Unlocking the Bible
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HUMAN WEAKNESS
The Bible is always honest about the failings and weaknesses of the individuals it describes and Judges is no exception. The characters in the book reveal a number of flaws: Barak was not manly; Gideon was fearful, constantly asking for signs, and towards the end of his life made a gold ephod, a priestly ‘pullover’, which later proved to be a ‘snare’ to Israel, a relic which had become an object of devotion. Jephthah was the son of a prostitute who made a reckless vow; Samson treated his wife poorly, slept with a prostitute and took a mistress. They were not strong characters, nor were they holy people, yet God used them!
DIVINE STRENGTH
How did these less than perfect people manage to achieve so much? It was not through their own power. Their secret was that the Holy Spirit came on them – they were all ‘charismatic’ people.
Judges gives us vivid examples of divine strength working through weak people, as we read how these individuals were able to perform supernatural feats. Samson was perhaps the most graphic example of this, but there are many amazing stories. This is an especially important point to note, because the anointing of the Holy Spirit only comes on a few in the Old Testament. In Judges such anointing was experienced by just 12 people out of the 2 million who populated Israel at that time. We note too that the Holy Spirit comes on them temporarily, not permanently: for example, the text states that the Holy Spirit left Samson. In the Old Testament it was an anointing Spirit that touched them for a time rather than an indwelling Spirit who stayed with them.
WHAT WERE THE JUDGES?
Our consideration of some of the individual stories of the judges has omitted an important question. What exactly were the judges? Who were they and what did they do?
In English they are called ‘judges’, but this expression does not really capture the essence of the word originally used to describe them. When we read that Samson ‘judged’ Israel, or that Gideon ‘judged’ Israel, the idea behind the Hebrew expression is that they were ‘troubleshooters’ who saved the people of God from themselves and others. They are never given a title as such, but are described in terms of what they did. Indeed, the only person to whom the noun is applied in the book of Judges is God. He is the Judge, sorting out their problems. It would therefore be more correct to say that God is the rescuer or troubleshooter who operates through these heroes, by his Spirit, for the benefit of the people.
They are concerned with justice within the nation, but mainly with external problems, since the people are surrounded by hostile nations who attack them at various times: the Ammonites (three times), the Amalekites (twice), the Moabites (once), the Midianites (once) and the Philistines (three times). There is also specific mention of the Kings of Jericho, Moab and Hazor.
The people of God had come into a highly populated area, to peoples largely hostile to their presence. They were perceived as invaders. The only justification for them being in that land at all was that God had given it to them, and they were to exact punishment on the resident population by wiping them out. Thus the book is not just about individual heroes – or the study of personalities, the first level of history described at the beginning of this chapter – but whole peoples too – the second level of history.
National history
If you add together all the years that the 12 people mentioned above judged Israel, they come to 400, but the book of Judges actually covers only 200 years. How can this be so?
GEOGRAPHICAL
This problem is easily resolved when we realize what the judges are actually doing. When we read about Gideon and Samson we tend to think that they were delivering the whole nation, but Israel was now divided into groups of tribes, spread over a wide area roughly the size of Wales. Therefore, when we read that a judge ruled for 40 years, it may only apply to tribes in the north. Another judge may have been saving a situation in the south at the same time. Samson, for example, delivered the southern tribes and Gideon the northern ones.
POLITICAL
At this time there was a leadership vacuum within Israel. Moses had led them out of Egypt, Joshua had led them into the Promised Land, but with both these great men dead, there was no figurehead for the nation – bearing in mind that this was before the days of the monarchy. Thus the judges were local leaders, commanding the loyalty of groups of tribes, but not uniting the whole nation.
MORAL
There was a moral reason why the tribes were continually facing opposition from other nations and people groups, and this is the heart of the book’s message. The structure of the book makes this clear, as we shall see if we look at a brief outline of it. It divides very clearly into three parts.
1. Inexcusable compromise (1–2)
(i) Allowances
(ii) Alliances
2. Incorrigible conduct (3–16)
(i) Sedition by the people
(ii) Subjection by an enemy
(iii) Supplication to the Lord
(iv) Salvation by a deliverer
3. Inevitable corruption (17–21)
(i) Idolatry in the north – Dan
(ii) Immorality in the south – Benjamin
In Section 2, the four stages of the cycle are repeated seven times. The book finishes with a statement that has actually been the refrain throughout: ‘There was no king in those days, every man did what was right in his own eyes.’
