Defeating the Philistines... Twice - 2nd Samuel 5:17-25

The uniting of northern and southern Israel was big news to their neighbors, especially the Philistines. TB says that the scattered several tribes throughout the Israel territory were easier to control than a large, united Israel under a single king. Probably hoping that not everyone was willing to fight under David, the Philistines “spread themselves in the valley of Rephaim.” David apparently left his new private estate and moved into a stronger hold position, probably to draw the Philistine armies away from his family but also because very few Israelites were willing to fight and die to defend David’s private estate, so moving more inland, the Philistine army would make it everyone’s problem, and therefore Israel would be more likely to fight. But David knew that the Philistines were there to fight, so he “inquired of the Lord” asking if he should go fight the Philistines and if so “wilt thou deliver them into mine hand?” I like that this “deliver into mine hand” is also a phrase used in the Book of Mormon, another example of it being written by authors familiar with Hebrew phraseology.

God answers that he will surely deliver the Philistines into David’s hands, and as usual, there is almost no detail about the battle, just saying that “David smote them there.” Interestingly, the Philistines had left all their idols and “images” there and David had them all burned, so that demonstrates David’s attitude toward idols and hopefully that stance will help diminish the prevenance of idols among the people. Even though they were defeated, the Philistines were persistent, and came into the same valley again later, and David again asked God if he should attack them. This time though, God’s answer wasn’t a simple yes, but instead a battle strategy, which was instead of confronting them head on, David was to sneak around behind them and hide in the mulberry trees, and “when thou hearest the sound of a going in the tops of the mulberry trees, that then thou shalt bestir thyself: for then shall the Lord go out before thee, to smite the host of the Philistines.”

The previous battle seems to have been a great victory but one that possibly could be attributed to Israel’s fighting skill or superior numbers or training or something like that. This time, God was going to show Israel that they He was capable of winning the battle by himself and that’s really quite an impressive feat but probably one that not everyone is capable of recognizing. Again, we don’t get any details about what happens but man I wish we did, it just says that David did what God said and he “smote the Philistines.” I love seeing God in battle and what strategies he uses.

Just as an aside from this concept, the other day I watched the movie Hacksaw Ridge which is about a 7th Day Adventist conscientious objector named Desmond Doss in WW2, and it was incredible so I got a book about him and while listening to it, I came across an interesting bot of information that the movie left out, but that I think fits nicely here. It says that the first day of major fighting on that island fighting off the Japanese, two companies took the cliff first. The company that Doss was assigned to joined him in prayer before heading up the cliff, and the other company got destroyed but Doss’ company, not a single man died that day and only one wounded by a flying rock. What a contrast between the other company that was slaughtered and Doss’ company lost not a single man. What a contrast, and the only difference was that they prayed before heading up the cliff. Now I’m not saying praying before hand is the foolproof way to never get anyone killed, but what a difference it made in this instance. In fact the next day, the commander didn’t want to wait for Doss to pray before ascending the cliff and they sustained significant casualties that day. In fact another story I heard about a female in Iraq who always prayed before her patrols and they never once got hit or lost anyone on her patrols. But when she went home for R&R for two weeks, her squad got hit multiple times every day that she was gone to the point where they were calling her to come home early because they were tired of getting hit so much. The irony that maybe one of them could have taken over the prayers and had similar results, but they attached that faith to that person instead of assuming it themselves. It was just interesting to think about.