And the golden mice, according to the number of all the cities of the Philistines belonging to the five lords, both of fenced cities, and of country villages, even unto the great stone of Abel, whereon they set down the ark of the LORD: which stone remaineth unto this day in the field of Joshua, the Bethshemite.
And the golden mice. There were five representative images of the emerods, corresponding to the five principal cities of the Philistines. But the number of the golden mice must have been greater, because they were sent from the walled towns as well as the country villages-literally, 'villages of the Perizzites.'
Unto the great stone of Abel. Abel or Aben means "stone;" so that, without resorting to italics, the reading should be, "the great stone" [Septuagint, lithos megalos]. 'We may understand,' says Taylor, editor of Calmet, 'the passage as implying that the ark was placed on a spare piece of ground, on a rising unproductive (waste) of grain. To this agree the circumstances of the story: -The men of Beth-shemesh were reaping in the grain-fields; they therefore took the ark aside to a place not occupied by growing grain, but where the surface was bare-that is, a rock; and this height, thus sanctified by the reception of the ark, was easily distinguished by future generations, because it formed no part of the cultivated land.'