1. 2 Samuel 5:21 (ESV)
  2. Exposition

Why did David and his men carry away the Philistine idols?

2 Samuel 5:21 (ESV)

21 And the Philistines left their idols there, and David and his men carried them away.

Carrying away the Philistine idols was a means of removing them from the land and keeping with the law (Numbers 33:52; Deuteronomy 7:5, Deuteronomy 7:25; Deuteronomy 12:3). We can assume that they were destroyed (see 1 Chronicles 14:12).1