Month: March 2023

Week 13  Judges 19-21

I’ve never seen a list titled: Top Ten Worst Stories in the Bible. But my guess is that one exists. And I’m pretty sure that the long & revolting story at the end of the book of Judges would be on it. It would have to be. In fact Judges 19-21 might be the story at the very top of the list.
The story grinds out more than a hundred degrading verses of personal violence and cruelty that insanely blossoms into rage against the city of Gibeah and grows into a murderous civil war that comes very close to eliminating the tribe of Benjamin.
The story of that evil Levite from the hill country of Ephraim who dismembered his gang-raped girlfriend then managed to diabolically galvanize all of Israel in a vendetta against Benjamin is a terrible terrible story.
The story starts with the line: now in those days Israel had no king. And it ends by saying: in those days Israel had no king, so the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes.
I guess that one way to frame this grisly finale is to say that a big point is being made: Israel needed a king!
Maybe that’s true. But I close the book in a low-spirited funk over how very very far Israel has managed to regress in just 19 short chapters. It’s a terrible story to have to read. And a huge relief to have it over-and-done-with.

Note: quotes from Judges 19:1 & 21:25 (NLT)

Week 13  Judges 6

There’s a snippet in the Gideon story that’s easy to skip past. A prophet appears with a message from the Lord: I brought you up out of slavery in Egypt…I drove out your enemies and gave you their land…I told you that you must not worship the gods of the Amorites…But you did not listen to me.
The message is important but it isn’t really the message I notice. What I notice is that the Lord sent a prophet. The only prophet I can think of in Judges is Deborah. I check a word book and it looks like the only prophets in Judges are Deborah and this Anonymous Guy. I also check prophecy prophecies prophesied prophesies prophesy prophesying prophetic & prophets. Just Deborah & the guy.
Back in Numbers the Lord said that one of the characteristics of prophets was that: I the Lord communicate with (them through) visions and dreams. Which is interesting because here in Judges there’s a bunch of unusual vision-and-dreamlike things happening – in fact right away in the Gideon story an angel appears…speaks with Gideon…and disappears right before his eyes.
But even though people in Judges are being communicated with in super-normal ways they’re not prophets and they don’t become prophets. Or at least not formal and actual real-life prophets (not like the prophets in the books of the prophets).
So in spite of the fact that there’s lots of exceptional activity in Judges there’s almost no prophecy.

Note: quote from Judges 6:8-10 & Numbers 12:6 (NLT)

Week 13  Judges 1-13

I always just figured that the judges in Judges appeared consecutively in the order they’re described in the book. But then I heard somewhere that maybe they’re not all just listed one-after-the-other. Maybe they showed up in different places at different times…not in order.
I’m not sure I buy that idea so I tried testing it by scanning through for hints in the text to see if the record is sequential:
Othniel appeared first in chapter 3 (so I’m guessing he’s the first judge). From there it goes like this:
Israel again did evil (then Ehud appeared)
after Ehud, Shamgar…
after Ehud’s death… (Deborah appeared)
again Israel did what was evil... (then Gideon appeared)
one day Gideon’s son Abimelech…
after Abimelech’s death, Tola…
after Tola died…Jair…
again the Israelites did evil… (then Jephthah appeared)
after Jephthah, Ibzan…
after Ibzan, Elon…
after Elon died, Abdon…
again the Israelites did what was evil… (then Samson appeared).
The word ‘after’ is used seven times. After sounds pretty sequential to me. First one person and then after that another.
It’s a bit harder with the word ‘again’. Even though there’s the idea of repetition I can’t say for sure it means after or later or subsequently or next-in-order. But even so it easily could mean later-in-time.
So for now I’m going to stick with my original idea that the judges are written-up in order by date.

