calling it a contradiction (which I don't think it is, more in a moment) but not marking it with "Injustice" or "Women", which I probably would have. The Bible seems to be suggesting that Michal was made infertile as a punishment for arguing with her husband, which seems a bit extreme to me, but maybe there's something to this story I'm missing. (It might be that David simply never had sex with her again.) As for the contradiction, I assume that the children that Michal is reported to have had were all born before this incident.

And Jonathan smote the garrison of the Philistines (1Sam 14)

Chapter 14 introduces us more formally to the character of Saul's son Jonathan, the man who would have succeeded Saul had there been a proper Saulide dynasty, and frankly someone who seems to have been far more suited to be king. This guy's smart, kind, and a good warrior, which is everything an ancient king really needed to be. Maybe I'm forgetting something, but I don't seem to recall the Bible having anything bad to say about Jonathan.

So the men of Israel are trying to figure out how to best wage a battle against the Philistines, and while Saul is busy making plans, Jonathan has leapt into action, saying "there is no restraint to the LORD to save by many or by few." This is fascinating, reminding us perhaps of Gideon's tiny army that overcame much larger forces; Jonathan is actually entertaining the idea that, what with God supposedly being on their side, they might as well go up against the Philistines as an army of two people (namely Jonathan and his armor-bearer) as thousands. This is pretty amazing faith.

Jonathan essentially asks God for a sign, saying that if the Philistines of the garrison call him up to them, it means God intends victory. They do, and Jonathan and his armor-bearer team up to take out twenty Philistines. As usual, the SAB calls this violent, unjust and intolerant, and I reply that well, this is war, and the Philistines are invaders, what do you expect?

Now apparently, there immediately follows an earthquake, which so scares and confuses the Philistines that they commence fighting each other. Saul watches all of this from a distance in wonder, and the Israelite army, which had largely scattered out of fear, regroups. Now Saul is apparently not making the best of the situation. He's brought the ark with him to war (perhaps this was twenty years later?) although at least he doesn't bring it to the front lines. Even with the ark and a priest present, he seems hesitant to take action.

Also, there is an interesting story that finishes out the chapter, reflecting further Saul's lack of sound decision making and understanding of spiritual things. Saul charges all of his men not to eat until they have achieved victory, most likely in some misguided attempt to make his men "spiritually cleansed". The SAB calls it absurd, and I agree. Apparently so does Jonathan, who, not knowing his father has pronounced this "curse", eats some honey; when he is informed of the situation, he points out how much better he feels after having eaten, and essentially points out that the army would probably fight better on a full stomach than an empty one.

In fact, this leads to a big problem, as the men finally break down to eat, and they are so hungry that they don't bother to take the time to drain the blood out of the animals, a serious breach of dietary law.

Saul decides it's time to go and finish off the Philistine army, but decides to inquire of God, I assume through the priest. God gives him no answer. Saul assumes that God doesn't want to talk to him because somebody in the army ate when they were still under Saul's pronounced curse, and it turns out to be Jonathan, so Saul and Jonathan both agree that Jonathan must die for simply eating honey. The people however point out that Jonathan was the hero of the day, and it makes no sense to punish Jonathan for being successful, so Jonathan does not die at this time.

The Philistines escape, and Saul ends up fighting them, and others, throughout his entire reign.

Out of the house of Abinadab (1Sam 7)

Okay, I don't really have a good answer for the first point of contention in chapter 7. The second one, yes, but here, I'm admittedly stumped, so of course I'm going to write far more than I need to in order to express my being at a loss for explanation.

So when the ark comes back to Israel, instead of taking it back to Shiloh (which would have actually made sense) they take it to Kirjathjearim, and put it in the house of a man named Abinadab. Here in 1Samuel 7, we are told it stays there for twenty years. However, the SAB rightly points out that when we compare dates, it's pretty clear that from this time until the time that David comes to carry it off to Jerusalem in 2Samuel 6, over forty years have passed, so what's up with that? I can think of a few possible explanations, but not many of them are highly convincing, even to myself.

