“David took the head of the P’lishti and brought it to Yerushalayim, but he put the armor of the P’lishti in his tent.”-1 Samuel 17:54
So why would David take Goliath’s head to Jerusalem?
There’s a lot of debate about this.
Some folks say it’s a problem because Jerusalem didn’t even exist during David’s time.
They argue someone must’ve added those verses in later.
Even though there was a walled city there with people called Jebusites, it wasn’t called Jerusalem at the time.
It was called Jebus.
So why would David take Goliath’s head there, no matter what the city was called or who ruled it?
I can’t give you a definite answer to that question, but I can tell you what some scholars think.
They say there’s more and more proof that Jebus was a city with walls where some Canaanites lived, called Jebusites.
However, right outside the walls, there was a neighborhood called “Jerusalem”.
They believe David went there, a Hebrew neighborhood, with Goliath’s head to show everyone he defeated him (we’re not told why doing that was important).
Later, they think the name of the neighborhood, Jerusalem, was also applied to the walled city of Jebus after David took it over as his capital.
Another opinion is that back then Jebus was a mixed city where Hebrews lived side-by-side with Canaanites.
The Canaanites liked to call the city by its old name, Jebus, while the Hebrews preferred the newer Hebrew name, Yerushalayim.
Finally, the third viewpoint is that calling the place Jerusalem might be a mistake.
In other words, “Jerusalem” is just a modern name being used to describe an ancient place that originally went by a different name.
This phenomenon happens a lot in the Scriptures and with historical records in general.
The original name might have been forgotten, so people started using the newer name instead.
Or, over the centuries, as languages evolved or new rulers came to power, that would also cause place names to change as well.
So, even if a place had a different name long ago, the newer name is used even if when the event occurred it went by a different name.
Ya feel me?
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