A Tale of Two Swords: The Untold Story Behind Saul’s Final Battle w/ Dr. Chris McKinny

Johnny Ova: Welcome everybody to the Dig In Podcast. I am your host, Pastor Johnny Ova, and today our guest is Dr. Chris McKinny. Dr. McKinny, thank you so much for your time today.

Dr. Chris McKinny: My pleasure. Thanks, Johnny, for having me on.

Johnny Ova: It's my pleasure. It's going to be a lot of fun. Let's jump into our conversation. Dr. McKinny, before we get into Saul's death, set the stage for us. What was the geopolitical world of ancient Israel actually like during Saul's reign, and why does geography matter so much for understanding the story?

Dr. Chris McKinny: If we think of the story of Saul, Saul himself is this seminal figure in the Israelite monarchy. He's the one that seems to have all the things you would want. He's tall. I like to think of him as Saul the Tall. From his shoulders upward he's taller than everyone else. He's wealthy, he's a landowner, he's got these donkeys, he's plowing, he can fight battles. And yet he's missing this ingredient that the biblical text requires, being a man after God's own heart. I would even call it basic cowardice in some passages. But overall, if we compare that to what we see from an archaeological and geographical perspective, we see that Saul's and David's kingdoms are largely the same geographical areas. We're talking about the highlands in and around Benjamin, north of Jerusalem. David, of course, seems to be primarily in the south, in Judah. But they're in the same general vicinity, and they deal with the same threats: primarily the Philistines in the west, maybe some local nomadic peoples in the south that the biblical text calls the Amalekites, and then various other peoples that surround them, like the Ammonites. And as we think about Saul's death, all of this is hurtling toward one major region, the Jezreel Valley, which is where most of the story takes place.

Johnny Ova: So Mount Gilboa is where everything falls apart for Saul. What is it about this specific location that made it so strategically significant, and why would a final battle between Israel and the Philistines take place there?

Dr. Chris McKinny: This is actually a really big debate, why this particular area is mentioned in the text. It goes back to how we think about the emergence of early Israel and whether we would actually see either Saul or David active in the Jezreel Valley. I'm so sorry, it's morning, I'm clearing my throat. If we think before this, in the days of Joshua, the Israelites are not able to drive out the Canaanites who live in the plains of the Jezreel Valley and the plains of Beth Shean. The same thing is true in the time of the judges. We read about it in Judges chapter 1. So Beth Shean, the Jezreel Valley, the Megiddo area, all of this was an international zone that was dominated in the preceding period by the Egyptians. This is where there are strong Egyptian city states, including garrisons at Beth Shean. Then the Egyptians pull out at the end of the 12th century or so, and we have the emergence of Canaanites again, or maybe they're Israelites. We don't really know. There's no definite moment where it says, OK, now we're going from Egyptians ruling over Canaanites to Israelites ruling over Canaanites.

Dr. Chris McKinny: So the question becomes when Israel emerges as this important territorial state, which we know it does over time. Either that's in the 11th and 10th centuries, as has traditionally been suggested, or, as Israel Finkelstein and others have said, it only happens at the end of the 10th century and really into the 9th century, which shifts the historical picture from Saul and David over to Omri and Ahab. I tend to think it makes a lot of sense that it would happen earlier. But in any case, from a strictly political and strategic perspective, the land of Israel is mostly defined by north-south regions. There's the coast, which is easy to traffic. The Shephelah, which is more or less easy to traffic, especially east-west. The hills are really a barrier. This is where Judah is located, and where Israel is located. Then, as we move further east, we have the wilderness, the Jordan Valley, and then climbing up, Transjordan, where the Ammonites, the Moabites and the Edomites are. The two great traffic routes through the country are the International Coastal Highway and the King's Highway in the far east.

Dr. Chris McKinny: However, the best places are the ones that cross and connect those two great routes, and the only place that really does that well is the Jezreel Valley. So from a political standpoint, it's the junction point of the two great roads of the land of Canaan, of the entire land bridge that makes up the southern Levant. Even though the text doesn't say this is why Saul is there, again and again throughout history we see people coming to the Jezreel Valley. But that raises an even bigger question: what are the Philistines doing there? Because the Philistines don't belong there. They belong in the south, south of Tel Aviv, in places like Ashdod, Ashkelon, Gath and Ekron. So we have some important historical questions to ask about the whole event and why the Philistines are there. But if we think about the larger geopolitical reasons, it's pretty clear that everyone is going to want to control the Jezreel Valley, which is where Mount Gilboa is located.

Johnny Ova: So walk us through what actually happened at the Battle of Mount Gilboa. What do we know historically and textually about how this battle unfolded, and why did Israel lose?

