Page "Eben-Ezer" Paragraph 5

According to some modern textual scholars, the second narrative is a redaction, added by a later editor, probably the deuteronomist, probably to explain away what is in reality an earlier sanctuary that featured a stone as a fetish of Yahweh ( such sanctuaries are found in the Canaanite archaeological record ).

The first narrative is considered to come from a sanctuaries narrative ( 1 Samuel 4: 1-7: 1 ) that recounts the tale of the Ark's captivity, and perhaps was originally more extensive in its details about the Ark's travels ( possibly including the narratives found elsewhere about Araunah's threshing floor, and the death of Uzziah ).

This first passage abruptly interrupts the narrative flow of the story of Samuel, which would read more naturally, in the eyes of textual scholars, if the text went straight from 1 Samuel 3: 21 to 1 Samuel 7: 17.