Coat of mail - Or "breastplate of scales." A kind of metal shirt, protecting the back as well as the breast, and made of scales like those of a fish; as was the corselet of Rameses III, now in the British Museum. The terms, helmet, coat, and clothed (armed the King James Version) are the same as those used in Isaiah 59:17.

Five thousand shekels - Probably about 157 pounds avoirdupois (see Exodus 38:12). It is very probable that Goliath's brass coat may have been long preserved as a trophy, as we know his sword was, and so the weight of it ascertained.

He was armed with a coat of mail - The words in the original, שרון קשקשים shiryon kaskassim, mean a coat of mail formed of plates of brass overlapping each other, like the scales of a fish, or tiles of a house. This is the true notion of the original terms.

With thin plates of brass or iron, overlapping each other, were the ancient coats of mail formed in different countries; many formed in this way may be now seen in the tower of London.

The weight - five thousand shekels - Following Bishop Cumberland's tables, and rating the shekel at two hundred and nineteen grains, and the Roman ounce at four hundred and thirty-eight grains, we find that Goliath's coat of mail, weighing five thousand shekels, was exactly one hundred and fifty-six pounds four ounces avoirdupois. A vast weight for a coat of mail, but not all out of proportion to the man.

And he had an helmet of brass upon his head,.... This was a piece of armour, which covered the head in the day of battle; these were usually made of the skins of beasts, of leather, and which were covered with plates of iron, or brass; and sometimes made of all iron, or of brass (g); as this seems to have been:

and he was armed with a coat of mail; which reached from the neck to the middle, and consisted of various plates of brass laid on one another, like the scales of fishes (h), so close together that no dart or arrow could pierce between:

and the weight of the coat was five thousand shekels of brass: which made one hundred and fifty six pounds and a quarter of zygostatic or avoirdupois weight; and therefore he must be a very strong man indeed to carry such a weight. So the armour of the ancient Romans were all of brass, as this man's; their helmets, shields, greaves, coats of mail, all of brass, as Livy says (i); and so in the age of the Grecian heroes (j).

(g) Vid. Lydium "de re militari": l. 3. c. 5. p. 63. (h) "----Rutilum thoraca indutus anis Horrebat squamis----" Virgil. Aeneid. l. 11. (i) Hist. l. 1. c. 22. (j) Pausan. Messenica, l. 3. p. 163. So Homer frequently describes the Grecians with a coat of mail of brass.

And he had an helmet of brass upon his head, and he was armed with a coat of mail; and the weight of the coat was five thousand {b} shekels of brass.

(b) That is, 156 pounds 4 ounces, after half and ounce to the shekel: and 600 shekels weight amounts to 18 4-Marpounds.

17:5 Coat of mail - Made of brass plates laid over one another, like the scales of a fish. The weight, and c. - The common shekel contained a fourth part of an ounce; and so five thousand shekels made one thousand two hundred and fifty ounces, or seventy - eight pounds: which weight is not unsuitable to a man of such vast strength as his height speaks him to be.

armed: Heb. clothed

5. helmet of brass-The Philistine helmet had the appearance of a row of feathers set in a tiara, or metal band, to which were attached scales of the same material, for the defense of the neck and the sides of the face [Osborn].

a coat of mail-a kind of corslet, quilted with leather or plates of metal, reaching only to the chest, and supported by shoulder straps, leaving the shoulders and arms at full liberty.

17:1-11 Men so entirely depend upon God in all things, that when he withdraws his help, the most valiant and resolute cannot find their hearts or hands, as daily experience shows.