1. Inexcusable compromise
(I) ALLOWANCES – VULNERABLE VALLEYS
God sent Israel into the land to destroy the inhabitants totally. Archaeology confirms the wicked practices of the Canaanite people – sexual diseases were rife. Those who question the justice of this extermination forget God’s Word to Abraham about the future of his descendants. He was told that the Jews would stay in Egypt for centuries until the wickedness of the Amorites reached its ‘full measure’. God was tolerant of their wickedness, but they finally overstepped the mark and he used Israel as the instrument of his judgement on a most perverted society.
Instead of following God’s commands, however, Israel were selective in their punishment. They captured the hills and mountains but allowed many of the peoples to remain, especially those living in the valleys. Israel thus became divided into three groups: northern, central and southern. Communication between the tribes was difficult and they were unable to respond speedily and unitedly when external threats arose. Furthermore, the valleys provided routes for invaders, who were only too keen to exploit such internal weakness.
(II) ALLIANCES – MIXED MARRIAGES
The lax standards of the valleys were too great a temptation for many Israelite men, and before long Israelites had married outside their faith in clear defiance of God’s law which forbade ‘mixed marriages’. This affected the spiritual life of Israel. If you marry a child of the devil you are bound to have problems with your father-in-law! Any designs on holy living were dashed and many Israelites in unequal marriages ended up serving Canaanite gods. The spiritual influence of the non-believer tends to be stronger in a mixed marriage, even today. The service of Canaanite gods led inevitably to immorality, for wrong belief always leads to wrong behaviour.
2. Incorrigible conduct
The bulk of the book of Judges consists of a series of cycles. With almost monotonous regularity the people of God repeat the same pattern.
The cycle does not just apply to the whole nation: individuals also live in a similar routine of sin and forgiveness and further sin. It is not simply an endless cycle either, but a spiral going downwards. Things get steadily worse.
3. Inevitable corruption
The last part of the book of Judges is a most unedifying account of what happened to the people. There were two situations, one in the north in the territory of Dan and one in the south in the territory of Benjamin. On both occasions, the people of God were misled by a priest. It is a perfect illustration of the maxim mentioned earlier, that idolatry (wrong belief) leads to immorality (wrong behaviour).
(I) IDOLATRY IN THE NORTH – DAN
The story starts with a son, Micah from Ephraim, stealing 1,100 shekels from his own mother. He returns the money to her and she is so delighted that she uses it to make an idol which she gives to Micah for the private shrine he has set up in his home.
A young Levite comes to Micah’s house in search of lodgings and is offered the opportunity to be his father and priest for a regular income, clothing and food. He accepts. Later the tribes of Dan, who failed to take the land God allocated to them in the south, migrate north. When their leaders lodge in this house with the idols and the priest, they offer the priest the chance to officiate for their whole tribe, for more money, and he accepts.
In clear violation of the law of God, therefore, the tribe of Dan slips into idolatry. Just as Judas Iscariot, one of the 12 disciples, went missing after his great sin, the tribe of Dan is missing in the book of Revelation. The sin starts with a man who steals money from his mother, then it is carried over to a Levite who becomes a private chaplain, first to a family and then to a whole tribe – without any proper appointment or authorisation.
(II) IMMORALITY IN THE SOUTH – BENJAMIN
This story is even worse. Another Levite from the tribe of Ephraim takes a concubine from Bethlehem in Judah. She leaves him and returns to her family home. After four months the Levite arrives in Bethlehem to seek her return. The father keeps urging the Levite to stay at his home before finally letting her go. They set off too late in the day and only get as far as Jerusalem, a pagan city at that time. The Levite refuses to stay with ‘pagans’, so they travel north to the tribe of Benjamin, arriving at Gibeah by nightfall. They are offered hospitality by an old man who welcomes them into his home. However, while they are eating, they are interrupted by ‘wicked men of the city’ who demand that the newcomer be given to them for sex. The old man refuses, but offers instead his daughter. Eventually the Levite gives them his concubine. The next morning the concubine lies dead on the doorstep, having been gang-raped through the night.
The Levite cuts his concubine up into 12 pieces and sends them to the other tribes of Israel. When the Israelites discover that men of the tribe of Benjamin committed the crime, they seek revenge on the perpetrators. The Benjaminites are offended by the accusation and refuse to hand the men over.
