1 Samuel 5:12

_AND THE MEN THAT DIED NOT WERE SMITTEN WITH THE EMERODS: AND THE CRY OF THE CITY WENT UP TO HEAVEN._ The cry of the city went up to heaven. The disease is attended with acute pain, and it is far from being a rare phenomenon in the Philistian plain, though on the occasion referred to in the text it appeared in a malignant form, and prevailed to an alarming extent (Van de Velde, vol. 2:, p. 174)....

6-12 The hand of the Lord was heavy upon the Philistines; he not only convinced them of their folly, but severely chastised their insolence. Yet they would not renounce Dagon; and instead of seeking God's mercy, they desired to get clear of his ark. Carnal hearts, when they smart under the judgments of God, would rather, if it were possible, put him far from them, than enter into covenant or communion with him, and seek him for their friend. But their devices to escape the Divine judgments only increase them. Those that fight against God will soon have enough of it....

Verse 1 Samuel 5:12. _THE MEN THAT DIED NOT_] Some it seems were smitten with _instant death_; others with the _haemorrhoids_, and there was a universal consternation; and _the cry of the city went up to_ _heaven_-it was an exceeding great cry. IT does not appear that the Philistines had any correct knowledge of the nature of Jehovah, though they seemed to acknowledge his _supremacy_. They imagined that every country, district, mountain, and valley, had its peculiar deity; who, in its place, was supreme over all others. They thought therefore to appease Jehovah by sending him back his ark or shrine: and, in order to be redeemed from their plagues, they send golden mice and emerods as _telesms_, probably made under some particular configurations of the planets....

EXPOSITION THE ARK OF GOD IN PHILISTIA (1 Samuel 5:1). 1 SAMUEL 5:1 THE PHILISTINES TOOK THE ARK OF GOD. The silence of Scripture is often as remarkable as what it tells us. From Psalms 78:60-19; Jeremiah 7:12; Jeremiah 26:9, we gather that from Aphek the Philistines marched upon Shiloh, and having captured it, put all whom they found there to the sword, a

AND THE MEN THAT DIED NOT WERE SMITTEN WITH THE EMERODS,.... As the inhabitants of Ashdod and Gath had been; this shows that those that died did not die of that disease, but of some other; very likely the pestilence: AND THE CRY OF THE CITY WENT UP TO HEAVEN; not that it was heard and regarded there, but the phrase is used to denote the greatness of it, how exceeding loud and clamorous it was; partly on the account of the death of so many of the inhabitants, their relations and friends; and partly because of the intolerable pain they endured through the emerods. There is something of this history preserved in a story wrongly told by Herodotus b, who relates that the Scythians returning from Egypt passed through Ashkelon, a city of Syria (one of the five principalities of the Philistines), and that some of them robbed the temple of Venus there; for which the goddess sent on them and thei...

6. THE ARK IN THE HANDS OF THE PHILISTINES AND ITS RETURN CHAPTER 5 _ 1. The ark in the house of Dagon (1 Samuel 5:1)_ 2. The Philistines smitten by Jehovah (1 Samuel 5:6) The ark was brought to Ashdod, the leading city of the Philistines, and set up in the temple dedicated to Dagon, the chief god of the people. It was half fish and half man, the symbol of fertility. Before this idol the ark was set up. In their blindness they imagined that Dagon had conquered the God of Israel. The next morning they found Dagon fallen with his face to the earth before the ark. It was the Lord who did it and not an accident. The next morning the whole idol-image, except the fish-part, is fallen upon the ground. “The head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands lay cut off upon the threshold.” T

1 SAMUEL 5. THE ARK IN THE PHILISTINE CITIES. 1 Samuel 5:1. Ashdod. 1 Samuel 5:8. Gath. 1 Samuel 5:10. Ekron: see Joshua 11:22; Joshua 13:3; p 28. 1 Samuel 5:2. Dagon: see Judges 16:23 *. 1 Samuel 5:3. The Ark is thought of as possessing marvellous inherent powers; it brings disaster on

_the cry of the city went up to heaven_ Cp. Exodus 2:13. The word used always denotes a _supplication_, a _cry for help_. Each city was visited with a heavier judgment than the preceding one. "The longer the Philistines resisted and refused to recognise the chastening hand of the living God in the plagues inflicted upon them, the more severely would they necessarily be punished." So when Pharaoh hardened his heart and refused to let the Israelites go, the hand of the Lord grew heavier and heavier, till an unwilling consent was wrung from him....

AND THE MEN THAT DIED NOT, &C.— The doctrine of intercommunity led the heathens into the custom of changing one tutelary deity for another; but the God of the Israelites had an absolute abhorrence of all community or alliance with the gods of the Gentiles: and the present instance of his power has set this opinion beyond all contradiction. When the Philistines had taken the ark from the Israelites in battle, and carried it as another _palladium_ to Ashdod, they placed it in the temple of their god Dagon, which was in consequence of their doctrine of intercommunity; but their deity passed two such bad nights with his new guest, that on the second morning he was found pared away to his _stump;_ and this disaster was followed by a desolating pestilence. The people of Ashdod, who hitherto had intended to keep the ark as one of their _idol protectors,_ now declared that it _should not abide w...

_The Ark in Ekron._ 1 Samuel 5:10-12 10 Therefore they sent the ark of God to Ekron. And it came to pass, as the ark of God came to Ekron, that the Ekronites cried out, saying, They have brought about the ark of the God of Israel to us, to slay us and our people. 11 So they sent and gathered together all the lords of the Philistines, and said, Send away the ark of the God of Israel, and let it go again to his own place, that it slay us not, and our people: for there was a deadly destruction throughout all the city; the hand of God was very heavy there. 12 And the men that died not were smitten with the emerods: and the cry of the city went up to heaven. 7. _Where was Ekron? 1 Samuel 5:10_ Ekron was about eleven miles from Gath. It had belonged at one time to Judah ...