Dr. Chris McKinny: The battle itself is one of the high points in the biblical narrative, because it's the only time where, like a modern novel, we go back and forth between different points of view. The whole point of the narrative is to show that Saul is going to die, and he's going to die as far away from David as possible. We want to read this exciting narrative about Saul's death and David's emergence, but David is as far removed from the stink of this death as he can be, because David is going to emerge as the next ruler. So from chapters 27 through 31 at the end of 1 Samuel, it's David, then Saul, then David again, then Saul. David is incrementally getting further south, into the area of the Amalekites and Ziklag, while Saul is slowly making his way to the farthest northern extremity, the area of Gilboa. If we focus on Saul, we're not told why this is happening. People are fighting battles with the Philistines. The Philistines are always the enemy. He fought them in Benjamin at the very beginning, in 1 Samuel 13 and 14. He fought them in the Elah Valley in the Shephelah, in 1 Samuel 17, the battle of David and Goliath. And he's neglected them while he's been chasing David.

Dr. Chris McKinny: Now David has gone off to hide among the Philistines, and Saul needs to take up the fight once more, and that happens to be in the Jezreel Valley. This is important to remember: we don't get the story from Saul's point of view. It's David's story. So the larger geopolitical reasoning is almost tangential, but we can infer it from the broader text. And this is where the story gets really interesting. Saul is facing off with the Philistines. We're told he's at Jezreel, the city famous in later biblical narrative for its connection with Ahab, Jezebel and Naboth's vineyard. And he doesn't know what to do. For many months, maybe even years, he has had no ability to go before the Lord. This takes us back to 1 Samuel 3, when Samuel becomes the seer. He falls asleep in the tabernacle where the Ark of the Covenant is, and he receives a vision from the Lord saying all these things are going to happen. So Samuel becomes the touchstone the leaders of Israel go to for direction. Saul has lost that. Samuel said, I'm not going to see you anymore, and he doesn't, and then he dies. So Saul is in a constant state of indecision, coupled with his own cowardice.

Dr. Chris McKinny: He's standing off with the Philistines on one side of the valley and himself on the other side, very similar to what we read in 1 Samuel 17. The Philistines seem to be near Shunem, which is itself a reduplication of the great story of Gideon and the Midianites, the same battle formation in the same valley, the Harod Valley, a branch of the Jezreel Valley. So Saul sneaks behind the Philistines on the Hill of Moreh to a place called Endor. Endor is, I guess, where George Lucas got the name for the moon in Star Wars. He knows there is a medium at Endor, and he secretly has her try to communicate with the dead. Samuel's spirit emerges, and Samuel is very surprised, Saul is very surprised, and the medium is very surprised that Saul is there. Samuel's only response to Saul is, listen, tomorrow you'll be with me, you and your sons. So Saul eats his last meal, prepared for him by the medium, and he has to go back behind enemy lines to his camp. The next morning the battle does not go well. The Philistines seem to have come up to the area of Saul's camp. The archers find him, he's wounded, and right at the moment when he's told the Philistines are about to take him and abuse his body, he tells his bodyguard, kill me, so they won't abuse me. The bodyguard refuses, and Saul falls on his own sword.

Dr. Chris McKinny: This is a really critical moment in the narrative, and I'll come back to it. But what happens next is a real mystery in terms of interpretation. We're told Saul's armor is taken, he's beheaded, and his body and the bodies of his sons, Yonatan or Jonathan, Abinadab and Malchishua, the three oldest sons of Saul, leaving Ishbaal or Ishbosheth as the heir, are hung somewhere. This is where the tale of two swords comes into play. It's clear the text is saying the bodies are hung at Beth Shean, the nearby site, but it's not clear what happens to Saul's head and his armor, which would of course include the sword he has just fallen on. This is the part of the story where I've made a new suggestion, which is actually an old suggestion, about what happens to Saul's armor, his sword and his head. But just to step back: it's really critical to understand that Saul's suicide on his own sword is the culmination of a narrative showing that David has been protected all through the story. Any time Saul has had an opportunity to kill him, the javelin goes to the side, or David receives some providence showing God is protecting him.

Dr. Chris McKinny: And David has said, it's not for me to kill the Lord's anointed. Maybe he will fall by the enemy, or by some other means fall by the sword, but it will not be by my hand. So when Saul makes this fateful decision, you can hear the footsteps of doom leading to that point. It's a really powerful moment, regardless of how we interpret what happens to his remains afterward. It's one of the peak heroic, epic pieces of biblical literature we have. So just to frame the setup, and then I'll stop for a second: the question I have is what happens to Saul's armor and his head? Does it go to Beth Shean with the rest of his body and the bodies of his sons that are hung on the walls of Beth Shean, or does it go somewhere else? And a second, related question is, why Beth Shean? Who is at Beth Shean, and how does that factor into the narrative? I'll stop there and see if you have any questions or comments.

