1 Samuel 6:19 - Meaning and Application

Here is, first, the sin of the men of Beth-shemesh: they looked into the ark of the Lord (1 Samuel 6:19). Every Israelite had heard much about the ark and had great respect for it. But they had also been told that it was kept behind a veil, and that even the high priest could look at it only once a year, and then through a cloud of incense. That kind of restriction may have stirred up a desire in some people to see what they were not allowed to see.

Some of the Beth-shemites likely rejoiced at the ark’s return more for their own curiosity than for the good of the nation. Even that was not enough for them. They wanted to go further, so they took off the covering and looked inside. They may have claimed they wanted to see whether the Philistines had taken out the tablets of the law or damaged them, but their real motive was sinful curiosity, reaching into things God had chosen to hide. It is a serious insult to God when proud people pry into secret matters that do not belong to them (Deuteronomy 29:29; Colossians 2:18). Human ruin began with a craving for forbidden knowledge.

What made this sin worse was their low and careless view of the ark. Because they had grown familiar with it, they lost their reverence for it. Perhaps they thought their work as priests gave them special freedom. But the office of a minister does not excuse careless treatment of holy things, it makes the sin heavier. They should have taught others, by their example, to keep a respectful distance and to treat the ark with holy fear.

They may also have thought that because they had welcomed the ark and offered sacrifices, they had somehow earned the right to look inside it. But no service done for God gives a person leave to show disrespect toward God’s holy things. Or perhaps they thought the ark was easier to handle because it had just come out of captivity and had been set down in a humble place. They should never have used its present low condition as a reason to make free with it. It is an offense against God to think less of his ordinances because they are handled in a simple or plain way. If they had looked with understanding instead of judging by appearance, they would have seen the ark’s true honor more clearly. It had defeated the Philistines and returned from bondage by its own power, like Christ coming out of the grave. If they had remembered that, they would not have treated it like an ordinary chest.

Second, their punishment for this sin: he struck the men of Beth-shemesh with a great slaughter, many of them. God guards the honor of his ark very seriously, and he will not let it be treated as common. Do not be fooled, God is not mocked. Those who will not fear his kindness, and who do not use the signs of his grace with reverence, will be made to feel his justice and fall under his displeasure. If people pry into what is forbidden and come too close to holy fire, they do so at their own risk.

The number struck is given in a very unusual form in the Hebrew text, and that has led many learned men to question how we should read it. The wording can be taken as, “he struck among the people seventy men, fifty thousand men.” The Syriac and Arabic versions read, “five thousand and seventy men.” The Chaldee reads, “seventy men of the elders, and fifty thousand of the common people.” Some have thought the seventy men were as important as fifty thousand because they were priests. Others think the seventy were Beth-shemites killed for looking into the ark, while the fifty thousand were people killed by the ark in Philistine territory. Some take it to mean seventy men out of every thousand, that is, one in twenty. The Septuagint reads it much as our English version does, seventy men and fifty thousand men. Josephus says only seventy were struck.

Third, this severe judgment filled the men of Beth-shemesh with fear. They said, as well they might, “Who is able to stand before this holy Lord God?” (1 Samuel 6:20). Some take this as a complaint against God, as if he had dealt harshly and unfairly with them. Instead of blaming their own sin, they blamed God’s judgment, much like David did in a similar case (2 Samuel 6:8-9). But I think this was more likely a humble and fearful confession of God’s holiness, recognizing that no one can stand before him.

Who can stand before God to worship him? By Christ’s mercy, we are invited, encouraged, and enabled to do that. But who can stand before God to oppose him? No one can stand before the glory of his immediate presence and look fully on it (1 Timothy 6:16). No one can stand before the court of his strict justice and make a case there (Psalm 130:3; Psalm 143:2). No one can stand before the power he puts forth in anger and resist it or endure it (Psalm 76:7).

Fourth, because of this, they wanted to get rid of the ark. They asked, “To whom shall he go up from us?” (1 Samuel 6:20). They should have asked instead, “How can we make peace with him and regain his favor?” (Micah 6:6-7). But they were already becoming weary of the ark, just as the Philistines had been. If they had treated it with proper reverence, it might have remained among them, and they could have been blessed because of it.

This is what happens when the word of God terrifies a sinner’s conscience. Instead of accepting the blame and shame, people often turn against the word and push it away (Jeremiah 6:10). So they sent messengers to the elders of Kirjath-jearim, a fortified city farther up in the country, and asked them to come and take the ark there (1 Samuel 6:21). They would not dare touch it themselves, but stood at a distance, as if it were dangerous. In this, foolish people move from one extreme to another, from bold disrespect to fearful avoidance.

Kirjath-jearim means “city of woods,” and it belonged to Judah (Joshua 15:9, Joshua 15:60). It lay on the road from Beth-shemesh to Shiloh, so they likely expected the elders of Shiloh to come and fetch it from there. But God had other purposes. The ark was passed from town to town, and no one in the nation took proper care of it, which showed that there was no king in Israel.