Chapter III: The Hebrews and the Philistines--Damascus (2)

On this occasion their merrymaking was disturbed by the presence among them of the officer charged with collecting the tithes, and Gaal did not lose the opportunity of stimulating their ire by his ironical speeches: Who is Abimelech, and who is Shechem, that we should serve him? is not he the son of Jerubbaal? and Zebul his officer? serve ye the men of Hamor the father of Shechem: but why should we serve him? And would to God this people were under my hand! then would I remove Abimelech. And he said to Abimelech, Increase thine army, and come out. Zebul promptly gave information of this to his master, and invited him to come by night and lie in ambush in the vicinity of the town, that in the morning, as soon as the sun is up, thou shalt rise early, and set upon the city: and, behold, when he and the people that is with him come out against thee, thou mayest do to them as thou shalt find occasion. It turned out as he foresaw; the inhabitants of Shechem went out in order to take part in the gathering in of the vintage, while Gaal posted his men at the entering in of the gate of the city. As he looked towards the hills he thought he saw an unusual movement among the trees, and, turning round, said to Zebul, who was close by, Behold, there come people down from the tops of the mountains. And Zebul said unto him, Thou seest the shadow of the mountains as if they were men. A moment after he looked in another direction, and spake again and said, See, there come people down by the middle of the land, and one company cometh by the way of the terebinth of the augurs. Zebul, seeing the affair turn out so well, threw off the mask, and replied railingly, Where is now thy mouth, wherewith thou saidst, Who is Abimelech, that we should serve him? is not this the people that thou hast despised? go out, I pray, now, and fight with him. The King of Manasseh had no difficulty in defeating his adversary, but arresting the pursuit at the gates of the city, he withdrew to the neighbouring village of Arumah.*

* This is now el-Ormeh, i.e.Kharbet el-Eurmah, to the south-
west of Nablus.

He trusted that the inhabitants, who had taken no part in the affair, would believe that his wrath had been appeased by the defeat of Gaal; and so, in fact, it turned out: they dismissed their unfortunate champion, and on the morrow returned to their labours as if nothing had occurred.

Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph reproduced by the Duc de
Luynes.

Abimelech had arranged his Abiezerites in three divisions: one of which made for the gates, while the other two fell upon the scattered labourers in the vineyards. Abimelech then fought against the city and took it, but the chief citizens had taken refuge in the hold of the house of El-berith. Abimelech gat him up to Mount Zalmon, he and all the people that were with him; and Abimelech took an axe in his hand, and cut down a bough from the trees, and took it up, and laid it on his shoulder: and he said unto the people that were with him, What ye have seen me do, make haste, and do as I have done. And all the people likewise cut down every man his bough, and followed Abimelech, and put them to the hold, and set the hold on fire upon them; so that all the men of the tower of Shechem died also, about a thousand men and women.

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a bas-relief in the Ramesseum.
This is a portion of the picture representing the capture of
Ascalon by Ramses II.

This summary vengeance did not, however, prevent other rebellions. Thebez imitated Shechem, and came nigh suffering the same penalty.* The king besieged the city and took it, and was about to burn with fire the tower in which all the people of the city had taken refuge, when a woman threw a millstone down upon his head and brake his skull.

* Thebez, now Tubas, the north-east of Nablus.

The narrative tells us that, feeling himself mortally wounded, he called his armour-bearer to him, and said, Draw thy sword, and kill me, that men say not of me, A woman slew him. His monarchy ceased with him, and the ancient chronicler recognises in the catastrophe a just punishment for the atrocious crime he had committed in slaying his half-brothers, the seventy children of Jerubbaal.* His fall may be regarded also as the natural issue of his peculiar position: the resources upon which he relied were inadequate to secure to him a supremacy in Israel. Manasseh, now deprived of a chief, and given up to internal dissensions, became still further enfeebled, and an easy prey to its rivals. The divine writings record in several places the success attained by the central tribes in their conflict with their enemies. They describe how a certain Jephthah distinguished himself in freeing Gilead from the Ammonites.**

* Judges ix. 23, 24. And God sent an evil spirit between
Abimelech and the men of Shechem; and the men of Shechem
dealt treacherously with Abimelech: that the violence done
to the threescore and ten sons of Jerubbaal might come, and
that their blood might be laid upon Abimelech their brother,
which slew them, and upon the men of Shechem, which
strengthened his hands to slay his brethren.

** The story of Jephthah is contained in chaps, xi., xii. 1-
7, of the _Book of Judges_. The passage (xi. 12-29) is
regarded by some, owing to its faint echo of certain
portions of Numb, xx., xxi., to be an interpolation.
Jephthah is said to have had Gilead for his father and a
harlot for his mother. Various views have been put forward
as to the account of his victories over the Midianites, some
seeing in it, as well as in the origin of the four
daysfeast in honour of Jephthahs daughter, insertions of a
later date.

But his triumph led to the loss of his daughter, whom he sacrificed in order to fulfil a vow he had made to Jahveh before the battle.* These were, however, comparatively unimportant episodes in the general history of the Hebrew race. Bedawins from the East, sheikhs of the Midianites, Moabites, and Ammonites--all these marauding peoples of the frontier whose incursions are put on record--gave them continual trouble, and rendered their existence so miserable that they were unable to develop their institutions and attain the permanent freedom after which they aimed. But their real dangers--the risk of perishing altogether, or of falling back into a condition of servitude--did not arise from any of these quarters, but from the Philistines.

