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

Today’s passage helps explain why the account of Caleb’s daughter marrying his nephew, Othniel, was so important that it was recounted twice in the Book of Joshua, and then again here.  Othniel was the first of the judges to follow the death of Joshua.  I always struggle deciding how to write about this passage here at  the beginning of the Book of Judges.  The writer clearly combines his editorial content with the history he is recording so that it is difficult to separate what he includes because it tells us what happened when and what he includes here because it helps us understand why these things happened.  For example, the passage tells us that the Israelites served the Lord throughout the lifetime of Joshua and the elders who outlived him, but that once that generation had died they turned from Him.  Yet, the first of the Judges whom God raised up when they were oppressed was Othniel, the son-in-law of Caleb.  I think we can conclude from this that Othniel did not become a leader of Israel until after the death of his father-in-law and of his father.  However, what the writer does establish here is a pattern we can see in more recent history.

1. People experience suffering because they fail to follow the laws which God has laid down.
2. They cry out to God for deliverance,.
3. God sends a leader to deliver them and turn their hearts back to Him.
4. That generation dies and the next generation, or the one following that, repeats step 1

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

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

I am unsure how the timing of what is described in today’s passage matches up with that described in the Book of Joshua.  The Book of Judges starts by saying “After the death of Joshua,…”, then goes on to talk about the tribe of Judah taking their territory.  In particular, this passage describes how Othniel earned Caleb’s daughter as his wife, an account which was also in the Book of Joshua.  I believe that this story is here to explain how Othniel, the first of the judges, rose to a position of prominence in Israel.  Actually, I want to backtrack a little bit.  I believe that Chapters 1 and 2 are intended to set the stage and explain how Israel went from Joshua’s conquest of the land to the situation which existed shortly before the Book of Judges was compiled (I believe that the Book of Judges was compiled either during the reign of King Saul or early in the reign of King David).  We can conclude from what we find written here, and in the Book of Joshua, that, as he approached his death, Joshua saw no reason to appoint a successor as individual leader over the Israelites.  The Israelites had no enemies in the land who could threaten them and were settling into the land.  However, without a leader to keep them focused on being faithful to God, they began to adopt the worship practices of the people remaining in the land.  Also, without a leader to make them into a unified political force, a neighboring power (the king of Aram) saw an opportunity to take control (a theme which gets repeated throughout this book).  When the Israelites started to turn back to God, Othniel used his connection to Caleb to unite them under him and drove the invaders out of the land.  Through the rest of his life Othniel led the people to remain faithful to the Lord.

After the death of Othniel, once again the people of Israel drifted away from following God.  The way I see it, they began to take the attitude of, “Who are you to tell me what I should, or should not, do?”  Without a defined leader, the Israelites stopped holding each other accountable to serving God, and to not worshiping idols.  The result was that they lost their unity and became susceptible to outside powers.  In this case, the king of Moab formed an alliance to impose his will on the land (basically demanding tribute and perhaps raiding).  Eventually, the Israelites once again turned back to God and Ehud rose up to lead them.  Ehud overthrew the Moabite king and united the people of Israel in obedience to God.  Throughout the Book of Judges we see this pattern repeated: the faithful leader dies, the people stop allowing themselves to be held accountable for their actions and drift away from God, the people no longer unite for their own defense, an oppressor takes advantage of their division, the people cry out to God, God raises up a faithful servant to unite them and free them from their oppressor.  If we refuse to be held accountable for our actions as individuals we will fall into sin.  If we refuse to be held accountable for our actions as a people, unity will disappear.

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

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.

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

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

The Israelites were unable to drive all of the other peoples out of the land during Joshua’s lifetime, which was consistent with what God had promised through Moses.  God had promised that He would drive the peoples out of the land gradually as the Israelites grew to control the land.  Unfortunately, as soon as the generation of leaders who served with Joshua had died the Israelites started to assimilate with those who remained.  We often read this and imagine it took a few generations for things to go bad, but it must have been almost immediately.  The passage tells us that God allowed King Cushan-rishathaim to oppress the Israelites because of their sin.  Then, when they cried out to Him, He raised up Caleb’s nephew to rescue them.  Caleb’s nephew led them to follow the Lord for forty years.  After which they descended once more into idolatry and evil.  And once again God allowed them to fall under an oppressive foreign ruler.  It does not take long for people to turn away from God and to experience the suffering which follows.