4.
1. “Elhanan, the son of Jair, the Bethlehemite, slew Goliath of Gath, the shaft of whose spear was like a weaver’s beam” (2 Sam. xxi, 19, H. V.).
2. “Elhanan the son of Jair slew Lahmi the brother of Goliath the Gittite, whose spear staff was like a weaver’s beam” (1 Chron. xx, 5).
3. “Elhanan the son of Jaare-oregim, a Bethlehemite, slew the brother of Goliath the Gittite, the staff of whose spear was like a weaver’s beam” (2 Sam. xxi, 19, A. V.).
The above are three versions of the same passage. The first is a correct translation of the passage as it appears in the Hebrew. It is a part of one of the two discordant narratives used by the compiler of Samuel. The compiler of Chronicles saw the discrepancy and interpolated the words “Lahmi the brother of.” Our translators interpolated the words “the brother of.”
Critics admit that if the killing of Goliath is a historical event, which is improbable, it was Elkanah, and not David, who slew him. The story of David and Goliath given by the other narrator in 1 Samuel is a myth. This writer says: “And David took the head of the Philistine, and brought it to Jerusalem,” evidently believing that the Israelites then occupied Jerusalem, whereas the duel between David and Goliath is said to have occurred 1062 B.C., while the conquest and occupancy of Jerusalem by the Israelites did not occur until 1047 B.C., fifteen years later.