* There are two views as to the nature of the sacrifice of
Jephthahs daughter. Some think she was vowed to perpetual
virginity, while others consider that she was actually
sacrificed.

By a decree of Pharaoh, a new country had been assigned to the remnants of each of the maritime peoples: the towns nearest to Egypt, lying between Raphia and Joppa, were given over to the Philistines, and the forest region and the coast to the north of the Philistines, as far as the Phoenician stations of Dor and Carmel,* were appropriated to the Zakkala. The latter was a military colony, and was chiefly distributed among the five fortresses which commanded the Shephelah.

* We are indebted to the _Papyrus Golenischeff_ for the
mention of the position of the Zakkala at the beginning of
the XXIst dynasty.

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a squeeze.

Gaza and Ashdod were separated from the Mediterranean by a line of sand-dunes, and had nothing in the nature of a sheltered port--nothing, in fact, but a maiuma, or open roadstead, with a few dwellings and storehouses arranged along the beach on which their boats were drawn up. Ascalon was built on the sea, and its harbour, although well enough suited for the small craft of the ancients, could not have been entered by the most insignificant of our modern ships. The Philistines had here their naval arsenal, where their fleets were fitted out for scouring the Egyptian waters as a marine police, or for piratical expeditions on their own account, when the occasion served, along the coasts of Phoenicia. Ekron and Gath kept watch over the eastern side of the plain at the points where it was most exposed to the attacks of the people of the hills--the Canaanites in the first instance, and afterwards the Hebrews. These foreign warriors soon changed their mode of life in contact with the indigenous inhabitants; daily intercourse, followed up by marriages with the daughters of the land, led to the substitution of the language, manners, and religion of the environing race for those of their mother country. The Zakkala, who were not numerous, it is true, lost everything, even to their name, and it was all that the Philistines could do to preserve their own. At the end of one or two generations, the colts of Palestine could only speak the Canaanite tongue, in which a few words of the old Hellenic _patois_ still continued to survive. Their gods were henceforward those of the towns in which they resided, such as Marna and Dagon and Gaza,* Dagon at Ashdod,** Baalzebub at Ekron,*** and Derketô in Ascalon;**** and their mode of worship, with its mingled bloody and obscene rites, followed that of the country.

* Marna, our lord, is mentioned alongside Baalzephon in a
list of strange gods worshipped at Memphis in the XIXth
dynasty. The worship of Dagon at Gaza is mentioned in the
story of Samson (Judges xvi. 21-30).

** The temple and statue of Dagon are mentioned in the
account of the events following the taking of the ark in 1
Sam. v. 1-7. It is, perhaps, to him that 1 Chron. x. 10
refers, in relating how the Philistines hung up Sauls arms
in the house of their gods, although 1 Sam. xxxi. 10 calls
the place the house of the Ashtoreth.

*** Baalzebub was the god of Ekron (2 Kings i. 2-6), and his
name was doubtfully translated Lord of Flies. The
discovery of the name of the town Zebub on the Tell el-
Amarna tablets shows that it means the Baal of Zebub.
Zebub was situated in the Philistine plains, not far from
Ekron. Halévy thinks it may have been a suburb of that town.

**** The worship of Derketô or Atergatis at Ascalon is
witnessed to by the classical writers.

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Insinger.

Two things belonging to their past history they still retained--a clear remembrance of their far-off origin, and that warlike temperament which had enabled them to fight their way through many obstacles from the shores of the Ægean to the frontiers of Egypt. They could recall their island of Caphtor,* and their neighbours in their new home were accustomed to bestow upon them the designation of Cretans, of which they themselves were not a little proud.**

* Jer. xlvii. 4 calls them the remnant of the isle of
Caphtor; Amos (ix. 7) knew that the Lord had brought the
Philistines from Caphtor; and in Dent. ii. 23 it is related
how the Caphtorim which came forth out of Caphtor destroyed
the Avvim, which dwelt in villages as far as Gaza, and dwelt
in their stead. Classical tradition falls in with the sacred
record, and ascribes a Cretan origin to the Philistines; it
is suggested, therefore, that in Gen. x. 14 the names
Casluhim and Caphtorim should be transposed, to bring the
verse into harmony with history and other parts of
Scripture.

** In an episode in the life of David (1 Sam. xxx. 14),
there is mention of the south of the Cherethites, which
some have made to mean Cretans--that is to say, the region
to the south of the Philistines, alongside the territory of
Judah, and to the south of Caleb. Ezelc. xx. 16 also
mentions in juxtaposition with the Philistines the
Cherethites, and the remnant of the sea-coast, as objects
of Gods vengeance for the many evils they had inflicted on
Israel. By the Cherethims here, and the Cherethites in Zoph.
ii. 5, the Cretans are by some thought to be meant, which
would account for their association with the Philistines.

Gaza enjoyed among them a kind of hegemony, alike on account of its strategic position and its favourable situation for commerce, but this supremacy was of very precarious character, and brought with it no right whatever to meddle in the internal affairs of other members of the confederacy. Each of the latter had a chief of its own, a Seren,* and the office of this chief was hereditary in one case at least--Gath, for instance, where there existed a larger Canaanite element than elsewhere, and was there identified with that of melek, ** or king.

* The _sarnê plishtîm_ figure in the narrative of the last
Philistine campaign against Saul (1 Sam. xxix. 2-4, 7, 9).
Their number, five, is expressly mentioned in 1 Sam. vi. 4,
16-18, as well as the names of the towns over which they
ruled.

