Commentaria in I Regum (I Samuelis)
Chapter the Seventh. Synopsis of the Chapter
The ark is transferred from Bethsames to Cariathiarim; in the twentieth year after the translation, Samuel, the covenant being renewed, wholly purges Israel of idols and binds it to the one God. Then, when the Philistines attack, praying and sacrificing, he strikes them with thunder; whence the Hebrews cut down the stricken, so that during the whole time of Samuel they were humbled. Wherefore Samuel judged Israel in quiet all his life.
1. And the men of Cariathiarim came and fetched the ark of the Lord, and brought it into the house of Abinadab in Gabaa; and they sanctified Eleazar his son, to keep the ark of the Lord. 2. And it came to pass, that from the day that the ark of the Lord abode in Cariathiarim, the days were multiplied (for it was now the twentieth year) and all the house of Israel rested after the Lord. 3. And Samuel spoke to all the house of Israel, saying: If you turn to the Lord with all your heart, put away the strange gods from among you, Baalim and Astaroth, and prepare your hearts for the Lord, and serve him only, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Philistines. 4. Then the children of Israel put away Baalim and Astaroth, and served the Lord only. 5. And Samuel said: Gather all Israel to Masphath, that I may pray to the Lord for you. 6. And they were gathered together to Masphath: and they drew water, and poured it out before the Lord, and they fasted on that day, and said there: We have sinned against the Lord. And Samuel judged the children of Israel in Masphath. 7. And the Philistines heard that the children of Israel were gathered together to Masphath, and the princes of the Philistines went up against Israel. And when the children of Israel heard this, they were afraid of the Philistines. 8. And they said to Samuel: Cease not to cry to the Lord our God for us, that he may save us out of the hand of the Philistines. 9. And Samuel took a sucking lamb, and offered it whole for a holocaust to the Lord; and Samuel cried to the Lord for Israel, and the Lord heard him. 10. And it came to pass, when Samuel was offering the holocaust, that the Philistines began the battle against Israel: but the Lord thundered with a great thunder that day upon the Philistines, and terrified them, and they were slain before the face of Israel. 11. And the men of Israel going out of Masphath pursued the Philistines, and slew them till they came under Bethchar. 12. And Samuel took one stone, and put it between Masphath and Sen; and he called the name of that place, The stone of help. And he said: Hitherto the Lord has helped us. 13. And the Philistines were humbled, and they came no more into the borders of Israel. And the hand of the Lord was upon the Philistines all the days of Samuel. 14. And the cities which the Philistines had taken from Israel were restored to Israel, from Accaron to Geth, and their borders: and he delivered Israel out of the hand of the Philistines, and there was peace between Israel and the Amorrhite. 15. And Samuel judged Israel all the days of his life; 16. and he went every year about to Bethel, and to Galgal, and to Masphath, and he judged Israel in the aforesaid places, 17. And he returned to Ramatha: for there was his house, and there he judged Israel; and he built there also an altar to the Lord.
1. AND THE MEN OF CARIATHIARIM CAME AND FETCHED THE ARK,—Cariathiarim, the city of the Woods, which is also called Cariath-baal and Bala, Baala, sometimes Baal and Pharesim, and jointly Baalpharasim, and by Jerome also Jarim. Hear Adrichomius, p. 22: “It is four and a half miles from Jerusalem, for those going toward the west to Diospolis. Jerome says one mile. It was first a city of the Gabaonites, afterwards of the tribe of Juda, and is the boundary of the tribes of Juda and Benjamin, set on a hill. In it the ark of the Lord abode twenty years in the house of Abinadab, which was in Gabaa, that is, on the height, until it was transferred to Jerusalem by David. Of this city was Zacharias, son of Joiada, whom they slew between the temple and the altar. Of this city was Urias the prophet, whom king Joachim slew in Jerusalem.”
INTO THE HOUSE OF ABINADAB IN GABAA.—“Gabaa”: this was not the city Gabaa in the tribe of Benjamin, Josue chap. 18, as Angelomus, Rupert, Lyranus and the Rabbis would have it; but it was a hill or higher place in the city of Cariathiarim (in which the house of Abinadab stood); for it is clear from verses 1 and 2 that the ark was carried to it. For Gabaa in Hebrew signifies a hill or a high place; whence our version and the Septuagint, in book 1 Paralipomenon 13, render it hill. So Josephus, book 6 of the Antiquities chap. 1, Bede, Dionysius, Cajetan, Vatablus, Tornielli, Serarius, Salianus and others. Bede adds that this hill was the citadel of the whole city: that place, therefore, being lofty, honored and fortified, was suited to the ark, which was as it were the citadel of all Israel. Hence the ark was a type of the Blessed Virgin, who, exalted above all the hills, protects all who invoke her.
