Commentaria in I Regum (I Samuelis)
Chapter the Fourth
It narrates that the calamities foretold by Samuel actually befell Heli and his sons, as well as all Israel, namely that 34 thousand were slain by the Philistines, the ark taken, Ophni and Phinees slain: whence Heli, hearing this, falling from his seat expired; and the wife of Phinees, her labour hastened by sorrow, bore Ichabod, saying: The glory is gone from Israel.
1. And it came to pass in those days, that the Philistines gathered themselves together to fight: and Israel went out to meet the Philistines in battle, and camped by the Stone of help. And the Philistines came to Aphec, 2. and put themselves in array against Israel. And when they had joined battle, Israel turned their backs to the Philistines: and there were slain in that fight, here and there in the fields, about four thousand men. 3. And the people returned to the camp: and the ancients of Israel said: Why hath the Lord defeated us to day before the Philistines? Let us fetch unto us the ark of the covenant of the Lord from Silo, and let it come in the midst of us, that it may save us from the hand of our enemies. 4. So the people sent to Silo, and they took from thence the ark of the covenant of the Lord of hosts, sitting upon the cherubims: and the two sons of Heli, Ophni and Phinees, were with the ark of the covenant of God. 5. And when the ark of the covenant of the Lord was come into the camp, all Israel shouted with a great shout, and the earth rang again. 6. And the Philistines heard the noise of the shout, and they said: What is this noise of a 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, saying: God is come into the camp. And sighing, they said: 8. Woe to us: for there was no such great joy yesterday and the day before: woe to us. Who shall deliver us from the hand of these high Gods? these are the gods that struck Egypt with all the plagues in the desert. 9. Take courage, ye Philistines, and quit yourselves like men: lest you serve the Hebrews, as they have served you: take courage and fight. 10. So the Philistines fought, and Israel was overthrown, and every man fled to his own dwelling: and there was a very great slaughter: for there fell of Israel thirty thousand footmen. 11. And the ark of God was taken: and the two sons of Heli, Ophni and Phinees, were slain. 12. And there ran a man of Benjamin out of the army, and came to Silo the same day, with his garments rent, and his head strewed with dust. 13. And when he was come, Heli sat upon a stool watching by the wayside. For his heart was fearful for the ark of God. And when the man was come into the city, he told it: and all the city cried out. 14. And Heli heard the noise of the outcry, and he said: What meaneth the noise of this tumult? But he made haste, and came and told Heli. 15. Now Heli was ninety and eight years old, and his eyes were dim, and he could not see. 16. And he said to Heli: I am he that am come from the battle, and I have fled today out of the field. And he said to him: What is there done, my son? 17. And he that brought the tidings answered and said: Israel is fled before the Philistines, and there hath been a great slaughter of the people: moreover thy two sons, Ophni and Phinees, are dead, and the ark of God is taken. 18. And when he had named the ark of God, he fell from his stool backward by the door, and broke his neck and died. For he was an old man, and far advanced in years. And he judged Israel forty years. 19. And his daughter in law, the wife of Phinees, was big with child, and near her time: and hearing the news that the ark of God was taken, and that her father in law and her husband were dead, she bowed herself, and brought forth: for her pains came upon her on a sudden. 20. And when she was at the point of death, they that stood about her said to her: Fear not, for thou hast brought forth a son. And she answered them not, neither did she take notice. 21. And she called the child Ichabod, saying: The glory is departed from Israel, because the ark of God was taken, and for her father in law, and her husband. 22. And she said: The glory is departed from Israel, because the ark of God was taken.
and they had obtained the victory, as is plain chapter 7, verse 19. Moreover “the camp (castra) is so called as if chaste (casta), because there
1. AND IT CAME TO PASS IN THOSE DAYS.—Behold, here are fulfilled the prophecy of Samuel and the threat of God, and the calamities threatened by him to Heli and his sons, and to all Israel. How much time intervened from the prophecy of Samuel to this fulfilment is uncertain. Serarius and Abulensis think it was fulfilled the same year; for it was uttered in year 98, and the last of Heli, in which he, hearing of the capture of the ark, fell and expired. It is truer that some years intervened. For Samuel foretold this calamity when he was a boy, as was said chapter 3, verse 4; but this calamity happened when he was a man, or at least a youth; for Heli being dead Samuel immediately succeeded to the governance of the people; he was therefore older and of mature age. Salianus, as I said, thinks that 26 years intervened, so that Samuel became judge after Heli in his 39th year. Mendoza judges that 18 or 28 years intervened; others more, others fewer.