** Achish was King of Gath (1 Sam. xxi. 10, 12, xxvii. 2),
and probably Maoch before him.

The five Sarnîm assembled in council to deliberate upon common interests, and to offer sacrifices in the name of the Pentapolis. These chiefs were respectively free to make alliances, or to take the field on their own account, but in matters of common importance they acted together, and took their places each at the head of his own contingent.* Their armies were made up of regiments of skilled archers and of pikemen, to whom were added a body of charioteers made up of the princes and the nobles of the nation. The armour for all alike was the coat of scale mail and the helmet of brass; their weapons consisted of the two-edged battle-axe, the bow, the lance, and a large and heavy sword of bronze or iron.**

* Achish, for example, King of Gath, makes war alone against
the pillaging tribes, owing to the intervention of David and
his men, without being called to account by the other
princes (1 Sam. xxvii. 2-12, xxviii. 1, 2), but as soon as
an affair of moment is in contemplation--such as the war
against Saul--they demand the dismissal of David, and Achish
is obliged to submit to his colleagues acting together (1
Sam. xxix.).

** Philistine archers are mentioned in the battle of Gilboa
(1 Sam. xxxi. 3) as well as chariots (2 Sam. i. 6). The
horsemen mentioned in the same connexion are regarded by
some critics as an interpolation, because they cannot bring
themselves to think that the Philistines had cavalry corps
in the Xth century B.C. The Philistine arms are described at
length in the duel between David and Goliath (1 Sam. xvii. 5
-7, 38, 39). They are in some respects like those of the
Homeric heroes.

Their war tactics were probably similar to those of the Egyptians, who were unrivalled in military operations at this period throughout the whole East. Under able leadership, and in positions favourable for the operations of their chariots, the Philistines had nothing to fear from the forces which any of their foes could bring up against them. As to their maritime history, it is certain that in the earliest period, at least, of their sojourn in Syria, as well as in that before their capture by Ramses III., they were successful in sea-fights, but the memory of only one of their expeditions has come down to us: a squadron of theirs having sailed forth from Ascalon somewhere towards the end of the XIIth dynasty,* succeeded in destroying the Sidonian fleet, and pillaging Sidon itself.

* _Justinus_, xviii. 3, § 5. The memory of this has been
preserved, owing to the disputes about precedence which
raged in the Greek period between the Phoenician towns. The
destruction of Sidon must have allowed Tyre to develop and
take the first place.

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from a photograph by Beato.

But however vigorously they may have plied the occupation of Corsairs at the outset of their career, there was, it would appear, a rapid falling off in their maritime prowess; it was on land, and as soldiers, that they displayed their bravery and gained their fame. Their geographical position, indeed, on the direct and almost only route for caravans passing between Asia and Africa, must have contributed to their success. The number of such caravans was considerable, for although Egypt had ceased to be a conquering nation on account of her feebleness at home, she was still one of the great centres of production, and the most important market of the East. A very great part of her trade with foreign countries was carried on through the mouths of the Nile, and of this commerce the Phoenicians had made themselves masters; the remainder followed the land-routes, and passed continually through the territory of the Philistines. These people were in possession of the tract of land which lay between the Mediterranean and the beginning of the southern desert, forming as it were a narrow passage, into which all the roads leading from the Nile to the Euphrates necessarily converged. The chief of these routes was that which crossed Mount Carmel, near Megiddo, and passed up the valleys of the Litâny and the Orontes. This was met at intervals by other secondary roads, such as that which came from Damascus by way of Tabor and the plain of Jezreel, or those which, starting out from the highland of Gilead, led through the fords of the Lower Jordan to Ekron and Gath respectively. The Philistines charged themselves, after the example and at the instigation of the Egyptians, with the maintenance of the great trunk road which was in their hands, and also with securing safe transit along it, as far as they could post their troops, for those who confided themselves to their care. In exchange for these good offices they exacted the same tolls which had been levied by the Canaanites before them.

In their efforts to put down brigandage, they had been brought into contact with some of the Hebrew clans after the latter had taken possession of Canaan. Judah, in its home among the mountains of the Dead Sea, had become acquainted with the diverse races which were found there, and consequently there had been frequent intermarriages between the Hebrews and these peoples. Some critics have argued from this that the chronicler had this fact in his mind when he assigned a Canaanite wife, Shuah, to the father of the tribe himself. He relates how Judah, having separated from his brethren, turned in to a certain Adullamite, whose name was Hiram, and that here he became acquainted with Shuah, by whom he had three sons. With Tamar, the widow of the eldest of the latter, he had accidental intercourse, and two children, Perez and Zerah, the ancestors of numerous families, were born of that union.*

* Gen. xxxviii., where there is a detailed account of
Judahs unions.

Edomites, Arabs, and Midianites were associated with this semi-Canaanite stock--for example, Kain, Caleb, Othniel, Kenaz, Shobal, Ephah, and Jerahmeel, but the Kenites took the first place among them, and played an important part in the history of the conquest of Canaan. It is related how one of their subdivisions, of which Caleb was the eponymous hero, had driven from Hebron the three sons of Anak--Sheshai, Ahiman, and Talmai--and had then promised his daughter Achsah in marriage to him who should capture Debir; this turned out to be his youngest brother Othniel, who captured the city, and at the same time obtained a wife. Hobab, another Kenite, who is represented to have been the brother-in-law of Moses, occupied a position to the south of Arad, in Idumsean territory.* These heterogeneous elements existed alongside each other for a long time without intermingling; they combined, however, now and again to act against a common foe, for we know that the people of Judah aided the tribe of Simeon in the reduction of the city of Zephath;** but they followed an independent course for the most part, and their isolation prevented their obtaining, for a lengthened period, any extension of territory.