One possibility is that by "twenty years", the author really means at least twenty years. It's possible, but not really too likely, since, if you're trying to express "that the time was long", forty years sounds better, and it's not like the author/editor of the book of Samuel wasn't aware of the true time span involved, since he wrote the latter passage as well. Note however that since we can say that the author did know the full story, something else probably was meant.

Another possibility is that this story is not in strict chronological order. While a possibility (since there are some stories in the book of Samuel that are clearly out of sequence), it's not likely. We are presented with the pretty clear picture that Saul was king for forty years, and if this happened during Saul's reign, it seems strange that Saul should not be involved in the story in some way.

Or are we sure Saul was King for forty years? Maybe it's just an error not here, but in Acts 13. It could be suggested, but that's not a really satisfactory resolution, both because we are still left with an error anyway (of some sort), and because I'm thinking Acts isn't the only book that says Saul was king forty years, although I'm not 100% certain.

The most likely explanation, although admittedly still not a very good one, is that the time span of twenty years is the span between the return of the ark and the events outlined in verse three and following. Thus twenty years would not be the total time that the ark was there, but the time between bringing the ark there and bringing the hearts of the people back to God, as apparently the people were very disheartened after their defeat and loss of the ark. Once they do turn back, Samuel calls them together and offers a sacrifice. (Edit to add: I note that the Ark was at least temporarily moved during the fighting in chapter 14. Perhaps that was 20 years later?)

This is the second matter noted by the SAB in this chapter, but a much easier one to comment upon. Who may offer sacrifices to God? Is it only Levites? Well, first of all, I have already argued that Samuel is a Levite, so that's not necessarily a problem. However, I'm not sure I'm convinced that only Levites may offer sacrifices anyway. There are certainly examples of others offering sacrifices, although admittedly most if not all of these are before the Mosaic Law.

Perhaps more important is the location, which is also noted upon here. There does seem to be a sentiment that at least proper, official sacrifices should be at the Tabernacle, and Samuel is not there in this story. However, consider that this is a special occasion with odd circumstances, the sort of which Israelites have had to wrestle with throughout history. The tabernacle is in Shiloh, but the ark, which is the centerpiece of the Tabernacle, is in Kirjathjearim. Given the situation, it may not have been very clear what was the right place for a sacrifice. Seeing as things turned out for the best, I assume that Samuel, who tended to hear directly from God on such matters, was told that this was sufficient for the situation.

Immediately following this, there is a battle between the Israelites and the Philistines, and the Israelites finally start winning, assumedly because God is on their side. I notice the SAB does not mark this passage with the usual markings that battle scenes get, but no matter; I'd just have to give my stock answer anyway.

And they had emerods in their secret parts (1Sam 6)

In examining the story unfolding here in 1Samuel 6, Robert Alter points out that there is indication of a possible mistranslation. The Philistines make an offering to the God of Israel in the form of "Five golden emerods, and five golden mice". This is the first time we hear about mice, and it's suggestive to some scholars that there is an aspect of the affliction of the Philistines about which we're not being explicitly told. Think about it: hemorrhoids are bad, but they aren't generally fatal. It may be that rather than being hemorrhoids, it was the dark boils associated with the Bubonic Plague that we're really talking about (which often appear in the groin area), a plague also associated with rodent infestations. It seems like a resonable speculation, although admittedly, golden images of their "buboes" still seems silly.

This offering of "Five golden emerods, and five golden mice" is at no point in the passage indicated to be demanded by God, only that the Philistine priests thought it was the best course of action, along with the rest of what is done in this chapter. (The issues of the number of gods and who it is that hardens hearts are ones I have previously addressed.) They put the ark onto a cart and return it to the Israelites, taking the manner in which the ark returned as a sign, which, lacking any evidence for or against God agreeing with this method of divination, you can take as you will. The actions of the cows is unusual, so it may be taken as miraculous, but it's not such an exciting miracle if so.

The final tale of this chapter is that of the men of Bethshemesh, many of whom died because they looked into the ark. Apparently, this was not a right thing to do. (It may have been reserved for Levites only to look, or it might possibly have been for no man to see the contents of the ark, I don't know; no doubt Stephen Spielberg has some thoughts on the matter.) In all of the nation of Israel's dealings with the ark, once again, the issue is their failure to take the Holy things of God seriously. Clearly, God takes the ark very seriously.