AND CAMPED BY THE STONE OF HELP.—It was a place so named afterwards by Samuel, because in it the Hebrews in battle had felt the help of God, ... lust was restrained, because no women were among them,” says Isidore, book 9, Origen, chapter 2. Let leaders and soldiers note this; for so they will be stronger, and will obtain the victory.
3. LET US FETCH UNTO US THE ARK OF THE COVENANT OF THE LORD FROM SILO.—For the Hebrews had often experienced the presence and help of God sitting upon the ark and giving answers from the propitiatory, as at the crossing of the Jordan, the taking of Jericho, etc.; much greater confidence have Christians in the sacrament of the Eucharist and the relics of the Saints, which therefore in danger of war, famine, plague they carry about with Litanies in supplications in solemn pomp, and often experience wonderful help thence. See Abulensis here, Question 5. Hear St. Athanasius, On the interpretation of the Psalms to Marcellinus: “If war,” he says, “threatened the people, the ark, in which were the tables of the law, went before all, and this sufficed them as a help instead of any army; unless in the bearers of the ark, or in the people, some crime or hypocrisy clung. For faith and sound affection are needed, that the law may co-operate with our prayers.”
7. GOD IS COME INTO THE CAMP,—because the ark was as it were the throne of God. Add that the Philistines, accustomed to the adoration and worship of idols and images, thought the ark to be the God, or idol, of the Hebrews; or at least the wiser among them judged that the power of God, and something divine, was enclosed in the ark; for they thought something of the kind about their own idols. So Abulensis, especially because they saw God work such wonders through the ark. Whence, chapter 6, verse 19, God smote fifty thousand of the people, because they had looked upon the ark.
Allegorically, the ark of the covenant is the humanity of Christ, especially in the Eucharist, on account of the many analogies on both sides, which St. Bonaventure recounts, sermon 9 for the fourth Sunday of Advent: “The ark of God,” he says, “is ordered to be wrapped in a veil, Numbers chapter 4, verse 5; in the veil, then, was the ark, in the ark the urn, in the urn the manna. By the veil the Sacramental species are signified, by the ark the body of Christ, by the urn the soul, by the manna the deity. This ark the Philistines fear, that is, the demons; nay they fear even a drop of the blood of Christ.” And he cites St. Chrysostom, who says: “Wherever they have seen blood, the demons flee, but Angels run to it.”
8. THESE ARE THE GODS THAT STRUCK EGYPT WITH ALL THE PLAGUES IN THE DESERT,—that is, in the Red Sea, which is near the desert of Arabia, says Vatablus; for in this sea God drowned Pharao with the whole camp of the Egyptians.
Serarius and others supply the conjunction and. Whence the Septuagint have, and in the desert. And the Chaldee, He smote the Egyptians with every stroke, and for His people worked many miracles in the desert.
AND THERE FELL OF ISRAEL THIRTY THOUSAND FOOTMEN.—For the Hebrews fought on foot, scarcely on horse, because God, Deuteronomy chapter 17, forbade them, if not the use, at least the abundance of horses, lest they should place the hope of victory in them, not in God. From this common slaughter of so many thousands it is plain that not only the priestly sons of Heli, but the people too, had offended God by neglect of the temple, the victims, the offerings, and other crimes. For the people imitates the priests. So Abulensis. Hear St. Jerome, epistle 3 to Heliodorus, recounting the calamities of the Roman Empire and suggesting their cause: “By our sins the barbarians are strong; by our vices the Roman army is overcome.” And a little after: “Unhappy we, who so displease God that through the rage of the Barbarians His anger rages against us.”
11. AND THE ARK OF GOD WAS TAKEN.—Why did God permit it? Procopius gives two causes: The first is, to teach the Hebrews, living rightly, to trust in the providence of God; but, sinning, to trust neither in the ark nor in God Himself. “Transgressors of the law,” says the Author of the Marvels of Holy Scripture, book 2, chapter 7 (it is in volume 3 of St. Augustine). “The ark of the law does not protect at all; but the law that was in it accuses,” says Theodoret. The second, that the Philistines, taking the ark, might recognize its force and power from the plagues sent by it, which we shall hear in the next chapter, and so fear and worship the God of the Hebrews.