* The father-in-law of Moses is called Jethro in Exod. iii.
1, iv. 19, but Raguel in Exod. ii. 18-22. Hobab is the son
of Raguel, Numb. x. 29.

** Judges i. 17, where Zephath is the better reading, and
not Arad, as has been suggested.

They failed, as at first, in their attempts to subjugate the province of Arad, and in their efforts to capture the fortresses which guarded the caravan routes between Ashdod and the mouth of the Jordan. It is related, however, that they overthrew Adoni-bezek, King of the Jebusites, and that they had dealt with him as he was accustomed to deal with his prisoners. And Adoni-bezek said, Threescore and ten kings, having their thumbs and their great toes cut off, gathered their meat under my table: as I have done, so God hath requited me. Although Adoni-bezek had been overthrown, Jerusalem still remained independent, as did also Gibeon. Beeroth, Kirjath-Jearim, Ajalon, Gezer, and the cities of the plain, for the Israelites could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron, with which the Hebrew foot-soldiers found it difficult to deal.* This independent and isolated group was not at first, however, a subject of anxiety to the masters of the coast, and there is but a bare reference to the exploits of a certain Shamgar, son of Anath, who smote of the Philistines six hundred men with an ox-goad. **

* See Josh. ix. 3-27 for an explanation of how these people
were allowed afterwards to remain in a subordinate capacity
among the children of Israel.

** Judges iii. 31; cf. also Judges v. 6, in which Shamgar is
mentioned in the song of Deborah.

Drawn by Boudier, from photograph No. 265 of the _Palestine
Exploration Fund._

These cities had also to reckon with Ephraim, and the tribes which had thrown in their lot with her. Dan had cast his eyes upon the northern districts of the Shephelah--which were dependent upon Ekron or Gath--and also upon the semi-Phoenician port of Joppa; but these tribes did not succeed in taking possession of those districts, although they had harassed them from time to time by raids in which the children of Israel did not always come off victorious. One of their chiefs--Samson--had a great reputation among them for his bravery and bodily strength. But the details of his real prowess had been forgotten at an early period. The episodes which have been preserved deal with some of his exploits against the Philistines, and there is a certain humour in the chroniclers account of the weapons which he employed: with the jawbone of an ass have I smitten a thousand men; he burned up their harvest also by letting go three hundred foxes, with torches attached to their tails, among the standing corn of the Philistines. Various events in his career are subsequently narrated; such as his adventure in the house of the harlot at Gaza, when he carried off the gate of the city and the gate-posts to the top of the mountain that is before Hebron. By Delilahs treachery he was finally delivered over to his enemies, who, having put out his eyes, condemned him to grind in the prison-house. On the occasion of a great festival in honour of Dagon, he was brought into the temple to amuse his captors, but while they were making merry at his expense, he took hold of the two pillars against which he was resting, and bowing himself with all his might, overturned them, and the house fell upon the lords, and upon all the people that were therein. *

* Some learned critics considered Samson to have been a sort
of solar deity.

The tribe of Dan at length became weary of these unprofitable struggles, and determined to seek out another and more easily defensible settlement. They sent out five emissaries, therefore, to look out for a new home. While these were passing through the mountains they called upon a certain Michah in the hill-country of Ephraim and lodged there. Here they took counsel of a Levite whom Michah had made his priest, and, in answer to the question whether their journey would be prosperous, he told them to Go in peace: before the Lord is the way wherein ye go. Their search turned out successful, for they discovered near the sources of the Jordan the town of Laish, whose people, like the Zidonians, dwelt in security, fearing no trouble. On the report of the emissaries, Dan decided to emigrate: the warriors set out to the number of six hundred, carried off by the way the ephod of Micah and the Levite who served before it, and succeeded in capturing Laish, to which they gave the name of their tribe. They there set up for themselves the ephod: and Jonathan, the son of Gershom, the son of Moses, he and his sons were priests to the tribe of the Danites until the day of the captivity of the land. * The tribe of Dan displayed in this advanced post of peril the bravery it had shown on the frontiers of the Shephelah, and showed itself the most bellicose of the tribes of Israel.

* The history of this migration, which is given summarily in
Josh. xix. 47, is, as it now stands, a blending of two
accounts. The presence of a descendant of Moses as a priest
in this local sanctuary probably offended the religious
scruples of a copyist, who substituted Manasseh for Moses
(Judges xviii. 30), but the correction was not generally
accepted. [The R.V. reads Moses where the authorised text
has Manasseh.--Tr.]

It bore out well its character--Dan is a lions whelp that leapeth forth from Bashan on the Hermon;* a serpent in the way, an adder in the path, that biteth the horses heels, so that his rider falleth backward. ** The new position they had taken up enabled them to protect Galilee for centuries against the incursions of the Aramaeans.

* See the Blessing of Moses (Dent, xxxiii. 22).