A civil war results which almost wipes out the tribe – only 600 men are left. Their towns are destroyed and all the women and children are slaughtered. The other tribes had vowed not to give their daughters in marriage to the tribe of Benjamin, but now the tribe is on the brink of extinction and the Israelites have pity on them and take action to prevent this happening. They find 400 virgins from Jabesh Gilead as wives for the Benjaminites, but they need more. They then concoct a clever plan. They hold a festival at Shiloh and allow the Benjaminites to kidnap their daughters – thus not technically ‘giving’ them away and so fulfilling the letter if not the spirit of their previous oath.
It is a dreadful tale in all aspects and, alongside the story of the tribe of Dan, it makes a depressing end to the book of Judges.
Theological or eternal purpose
After such a gloomy story we turn to a more uplifting subject: a consideration of the theological purpose of the book. Ultimately Bible history is not a human record but a record of what God has said and done, showing us who he is.
We have noted already that God is the judge or deliverer of the people, since he is the only person to whom the noun ‘judge’ is applied in the book. He is the real hero, and success is achieved when the human leaders co-operate with him.
However, when we ask the question, ‘Who drove the Canaanites from the land, Israel or God?’ we must reply, ‘Both!’ We can sum up the situation like this: Without him they could not; without them he would not. On the one hand God declared that he would give them the land and drive out the inhabitants, but on the other hand he needed Israel to respond to his direction.
Furthermore, we read that in some cases God did not drive out the opposition, but left them in the land to test Israel and teach them to fight. We learn from Amos that just as God brought Israel out of Egypt, he brought the Philistines from Crete as neighbours, to inflict injury on Israel.
Within the book of Judges, therefore, we find that God chastises his people. He delivers them to evil, demonstrating his justice, as well as from evil, showing his mercy.
This principle is also seen in the New Testament. There is, of course, the line in the Lord’s Prayer: ‘Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil.’ The power of the Holy Spirit can heal the sick, but it can also bring disease; it can give sight to the blind, but it can also prevent good eyes from seeing; it can raise the dead, but it brings death too, as with Ananias and Sapphira. The ultimate sanction in church discipline is to hand over erring members to Satan, whose destructive power over the body may bring them to their senses and save their souls on the day of judgement.
Yet at the same time God hears the prayers of Israel and responds. He is grieved by their misery, he is patient and faithful, in spite of the people’s repeated disobedience. So we read how God answered prayer, sending anointed leaders and directing operations, for example with Gideon and Barak. We see a dynamic relationship between God and man, each affecting the other.
Noting this important dynamic still does not explain the purpose of the book, however, but this will not become truly clear until we have looked at Ruth as well. At this stage all we see is the unedifying cycle of Israel getting into and out of trouble. We do not yet know where it is going.
The reasons for these problems within Israel can be explained in two ways:
1. SECOND-GENERATION MEMBERS
The people of Israel now occupying the Promised Land did not have the same knowledge of God and what he had done for them as the previous generation. They did not want to know God. Instead they did what was right in their own eyes, but wrong in his eyes. Everyone was a law to himself.
2. SECOND-GENERATION LEADERS
There was no seamless succession in the leadership. When a judge died, there was a gap before another judge appeared, and during this gap the people reverted to the type of behaviour which led to God’s punishment. The pattern of the cycle is indicated by phrases such as, ‘as long as the judge lived … but when the judge died…’ This was very different from the dynastic succession which prevailed in other nations, ensuring continuity and stability – and the judges only ruled over a limited group, not a united nation.
This question of kingship crops up a number of times.
1 Gideon is offered the throne by his followers following his victory over the Midianites. The people ask him to start a dynasty. Some argue that he should have accepted, but clearly this is not God’s time for a king to be chosen. Gideon tells the people their problem is that they have not looked to God as their king.
2 Following Gideon the leadership is in the hands of a number of people. Abimelech asks the people whether they would prefer his sole leadership to leadership by Gideon’s 70 sons as a group. He is duly installed and proceeds to murder his brothers. Things get steadily worse as his hunger for power demonstrates that he has little interest in the welfare of the people, and he is eventually killed in battle.
3 Throughout Judges we read the refrain, ‘There was no king in those days…’ and the suggestion is that things would have been much better if there had been one.
We will return to this theme later. For now the important point to note is that Judges tells us there is a desperate need for a king. As we turn to the book of Ruth we are faced with the more positive message that a king will be provided. Ruth starts to address the question, ‘Who will it be?’
Ruth
The book of Ruth was written at the same time as Judges but there could hardly be a greater contrast between the two.
Ruth reads like a Thomas Hardy novel, with the sort of romance which would not be out of place in a magazine story. It is a breath of fresh air after Judges. In Judges we have mass killing, rape, a prostitute cut up into pieces, civil war, evil priests. It is just two miles from the Benjaminites’ territory to Judah where Ruth is located, but it is a totally different atmosphere.
