📖WEB · 1 Chronicles 11:23
What does 1 Chronicles 11:23 mean?
"He killed an Egyptian, a man of great stature, five cubits high. In the Egyptian’s hand was a spear like a weaver’s beam; and he went down to him with a staff, plucked the spear out of the Egyptian’s hand, and killed him with his own spear."
— 1 Chronicles 11:23 (World English Bible)
Surrounding context
Abishai, the brother of Joab, he was chief of the three; for he lifted up his spear against three hundred and killed them, and had a name among the three.
Of the three, he was more honorable than the two, and was made their captain; however he wasn’t included in the three.
Benaiah the son of Jehoiada, the son of a valiant man of Kabzeel, who had done mighty deeds, killed the two sons of Ariel of Moab. He also went down and killed a lion in the middle of a pit on a snowy day.
He killed an Egyptian, a man of great stature, five cubits high. In the Egyptian’s hand was a spear like a weaver’s beam; and he went down to him with a staff, plucked the spear out of the Egyptian’s hand, and killed him with his own spear.
Benaiah the son of Jehoiada did these things, and had a name among the three mighty men.
Behold, he was more honorable than the thirty, but he didn’t attain to the three; and David set him over his guard.
The mighty men of the armies also include Asahel the brother of Joab, Elhanan the son of Dodo of Bethlehem,
Explanation
This verse describes one of the remarkable exploits of Benaiah son of Jehoiada, a warrior in King David's army who is listed among David's "mighty men" in 1 Chronicles 11. In plain language, the text tells us that Benaiah confronted a massive Egyptian warrior, roughly seven and a half feet tall (a cubit is about eighteen inches, so five cubits comes to around seven and a half feet), who was armed with an enormous spear described as being like a weaver's beam — the heavy wooden bar used in looms, suggesting the spear's shaft was unusually thick and formidable. Despite this imbalance in weaponry, Benaiah went to meet the giant carrying only a staff, a simple wooden club or rod, wrestled the spear away from him, and killed the Egyptian with his own weapon.
The broader context is a chapter that catalogs the exploits of David's elite warriors, the men who supported him during his rise to kingship and throughout his reign. First Chronicles was likely compiled after the Babylonian exile, drawing on earlier records (this account also appears in 2 Samuel 23), to remind the returning Jewish community of God's faithfulness to David's line and to honor the covenant community's history. Benaiah later became commander of David's bodyguard and, under Solomon, commander of the entire army, so this story functions partly as a résumé of the courage and skill that earned him such trust
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