Mourning of the Philistines
The next nation on Jeremiah’s prophecy list is Philistia. The Philistines occupied a small strip of land on the southern coast. The modern area of Gaza encompasses a portion of it, although the Philistines controlled a larger area than that.
The Philistines had occupied five main cities: Gaza, Ashkelon, Ashdod, Ekron, and Gath. They had migrated from Caphtor around 1200 BC (Jeremiah 47:4, Amos 9:7). By Jeremiah’s time, Gath had already been destroyed a couple of centuries earlier. When the Persians arrived a half-century after Jeremiah, the Philistines were no longer a people.
Amidst the prophecy of destruction, Jeremiah records some common mourning practices:
Baldness has come upon Gaza;
Jeremiah 47:5
Ashkelon has perished.
O remnant of their valley,
how long will you gash yourselves?
Shaving one’s head bald (קָרַח karach) or cutting oneself (גָּדַד gadad) were two mourning practices mentioned in several other places throughout the Bible. Leviticus 21:5 forbids priests from shaving their heads or beards or cutting themselves as part of mourning practices. This is extended to all Israel as a whole in Deuteronomy 14:1. Jeremiah 16:6 lists them along with burial as practices that will not take place because of how bad the Lord’s punishment will be on the land. Part of the city lament for the city of Tyre in Ezekiel 27 and part of the lament includes making themselves bald (Ezekiel 27:31). A similar statement of mourning is in the next chapter, where Jeremiah prophecies against Moab (Jeremiah 48:37). Cutting oneself also appeared to be part of Canaanite worship of Baal (1 Kings 18:28).
This doesn’t mean that shaving one’s head was forbidden altogether. A Nazirite was expected to shave his head at the completion of his vow (Numbers 6:18), but this is a different word, simply meaning to shave (which can be more than the top of the head). The point seems to be that the Lord does not approve these as mourning rituals for his people.
To Ponder…
- What are common practices in your culture of which the Lord disapproves?