** These are the words used in the Blessing of Jacob (Gen.
xlix. 17).

Drawn by Boudier, from photograph No. 100 of the _Palestine
Exploration Fund._

Their departure, however, left the descendants of Joseph unprotected, with Benjamin as their only bulwark. Benjamin, like Dan, was one of the tribes which contained scarcely more than two or three clans, but compensated for the smallness of their numbers by their energy and tenacity of character: lying to the south of Ephraim, they had developed into a breed of hardy adventurers, skilled in handling the bow and sling, accustomed from childhood to use both hands indifferently, and always ready to set out on any expedition, not only against the Canaanites, but, if need be, against their own kinsfolk.* They had consequently aroused the hatred of both friend and foe, and we read that the remaining tribes at length decreed their destruction; a massacre ensued, from which six hundred Benjamites only escaped to continue the race.** Their territory adjoined on the south that of Jerusalem, the fortress of the Jebusites, and on the west the powerful confederation of which Gibeon was the head. It comprised some half-dozen towns--Ramah, Anathoth, Michmash, and Nob, and thus commanded both sides of the passes leading from the Shephelah into the valley of the Jordan. The Benjamites were in the habit of descending suddenly upon merchants who were making their way to or returning from Gilead, and of robbing them of their wares; sometimes they would make a raid upon the environs of Ekron and Gath, like a wolf that ravineth: realising the prediction of Jacob, in the morning he shall devour the prey, and at even he shall divide the spoil. ***

* Benjamin signifies, properly speaking, the Southern.

** Story of the Lévite of Ephraim (Judges xix.-xxi.). The
groundwork of it contains only one historical element. The
story of the Lévite is considered by some critics to be of a
later date than the rest of the text.

*** He is thus characterised in the Blessing of Jacob (Gen.
xlix. 27). VOL. VI. X

The Philistines never failed to make reprisals after each raid, and the Benjamites were no match for their heavily armed battalions; but the labyrinth of ravines and narrow gorges into which the Philistines had to penetrate to meet their enemy was a favourable region for guerilla warfare, in which they were no match for their opponents. Peace was never of long duration on this ill-defined borderland, and neither intercourse between one village and another, alliances, nor intermarriage between the two peoples had the effect of interrupting hostilities; even when a truce was made at one locality, the feud would be kept up at other points of contact. All details of this conflict have been lost, and we merely know that it terminated in the defeat of the house of Joseph, a number of whom were enslaved. The ancient sanctuary of Shiloh still continued to be the sacred town of the Hebrews, as it had been under the Canaanites, and the people of Ephraim kept there the ark of Jahveh-Sabaoth, the Lord of Hosts. * It was a chest of wood, similar in shape to the shrine which surmounted the sacred barks of the Egyptian divinities, but instead of a prophesying statue, it contained two stones on which, according to the belief of a later age, the law had been engraved.** Yearly festivals were celebrated before it, and it was consulted as an oracle by all the Israelites. Eli, the priest to whose care it was at this time consigned, had earned universal respect by the austerity of his life and by his skill in interpreting the divine oracles.***

* At the very opening of the _First Book of Samuel_ (i. 3),
Shiloh is mentioned as being the sanctuary of _Jahveh-
Sabaoth_, Jahveh the Lord of hosts. The tradition preserved
in Josh, xviii. 1, removes the date of its establishment as
far back as the earliest times of the Israelite conquest.

** The idea that the Tables of the Law were enclosed in the
Ark is frequently expressed in Exodus and in subsequent
books of the Hexateuch.

*** The history of Eli extends over chaps, i.-iv. of the
_First Book of Samuel_; it is incorporated with that of
Samuel, and treats only of the events which accompanied the
destruction of the sanctuary of Shiloh by the Philistines.

His two sons, on the contrary, took advantage of his extreme age to annoy those who came up to worship, and they were even accused of improper behaviour towards the women who served at the door of the tabernacle. They appropriated to themselves a larger portion of the victims than they were entitled to, extracting from the caldron the meat offerings of the faithful after the sacrifice was over by means of flesh-hooks. Their misdeeds were such, that men abhorred the offering of the Lord, and yet the reverence for the ark was so great in the minds of the people, that they continued to have recourse to it on every occasion of national danger.* The people of Ephraim and Benjamin having been defeated once between Eben-ezer and Aphek, bore the ark in state to the battle-field, that its presence might inspire them with confidence. The Philistines were alarmed at its advent, and exclaimed, God is come into the camp. Woe unto us! Who shall deliver us out of the hand of these mighty gods?... Be strong, and quit yourselves like men, O ye Philistines, that ye be not servants unto the Hebrews, as they have been to you. ** In response to this appeal, their troops fought so boldly that they once more gained a victory. 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. And when he came, lo, Eli sat upon his 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. And when Eli heard the noise of the crying, he said, What meaneth the noise of this tumult? And the man hasted, and came and told Eli. Now Eli was ninety and eight years old; and his eyes were set, that he could not see. And the man said unto Eli, I am he that came out of the army, and I fled to-day out of the army. And he said, How went the matter, my son? And he that brought the tidings answered and said, Israel is fled before the Philistines, and there hath been also a great slaughter among the people, and thy two sons also, Hophni and Phineas, are dead, and the ark of God is taken. And it came to pass, when he made mention of the ark of God, that he fell from off his seat backward by the side of the gate, and his neck brake, and he died: for he was an old man, and heavy. ***

* Sam. iv. 12-18.

** This is not mentioned in the sacred books; but certain
reasons for believing this destruction to have taken place
are given by Stade.