Johnny Ova: Amazing explanation, but you must be prophetic, because my next two questions are going to be: why Beth Shean? What is the city, and why did it matter to the Philistines? And I know this is where your research gets quite interesting. You've argued that scholars have misinterpreted the archaeological evidence at Beth Shean. So what exactly did they get wrong? That's my two-parter.

Dr. Chris McKinny: This is one of the best examples of how biblical archaeology can shed light on ancient stories, but also how, if we're too intent on our own interpretation, it can lead us astray. I get the question a lot: how does biblical archaeology affirm your faith? In general, it affirms that these stories are grounded and rooted in a real place and a real time. But oftentimes what people are fighting about is not actually the text versus the material. It is the interpretation of the text versus the material. And scholars have to interpret the text like anyone else. When the initial excavations took place at Beth Shean, in the early days of archaeology in the 1920s and 1930s, they found amazing things. They found an Egyptian garrison, and they found temples, related in fact to the earlier part of Iron Age II. What they suggested is this: 1 Samuel 31 and its parallel in Chronicles each mention a god or goddess connected with where Saul's head and armor are brought, so we should read the two texts as independent witnesses to two Canaanite temples at the site. One says Dagon, the other says Ashtaroth. So, according to the archaeological interpretation, we have two temples at Beth Shean: this is the temple of Ashtaroth, this is the temple of Dagon.

Dr. Chris McKinny: But that is illegitimate even in how we should read the text, because these accounts are synoptic, like the Synoptic Gospels are. So one has to be right, or more reflective of an ancient tradition. We may have some corruption going on, or maybe it was a temple of Dagon and Ashtaroth together, but it has to be one building. And even more important than which deity it was: the text actually doesn't say that the head and the armor were taken to Beth Shean. It says they were taken to the land of the Philistines. And this gets back to the bigger question: what is going on with Beth Shean? Why is Beth Shean in the story at all? Because of the earlier interpretation, people began to say the Philistines had taken over the Jezreel Valley, that Beth Shean was a kind of Philistine outpost, at least for a brief moment. The Philistines had conquered the temples there and were living there, so when they defeated Saul, they brought him to Beth Shean because it belonged to them. But the text doesn't say that at all. All it says is that the bodies were hung on the walls of Beth Shean, but the head and the armor were taken back to the land of the Philistines.

Dr. Chris McKinny: Any time you have that phrase, the land of the Philistines, it indicates the region associated with their territorial homeland, like the land of Israel. So once you see that, even without the wider story of the tale of two swords, we need to conclude that Saul's head and his armor were taken to Philistia. It doesn't say specifically where. I tend to think it's most likely Gath of the Philistines, but we can talk about that in a minute. To close the loop on Beth Shean, we can't say with certainty what is going on there, other than that both the archaeology and the text seem to indicate it was a Canaanite site. Perhaps by this point it's an Israelite site, but it's hard to distinguish between Canaanite and Israelite in this period. We're grasping at straws. We do know that right after this, the men of Jabesh Gilead, just across the Jordan Valley, act. That's where Saul's maternal lineage is from. Remember Judges 19 through 21: after the men of Gibeah commit that heinous crime, and the Benjaminites are about to be wiped out, they go to Jabesh Gilead, kill the men, and take the women so the Benjaminites can marry and survive.

Dr. Chris McKinny: So Jabesh Gilead is clearly connected with Saul's heritage, and early in the narrative he saves the city of Jabesh Gilead. So Jabesh Gilead seems to be an Israelite site, but the question of Beth Shean still remains. From an archaeological perspective, there is almost no evidence of anything Philistine at Beth Shean. Everything we have is Canaanite, Egyptian or Egyptianized, and then later, even in this period and certainly after, a clear turn toward an Israelite site. So for that part of the story, we can say Saul's body and the bodies of his sons were taken to probably a Canaanite or Canaanite-Israelite site at Beth Shean. I have some other details in my notes, because in some cases it could also refer to Rehov, since Beth Shean and Rehov are right next to each other, but we don't have to go into that. So let's go back to the other question. If Saul's sword is brought back to the Philistines, why? What's going on in that part of the story? Again, I'll stop for any comments or questions.

Johnny Ova: No, you can continue.

Dr. Chris McKinny: With this in mind: I like fantasy literature, epic literature. I love the Iliad, the Odyssey, Lord of the Rings, storytelling in general that uses weapons as literary devices. And I'm not the only one to have recognized this in the book of Samuel, specifically in the rise of David. If we go all the way back to Saul's first interaction with the Philistines, there's a curious note. Saul is standing off against the Philistines, in this case very close to his home in Benjamin, and Jonathan is with him as his commander. After some initial skirmishes, the text says the only two swords available to the Israelites were in the hand of Saul and in the hand of Jonathan, because the Israelites had to go down to the Philistines to sharpen their tools. On one hand, it remains unproven archaeologically that the Philistines were stronger than the Israelites or had a monopoly on metallurgy. But what is clear in the early days of Israel and the Philistines is that there's a tug of war, and for at least a brief moment the Philistines do seem to have the upper hand, which would mean they're stronger agriculturally and militarily. This is another place where we could try to make someone's interpretation fit the text.

