the grand theme of this book? EVERYONE DID AS HE SAW FIT. that's what tribal leaders do. they make up their own rules. opens the people up to all kinds of abuse, very russian roulette- hit and miss-sketchy. very sketchy. one is tempted to draw parallels to wallstreet's unregulated ceo's and the like as well, but 'one' will forego the temptation for now. too many irons in the fire, as it were.
i used to put off judges for a long time after reading joshua, dreading that horrible story at the end, but i don't think i remembered until the 2002 reading that the horrible rape of the concubine doesn't happen until chapter 20, at the very end of this book about the height of the early apostasy, the darkest night right before the dawn of the age of the prophets (enter Samuel stage left) but not yet, we're doing judges. hold your horses.
you do have to ask yourself what joshua had to do with the fact that the fragile little civil society spectacularly crashed and burned almost as soon as he died -- was there a failure of vision and leadership on his part? did he not think about the fact that there would need to be strong capable leaders to take over when God took him out? there is virtually no leadership structure in place when he exits. big power vacuum. those really suck.
somehow we tend to put ourselves on automatic pilot when reading through the old testament, like it was this ordeal we have to go through to get our little bible reading star in our crowns, but already determined that we weren't gonna get nothin from it.
but if you even stay half awake, you should be able to see this beautiful little pattern that swirls around about 20 times throughout the book. ok the pattern itself is tragic and pathetic, but the structure is gorgeous and there is a message in the structure! God is a God of order, so finding the structures He's built into Scripture is a delightful sally into the well groomed garden of His mind. . .
1) The people screw up and do evil
2) Other nations start messing with them and turning up the heat
3) They come to their acute senses and cry out to God for help
4) God raises up a leader, a judge, a superheroe if you will
5) The hero saves them (well, God saves them through the hero)
6) The people, with a 3 second memory like a fish, shortly if not immediately return to their degenerate ways, taking their eyes off God, sin-king beneath the waves of their self-worshiping human nature
I mean it was quite a merry go round. Except for the merry part. Unless it was the Eat drink and be merry in steps 1 and 6. It's like a laundry cycle, only two of the cycles make the clothes filthy --it's like apply filth, rub in filth, soak in soap, wash vigorously, rinse, soak in filth, repeat. but the wash and rinse cycles are glorious. they truly are. and sometimes they're pretty long cycles. and normally in judges, after telling you about a particular judge and his/her "reign" the writer adds how long the cycle was, how many years of peace ensued after the hero performed amazing feats yada yada, before moving on to the next. so that's the cycle.
Here are some of the judges:
1) Othniel conquers the oppressor, King of Aram (3:7-11) 40 years of peace ensued
2) Ehud (a lefty) kills the fat oppressive king of moab, Eglon, with a double edged sword (funniest bathroom scene in scripture embedded here (3:12-30) 80 years of peace ensued
3) Shamgar killed 600 Philistines with an ox goad. ONE VERSE. (3:31) Shortest narrative in scripture?? Shockingly, no mention of how much peace ensued.
4) Deborah, the prophetess (Married to Lappidoth (about whom we hear nothing)) rises to power when Israel's chief oppressor is Jabin, King of Canaan and his army commander is Sisera. In the voice of God, Deborah orders her own army commander, Barak, (dang, i did not remember that was his name when i voted) to organize 10,000 troops to go to war against Sisera. Barak is weak kneed and Deborah prophecies that because of his lack of courage he will be disgraced by having the honor of taking the enemy's leader out given to a woman. (some of us think worse fates could befall you).
the woman in point was apparently not the powerful, spiritual, political and intellectual force that was Deborah, but humble tent-peg wielding housewife/ homemaker/ domestic engineer Jael! apparently this struggle between Isreal and theCanaanites was a gradual victory that sort of culminated in the incident where Jael nails the enemy commander-- "and the hand of the Israelites grew stronger and stronger against Jabin,"until they destroyed him. remember Jabin was the king they were struggling against. but his army commander was Sisera.
Sisera is the one who got nailed by Jael for underestimating the power of a civilian woman who appeared to be consumed by her domestic responsibilities. Sisera takes warm milk from the nice lady and then takes a nap under her covers and then gets violently assassinated by said nice lady (chapter 4:1-24) 40 years of peace ensued.
Incidentally, Deborah's song of Worship-history is 30 verses long and a bit sadistic for my tastes (28-30) (chapter 5:1-31)
5) Gideon (also a bit weak-kneed) rose up against Midian (Oh come on you have to appreciate a primary opponent that rhymes with the leading man's) and the Amalekites and apparently a scattering of other Eastern peoples, who would come in and destroy the Israelites' crops and force them into hiding desperately in the mountain caves and clefts.
scene 1: God gives Israel a lecture about Egypt and not worshiping the Amorite Gods.
scene 2: The angel of the Lord interrupts Gideon in the midst of his wheat-threshing and calls him a mighty warrior (is there irony here? was he hiding in the barn?) Gideon is a little whiney and a little cheeky. He complains that when God delivered Israel from Egypt He performed "wonders." apparently without 'wonders' God has obviously abandoned Israel.
scene 3: Gideon asks for a sign and his sacrifice is consumed by fire. (6:17-24) Gideon Responds "Ah, Sovereign Lord! I have seen the angel of the Lord face to face." Gideon builds an altar and names it The Lord is Peace.
scene 4: Assignment-Tear down the Ashera poles and the altar your father established to Baal and make 2 proper bull sacrifices to God. (6:15-40) He did this at night because he was afraid, and in the morning the people wanted to kill him anyway (apparently he was hiding in his house). So interesting that it was his father, Joash, whose altar to Baal Gideon destroyed, but yet Joash is quick to comply and it is he who challenges the men of the town- "If Baal is really God, he can defend himself when someone breaks down his altar." Apparently everyone accepts this because the embedded narrative ends.
scene 5: Gideon asks for signs through fleeces and gets them (6:33-40).
scene 6: 300 handlapping men best the inumberable Midianite Alliance (7:1-25) via psychological warfare achieved via sound effects (trumpet, breaking clay jars). Orebe and Zeeb (2 Midianite leaders) get decapitated and the place they were killed gets named after them (7:25)
scene 7: Gideon diffuses conflict by minimizing his own contribution to success (8:1-3).
scene 8: Two unlucky and unwise towns refuse Gideon and his 300 men bread and taunt them-they get blasted later (8:4-17)
scene 9: Gideon kills Zebah and Zalmunna (Midianites) for killing his 70 brothers (with the bearing of a prince) (8:18-21).
scene 10: Gideon refuses to rule (as General Washington first had in America's founding) and urges the Israelites to let God rule. He only asks for one earring from each of them, out of which he makes an ephod, which becomes a great snare to him and his family (8:22-27)
scene 11: Gideon dies and Israel spirals right back to its cycle of idolatry.
The 6th through 13th judges coming right up. . .
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