Zephaniah identified the
Philistines as “Kerethites,” a term that may identify a clan of the Philistines
or may be associated with the island of Crete, from which most assume the
Philistines migrated. In Amos 9:7, Deut 2:13, and Jer 47:4, the Philistines are
associated with Caphtor, which may have been Crete. David recruited part of his
bodyguard from the Kerethites (2 Sam 8:18). In the present context Zephaniah
referred to the whole nation by the name of Kerethites. (Kenneth L.
Barker, Micah, Nahum, Habakkuk, Zephaniah [The New American Commentary
20; Nashville: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1999], 456)
Nation of Cherethites. Peoples of Crete, a designation for the
Philistines. The Cherethites are elsewhere associated with the Philistines
(Ezek 25:16 and cf. 1 Sam 30:14), since Philistine origins are in the
Mediterranean islands. Ben Zvi finds a wordplay in krtym, “Cherethites,” and krt,
“cut off” (cf. Ezek 25:16). Cf. also Zeph 2:6, nwt krt. (Adele Berlin, Zephaniah: A New Translation
with Introduction and Commentary [AYB 25A; New Haven: Yale University Press,
2008], 104-5)
[2:5] The oracle begins with the direct, second-person address of
the threatened party so characteristic of hôy-oracles.
Zephaniah first gets their attention with the exclamation and a couple of
designations for the Philistines. He addresses them as the inhabitants of the
seacoast, because the main Philistine centers were located in the coastal
plain, and he refers to them as the nation of the Kerethites, because the
Kerethites, a subgroup of the Philistines that apparently traced their origins
to the island of Crete, were a dominant element in the Philistine population (1
Sam. 30:14; 2 Sam. 8:18 and passim; Ezek. 25:16). He then informs them that the
word of Yahweh is against them and addresses them with two more designations
before quoting Yahweh’s direct words to them: “I will destroy you, leaving no
inhabitant.” He addresses them as Canaan, the land of the Philistines, because
the Philistines were early settlers in Canaan (K. A. Kitchen, “The
Philistines,” in POTT, 53–78; Trude
Dothan, The Philistines and Their
Material Culture [New Haven, Conn.: Yale University Press, 1982]), and they
remained the dominant non-Israelite population that still occupied a
significant portion of ancient Canaan that impinged directly on Judean
territory. Their territory is reckoned as Canaanite in Josh. 13:2–4. The
prophet’s failure to mention the Phoenicians in his oracles against the foreign
nations may suggest either that their relations to Judah at the time were
friendly or that their remoteness from Judah made their relations relatively
insignificant to Zephaniah. (J. J. M. Roberts, Nahum, Habakkuk, and Zephaniah: A Commentary [The Old Testament
Library; Louisville, Ky.: Westminster/John Knox Press, 1991], 196-97)
