Week 9 Judges
I’ve finished reading Judges chapter one before I realize it hasn’t said anything about judges or judging. The whole chapter is a bunch of miscellaneous tidbits of information – I go back and count about twenty of them.
Of the twenty the most interesting one is the story about Achsah. Achsah is Caleb’s daughter. Caleb is battling to carve out his inheritance and when he comes to a place called Kiriathsepher he wants help. As an incentive he offers that whoever captures Kiriathsepher can marry his daughter Achsah.
A man named Othniel captured Kiriathsepher. And so he got to marry Achsah.
Then two things happened. First: when Achsah married Othniel, she urged him to ask her father for an additional field. So Caleb gave them the land. Not long after Achsah came to her father with another request: you have been kind enough to give me land in the Negev; please give me springs as well. And so Caleb did.
I get a feeling of decisiveness with Achsah. She seems strong ambitious family-interested determined practical. She gave Othniel good advice, and then took initiative again to benefit her family even more. She was a woman living inside her cultural fence. But seemed to be testing its limits too.
I don’t know how many power couples there are in the bible. But I think Othniel & Achsah are good candidates.
Note: quotes from Judges 1:14, 15 (NLT). The Achsah story is also told in Joshua 15:13-19. Achsah is spelled Acsah in NLT.