Today, I am reading and commenting on  Judges 1-3.

The passage tells us that the tribes of Manasseh, Ephraim, Zebulun, Asher, Napthali, and Dan failed to drive the Canaanites out of their territory.  It then tells us why they had been unable to do so, because they had not destroyed the altars of the Canaanites in the land which they did conquer.  These two things provide the setup for the rest of this Book.  Despite being unfaithful in destroying the altars of the people they conquered, the generation which Joshua had led into the land served God.  However, when they passed away their children began worshiping these other gods.  As a result God allowed them to fall into the hands of various oppressors.  When things got bad, the Israelites remembered God and cried out to Him.  He sent them a judge who led them back to following God’s law and freed them from their oppressors.

We often think of this early Israel as being a theocracy, but the description makes it sound more like the libertarian ideal.  Even when judges rose up and ruled over Israel, their only authority came from the willingness of the people to follow them.  Each person was free to do as he chose.  When the majority served God, things went well for Israel.  When the majority fell into the worship of other gods Israel fell under the sway of an oppressor.  Which should warn us that libertarianism only works when people seek to serve the Lord.  I will note that this is true of any form of government: if the people serve the Lord, things will go well for them, if they rebel against God, things will go badly.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.