Is God merciful? You just know I'm going to give the answer "Yes" but how does one deal with the details the SAB brings up, which are certainly confusing? One thing worth noting first of all is that the first verse given in both columns is from the very same chapter. When you get an apparent contradiction that follows so quickly on itself, you're probably misreading or misunderstanding. God is merciful, yes, but His mercy is not without limit. To some extent, this is simply logical; there are cases where two parties are in conflict, and to give mercy to one would logically deny mercy to the other. Also, there's a very strange quality to mercy that I feel I understand conceptually, but may not be able to put into words well. Mercy is of a certain nature that it lives in contrast to justice. It's been said that justice is getting what you deserve; grace is getting something good you don't deserve; mercy is not getting the punishment you do deserve. If justice is never served, then in some sense, it cheapens mercy, and stretches the limits of some sort of cosmic balance sheet, it seems. God is merciful, but we can't escape punishment forever if we keep on pushing it.

A great sacrifice unto Dagon their god (1Sam 5)

In chapter five, we see a series of rather humorous miracles.

First, the ark is taken to the temple of Dagon and left there. The following morning, Dagon's statue had fallen over, appearing to bow before the ark. Not liking this, the Philistines figure it's just an accident, and set Dagon upright again. The next morning, not only is Dagon on the ground, but his head and hands have been severed. The Philistines are apparently freaked out, and stayed out of the temple from then on.

But this is not enough. Apparently soon afterwards, many people died, and among most who did not die...yep, they were all struck with hemorrhoids. (I don't know why this triggers the "language" icon in the SAB; it is what it is!) So they take the ark and take it away from Ashdod to Gath, where the same thing happens. And again to Ekron. Death and hemorrhoids everywhere. What's a Philistine to do? Well, the situation is admittedly pretty absurd, and their response to it takes it to a new level of absurdity.

Hophni and Phinehas; in one day they shall die both of them. (1Sam 4)

So despite the fact that the SAB has no notes on chapter 4, there's a lot here that I really think is noteworthy, including the fact that there are no notes despite the presence of certain items.

Israel goes to battle against the Philistines, and early in the fighting, they sustain casualties in the neighborhood of 4,000. The SAB doesn't mark this attack against Israel as violent, unjust and intolerant, despite the fact that I'm certain it would had the roles been reversed. What's up with this? I only ask for consistency here.

Now, as things are going pretty badly, some people get a bright idea: Since it served them so well in the days of Joshua, why not run back to Shiloh and fetch the ark of the covenant, and take it into battle? So they send for it, and Eli's sons bring it to the front lines. At first, it seems this might do them well, as the Philistines get worried. In the end, things go worse for them as the Israelites discover that the ark isn't some sort of battle-winning magic charm. This time 30,000 of them are struck down (still no comment from the SAB, although I think Steve Wells might reasonably add these folks to his list of people killed by God, as I think they lost this battle to be taught a lesson), including Eli's two sons, thus fulfilling the prophecy.

A man runs from the battle back to Shiloh to inform Eli of what has happened. Eli, being old, blind, and overweight, falls over backward at the shock of the news, and breaks his neck. When his daughter-in-law hears the news, she goes into labor and gives birth to a child, who is named Ichabod ("no glory") to commemorate this terrible day in Israel's history. (It sounds as though she may have died in giving birth, too, but it's not fully clear.) Pretty much all of the misfortune that befalls Israel in general and Eli's family in particular is the result of dealing with God in a far too casual manner.

Of course, the Philistines aren't going to have a good time of this, either.

On the seventh day, which is the sabbath, in it there shall be none. (Joshua 6)

Joshua 6 is the first chapter of Joshua to have a lot of notes in the SAB, but the interesting thing about the chapter to me is something that doesn't appear in the notes, at least as of the time I write this. Perhaps this will be another response that will result in additional notes added to the SAB rather that existing notes taken away. We'll see.

First thing, and most obvious to anyone at all familiar with the story of Joshua and the battle of Jericho is the manner in which the battle is to be conducted. I won't go into full detail, as one can easily read it and see, as the SAB points out, that it's an absurd matter of the Israelites repeatedly walking in a circle around the city. Yes, it's absurd, but once again, this is intended to be a miraculous battle, so that the victory can be clearly God's, and not the Israelites.

