The Ark is Taken Into Captivity 1 Samuel 4-6
God was true to His word. Yesterday, we learned about God telling Samuel that He was going to destroy Eli's family. Eli's son, Hophni and Phinehas were very evil and God was not going to allow their wickedness to continue.
Now God was using the Philistines to bring judgement to Eli's family. God was going to allow the Philistines to have the victory over Israel. During the Battle of Aphek, they triumphed over Israel on the first day of the battle. At this point, the Israelites took the Ark from Shiloh, hoping that it would help them have the victory. Instead of receiving the victory however, God gave them over to their enemies, the Philistines.
During this battle, the two sons of Eli were killed, and Eli himself died when he heard the news that the Ark had been captured. He fell over backward and died. What a sad ending for this family!
Now that the Philistines had the Ark, they took the Ark and put it into their temple of their god Dagon. They believed that Dagon was the true and living God and they worshiped him. The Philistines believed that Dagon was more powerful than the God of the Hebrews. We know that there would have been no contest between Dagon and the True and Living God. But the Philistines didn't know this and when they came to their temple in the morning, they saw Dagon lying face down before the Ark. They put the idol back in place, but the next morning when they went into their temple, not only was Dagon lying before the Ark, but now his hands and head were broken off!
Wherever the Ark ended up, God's hand was heavy upon the people in those cities. God unleashed plagues upon the Philistines, much like He did to the Egyptians. Rats swarmed through their cities and the people were breaking out in tumors. It must have been very hard for the Philistines, because God was opposing them.
They finally figured out that they needed to get rid of the Ark. So they took the Ark and attached it to a cart, then hitched up some cows to the cart and they let the cows go in whatever direction they would go. Somehow, in God's providence, the cows headed right back to Israel! The plagues ended and the Israelites were happy once again, at least for a little while.
This happened around 1050 B.C.
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