Goliath

Goliath ( gə-LY-əth) was a Philistine warrior of giant stature who plays a pivotal role within the Biblical story's legendary account of King David in the Book of Samuel. According to 1 Samuel, Goliath challenges the Israelites to beat him in single combat. David, then a young shepherd, takes up the challenge. He fells Goliath with a stone slung from a sling and beheads the fallen giant with his own sword. The narrative signifies King Saul's unfitness to rule for not taking up the giant's challenge himself. The phrase "David and Goliath" has taken on a more popular meaning denoting an underdog situation, a contest wherein a smaller, weaker opponent faces a much bigger, stronger adversary. Some modern scholars now believe that the original slayer of Goliath in the text may have been Elhanan, son of Jair, who features in 2 Samuel 21:19, in which Elhanan kills Goliath the Gittite, and that the authors of the Deuteronomistic history changed the original text to credit the victory to the more famous figure of David.