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Question about David and Goliath
- Thread starter Kfox
- Start date
wellwisher
Well-Known Member
David and Goliath was a story of an underdog beating a larger opponent against all the odds. Goliath challenged everyone in the Ancient Israeli army, to fight him, man to man. Young David volunteers. This would be like a Lightweight Boxing contender taking on the Heavyweight champion, and against all the odds, knocking him out in the first round. The audience on both sides are stunned. That day a battle was averted since everyone was so stunned, excited and scared of the Lord. It was a sign.
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Audie
Veteran Member
The idea of "glory" in war is something my lil
mind would never have thought of.
Why would members of an army fight someone one on one? Armies are made up of thousands of people; they fight as one; not individually. Obviously as big as Goliath was, he could not take on an entire army.
How do you suppose things would have been different had David lost? Do you think the Armies would have fought? If so, why would the death of a single soldier prevent all the other soldiers from fighting for whatever cause they were ready to battle over?
Other than the fact that Goliath was larger than the average man (commentators and scholars disagree on what his exact height was in modern measurements), the Philistines as a whole were much stronger and more technologically advanced. They had more iron weapons than the Israelites, heavy armor, etc. So basically David was commended for beating the Philistine champion fighter, who was apparently a credible threat to the Israelites.
True, but the Israelites only ever had relatively meager successes against the Philistines. So it seems the best option for that particular battle was to accept the Philistines' terms for battle.
But if the Philistines army was so much better than the Israel army, why would they agree to a battle where the fate of the entire army rests upon the success or failure of 1 fighter? IOW; why didn't they fight the Israelites regardless of who won?
Evidently they believed in the might of their champion Goliath. Deut. 8:17 expresses this cockiness well:
"and you say to yourselves, “My own power and the might of my own hand have won this wealth for me.”"
Perhaps it's a tale.
That would be like the United States getting ready to go to war with Sweden. The USA spends billions on their military, US Soldiers spend years training for combat, then at the last minute when the two sides meet, for some reason they decide the toughest fist fighter in the USA and the toughest from Sweden should settle the fate of the entire country in the Cage. The USA has (UFC champion) Jon Jones and the Swedish has (UFC fighter) Alexander Gustafsson, and in the end Gustafsson wins! Do you really think the entire US military is going to turn away and run like cowards because Jon Jones lost? Wars aren’t settled this way. Do you think perhaps this might be just a fiction tale like Jayhawker Soule suggested? Or do you believe these are actual historical events.
I think your comparison is based on wrongful proportionality, not to mention that the situations aren't comparable (and yes, I think we are talking about historical events). The Philistines neighbored Israel for centuries and while they had some skirmishes over the years (e.g. Samson), they also maintained other forms of contact. Circa the end of the period of the Judges (particularly the first part of 1 Samuel) we see that the Philistines settlement zone had begun penetrating Israelite territory (some say that by the last days of Saul they had conquered Beth Shean in the Jordan Valley, though not everyone agrees with this). This means that there were Israelite sites under Philistine control.
In the days of Saul, we find a series of battles between the newly united Israelites and the Philistines, with the Israelites attempting to push the Philistines back to the coastal region of Philistia. Now, given that Philistia was actually an alliance of five main cities, each ruled by a separate king or lord of sorts, I think it's fair to consider the possibility that not every Philistine city-kingdom was involved in every battle against the Israelites.
There are many more details consider, including manpower, armor quality and more, however I don't have time to get into all of that (nor do we have information about everything). But, with the rest of those details in mind, consider that a single city-kingdom could have sent a strong force to try to ward off the Israelites from one particular area (the Valley of Elah in this case). The Israelites may have been similar to the USA's Continental Army at that point (a bit more ragtag, not quite so professional, less equipment), so it would be natural for them to be intimidated by the situation. The Philistines, on the other hand, might have seen this practically as a joke (later on they would get more serious). So, it's not crazy to think they would get cocky and reckless. For them, it wasn't really betting anything on one man because they never thought he would lose. Him dying caught them completely by surprise.
Okay; so him losing caught everybody by surprise; I get it. So why did the soldiers retreat?
I would guess that the situation caught them by surprise and they lost their confidence. Presumably, right about the same time the Israelites got excited and began rushing at the the Philistines. This is stated in the next verse but it makes sense that the two verses occurred pretty much at the same time. So suddenly reinvigorated enemy soldiers who've just practically miraculously defeated a champion giant warrior are all rushing at you...well, hightailing it makes at least some sense.
There is a long history of this in Greek mythology, for example.
I'd caution against reading this literally, unless you also view Paris and Menelaus fighting as a literal truth, complete with intercession by Aphrodite.
Kinda makes you wonder why even have an army if you gonna bet the fate of the nation on the fighting skills of 1 guy!
Are you referring to the Philistines? If so, then I already wrote that from their perspective they likely weren't betting anything. It was practically a joke to them. I can actually bring some other historic examples that show that when one side thinks they've got the upper hand, they tend to make some dumb mistakes.
One interestingly highly related example was described in the book The Romance of the Last Crusade by WW1 British Major Vivian Gilbert who was part of Allenby's forces who took the Land of Israel from the Ottomans:
(summary from Wikipedia, you can find the full story on the Internet Archive):
Michmash was a place where Yonatan, son of Saul, also outmaneuvered the Philistines during one of the early wars between the Israelites and the Philistines. The purpose of that battle was to the Philistines out of the territory of Benjamin (which is where Michmash is).
Augustus
…
People did sometimes fight in single combat before battles, for example knights in medieval Europe during the age of chivalry. Even though it is somewhat mythologised, it does appear to have actually been something that happened.
It was a way for warriors to show off their bravery and skill, make a name for themselves and give a morale boost to their side if one of their top fighters could beat one of the opposition fighters.
The main armies would still fight afterwards though.
Sometimes disputes could be settled with combat between individuals or a small number of chosen representatives, although these tended to be for more personal or minor disputes rather than to replace major wars between nations.
Being outmaneuvered or even making a foolish mistake causing you to lose a battle you should have easily won is far different than all the soldiers running away without even attempting to fight because their toughest solder lost a fight against a little guy. That would be akin to the USA back in the 1940's allowing Germany to take over the country without a fight because Max Smelling defeated Joe Lewis in the boxing ring (had he won) can't make it make sense to me.
Now that makes sense; even though it's a different scenario than the David vs Goliath story.
A couple of quick points ...
- Rather than "the fact that Goliath was larger," I would have preferred "the fact that Goliath was depicted as larger."
- It might have been more accurate to say that commentators and scholars disagree on what "exact height" was originally depicted due to textual considerations.
- There is also the matter of Elhanan, son of Jaare-oregim, so it appears the commentators and scholars are not exactly clear on who killed the big guy.
Or, they were depicted as much stronger ...