The thing that makes this odd even from a miraculous standpoint, however, is a handful of particular details. First of all, the Levites were to lead the march. What makes this odd is that most of the time, the Levites didn't even go to battle. When Moses takes a census to find out how many soldiers they have as they begin their journey, the Levites get skipped. I'm pretty sure that it's widely accepted that it was part and parcel of the whole concept that the Levites received no land in Canaan because they also were not required to fight for it. Here, not only do they participate, which is odd enough, but they lead the way. As a second point, which may be almost like a sub-point of the former, they lead the way while carrying the Ark of the Covenant, which is also very unusual. The Israelites got in trouble for trying to use the Ark in battle in 1Samuel 4, and lost it for a time. The command to carry the Ark into battle like this was peculiar to this specific battle, was was pretty much peculiar all around.

The third and last point I want to make about this battle is one that I'm surprised so few people seem to notice. From the first time I ever read the book of Joshua, it leaped right out at me. They march around the city once for six days, right? Verse three ends with, "Thus shalt thou do six days." Pretty much everywhere else in the Bible, a phrase like this would be immediately followed by a reminder of the sabbath, but here? "...the seventh day ye shall compass the city seven times, and the priests shall blow with the trumpets." Not only is God having them break the sabbath, but He's having them do the most work they've done all week! Now, of course, I don't know for sure that this last day was the sabbath, but the point still stands that certainly at least one of these days was a sabbath day spent marching and carrying the Ark, not your standard sabbath activity.

Oddly enough, I don't have anything to say about these points other than the fact that this battle plan, which was given to Joshua by God, seems very inconsistent with a lot of other scripture, even to the point of violating Mosaic Law, and I don't know why. I'm sure someone out there has an answer to this, but I don't personally. (I suspect the thing about the Levites and the Ark has to do with my point farther up in that it emphasizes God's role in the conquest of Jericho, but sabbath-breaking?)

(A side note of no particular value: When I was reading through this story on the SAB, it apparently was the first time I'd read it in the King James. I thought "rereward" must be a typo. Turns out it's an archaic term that means something like "rear guard", which is the term most modern translations use.)

I am at this point going to skip over the issues of violence, injustice and intolerance in this chapter, and I vow to make my next post the one where I finally address the issue of Holy war as a general topic for the whole book, and pretty much the Bible as a whole, as the topic comes up from time to time throughout the Old Testament. I'm not going to ignore the tough stuff, I just want to make sure I give it its due. There needs to be a whole post dedicated to the issue.

I will address the issue of what is "the accursed thing" mentioned here, although it's a discussion that might belong best in the next chapter. A lot of other translations make it clearer, and in the Hebrew, I think they use a word that is very clear despite being translated differently by the King James elsewhere. This thing that they are not supposed to touch is actually something that had been dedicated to the pagan gods of Jericho. It probably wasn't a specific thing, but just whatever might be found in the temple in that city. Food, livestock, incense, wooden idols, who knows? The only thing they could take would be items made of metal that would have to be melted down and remade into something else. Why was this important? Interestingly enough, it was related to the issue of Holy war. If the Israelites were to utterly destroy the people of Jericho and their culture and customs, then certainly any religious artifacts could not be spared.

After the city is destroyed, Joshua pronounces a curse on it. Now, as this curse comes from Joshua, and I am not sure whether or not he's considered a prophet in the usual sense, I don't know that this curse has any force behind it other than to scare off the people of his own day. There's no record here that God told anybody that the city should not be rebuilt, although He may have and it simply was not recorded. It appears to be simply Joshua saying something on his own. Nonetheless, I did notice that one of the other responders to the chapter has something to say about the matter that might be interesting. Unfortunately, the link doesn't work anymore, so I'm not sure what he's talking about. Maybe I'll follow it up.

Wish me luck for my next post. Or don't. As you wish.

The flood decayeth and drieth up (Gen 8)

I added one more paragraph to the previous post, as I started some commentary here that I realized belonged with that material.

