The Philistines are being deliberately blind to the truth. The Lord has shown them mercy by displaying His power over their false god Dagon. This was an opportunity to repent and be saved by faith. But instead they burrowed even deeper into idolatry. The Lord will bring troubles on them for possessing the ark and for having no respect for the God it symbolizes. He will display His power and glory, and even though most or all of the Philistines will never bow their knees to Him, they can never say they were ignorant of His existence.
"The Lord's hand was heavy on the people of Ashdod and its vicinity; He brought devastation on them and afflicted them with tumors." (1 Samuel 5:6) We typically think of cancer when we think of tumors but many modern scholars and medical professionals believe the Philistines were afflicted with "buboes": the painful swellings that occur in those with bubonic plague. A number of times in the Bible we find people dying of plagues but the symptoms of these plagues are not usually provided to us. Most times we can't even make a reasonably accurate guess as to what befell them. But as we continue moving on through the book of 1 Samuel we will learn that at the same time the "tumors" appeared on the people, a plague of rats also appeared in the territory of the Philistines. The fleas and lice that infest rats and other wild rodents can spread bubonic plague to humans when these parasites bite humans.
The Philistines at Ashdod are suffering and they call the leadership together to discuss what to do. "When the people at Ashdod saw what was happening, they said, 'The ark of the God of Israel must not stay here with us, because His hand is heavy on us and on Dagon our god.' So they called together all the rulers of the Philistines and asked them, 'What shall we do with the ark of the God of Israel?' They answered, 'Have the ark of the God of Israel moved to Gath.' So they moved the ark of the God of Israel." (1 Samuel 5:7-8) Why did they think moving the ark would help? Wouldn't it have made more sense to return it to the Israelites? In my background study I found the theory that the Philistines were conducting a test. If they moved the ark to Gath and no illness broke out there, they could conclude that it was just a coincidence that the plague fell at Ashdod while the ark was at the temple of Dagon.
"But after they had moved it, the Lord's hand was against that city, throwing it into a great panic. He afflicted the people of the city, both young and old, with an outbreak of tumors." (1 Samuel 5:9) You would think this would be enough to convince the Philistines that the plague is the judgment of God. But it doesn't. Just as they stubbornly refused to believe the Lord caused the statue of Dagon to bow before the ark, they stubbornly refuse to accept the results of their test. The leaders of the Philistines decide to run the test again. "So they sent the ark of God to Ekron." (1 Samuel 5:10a)
The people at Ekron don't want to be a part of this experiment. When they see the ark approaching their city, they cry out in fear because they've heard about what happened when the ark was at Gath and at Ashdod. "As the ark of God was entering Ekron, the people of Ekron cried out, 'They have brought the ark of the God of Israel around to kill us and all our people.'" (1 Samuel 5:10b) The leaders of the Philistines will continue conducting their deadly experiment in spite of the people's protests but we don't want to miss the fact that no one (that we're aware of) at Ekron or at Gath or at Ashdod acknowledged God as the Lord. They believe He exists; they can hardly deny it at this point. But they believe He is merely one of many gods. They keep referring to Him as "the God of Israel" but never as their own God. They have not accepted that He is the only God. They have not turned from idolatry and accepted Him as their Savior. Had a large percentage of the population in any of these three cities repented and turned to the Lord, I believe His response would have been to lift the plague. Had the people of Ekron cried out to the Lord for salvation when they saw the ark approaching their city, I believe the plague would not have even begun there. But instead what the people of Ekron do is appeal to the leaders of the Philistines to send the ark back to the Israelites.
"So they called together all the rulers of the Philistines and said, 'Send the ark of the God of Israel away; let it go back to its own place, or it will kill us and our people.' For death had filled the city with panic; God's hand was very heavy on it. Those who did not die were afflicted with tumors, and the outcry of the city went up to heaven." (1 Samuel 5:11-12) They reject the Lord as their Lord. They convince themselves that He's only doing what one of their own gods would do. For example, if another culture came in and took away a statue of Dagon or objects used in his worship, the Philistines believe Dagon would pour out his wrath on whoever was in possession of such objects. They're wrong, of course, and their stubbornness is difficult to understand after they witnessed Dagon's inability to protect his own statue in his own temple earlier in Chapter 5, but they are determined to remain willfully blind to the truth. They call for their leaders and say to them: "It's time to put a stop to these experiments before our entire nation is wiped out! What more evidence do we need that this plague is connected with the ark? The God of the Israelites is angry that His ark is in the hands of people other than the Israelites. We would expect our own gods to be angry if their images were carried off by another nation, wouldn't we? Wouldn't our gods afflict those people with a plague to make them bring our objects of worship back? Let's send the ark back to the Israelites immediately and end our dealings with the God of Israel. He will leave us alone and we'll never have to think about Him again."
On judgment day the Philistines who lived during the times described for us in Chapter 5 will be unable to claim that the Lord never displayed His mighty power among them or put to shame their false religion. They will never be able to accuse Him of not making Himself known to them and giving them an opportunity to repent and be saved. And it's not only the generation of Philistines of Chapter 5 to whom He revealed Himself. The Philistines will continue to pester the Israelites for some time to come in the Old Testament and they will witness, over and over, how mightily the Lord works on behalf of Israel. There may have been cases of individual repentance among the Philistines, but we will not find them turning to the Lord on a national scale. If any individuals in Ashdod, Gath, or Ekron from today's text turned to the Lord, the Lord very well may have spared their lives during the plague. The author of 1 Samuel would not be likely to know any personal stories like this to be able to relay them to us. But what we do know is that, by and large, all the Philistines really wanted was to put distance between themselves and the Lord and that involves getting His ark out of their territory. They want nothing to do with Him; they just want to hand the ark back over to the Israelites in a manner that won't cause the Israelites to engage them in battle. In tomorrow's text we'll find them planning a "contactless" method of putting the ark back into Israelite hands.
As we conclude today's study I'm reminded of what Governor Felix said to the Apostle Paul in the book of Acts when Paul was making his defense before him. After hearing Paul explain what the gospel message was and why he was preaching it, the Bible says Felix trembled in fear. Felix was under conviction when he heard the gospel message and was on the verge of accepting the Lord, but instead of making a life-changing and soul-saving decision he sent Paul out of his presence so he would not have to hear any more. (Acts 24:25) I think the Philistines found themselves in the same position as Felix when the ark was among them. They were so close to a saving knowledge of the Lord but they rejected Him instead. They did not want to see or hear any more of the God of Israel because that would cause them to have to do something about what they knew of the God of Israel. They could have become members of the family of God but they chose instead to cling to their idols and remain, as Paul described heathen Gentiles, "dead in transgressions and sins", "deserving of wrath", "excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world". (Ephesians 2:1,3,12)
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