1 Samuel 17:5

17:5 He had a bronze helmet on his head and was wearing scale body armor. The weight of his bronze body armor was five thousand shekels. ¹ 

1 Samuel 17:58

17:58 Saul said to him, “Whose son are you, young man?” David replied, “I am the son of your servant Jesse in Bethlehem.” ² 

Yesaya 59:17

59:17 He wears his desire for justice ³  like body armor, ⁴ 

and his desire to deliver is like a helmet on his head. ⁵ 

He puts on the garments of vengeance ⁶ 

and wears zeal like a robe.

Yesaya 59:1

Injustice Brings Alienation from God

59:1 Look, the Lord’s hand is not too weak ⁷  to deliver you;

his ear is not too deaf to hear you. ⁸ 

Yesaya 5:8

Disaster is Coming

5:8 Those who accumulate houses are as good as dead, ⁹ 

those who also accumulate landed property ¹⁰ 

until there is no land left, ¹¹ 

and you are the only landowners remaining within the land. ¹² 

[17:5]  ¹ sn Although the exact weight of Goliath’s defensive body armor is difficult to estimate in terms of modern equivalency, it was obviously quite heavy. Driver, following Kennedy, suggests a modern equivalent of about 220 pounds (100 kg); see S. R. Driver, Notes on the Hebrew Text and the Topography of the Books of Samuel, 139. Klein, taking the shekel to be equal to .403 ounces, arrives at a somewhat smaller weight of about 126 pounds (57 kg); see R. W. Klein, 1 Samuel (WBC), 175. But by any estimate it is clear that Goliath presented himself as a formidable foe indeed.

[17:58]  ² map For location see Map5 B1; Map7 E2; Map8 E2; Map10 B4.

[59:17]  ³ tn Or “righteousness” (KJV, NASB, NIV, NRSV, NLT); NCV “goodness.”

[59:17]  ⁴ tn Or “a breastplate” (traditional; so many English versions); TEV “a coat of armour.”

[59:17]  ⁵ tn Heb “and [as] a helmet deliverance on his head.”

[59:17]  ⁶ tn Heb “and he puts on the clothes of vengeance [as] a garment.”

[59:1]  ⁷ tn Heb “short” (so NAB, NASB, NIV, NRSV).

[59:1]  ⁸ tn Heb “or his ear too heavy [i.e., “dull”] to hear.”

[5:8]  ⁹ tn Heb “Woe [to] those who make a house touch a house.” The exclamation הוֹי (hoy, “woe, ah”) was used in funeral laments (see 1 Kgs 13:30; Jer 22:18; 34:5) and carries the connotation of death.

[5:8]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “[who] bring a field near a field.”

[5:8]  sn This verse does not condemn real estate endeavors per se, but refers to the way in which the rich bureaucrats of Judah accumulated property by exploiting the poor, in violation of the covenantal principle that the land belonged to God and that every family was to have its own portion of land. See the note at 1:23.

[5:8]  ¹¹ tn Heb “until the end of the place”; NASB “until there is no more room.”

[5:8]  ¹² tn Heb “and you are made to dwell alone in the midst of the land.”