Dr. Chris McKinny: But what the text is really indicating, read straightforwardly, is that the only people with agency in the narrative are Saul and Jonathan, because they're the ones with swords in their hands. They're the ones with this almost magical thing. People don't realize how hard the creation of metal is to imagine. Watching someone take a lump of ore and turn it into a tool or a weapon was considered, maybe rightly so, mystical or magical throughout the ancient world. Go to The Lord of the Rings and the remaking of Narsil, the Flame of the West, for Aragorn. Or go to Gilgamesh, where Gilgamesh and Enkidu set out against Humbaba, equipped with freshly made weapons. Or Arthurian legend, with Excalibur as an object that is not only imbued with some kind of incantation and magic, but has a character in itself. There's something going on with that weapon that's more than just material. I think that's what's happening here. In the story you have Saul with his weapon and Jonathan with his. And Jonathan, because he's courageous, even though he's not the one God has chosen to be king, acts like the real king. He has courage and he defeats the Philistines.

Dr. Chris McKinny: Saul, on the other hand, is afraid. He offers the sacrifice, he makes rash vows, and at each moment when he should pick up the sword, he fails to. He has this bumbling victory over chapters 13 and 14. Then in chapter 15, with this Philistine sword, probably forged in Gath or at least one of the Philistine cities, and by the way, we often find metalworking connected with temples at these sites, we find Saul going against the Amalekites. He's doing something he's supposed to do, in a really grisly scene where he kills the Amalekites, but he keeps the animals as plunder and wealth for himself. He also spares their king, Agag, who has killed Israelites, and whom the text says is the main one he has to kill. So Samuel has to come and rebuke him and say the kingdom has gone elsewhere. Samuel picks up the sword and hacks Agag to pieces. We could read that and think, this is weird, but the constant is the weapon. The weapon is the thing that gives them agency. Then 1 Samuel 16 is where Samuel rejects Saul, saying I'm not going to see you anymore, and goes to David, the man after God's own heart. That sets the stage for where we finally have the two swords, 1 Samuel 17.

Johnny Ova: So you call this narrative the tale of two swords. Can you explain a little more why this motif is so important to understanding 1 Samuel 13 to 31?

Dr. Chris McKinny: It's important for a couple of reasons. It ties the whole thing together in a way that is understandable, and it helps us visualize what's happening in a really clear way. There are several levels. First, the biblical text is often negatively compared to Greek myth, the Iliad, the Odyssey or Gilgamesh, as if it isn't as good at storytelling. I think this is one of the high peaks of storytelling. Joseph's story also has a lot of this going on. Once you see this piece here, along with the shifting point of view at the end of the book, it shows the literature is at a very high level, and it fits these deep, almost universal ways of telling epic stories. Achilles has armor from Hephaestus, prepared specifically for him to do his job, and it gets fought over book after book in the Iliad. It's a major story device. So good stories, stories that matter and mean something, tend to have these elements. That doesn't say anything about their historicity. It says something about good stories. We have swords. We know the Philistines made them, and we know the Israelites made them. That's the first takeaway.

Dr. Chris McKinny: The second takeaway is that it helps us imagine what an Israelite would be thinking when these objects accompany people to different locations. This is one of the things I'm most interested in: how the biblical story was being formed and told and retold before it was written. When you pass Gath of the Philistines, what are you talking about? David acting like a madman. David serving the king, Achish. Wow, that massive wall, look how big it is, it's as tall as Goliath, six cubits and a span. I don't know if we want to use the word realistic, but these parts of the story relate to how people formed and shaped them. So if you were to make a movie poster about 1 Samuel 13 through 31, the thing that would most qualify are these two crossed swords, the sword of Goliath and the sword of Saul. And as an aside, I'm making a similar case for the bigger story this is only a part of, the story of the Ark. They bring the Ark from Shiloh earlier in Samuel, it goes among the Philistines, it fights its own battles there, and it returns.

Dr. Chris McKinny: So the wider story of God's presence among his people through the Ark is the bigger story David is being brought into. And of course David will later have something to say about what happens to the Ark. Once again we have physical objects imbued in some sense with divine or mystical power playing a major role. All of that takes us to 1 Samuel 17, the story everyone knows. It's one of my favorite places to visit in all of Israel. I had the privilege of spending many nights nearby, because that's where our excavation camp was when we dug at Tel Burna, at Nativ HaLamed He, right where the battle would have happened, or near it. We had the brook out front where we could pick up smooth stones. Saul goes to fight the Philistines after they've come up between Socoh and Azekah, and the giant from Gath, Goliath, shouts out for 40 days: Israel, send me a man to fight me. It's a long narrative. In fact, it's the longest narrative in the book of Samuel, because it's this peak moment.