AND THEY SANCTIFIED ELEAZAR HIS SON,—that is, they consecrated him through Achitob the High Priest, dwelling in the city of Silo; either as a Levite, as Abulensis, Theodoret, Procopius and Cajetan would have it, or as a Priest, as Angelomus, Hugo and Dionysius judge. For he was a just man, says Josephus: or they sanctified, that is, chose, destined, fitted and set him over the keeping of the ark; so also the Chaldee, Josephus, Abulensis, Clarius, Vatablus.
2. FOR IT WAS NOW THE TWENTIETH YEAR—of the translation and change of place of the ark to Cariathiarim, and which consequently was the twentieth year from the death of Heli and from the leadership of Samuel, who succeeded Heli. For in about the same year in which the ark was taken, and brought back, and transferred from Bethsames to Cariathiarim, Heli died and Samuel was put in his place: so Lyranus, Abulensis, Salianus, Mendoza and others; although Cajetan, Genebrard and Melchior Canus, book 11 On the Commonplaces, chap. 5, and following them Serarius, think that Samuel began to judge Israel only after these twenty years were completed, and to go about the province preaching, that he might lead all from idols to the worship of God. Whence also St. Jerome (or whoever the author is) in the Quaestiones: “From the time,” he says, “when the priesthood of Heli was reprobated, until the leadership of Samuel, there were twenty years of miseries and servitude.” But that Samuel entered upon the leadership immediately from the death of Heli is clear from the chronology which I assigned at Judges chap. 3 and 4. Furthermore the ark remained thenceforth in Cariathiarim until the seventh year of the reign of David, who, as is said in 1 Paral. chap. 13, verse 5, clearly and expressly, transferred it from there to the house of Obededom; thence to Mount Sion; thence it was brought over into the temple built by Solomon. Although St. Jerome, Angelomus and Lyranus suppose that the ark was transferred from Cariathiarim after the twentieth year to Maspha, thence to Galgala, thence to Nobe, thence to Gabaa, thence to the house of Obededom, because we read that sacrifice was offered in these places. But this does not prove that the ark was there. For outside the place of the tabernacle and the ark, the Hebrews often sacrificed for extraordinary and special reasons. So Abulensis. Otherwise they ordinarily offered sacrifices not where the ark was, but where the tabernacle was; for in it was the altar appointed for the sacrifices of holocausts. The tabernacle, therefore, was separate from the ark, and was moved from Silo to Nobe, and thence to Gabaa before the times of Saul, while the ark was in Cariathiarim. Whence the ark was led out by Saul to the battle, chap. 14, and after the battle was brought back.
AND ALL ISRAEL RESTED AFTER THE LORD,—The Interpreter reads, with the Chaldee, nachu, from the root nuach, that is, to rest. Now they read nahu, from the root naha, that is, to lament. Whence Vatablus renders, and with a certain lamentation all the house of Israel panted after the Lord; Abulensis, and hastened after the Lord. The sense is the same, but more forceful, as if to say: All the people of Israel, terrified by the slaughter of Heli and the plagues inflicted by God through the ark, for twenty years rested in the true worship of the one God, and this at the exhortation and urging of Samuel, as follows; even though some still worshipped Baalim and Astaroth, not publicly but in private; for these Samuel removed in the following verse, that he might at the same time remove from them the yoke of the Philistines, which from the time of Heli until now they had borne for their worship of idols, so that, wearied by miseries, they might return from them to the faith and worship of the true God. So Lyranus, Cajetan, Dionysius, Salianus, Tornielli, Mendoza and others. Hear Josephus, book 6 of the Antiquities chap. 2: “When the people throughout this whole twenty years gave attention to vows and sacrifices, and showed great care for religion and divine worship, Samuel, observing their readiness, and thinking that he had found an occasion for exhorting them to liberty and the goods that follow it, adapting his speech to the time and the business, spoke to them words to about this effect.”
The Hebrews, however, in St. Jerome, hold the contrary, namely that these twenty years were years of idolatry, misery and servitude, in which the Hebrews, on account of their idols, were oppressed by the Philistines: so also Abulensis and Serarius.