2 Samuel 21:20

20 A fourth battle was in Geth: where there was a man of great stature, that had six fingers on each hand, and six toes on each foot, four and twenty in all, and he was of the race of Arapha.

2 Samuel 21:20 Meaning and Commentary

2 Samuel 21:20

And there was yet a battle in Gath
Besides the battles in the above place or places; for this does not necessarily suppose that one of the said battles had been there, only that this, which was another battle, had been there:

where was a man of [great] stature;
for so the sense of the word appears to be from ( 1 Chronicles 20:6 ) ; though here it signifies a man of strife and contention, a man of war, and both were true of him:

that had on every hand six fingers, and on every foot six toes, four
and twenty in number;
twelve fingers on his two hands, and twelve toes on his two feet. Pliny F1 speaks of one M. Curiatius, a patrician, who had two daughters that had six fingers on an hand, and were called "Sedigitae", six-fingered; and of Volcatius, a famous poet, called "Sedigitus", or six-fingered, for the same reason; and elsewhere, from other writers F2 he makes mention of a people that had eight toes each foot; so Ctesias F3 speaks of a people in the mountains of India, which have eight fingers on each hand, and eight toes on each foot, both men and women:

and he also was born to the giant;
a son of a giant.


FOOTNOTES:

F1 Nat. Hist. l. 11. c. 43.
F2 Megasthenes apud ib. l. 7. c. 2.
F3 In Indicis, c. 31.

2 Samuel 21:20 In-Context

18 There was also a second battle in Gob against the Philistines: then Sobochai of Husathi slew Saph of the race of Arapha of the family of the giants.
19 And there was a third battle in Gob against the Philistines, in which Adeodatus the son of the Forrest an embroiderer of Bethlehem slew Goliath the Gethite, the shaft of whose spear was like a weaver’s beam.
20 A fourth battle was in Geth: where there was a man of great stature, that had six fingers on each hand, and six toes on each foot, four and twenty in all, and he was of the race of Arapha.
21 And he reproached Israel: and Jonathan the son of Samae the brother of David slew him.
22 These four were born of Arapha in Geth, and they fell by the hand of David, and of his servants.
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