Now, I already talked about the overall length of the flood in the previous post, so I won't go over that again, but there are a few notes in the SAB about time frames specifically for this chapter that ought to be addressed. (This chapter is much more coherent in general than the previous.) The first new thing noted is that there seems to be an inconsistency between verses four and five, which is strange, since I've never heard anyone elsewhere having a problem with these verses. The fact is that I think the answer is so simple I'd never thought there was a problem. Boats run aground onto things that are submerged under the waters all the time. While the tops of the mountains were not visible until the tenth month, that doesn't mean that the ark was not sitting low enough in the water to rest on them earlier. One might even interpret it as providence that the ark, which was not exactly built for navigational purposes, managed to find landing even before a landing was obviously available. If the ark had ended up bobbing about in the ocean, Noah, his family and all the animals would have been screwed.

The other timeline note is on verses 13-14, asking when exactly did the earth dry. I think the King James is lacking a bit in its translation here, as the meaning is not made clear as it could be, but actually when looking at the Hebrew words, I'm not sure I agree with any translation, but then, I'm hardly a Hebrew scholar. Note that even in the KJV, different phrases are used in the two verses. In verse 13, "the waters were dried up from off the earth" while in verse 14, "was the earth dried." The idea here is that at first, Noah sees that there's no more standing water, but everything is pretty much mud. Later, he sees actual dry land. Many other translations say "dry" and then "completely dried". The original Hebrew uses the words "charab" and "yabesh" which of course have different meanings that can include "dry". The thing I find interesting is that "charab" is also often translated as "desolate", which seems like it could be fairly appropriate in this context; one certainly could imagine that the ground must be rather desolate. However, one of the copies of the book of Genesis I own notes that these two Hebrew words appear together in Job 14:11 and Isa 19:5, suggesting a natural temporal sequence of drying.

The SAB notes that it's rather strange that a Dove could find a living olive tree. It does indeed seem unlikely that any tree would survive such a massive flood, and if indeed there were any olive seeds that had a chance to germinate after the flood, could they have produced leaves so quickly afterwards? I really don't know. I'm thinking this is likely to be another miracle to pile on the ones of the previous chapter, but if anyone knows how long it takes for an olive seed to germinate and produce leaves, let us know if it's anywhere in the neighborhood of 50 days.

While it is a good question to wonder what the animals leaving the ark had to eat, I wonder why the SAB waits until now to ask that question. As I mentioned earlier, I think it's much harder to imagine what they ate while on the ark. If there are olive trees, there may be many other kinds of plants. I don't know what the carnivores may have eaten, but really, it's the same problem we had on the ark. Oh, I still don't have any better, more scientific answer than I had then, in case you were holding out for one.

Noah then proceeds to give a sacrifice to the Lord, which is not a logistical problem if he had more than two of each of the animals suitable for sacrifice, and of course, he had seven of each of those. God does require animal sacrifice, yes, and I covered that somewhere way back...um...here.

God promises that He will not curse the earth again, but the SAB points to a verse in Malachi that seems to be God threatening to do so. What's up with that? Well, I'm going to stick with my first interpretation of this, especially after looking at the Hebrew behind it. At the end of a previous post, I implied that what I think God is saying here is that there is an intrinsic property of the ground in general that God placed upon it to make agriculture particularly difficult for Adam, and He's reversing that decision ("not again" thus taking the connotation of "not any more"). The thing that's interesting in the Hebrew is that the words for "curse" and "ground"/"earth" are different in both cases. I think the Genesis verse is saying, as it is put "curse the ground", but the Malachi passage is carrying a meaning more like "I will destroy (or maybe take away?) their territory."

So long as I'm leaving the flood behind, I'd like to point out something I didn't point out yet, nor did I see it in the article I linked to in the last post. Fish. I don't think anyone ever assumes that Noah took marine life into the ark with him, but it would present problems whether he did or not. If he took fish and the like onto the ark, where did he store them? If the entire world was one big body of water, was it salt or fresh water? I think we'll have to lean on another miracle here as well, but it may be that a miraculous saving of marine life is a possible answer to the dilemma of what carnivores ate after the flood. Many modern carnivores do eat fish, and as a source of meat, it may have been quite plentiful at this time. It's something for people on both sides to think about, in any case.