Dr. Chris McKinny: David, as providence would have it, comes to visit his brothers, bringing them food. He hears the giant demeaning Saul, demeaning Israel, demeaning God himself, and he says, how come no one is doing anything about this? He has the anointing. He's the man after God's own heart, the real king, even though he's a shepherd boy, probably 15 or 16, a real Achilles-age figure. And remember, Saul is reluctant, but he says, fine, if you're going to fight him, at least wear my armor. We think of that and picture a boy wearing a grown man's armor, but it's odd that we even have the detail. Maybe, if we read the text at face value, the only armor and the only swords there are Saul's and Jonathan's. So the only means Saul imagines for killing Goliath is this weaponry, which, as I've argued, originates in the land of the Philistines. David tries it on, but he hasn't tested it, so he goes to face the giant alone, as the representative of the one true God against the Philistine. Later in the narrative we learn the other sword is there too. I call it the tale of two swords, but at one point, as you go from 1 Samuel 17 to 18, Jonathan is there with his own sword, and he gives it to David after the battle.

Dr. Chris McKinny: So you have the sword of Saul, the sword of Goliath and the sword of Jonathan all there. And you have the contrast with Saul: here's my armor, you go fight the battle for me because I'm a coward. David says, I don't need your stink, I'm going to fight alone. After the battle, Jonathan gives him his sword, which shows once again that Jonathan, who defeated the Philistines because he's God's man, recognizes the Lord is with David. This is like a Psalm 2 or Psalm 110 idea. But back to the story everybody remembers. David faces the Philistine. He picks up five smooth stones. They have this elegant trash talk back and forth. David is on the Lord's side. He says, I'm going to remove your head, without a sword in my hand. It says it about three times. I'm going to cut your head off, and there's no sword. It's plain as day. The sword is a big deal. He lets one fly, hits him in the head, walks over and chops his head off. There are no sounds in the biblical text, but the eruption after the silent moment of the thud must have been really impactful.

Dr. Chris McKinny: He accomplishes his mission of killing the giant, holding up the head as Israel chases the Philistines back to Gath and back to Ekron. So within a very small area, right between Israel and the Philistines, we have three Philistine-made swords: the sword of Saul, the sword of Goliath and the sword of Jonathan. And the rest of the narrative continues to revolve around the sword of Goliath and the sword of Saul especially. Any questions to this point?

Johnny Ova: Nope. Keep going, because my questions are going to go to the climax, and I know you're building toward it.

Dr. Chris McKinny: There's a curious note at the end of chapter 17, where it says David took the armor of Goliath and put it in his tent, and he took the head to Jerusalem. There are some issues with the text of 1 Samuel. In general the Septuagint seems to offer a more consistent reading, but it's also shorter than the Masoretic Text. So we have some questions about exactly what's going on, because it breaks the flow. We see textual issues elsewhere too, like in 1 Samuel 13, where many translations have Saul was dot dot dot years old and he reigned for two years. It doesn't quite fit. So there are textual issues, but in the larger flow it fits that David would have brought the sword of Goliath to Jerusalem. That connection comes back later when he goes to Nob, which I believe is right next to Jerusalem. This may also be a clue about Beth Shean. The Philistines bringing the dead bodies to Beth Shean might be similar to David bringing the head of Goliath to Jerusalem, essentially saying, you're next, we've got you in our sights. But I wouldn't be too dogmatic about that.

Dr. Chris McKinny: What is clear, if we read the whole text together, is that the sword of Goliath ends up in the tabernacle, which is at Nob. That's a whole other discussion, what happens to the tabernacle, because after the Ark is lost, the tabernacle is essentially disassembled, like Lego pieces going in different directions. The Ark is lost to the Philistines and moves from site to site. It eventually ends up at Kiriath Jearim, waiting for David to bring it to Jerusalem, but Jerusalem isn't conquered yet. We learn the altar is at Gibeon, north of Jerusalem and west of Gibeah. The Chronicler says this is the very altar Moses had Bezalel make in the wilderness, so there's a kind of tabernacle structure there. We can assume there's a tent for the Ark at Kiriath Jearim, and there's also a tabernacle tent set up at Nob with the table of the bread of the presence, and presumably the menorah and whatever else. This seems to be the tent the sword was brought to, and it seems to be where the priests remained. So even though they don't have the Ark of the Covenant, they have the table of the bread of the presence, which they're offering before the Lord.