*** The Philistine garrison at Geba (Gibeah) is mentioned in
1 Sam. xiii. 3, i.

The defeat of Eben-ezer completed, at least for a time, the overthrow of the tribes of Central Canaan. The Philistines destroyed the sanctuary of Shiloh, and placed a garrison at Gibeah to keep the Benjamites in subjection, and to command the route of the Jordan;* it would even appear that they pushed their advance-posts beyond Carmel in order to keep in touch with the independent Canaanite cities such as Megiddo, Taanach, and Bethshan, and to ensure a free use of the various routes leading in the direction of Damascus, Tyre, and Coele-Syria.**

* After the victory at Gilboa, the Philistines exposed the
dead bodies of Saul and his sons upon the walls of Bethshan
(1 Sam. xxxi. 10, 12), which they would not have been able
to do had the inhabitants not been allies or vassals.
Friendly relations with Bethshan entailed almost as a matter
of course some similar understanding with the cities of the
plain of Jezreel.

** 1 Sam. vii. 16, 17. These verses represent, as a matter
of fact, all that we know of Samuel anterior to his
relations with Saul. This account seems to represent him as
exercising merely a restricted influence over the territory
of Benjamin and the south of Ephraim. It was not until the
prophetic period that, together with Eli, he was made to
figure as Judge of all Israel.

The Philistine power continued dominant for at least half a century. The Hebrew chroniclers, scandalised at the prosperity of the heathen, did their best to abridge the time of the Philistine dominion, and interspersed it with Israelitish victories. Just at this time, however, there lived a man who was able to inspire them with fresh hope. He was a priest of Bamah, Samuel, the son of Elkanah, who had acquired the reputation of being a just and wise judge in the towns of Bethel, Gilgal, and Mizpah; and he judged Israel in all those places, and his return was to Bamah, for there was his house... and he built there an altar unto the Lord. To this man the whole Israelite nation attributed with pride the deliverance of their race. The sacred writings relate how his mother, the pious Hannah, had obtained his birth from Jahveh after years of childlessness, and had forthwith devoted him to the service of God. She had sent him to Shiloh at the age of three years, and there, clothed in a linen tunic and in a little robe which his mother made for him herself, he ministered before God in the presence of Eli. One night it happened, when the latter was asleep in his place, and the lamp of God was not yet gone out, and Samuel was laid down to sleep in the temple of the Lord, where the ark of God was, that the Lord called Samuel: and he said, Here am I. And he ran unto Eli, and said, Here am I; for thou calledst me. And he said, I called thee not; lie down again. Twice again the voice was heard, and at length Eli perceived that it was God who had called the child, and he bade him reply: Speak, Lord; for Thy servant heareth. From thenceforward Jahveh was with him, and did let none of his words fall to the ground. And all Israel from Dan even to Beersheba knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet of the Lord. Twenty years after the sad death of his master, Samuel felt that the moment had come to throw off the Philistine yoke; he exhorted the people to put away their false gods, and he assembled them at Mizpah to absolve them from their sins. The Philistines, suspicious of this concourse, which boded ill for the maintenance of their authority, arose against him. And when the children of Israel heard it, they were afraid of the Philistines. And Samuel took a sucking lamb, and offered it for a whole burnt offering unto the Lord: and Samuel cried unto the Lord for Israel, and the Lord answered him. The Philistines, demoralised by the thunderstorm which ensued, were overcome on the very spot where they had triumphed over the sons of Eli, and fled in disorder to their own country. Then Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpah and Shen, and called the name of it Eben-ezer (the Stone of Help), saying, Hitherto hath the Lord helped us. He next attacked the Tyrians and the Amorites, and won back from them all the territory they had conquered.* One passage, in which Samuel is not mentioned, tells us how heavily the Philistine yoke had weighed upon the people, and explains their long patience by the fact that their enemies had taken away all their weapons. Now there was no smith found throughout all the land of Israel: for the Philistines said, Lest the Hebrews make them swords or spears; and whoever needed to buy or repair the most ordinary agricultural implements was forced to address himself to the Philistine blacksmiths.** The very extremity of the evil worked its own cure. The fear of the Midian-ites had already been the occasion of the ephemeral rule of Jerubbaal and Abimelech; the Philistine tyranny forced first the tribes of Central and then those of Southern Canaan to unite under the leadership of one man. In face of so redoubtable an enemy and so grave a peril a greater effort was required, and the result was proportionate to their increased activity.

* This manner of retaliating against the Philistines for the
disaster they had formerly inflicted on Israel, is supposed
by some critics to be an addition of a later date, either
belonging to the time of the prophets, or to the period when
the Jews, without any king or settled government, rallied at
Mizpah. According to these scholars, 1 Sam. vii. 2-14 forms
part of a biography, written at a time when the foundation
of the Benjamite monarchy had not as yet been attributed to
Saul.

