Home » Articles » Media Lies: David, Goliath, and Elhanan
David, Goliath, and Elhanan: Mainstream Media Lies
I've witnessed a long history of distored and falsified Biblical information on many mainstream media television channels. Below is an example along with a scholarly explanation.
Why do they hate the Bible so much? Because the Bible exposes the corrupt religion by virtually all global powerbrokers today, including all mainstream media. This religion is called the mystery schools. You cannot truly understand the world today without first understanding the mystery schools.
I occasionally watch The History Channel, The Biography Channel, or one of the Discovery channels to see what they have to say about world events or history. I am especially interested in seeing what they say about the Bible because I've seen each of them lie about the Bible on countless occasions. In fact, I honestly have not seen a single program related to the Bible on one of these channels that wasn't replete with lies or at the very least, blatent misrepresentations about the Bible.
I was just now inspired to write this short article because I witnessed another misrepresentation about the Bible. This time, it’s really more of an omission, a half-truth, but it lacks integrity nonetheless.
The misrepresentation I just saw occurred on November 19, 2006 at about 11:15 am on the Biography Channel. In fact, the program is still running as I write this.
In this program, they state that the Bible contradicts itself concerning the slaying of Goliath by David. The Biography Channel story had a couple so-called scholars claiming that one part of the Bible states that David slew Goliath but on two other occasions, the Bible says that Elhanan slew Goliath.
To anyone claiming to be a Bible scholor, this is clearly not accurate.
In I Samual, 17:49, the Bible states that David killed Goliath:
"And David put his hand in his bag, and took thence a stone, and slang it, and smote the Philistine in his forehead, that the stone sunk into his forehead; and he fell upon his face to the earth."
—1 Samuel 17:49
In II Samual 21:19, the Bible states this:
"And there was again a battle in Gob with the Philistines, where Elhanan the son of Jaareoregim, a Bethlehemite, slew the brother of Goliath the Gittite, the staff of whose spear was like a weaver's beam."
—2 Samuel 21:19
I Chronicles 20:5 states this:
"And there was war again with the Philistines; and Elhanan the son of Jair slew Lahmi the brother of Goliath the Gittite, whose spear staff was like a weaver's beam."
—1 Chronicles 20:5
It must be noted that the phrase, "the brother of" does not occur in II Samual 21:19 in the manuscripts. It was added to the King James translation for clarification.
These small clarifications occur occasionally throughout the Bible and are set off from the regular text—usually in italic font—to let the reader know that the phrase is not in the original manuscripts.
There are two logical explainations for these verses, but the Biography Channel makes no attempt to clairfy their contrived confusion thereby accomplishing their goal, namely, to attempt to discredit the Bible by misrepresentation.
Following are two explainations that clear up this contrived confusion.
Who killed Goliath, David or Elhanan?
1 Samuel 17:50 and 2 Samuel 21:19
1. David did (1 Samuel 17:50) - "Thus David prevailed over the Philistine with a sling and a stone, and he struck the Philistine and killed him; but there was no sword in David’s hand."
2. Elhanan did (2 Sam. 21:19)- "And there was war with the Philistines again at Gob, and Elhanan the son of Jaare-oregim the Bethlehemite killed Goliath the Gittite, the shaft of whose spear was like a weaver’s beam."
The answer lies in two areas. 1 Chronicles 20:5 says, "And there was war with the Philistines again, and Elhanan the son of Jair killed Lahmi the brother of Goliath the Gittite, the shaft of whose spear was like a weaver’s beam." This is the correct answer; namely, that Elhanan killed Goliath's brother.
Second, it appears there was a copyist error in 2 Samuel 21:19. According to Gleason Archer's Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties on page 179, it says,
1. The sign of the direct object, which in Chronicles comes just before "Lahmi," was '-t; the copyist mistook it for b-t or b-y-t ("Beth") and thus got Bet hal-Lahmi ("the Bethlehemite") out of it.
2. He misread the word for "brother" ('-h) as the sign of the direct object ('-t) right before g-l-y-t ("Goliath"). Thus he made "Goliath" the object of "killed" (wayyak), instead of the "brother" of Goliath (as the Chronicles passage does).
3. The copyist misplaced the word for "weavers" ('-r-g-ym) so as to put it right after "Elhanan" as his patronymic (ben Y-'-r-y'-r--g-ym, or ben ya 'arey 'ore -gim -- "the son of the forests of weavers" -- a most unlikely name for anyone's father!). In Chronicles the 'ore grim ("weavers") comes right after menor ("a beam of ") -- thus making perfectly good sense.
Therefore, we see that 2 Samuel 21:19 had a copyist error and 1 Chronicles 20:5 is the correct information.
Taken from:
The Christian Apologetics and Research Ministry
http://www.carm.org/diff/1Sam17_50.htm
As you probably know, the KJB translators routinely used italics to express the meaning of the Bible, even though the words themselves might not have occurred in the Hebrew/Greek texts.
Such is the case at 2 Samuel 21:19. The italics are necessary to understand (comparing Scripture to Scripture) that the Giant referred to in 2 Sam 21:19 was in fact Lahmi, brother to Goliath. Thus if it is the Goliath that David slew (this is often used as a supposed "contradiction" in the Bible by atheists and other Bible doubters), then we would not have God's clarification in verse 22 that there were four brothers. The three mentioned in the passage, plus Goliath, means that there were four "born to the giant in Gath" and slain by David AND HIS SERVANTS, just as the KJB math demonstrates.
Why did the KJB translators include the words "the brother of?" Because it clarifies that it was not Goliath who was killed by Elhannan, nor was it a "different Goliath" else there would have been FIVE and not FOUR "born to the giant in Gath" who were slain by David and his servants. And they were fully justified in including the words in the text (in italics) by the parallel passage at 1 Chron. 20:5.
Taken from:
http://www.jesus-is-lord.com/goliath2.htm