Goliath's Brothers or Sons?

“Then he [David] took his staff in his hand; and he chose for himself five smooth stones from the brook, and put them in a shepherd’s bag, in a pouch which he had, and his sling was in his hand. And he drew near to the Philistine [Goliath].”

(1 Samuel 17:40, NKJV).

 

 

Over the years, I have heard preachers and have read that these “five smooth stones” were for Goliath and his four brothers. However, after examining the Scriptures 2 Samuel 21:15-22; 1 Chronicles 20:4-8 that speak about Goliath’s relatives, I ran into a couple problems.

First, only three giants are mentioned by name, but one is not, which is fine. The problem was that three of these giants are mentioned to be “born to the giant,” whereas only Lamni is actually mentioned to be “the brother of Goliath the Gittite” (see 2 Sam. 21:19; 1 Chron. 20:5). So the question of these four giants being Goliath’s brothers is simply not true. Only one, Lamni is mentioned as the actual brother of Goliath. So that still leaves us with the question to who is the father of the giants Ishbi-Benob, Saph [Sippai], and the unnamed giant with the six fingers on each hand and six toes on each foot? Some argue that the phrases “one of the sons of the giant” (see 2 Sam. 21:16, 18; 1 Chron. 20:4) and “born to the giant” (see 2 Sam. 21:20; 1 Chron. 20:6) refers to Goliath. If that is true, then we can conclude that Goliath had three sons. However, the Scripture texts that refer to the three giants being born to the giant does not confirm their father was Goliath. A better explanation could be that the Bible texts that refer to giants born to the giant speaks about these giants are the descendants of their father Anak who was a giant (see Num. 13:28, 32-33).

Second, we have what appears to be a contradiction. 2 Samuel 21:19 says that Elhanan killed Goliath the Gittite; but 1 Samuel 17:40-58 says that David slew the giant Goliath. So who is it? Did David or did Elhanan kill Goliath? Well this problem is easily rectified by comparing 2 Samuel 21:19 with 1 Chronicles 20:5 which clearly identifies the giant that Elhanan killed was “Lamni, the brother of Goliath the Gittite.” The NKJV version of 2 Samuel 21:19 actually states “the brother of Goliath.” Dr. Norman L. Geisler and Thomas Howe agree, when they wrote:

“The 2 Samuel text is probably a scribal error in coping the manuscript and should read “Elhanan…slew Lamni the brother of Goliath the Gittite.” This conclusion is supported by a parallel report of the story in 1 Chronicles 20:5 which has the missing highlighted phrase “Lamni the brother of,” thus showing it was the brother of Goliath that Elhanan killed and not Goliath, whom David slew just as 1 Samuel 17 reports.” (see The Big Book of Bible Difficulties, by Norman L. Geisler and Thomas Howe, pgs. 176-177).