Note: quotes from 3:12 3:31 4:1 6:1 9:1 10:1 10:3 10:6 12:8 12:11 12:13 13:1 (NLT)

 

Week 13  Judges 1

The book of Judges opens with the people asking the Lord which tribe should be first to go into battle. The answer is: Judah, for I have given them victory over the land. That might be why the Judah tribe is featured in chapter 1 (it’s not like no one else is mentioned…but the spotlight seems to be on them).
So Judah (tag-teaming with Simeon) begins consolidating territory. They’re spot-lighted in the first 21-verses (it’s confusing at first because some of Caleb’s story seems to clutter things up. But even though in reality Caleb is a Kenite he had become a kind of naturalized Judahite – he had been Judah’s choice to spy-out Canaan in Numbers 13 – and his land allotment was inside Judah-territory).
Anyway after featuring the Judah clan in 1:2-21 ‘Joseph’ appears. There is no tribe-of-Joseph…only the tribes of his two sons – Manasseh & Ephraim. They get about 8-verses.
Even though it looks like Judah (+Simeon) and Ephraim & Manasseh get top-billing in chapter 1 there are honourable-mentions: Benjamin Zebulun Asher Naphtali & Dan.
So the nine tribes I found in chapter 1 were Judah Simeon Ephraim Manasseh Benjamin Zebulun Asher Naphtali Dan.
There’s no mention of Issachar.
No mention of Reuben Gad & ½-Manasseh (they were already set up across the river).
No mention of Levi (for obvious reasons).
I wonder if there’s anything to make of it but I’m finished for today and so I’m left wondering.

Note: quote from Judges 1:2 (NLT)

Week 12  Joshua 24 & Psalm 81

Right near the end of his life Joshua makes the tribes an offer. It’s a pretty interesting one: so honour the Lord and serve him wholeheartedly. Serve the Lord alone. But if you are unwilling to serve the Lord, then choose today who you will serve. Would you prefer the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates? Or will it be the gods of the Amorites in whose land you now live?
This sounds to me like a fair choice that’s on offer. If it’s disagreeable to serve the Lord then choose someone else to serve. Since y’all gotta-serve-somebody feel free to make your choice.
The psalm I was reading today quoted the Lord: my people wouldn’t listen. Israel did not want me around. So I let them follow their…way, living according to their own desires.
This is the sense I usually get reading the bible. The Lord makes an offer and Israel gets to make a choice. Free to choose what’s on offer…or free not to.
One thing the Lord usually does is to spell-out consequentialities – outcome x is the consequent of action y. But I don’t get the impression the Lord is a terrible punitive vindictive I’m-gonna-get-you kind of God for mentioning after effects. To me it sounds more like a fair warning. More like a don’t-drive-through-a-red-light-at-high-speed-at-a-busy-intersection kind of warning.
In the end the choice is mine to make.

Note: quotes from Joshua 24:14-15 & Psalm 81:11-12 (NLT)

Week 12  Joshua 24

I finished Joshua today.
In chapter 24 the Lord summarized Israel’s history:
Long ago your ancestors lived beyond the Euphrates River and worshiped other gods. But I took Abraham from that land and led him into the land of Canaan. I gave him many descendants through his son Isaac.
Jacob and his children went down into Egypt.
Then I sent Moses and Aaron and I brought terrible plagues on Egypt. Afterward I brought you out as free people. But the Egyptians chased after them. When your ancestors arrived at the Red Sea they cried out to me. I put darkness between them and the Egyptians. Then I brought the sea crashing down on the Egyptians, drowning them.
You lived in the wilderness for many years.
But finally I brought you into the land of the Amorites. They fought against you but I gave you victory and you took possession of their land.
When you crossed the Jordan River and came to Jericho the men of Jericho fought against you. So did the Amorites the Perizzites the Canaanites the Hittites the Girgashites the Hivites and the Jebusites. But I gave you victory over them.
This is a pretty good condensed version of the bible covering Genesis 12 to Joshua 24. 335-pages collapsed into ~20-lines.
It would’ve saved me a lot of time if I’d just read it. But I would have missed quite a bit.

Note: paraphrased from Joshua 24:2-11 (NLT)

Week 12  Joshua 20-21

In chapter 20 Joshua named a) the six urban locations that got the City of Refuge designation (CoR) and b) the tribal districts where those cities were located:
Kedesh (Naphtali)
Shechem (Ephraim)
Hebron (Judah)
Bezer (Reuben)
Ramoth-Gilead (Gad)
Golan in Bashan (Manasseh)
So then I got to the next chapter and was idling my way through the long list of all the cities that were given to the Levite tribe (there were 48 of them – mostly unfamiliar & unrecognizable names).
After a dozen verses I saw that Hebron in Judah was identified as a CoR. Hang on! I had just read that. I glanced back at chapter 20. Sure enough – Hebron in Judah was a CoR.
A bit farther down it said that Shechem in Ephraim was a CoR.
Then that Golan in Manasseh was.
So was Kedesh in Naphtali.
And Ramoth-Gilead in Gad.
I was cross-checking chapter 21 with the list in 20 and so when I only found five cities in 21 I doubled-back to see what I missed. I found this: from the tribe of Reuben they received Bezer. That’s it. It didn’t say anything about Bezer being a CoR – which it definitely did with the other five cities.
So I wondered: what’s going on? Was it an intentional omission by the writer? If it was…then why? If not…then what was it? A glitch? A copying error?
It’s a small thing and not really so important I guess. But it made me wonder.

