David and Goliath

The two armies face each other across the Valley of Elah, camped on opposite ridges with a valley between, which is a standoff rather than a battle. The Philistine proposal is single combat to decide the outcome, which was a recognised way of settling a confrontation without destroying two armies.

Goliath's height is given as six cubits and a span in the Hebrew manuscripts, which is about two metres ninety. Several older witnesses, including the Greek version, a Dead Sea Scroll copy and Josephus, give four cubits and a span, about two metres. Either way he is a very large man, and the smaller figure is within the range of documented human height while the larger is not.

His equipment is itemised like an inventory: a bronze helmet, a coat of scale armour weighing five thousand shekels, bronze greaves, a bronze javelin slung on his back, a spear with a shaft like a weaver's rod and an iron point weighing six hundred shekels, and a shield-bearer walking ahead of him. Scale armour and the shield-bearer are both consistent with Aegean military equipment of the period.

He comes out twice a day for forty days.

David arrives carrying bread and cheese for his brothers, hears the challenge, and starts asking around about the reward. His eldest brother accuses him of coming down to watch the battle out of conceit. His question, when he puts it, is not about the reward: who is this uncircumcised Philistine that he should defy the armies of the living God?

Saul offers him his own armour and David cannot walk in it, and takes it off. He goes down to the stream and picks five smooth stones.

The sling was not a boy's toy. It was a standard weapon of ancient armies, and specialist slingers were employed as light artillery throughout the region; a stone of that size, released at speed, carries lethal force. What David does is bring a ranged weapon to a duel that the other man had equipped himself for at close quarters, and he refuses to fight on the terms offered. He also runs quickly towards the battle line rather than waiting.

The exchange before it is entirely verbal and Goliath opens it: am I a dog, that you come at me with sticks? David's answer names the terms he is fighting on. You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the LORD Almighty. The whole world will know that there is a God in Israel, and all those gathered here will know that it is not by sword or spear that the LORD saves.

One stone, one shot, and he takes the man's head off with the man's own sword because he has none of his own.

The Philistines run and Israel pursues them all the way to Gath and Ekron.