Without Glory

1 Samuel 4

            Three interesting bits in today’s reading.  First, completely unimportant in the grand scheme of things, but 1 Samuel 4 gives us the origin of the name “Ichabod.”  (You remember Ichabod Crane, from The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, right?)  Literally, the name means “No glory,” i-chabod.  The capture of the ark is one of the real low points in Israel’s history.  The ark is the seat of God’s glory, His gracious presence.  So, the capture of the ark literally means that the glory of god has left Israel.  Not to mention that such an ignominious defeat at the hands of the Philistines stole even Israel’s human glory!

            Second, a comment might be necessary about the Philistines and how they knew about Israel’s history from several centuries prior.  The best guess is that the Philistines were a sort of combination of Semitic people who had originally lived on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea and generally Greek peoples who had migrated in the 13^th and 12^th centuries BC.  So, they would have had historical, cultural memory of the Conquest by Israel, and they would have had the more advanced technology of a people who entered the Iron Age ahead of the Israelites.

            Third, and probably most important, is one little word—“it.”  In verse 3, the Israelites say that “it,” that is, the ark, will save them.  Not the Lord, whose ark it is and whose presence the ark represents, but the ark itself.  Pretty clearly Israel has fallen into superstition and idolatry.  The ark has become for them a talisman, a good luck charm.  Truly the glory has left Israel!