Dr. Chris McKinny: They also seem to have the ephod, which is the thing that allows you to ask questions of the deity. We don't really know what the Urim and Thummim are or how they work, but we do know that if you know how to use them, you can ask God what to do. Those are located at Nob, about two or three miles from Gibeah, next to Jerusalem. That's an important detail. The sword of Goliath is there waiting, like at Rivendell with Elrond, waiting for Aragorn. Then David enters fully into the service of Saul at Gibeah, and this is where we shift from the heroic story of David as heir apparent and this nice relationship, to Saul having a spirit come upon him that is harmful to him. He's lost the anointing of the Holy Spirit, even though he still has the status. With this change, we don't see Saul's sword again until the very end of the story. Instead it's the spear. He throws a spear at David a couple of times. Later we find the spear next to him while he's asleep, and David could easily have turned him into a shish kebab while he's lying on the ground.

Dr. Chris McKinny: So Saul's mental state is really deteriorating. The biblical text indicates this is from the Lord, and in later biblical interpretation, David's ability to play the harp is part of how people think of him driving out demons. Even at Qumran there's a really interesting passage that says David wrote psalms to have demons driven out, because he plays the harp. So again, harp versus spear. There are these really compelling props in the hands of these characters. 1 Samuel 18 and the next several chapters are all about Saul's usually clumsy plots to kill David. Some are direct, like throwing a spear at him. Others are, I'll use my promise that he can marry one of my daughters and be my son-in-law, and I'll send him against the Philistines. Yes, you can marry my daughter. The bride price is 100 foreskins of the Philistines. David says, OK, no problem, and comes back with 200. Who he kills them with is hard to say, but presumably Jonathan's sword, because he just received it in the previous chapter.

Johnny Ova: I've got a question. This is more of a ha-ha question. What do they do with the foreskins? I want 100 foreskins. What are you doing with them after you get 200? Are you hanging them up, wearing them around your neck like a necklace?

Dr. Chris McKinny: At a bris, a circumcision in the Jewish community, there is that, and having kids myself, I remember the umbilical cord falling off. It's kind of a grisly scene. I would say, though, that most likely what's being talked about is not an actual circumcision but a full removal. We know from ancient texts, especially from Medinet Habu in ancient Egypt, that when the Philistines and others who fought against the Egyptians were killed, the way they were counted was by cutting off either a hand or an uncircumcised penis. We have depictions of mounds of hands or phalluses. It's not exactly the kind of thing that survives, but we have actually found hands, not penises, but hands removed from the same time period, the end of the Late Bronze Age, buried. So great question, and again, it's the kind of thing archaeology can tell us a little about because of the nature of the story.

Johnny Ova: Really? Wow. I didn't mean to interrupt. It's the culture that blows my mind sometimes, because it's so hard for us to read these stories, and right now we're recording in 2026. We read them with a 2026 mindset and try to understand what they valued and what they were really trying to do. We see this with languages, we see it with different practices. So I was curious if you had any insight on that.

Dr. Chris McKinny: No, it does matter. I know it's gross, but think about the physicality in the narrative, whether we're talking about metal objects or the removal of body parts, as a way of saying, here's what's going on, I have it in front of me. Think of a marriage in ancient Israel. It requires a bride price, and how do you pay it? You can't just say, I killed all these guys. Here they are, here's the proof, you weren't there, Saul. There's something similar in a narrative like Joseph and Jacob. Joseph is dead. How do we know? Here's his bloody coat. You have this proof of death or proof of life that is realistic to someone actually questioning whether you're telling the truth, but also as an object, I can imagine what that coat looked like. Maybe not what these foreskins would have looked like. So I think it's intentionally realistic, but also intentionally a bit dark and humorous. As the story goes on, David eventually marries Michal, the second daughter of Saul. Jonathan loves him, Michal loves him, everyone loves David. But things are not going well for Saul. He realizes that if this continues, his position is not secure, so he decides to kill David directly.

Dr. Chris McKinny: He tries to seize him at night. This is another interesting one. Michal takes a teraphim, apparently an idol or a statue, and puts some goat hair on it. The old trick-a-roo. David is out the window and off in the field. And Jonathan and David have that moment of covenant where they shoot the arrows, and Jonathan says, I will be with you whatever happens. I'm going to be faithful to my dad, Saul, but I'm also going to be faithful to you. This is where Jonathan becomes one of my favorite characters in the Bible, because like many of us, he's not in an easy situation. Jaime Lannister from Game of Thrones has a great line where he's pulled in all these directions and says they make you swear and swear, and keeping one allegiance means breaking another. These are the kinds of situations we often find ourselves in, in the church, in politics, in families.

Johnny Ova: That was Jaime, not Tyrion.