** 1 Sam. xiii. 20, 21.

The Manassite rule extended at most over two or three clans, but that of Saul and David embraced the Israelite nation.* Benjamin at that time reckoned among its most powerful chiefs a man of ancient and noble family--Saul, the son of Kish--who possessed extensive flocks and considerable property, and was noted for his personal beauty, for there was not among the children of Israel a goodlier person than he: from his shoulders and upward he was higher than any of the people. ** He had already reached mature manhood, and had several children, the eldest of whom, Jonathan, was well known as a skilful and brave soldier, while Sauls reputation was such that his kinsmen beyond Jordan had recourse to his aid as to a hero whose presence would secure victory. The Ammonites had laid siege to Jabesh-Gilead, and the town was on the point of surrendering; Saul came to their help, forced the enemy to raise the siege, and inflicted such a severe lesson upon them, that during the whole of his lifetime they did not again attempt hostilities. He was soon after proclaimed king by the Benjamites, as Jerubbaal had been raised to authority by the Manassites on the morrow of his victory.***

* The beginning of Sauls reign, up to his meeting with
David, will be found in 1 Sam. viii.-xv. We can distinguish
the remains of at least two ancient narratives, which the
writer of the Book of Samuel has put together in order to
form a complete and continuous account. As elsewhere in this
work, I have confined myself to accepting the results at
which criticism has arrived, without entering into detailed
discussions which do not come within the domain of history.

** 1 Sam. ix. 2. In one account he is represented as quite a
young man, whose father is still in the prime of life (1
Sam. ix.), but this cannot refer to the time of the
Philistine war, where we find him accompanied, at the very
outset of his reign, by his son, who is already skilled in
the use of weapons.

*** 1 Sam. xi. According to the text of the Septuagint, the
war against the Ammonites broke out a month after Saul had
been secretly anointed by Samuel; his popular proclamation
did not take place till after the return from the campaign.

We learn from the sacred writings that Samuels influence had helped to bring about these events. It had been shown him by the divine voice that Saul was to be the chosen ruler, and he had anointed him and set him before the people as their appointed lord; the scene of this must have been either Mizpah or Gilgal.*

* One narrative appears to represent him as being only the
priest or local prophet of Hamah, and depicts him as
favourable to the establishment of the monarchy (1 Sam. ix.
1-27, x. 1-16); the other, however, admits that he was
judge of all Israel, and implies that he was hostile to the
choice of a king (1 Sam. viii. 1-22, x. 17, 27, xii. 1-25)

The accession of a sovereign who possessed the allegiance of all Israel could not fail to arouse the vigilance of their Philistine oppressors; Jonathan, however, anticipated their attack and captured Gibeah. The five kings at once despatched an army to revenge this loss; the main body occupied Michmash, almost opposite to the stronghold taken from them, while three bands of soldiers were dispersed over the country, ravaging as they went, with orders to attack Saul in the rear. The latter had only six hundred men, with whom he scarcely dared to face so large a force; besides which, he was separated from the enemy by the Wady Suweinît, here narrowed almost into a gorge between two precipitous rocks, and through which no body of troops could penetrate without running the risk of exposing themselves in single file to the enemy. Jonathan, however, resolved to attempt a surprise in broad daylight, accompanied only by his armour-bearer. There was a rocky crag on the one side, and a rooky crag on the other side: and the name of the one was Bozez (the Shining), and the name of the other Seneh (the Acacia). The one crag rose up on the north in front of Michmash, and the other on the south in front of Geba (Gribeah). The two descended the side of the gorge, on the top of which they were encamped, and prepared openly to climb the opposite side. The Philistine sentries imagined they were deserters, and said as they approached: Behold, the Hebrews come forth out of the holes where they had hid themselves. And the men of the garrison answered Jonathan and his armour-bearer, and said, Come up to us, and we will show you a thing. And Jonathan said unto his armour-bearer, Come up after me: for the Lord hath delivered them into the hand of Israel. And Jonathan climbed up upon his hands and upon his feet, and his armour-bearer after him: and they fell before Jonathan; and his armour-bearer slew them after him. And that first slaughter that Jonathan and his armour-bearer made, was about twenty men, within as it were half a furrows length in an acre of land. From Gribeah, where Sauls troops were in ignorance of what was passing, the Benjamite sentinels could distinguish a tumult. Saul guessed that a surprise had taken place, and marched upon the enemy.

Drawn by Boudier, from photograph No. 402 of the _Palestine
Exploration Fund_.

The Philistines were ousted from their position, and pursued hotly beyond Bethel as far as Ajalon.* This constituted the actual birthday of the Israelite monarchy.

* The account of these events, separated by the parts
relating to the biography of Samuel (1 Sam. xiii. 76-15a,
thought by some to be of a later date), and of the breaking
by Jonathan of the fast enjoined by Saul (1 Sam. xiv. 23-
45), covers 1 Sam. xiii. 3-7a, 156-23, xiv. 1-22, 46. The
details appear to be strictly historical; the number of the
Philistines, however, seems to be exaggerated; 30,000
chariots, and 6000 horsemen, and people as the sand which is
on the sea-shore in multitude (1 Sam. xiii. 5).

Gilead, the whole house of Joseph--Ephraim and Manasseh--and Benjamin formed its nucleus, and were Sauls strongest supporters. We do not know how far his influence extended northwards; it probably stopped short at the neighbourhood of Mount Tabor, and the Galileans either refused to submit to his authority, or acknowledged it merely in theory. In the south the clans of Judah and Simeon were not long in rallying round him, and their neighbours the Kenites, with Caleb and Jerahmeel, soon followed their example. These southerners, however, appear to have been somewhat half-hearted in their allegiance to the Benjamite king: it was not enough to have gained their adhesion--a stronger tie was needed to attach them to the rest of the nation. Saul endeavoured to get rid of the line of Canaanite cities which isolated them from Ephraim, but he failed in the effort, we know not from what cause, and his attempt produced no other result than to arouse against him the hatred of the Gibeonite inhabitants.* He did his best to watch over the security of his new subjects, and protected them against the Amalekites, who were constantly harassing them.