Ruth is only four chapters long. The first two chapters are about two inseparable women, and the second two chapters are about two influential men. These four people form the main characters in the drama.
1 Mother-in-law’s loss
2 Daughter-in-law’s loyalty
3 Redeemer kinsman’s love
4 Royal king’s line
1. Mother-in-law’s loss
The story begins with a famine in Israel, which caused three men to leave for Moab. We can guess that the famine was a punishment from God, for this was a common sign of God’s displeasure, and it provides a contrast with the location of the main drama – Bethlehem means ‘house of bread’ in Hebrew.
If the family had learned the lessons from Israel’s history, they would have known that searching for food outside Israel always led to problems, as the stories of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob testify, but there is no record that they prayed to God for food. So Naomi and her husband travelled east across the hills on the far side of the Dead Sea to Moab. As time passed each of their two sons married a Moabite woman. Things went from bad to worse. Naomi’s husband died and the two sons died also. The three widows were left alone. In those days a widow’s future was bleak. The whole drama started from the men’s refusal to rely on God. They sought a human solution to their situation instead of asking God what was happening and what they should do.
God would have told them that the famine was part of his punishment, and if only they would turn back to him they would have enough food again. But they did not even wait to ask him, let alone listen for an answer.
As a result of this crisis Naomi became bitter. Her name actually means ‘pleasure’, but when she returned to Israel she was unrecognizable to her old relatives and asked to be called ‘Mara’, meaning ‘bitter’, instead. She encouraged her two daughters-in-law to stay in Moab, knowing that returning to Judah would mean little prospect of remarrying. The men in Judah were not likely to marry outside their clan.
Orpah agreed and went back to Moab and is never heard of again. On the basis of her choice she had no more place in God’s purpose. Ruth, however, went with Naomi and her name has gone down in history as an ancestor of Our Lord Jesus Christ.
The story carries the reminder that much can hang on just one decision. It is the choices we take that make up our character, and Ruth made the right choice at the right time.
At last we see someone whose actions break out of the endless cycle. Ruth became part of God’s line instead. Her name is mentioned in the genealogy of Jesus in Matthew, despite the fact that she was both a Gentile and a woman.
2. Daughter-in-law’s loyalty
Ruth was a beautiful character, both inside and out. She was full of humility and yet she had the sort of boldness that men find attractive. She was loyal, with a serving spirit, but she was not passive or an underdog by any means.
She not only chose to stay with Naomi, but chose Naomi’s people and Naomi’s God. God was evidently real to her, even though she had seen him punishing his people. On four occasions she said ‘I will’ to Naomi. In being so loyal to Naomi she demonstrated her love for her. ‘Loyalty’ and ‘love’ are almost the same word in Hebrew. Love that is not loyal is not true love. Likewise, God’s covenant love for his people means that he sticks with them through thick and thin.
Furthermore, we read that Ruth found ‘favour’ in the eyes of the Lord. In Hebrew, ‘favour’ is the same word as ‘favourite’ – she became one of God’s favourites. It is clear from the story that Ruth became the talk of the town in Bethlehem, for the Lord did not stop showing his kindness to Ruth.
3. Redeemer kinsman’s love
The second half of the book includes two influential men, Boaz and the man who would become king.
Boaz was a man of great standing and great generosity. It was common for the poor to be allowed to collect any grain remaining in the field after harvest, but Boaz instructed his workers to make sure that Ruth especially received a large provision.
There are two other customs in the book of Ruth which we must appreciate in order to understand the unfolding drama. The first is the Levirate marriage. In the year of Jubilee, every 50 years, all the property was returned to the original family that owned it in the previous Jubilee year. It was imperative, therefore, that there was a male family representative to claim the property after 50 years. The Levirate law stated that if a woman’s husband died before she had a son to pass on her inheritance, her husband’s brother had to marry her and give her a son, thus keeping the property in the family. Ruth, of course, had been married to someone who was entitled to property, but now she had no husband or son, so a relative was under the obligation to marry her to keep her husband’s name and line going and reinherit the property when it became available in Jubilee year.
The second law to understand was a social custom. A girl could not propose marriage to a man in those days, but she was free to indicate that she would like to be married to someone and could do that in a number of ways. One was to warm the man’s feet! So when Ruth lay at Boaz’s feet and covered them with her cloak she was indicating that she would not mind being married to him. These two customs explain how Boaz married Ruth.