Dr. Chris McKinny: It's realistic. Jonathan is trying to be true to the person he sees as the anointed one in front of him, a man after God's own heart he's drawn to in true, genuine love, while he also has an allegiance to his father. How loyal is he to his father? We already know he dies as a result. It's a fascinating glimpse into what true character is. In any case, David decides he can't stick around. Saul is wondering where he is and wants to kill him. He even throws the spear at Jonathan, showing how insane he has become. So what does David do? He goes from Gibeah to Nob, just a few miles away, next to Jerusalem. There the priest Ahimelech, one of the last descendants of Eli, says, I know you're hungry, but I can't give you anything, because this is the bread of the presence. David says his men have kept themselves chaste, so he allows them to eat it. Jesus would later reflect on this same passage in the Gospels when the disciples eat grain from the field. Then David asks, is there any weapon here? And the priest says, there's the sword of Goliath. David says, that's the one I want. There's none like it.

Dr. Chris McKinny: So now David has the sword. The text doesn't spell out his plan, but it's clear his plan is to go to the Philistines and hide among them as a kind of mercenary, seeking asylum with the enemy while Saul chases him. The classic my enemy's enemy is my friend. David gets the sword of Goliath in his hand, which becomes a major weapon, and they flee. Saul hears about it because of a character, Doeg, I believe, who is there, sees what's happening and tells on them. Then Saul comes to Nob, the city of priests, takes out his sword once more, and puts everyone to the edge of the sword: all the priests, man, woman, child and beast. The same thing he was supposed to do to the Amalekites, the enemies of Israel, he does to this Levitical, priestly city. And it's the sword he does it with. He's misusing his agency. Except Abiathar the priest, who has the ephod with him and gets out of Nob to go meet David. So now Saul has lost his marbles, lost the spirit, lost access to Samuel, and lost access to the ephod, which is how he could ask basic questions like, should we do this or should we do that? He's on his own. All he has is himself and this weapon, and at every stage it will not benefit him.

Dr. Chris McKinny: So what happens next with David? He goes among the Philistines, and his plan doesn't work. They've got the new theme song, like the Avengers: Saul has killed his thousands, and David his ten thousands. The same song that drove Saul crazy is still playing in Gath of the Philistines. We should stop here and say Gath at this moment is an enormous city. Compared to Gibeah of Saul, which is a small hill, this is a metropolis, a massive city, a large fortress. They seem to be welcoming David in, but David gets cold feet. He acts like a lunatic, with drool dripping down his beard, and Achish says, get him out, I don't need any crazy people here. So David makes the conscious decision to hide in the very same valley where he fought Goliath, between the forces of Israel and the Philistines, with the sword. It's there, at the fortress or cave of Adullam, that we get what I like to think of as the Merry Men of Robin Hood. I actually think this story is a basis for that legend. People who are outcasts and having a really difficult time all gather around him. This is the beginning of the mighty men: David's family, Joab and his brothers, Benaiah son of Jehoiada. All these guys join David, a kind of grassroots movement.

Dr. Chris McKinny: And this again shows the geography and how these stories work: while David is at the cave, Abiathar brings him the ephod. So at this moment David has the anointing of God's spirit. He is the man of the hour. He has the sword of Goliath. He has loyal followers who will be with him wherever he goes. But he is homeless. He can't go back to Gibeah. He can't go back to Bethlehem. He sends his parents away to Moab, similar to Saul with Jabesh Gilead, because David has family in Moab. Remember the story of Ruth. So David is in a very transient situation, but he has the resources and the things that really matter. And he'll be given opportunities throughout this story to end it, that is, to kill Saul. He has one when Saul comes after him at En Gedi, and another when Saul is asleep. In each instance he says, I will not put out my hand against the Lord's anointed. Those lines have a payoff at the end of the story, because the Lord is going to make it happen. I won't go into all the trials and travails, which are a fascinating study in themselves, but there are two elements that are really important.

Dr. Chris McKinny: One is the story of David with Abigail and Nabal. The only time David straps on his sword to kill someone in hot anger, it's not Saul. It's this guy whose name means fool, Nabal, in 1 Samuel 25. Abigail stops him and says, look, you can't do this, this is unjust, here are some raisins and other things. David says, OK, you're right. And then God strikes the fool dead after he hears what happened. This is an important detail in how David is slowly winning the southern hill country, the area of Hebron, Carmel and Maon. The Ziphites, from a place near Hebron, tell on David twice to Saul: David's around, he's over here, come get him. So throughout this narrative David has the sword. He's on the run from Saul, and at a certain point he decides to go back to plan A. Plan A is to go among the Philistines, where he can have at least some semblance of peace. So David goes back to Gath of the Philistines with his Philistine sword, Goliath's sword, which has now won many battles but has never reached out against Saul.