Note: see Joshua 20:7-8 & 21:9-13 20-21 27 32 38 36 (NLT)

Week 11  Joshua

Everyone living west of the Jordan River hated Israel and decided to fight against them when they crossed the river. With two exceptions: a) Rahab (& her family) and b) the Gibeonites.
Both of them already knew about Israel. Rahab told the spies: I know the Lord has given you this land…We are all afraid of you. Everyone is living in terror. For we have heard how the Lord made a dry path for you through the Red Sea…And we know what you did to Sihon and Og…The Lord your God is the supreme God.
The Gibeonites also knew the backstory: we have heard of the might of the Lord your God and all he did in Egypt. We have also heard what he did to the two Amorite kings east of the Jordan – King Sihon and King Og.
Rahab and the Gibeonites had heard the stories. But they weren’t the only ones. For instance:
The Amorite kings heard
The kings west of the Jordan heard
Adonizedek, king of Jerusalem, heard
King Jabin of Hazor heard.
So the news had gotten around. Lots of people heard it. It was fearsome news. And now people had a big decision to make.
In the end only Rahab and the Gibeonites joined ranks with Israel. The rest hunkered down. They had their preferred lifestyle and were prepared to defend it.

Note: quotes from Joshua 2:9-11 9:9-10 5:1 9:1 10:1 11:1 (NLT)

Week 11  Joshua 8

I read something today I hadn’t noticed before.
In the second battle at Ai Joshua set up a more complicated strategy than they had used the first time. In my memory of the story Joshua planned-out the ambush and then spent the night with the army and then fought the battle the next day. But today I realized he had a) sent the ambush party ahead then b) travelled with the army the next day then c) spent one more night in camp and then d) stormed the city on the third day. So I’d made a mistake.
Anyway while I was re-reading the passage I also noticed that there was a discrepancy in numbers. Initially: Joshua chose thirty thousand fighting men… to hide in ambush close behind the city. But then the next night: Joshua sent five thousand men to lie in ambush. So which was it? 30,000 or 5,000?
There’s possibilities. It’s possible that the original 30,000 was the total fighting force and the ambush party was a 5,000-soldier subset. Or it’s possible that there were two different ambush parties with different responsibilities. Or it’s possible there was a secretarial-transcriber glitch and whoever hand-copied the original book of Joshua copied the numbers incorrectly.
But the long-and-short is that there’s a problem. I can look for a solution. But if I don’t find one I have to put the numbers in the Unresolved Problems file. And move on.

Note: quotes from Joshua 8:3-4 12 (NLT)

Week 11  Joshua 6-7

When I finished the Achan story I came away with three questions.
The first was: how could Achan have been so idiotic? He had clearly witnessed miraculous events in Israel. He knew the Lord knew everything. He had heard Joshua explicitly & publicly say ‘don’t steal anything from Jericho’. But he stole some loot. Why would he do that?
The second question was: what did he do after he got caught? Well…he admitted his guilt: I have sinned against the Lord God of Israel. This sounds quite a bit like repentance to me. But it didn’t save him. Maybe he was just admitting his theft since he’d been caught red-handed. So was it fake-repentance? But what if it was real & heart-felt & genuine? Would it have changed things?
The third question was about the execution: who all was executed? Achan and his family were taken to the valley of Achor. One bible that I read says: the Israelites stoned Achan and his family. Another version says: then all Israel stoned him. Another version: all Israel stoned them (but in the margin it says that “them” literally means “him”). So who was executed? Just Achan…or his entire family?
My (hesitant) answers to the questions are:
1) Achan was a person. Doing something crazy & inexplicable wasn’t strange
2) If Achan had genuinely repented it could have changed things
3) If the family colluded then they were guilty…but not otherwise.
But really…I’m pretty much just guessing.

Note: quotes from Joshua 7:20 (NLT) & 7:25 (NLT NIV NASB)