(1) В¶ And the Philistines took the ark of God, and brought it from Ebenezer unto Ashdod. (2) When the Philistines took the ark of God, they brought it into the house of Dagon, and set it by Dagon.
What the Philistines design was in bringing the ark into the house of their idolatrous God, is not so easy to determine. Whether it might be to give honor to Dagon, as they did in the case of their conquering Samson, or whether it might be that they intended to unite the ark of God with Dagon as the joint object of adoration, it is impossible to say. Strange, that the human mind should have sunk so low by the fall, as ever to give into the idea of worshipping the dunghill deities of a man's own making. But the Holy Ghost by his servant the apostle, gives us the satisfactory reason of it. Romans 1:22-25.