Dr. Chris McKinny: Over the next couple of chapters, especially 1 Samuel 26 and 27, David fights Israel's enemies and the Philistines' enemies. This is where it gets really interesting. David is killing the Amalekites, defeating people no one seems to like, and sending spoil to Gath, but also to others among the people of Israel, specifically Judah, to the people who support him. All is going swimmingly. He has cover from Saul by being with Achish of Gath. But then he gets the news that there's a muster of all the Philistines with their mercenaries, and David is a mercenary for Achish. It says the seranim, the lords of the Philistines, which seems to be a Philistine word, maybe even related to the Greek word tyrant, muster at a place called Aphek, northeast of Tel Aviv today. David dutifully goes there, thinking, I don't know what's going to happen, but I'm on this path now. I've got my Philistine sword, let's do it. Achish insists, he's done all this for me, he's proven himself time and again, he'll fight for us, he won't turn against us when Saul, his worst enemy, is on the battlefield. But God providentially has the other four lords say, we can't risk it.

Dr. Chris McKinny: So David turns around at Aphek, in the coastal plain, and goes as far south as possible, all the way to Ziklag, which, there's debate, but I think is west of Beersheba. Dan to Beersheba, those are the borders of the country. There he finds his city attacked, his family taken and the city burned. So not only does he go to the edge of the habitable area, he goes beyond it to chase the Amalekites and kill them. It's like a cowboy movie, going as far west as possible, like The Searchers, a John Wayne film. He's getting further and further from the action. That's the backdrop to where David is when Saul's death happens. So put it all together. All three swords most likely emerged from Gath of the Philistines, the most important city of the time, probably in connection with the temple of Dagon or Ashtaroth or some temple where this metalworking happened. David has carried Goliath's sword since the battle and fought all these battles with it. Saul's sword never comes against the Philistines on their own turf, but it does all these other things throughout the narrative. The swords show up together in 1 Samuel 17, but at the end of the narrative Saul's sword and his head are brought back to the place where they were made.

Dr. Chris McKinny: And think about how that compares to the Ark being brought into the house of Dagon. This is my trophy, this is what I've accomplished. So if we follow the swords from 1 Samuel 13 all the way to 31, we see it's the literary device that ties the whole thing together. An Israelite knows these places, and they can imagine an object going to Gath, going after the Amalekites, going to Gilboa, and it becomes a story that's really tangible and extremely well told. From there, David will have his rise and eventually become king over all Israel, and the Philistines will attack him. The last point I want to make is that this idea of heroic swords was recognized early in biblical history. Judah the Hammer didn't have a hammer. That was a nickname. He has a sword that he takes from a Seleucid general he kills, and 1 Maccabees goes out of its way to say he carried that sword with him for the rest of his days. It's a clear allusion to what David does with the sword of Goliath. So that's the tale of two swords. There's more we could say, but it only really opens up if we see that final battle with the head and the sword being brought from the battlefield back to the land of the Philistines, because that gives the symmetry: it comes back to where it was created.

Johnny Ova: Dr. McKinny, this has been great. You really brought this story to life. Can you tell us more about the tale of two swords and how people can get hold of you and find the projects you're working on?

Dr. Chris McKinny: This is something I'm still working on. I wrote it several years ago and need to publish it. I always talk about it in the field. I'm currently at the Lanier Center for Archaeology at Lipscomb University, and this is exactly the kind of thing we get into in classes. The Lanier Center is a leading center for the study of biblical archaeology in the United States, really one of the only places you can get an MA and a PhD from an accredited institution, and I'm really happy to be there. We have several projects: Ashdod, where the Ark was brought, Ashdod of the Philistines, and Karnak in Egypt, the greatest temple in existence from the ancient world. I'm also joining a project on the Sea of Galilee this summer at el-Araj, the site of Bethsaida, home of Simon Peter, Andrew and Philip, and maybe some other disciples. A pretty important site.

Dr. Chris McKinny: Two other things. We have a podcast called the Biblical World Podcast, where we discuss exactly these kinds of topics all the time. We just finished a long series on Gilgamesh, which was a lot of fun. And perhaps most important for your listeners, I have a movie coming out exactly one month from today. We're in early March, and on April 12th, 14th and 15th the film Legends of the Lost Ark premieres in theaters. It's a documentary about what happened to the Ark according to the most ancient sources. I like to call it a love letter to biblical archaeology and historical geography, because we really look at what the text actually says and how the ancient Judeans who lost the Ark grappled with it. It's shot on location in Israel. We have lots of reenactments of biblical scenes, Jeremiah, Moses. We actually made an Ark. So it's really exciting to see this come to fruition. Definitely check it out if you have time. Legendsofthelostark.com is where you can get more information.

Johnny Ova: Very nice. I'll make sure I link all of that in the description on YouTube, Apple and Spotify so people can check it out. Dr. McKinny, thank you so much for joining us today. Really fascinating stuff, and I'm looking forward to connecting again in the future.

Dr. Chris McKinny: Great, thanks, Johnny.