Goliath
This page is about a Biblical figure. For other meanings of the word see: Goliath (disambiguation)
Goliath of Gath (גלית "Passage; revolution", Standard Hebrew Golyat, Tiberian Hebrew Golyāṯ) was a gigantic figure in the Biblical story of David in the Book of I Samuel in the Hebrew Bible. He came from Gath, one of five ancient city-states of the Philistines, which was opposed to Israel at the time.
Scripture describes how David, as a young man without military training, volunteered to defend the honor of God and Israel by fighting Goliath in a match to the death. Goliath, a national battle hero, was fully armored and quite willing to destroy little David. David slung a single stone which either killed or rendered Goliath unconscious. David then decapitated Goliath with Goliath's own sword. According to the Midrash, Goliath was killed by the stone from the sling which miraculously penetrated his forehead. David and Goliath shared ancestry, David's great-great-grandmother being the Moabite Ruth who was the sister of Orpah, the forebear of Goliath.
Although Goliath is generally known as a "giant" of the Bible, actual careful reading of the scripture in the original Hebrew clearly shows a detailed description of the height and size of Goliath. He was a giant of a man, perhaps eight to eight and half feet tall, but no mythical "giant" of lore.
He is also mentioned in the Qur'an under the Arabicname جالوت Jālūt (see Similarities between the Bible and the Qur'an).
The name has been used elsewhere for various pieces of software, large machinery (for example, a crane on the Clyde in Scotland), a frog (Conraua goliath), the Goliath beetle and any situation featuring unequal competing groups.
Compare star of Goliath.
