HEBREW WORD STUDY: THE THIRD WARRIOR – SHALESHIM שׁלשׁימ
I Samuel 4:7 “And the Philistines were afraid, for they said, God is come into the camp and they said: Woe unto us! For there hath not been such a thing heretofore.”
I find this verse very remarkable in that the Philistines declared that God had come into the camp of Israel. Yet, in verse 3 the people of Israel declared that “it” or the Ark of the Covenant in its proper syntax, would save them. Can you dig it? The people of Israel said the ark would save them and their Godless, pagan enemy, the Philistines, said “God” would save Israel. You know, I think sometimes we Christians do not give the world enough credit. There are occasions when they can see things that we just don’t see.
Israel represented a faith, one that was feared and respected by the Philistines, yet as events unfolded, it was shown that they may have represented a true faith, but they had no faith, they did not walk the walk and were soundly defeated.
That last phrase: “Woe to us for there has not been such a thing heretofore” is a very curious statement. Every translation will render this phrase in a similar fashion. Yet, literally in the Hebrew, it says: “Woe to us for she has not come as this yesterday three days.” I know it doesn’t make sense.
What is even more interesting is that the Philistines use a feminine pronoun to represent God. I doubt every Philistine said these words, and I am not sure if even one said these exact words. This was spoken not by a Philistine but a composite of Philistines. What we are reading is a composite of the sentiments of all the Philistines. There is no one translation to this phrase. The word yesterday is really an adverb which means before or heretofore. The word thing catches my attention. It is the word shaleshim which is used in extra-Biblical literature for the third warrior or the ultimate warrior. The Philistines are saying that they stand before the ultimate warrior. The use of the feminine pronoun creates a picture of the ferocity of a mother fighting to protect her young. In ancient times as it is today, this is a picture of an ultimate warrior, one who will fight to the death for someone or something. You don’t want to pick up a bear cup when mamma bear is around, you might be able to deal with papa bear, but you don’t want to mess with mamma bear. Go near a nest of young birds and it will not be daddy bird, but mamma that takes after you. Even though you are 50 times bigger than mamma bird, she will take you on and I guarantee you will run.
This is how the Philistines saw the Hebrew God, as a mother protectively wrapping her young in her arms and glaring at them: “You touch my little ones and you have to deal with Me.” The Philistines did not want to deal where “Her.”
Consider this the next time you come up against your Philistine. Mamma bear is right behind you ready to claw those Philistines to shreds if they dare touch a hair on your head. You may be posed in your boxer’s stance ready to take on the Philistines as they stand there laughing at you, but then they will see something behind you that you may not really be paying attention to. They will see it or detect it and they will flee in terror. You can be sure they are not retreating out of a fear of getting punched in the nose by you.
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