* The fact is made known to us by an accidental mention of
it in 2 Sam. xxi. 1-11. The motive which induced Saul to
take arms against the Gibeonites is immediately apparent
when we realise the position occupied by Gideon between
Judah and the tribes of Central Canaan.

Their king, Agag, happening to fall into his hands, he killed him, and destroyed several of their nomad bands, thus inspiring the remainder with a salutary terror.* Subsequent tradition credited him with victories gained over all the enemies of Israel--over Moab, Edom, and even the Aramaeans of Zobah--it endowed him even with the projects and conquests of David. At any rate, the constant incursions of the Philistines could not have left him much time for fighting in the north and east of his domains. Their defeat at Gibeah was by no means a decisive one, and they quickly recovered from the blow; the conflict with them lasted to the end of Sauls lifetime, and during the whole of this period he never lost an opportunity of increasing his army.**

The monarchy was as yet in a very rudimentary state, without either the pomp or accessories usually associated with royalty in the ancient kingdoms of the East. Saul, as King of Israel, led much the same sort of life as when he was merely a Benjamite chief. He preferred to reside at Gibeah, in the house of his forefathers, with no further resources than those yielded by the domain inherited from his ancestors, together with the spoil taken in battle.***

* The part taken by Samuel in the narrative of Sauls war
against the Amalekites (1 Sam. xv.) is thought by some
critics to have been introduced with a view of exalting the
prophets office at the expense of the king and the
monarchy. They regard 1 Sam. xiv. 48 as being the sole
historic ground of the narrative.

** 1 Sam. xiv. 47. We may admit his successful skirmishes
with Moab, but some writers maintain that the defeat of the
Edomites and Aramaeans is a mere anticipation, and consider
that the passage is only a reflection of 2 Sam. viii. 8, and
reproduces the list of the wars of David, with the exception
of the expedition against Damascus.

*** Gibeah is nowhere expressly mentioned as being the
capital of Saul, but the name Gibeah of Saul which it bore
shows that it must have been the royal residence; the names
of the towns mentioned in the account of Sauls pursuit of
David--Naioth, Eamah, and Nob--are all near to Gibeah. It
was also at Gibeah that the Gibeonites slew seven of the
sons and grandsons of Saul (2 Sam. xxi. 6-9), no doubt to
bring ignominy on the family of the first king in the very
place in which they had governed.

All that he had, in addition to his former surroundings, were a priesthood attached to the court, and a small army entirely at his own disposal. Ahijah, a descendant of Eli, sacrificed for the king when the latter did not himself officiate; he fulfilled the office of chaplain to him in time of war, and was the mouthpiece of the divine oracles when these were consulted as to the propitious moment for attacking the enemy.

Drawn by Faucher-Gudin, from the bronze original in the
Louvre.

The army consisted of a nucleus of Benjamites, recruited from the kings clan, with the addition of any adventurers, whether Israelites or strangers, who were attracted to enlist under a popular military chief.* It comprised archers, slingers, and bands of heavily armed infantry, after the fashion of the Phoenician, bearing pikes. We can gam some idea of their appearance and equipment from the bronze statuettes of an almost contemporary period, which show us the Phoenician foot-soldiers or the barbarian mercenaries in the pay of the Phoenician cities: they wear the horizontally striped loin-cloth of the Syrians, leaving the arms and legs entirely bare, and the head is protected by a pointed or conical helmet.

* Ahijah (1 Sam. xiv. 3), son of Ahitub, great-grandson of
Eli, appears to be the same as Ahimelech, son of Ahitub, who
subsequently helped David (1 Sam. xxi. 1-10), and was
massacred by order of Saul (1 Sam. xxii. 9-19). The scribe
must have been shocked by the name Melech--that of the god
Milik [Moloch]--and must have substituted Jah or Jahveh.

Saul possessed none of the iron-bound chariots which always accompanied the Qanaanite infantry; these heavy vehicles would have been entirely out of place in the mountain districts, which were the usual field of operations for the Israelite force.* We are unable to ascertain whether the kings soldiers received any regular pay, but we know that the spoil was divided between the prince and his men, each according to his rank and in proportion to the valour he had displayed.** In cases of necessity, the whole of the tribes were assembled, and a selection was made of all those capable of bearing arms. This militia, composed mainly of a pastoral peasantry in the prime of life, capable of heroic efforts, was nevertheless ill-disciplined, liable to sudden panics, and prone to become disbanded on the slightest reverse.***

* With regard to the use of the bow among Sauls soldiers,
cf. 1 Sam. xx. 18-42, where we find the curious scene of the
meeting of David and Jonathan, when the latter came out of
Gibeah on the pretext of practising with bow and arrows. The
accoutrement of the Hebrews is given in the passage where
Saul lends his armour to David before meeting with Goliath
(1 Sam. xvii. 38, 39).

** Cf. the quarrel which took place between the soldiers of
David about the spoil taken from the Amalekites, and the
manner in which the strife was decided by David (1 Sam. xxx.
21-25)

*** Saul, for instance, assembles the people and makes a
selection to attack the Philistines (1 Sam. xiii. 2, 4, 7)
against the Ammonites (1 Sam. xi. 7, 8) and against the
Amalekites (1 Sam. xv. 4).