Introduction to the Judges

Continuing a chronological Bible study:

(Judges 2:1) And an Angel of the Lord came up from Gilgal to Bochim, and said, "I made you to go up out of Egypt and have brought you into the land which I swore to your fathers, and I said, 'I will never break My covenant with you.'"

The end of the last chapter described all the places in their promised land where the Israelites had failed to drive the Canaanites out.  Now an Angel of the Lord was said to have come up from Gilgal to a place called Bochim.  He said that He had made the people leave Egypt and had brought them into the land He had sworn to give their forefathers.  This Angel of the Lord appears to be Jesus Christ who last appeared at Gilgal to Joshua (Joshua 5:14).  Some people believe that these words were spoken by the prophet Phinehas, but as the angel did not say, "Thus says the Lord," it appears more likely that this was Jesus Christ, the only one who could have ascribed these words to Himself.  He referred to the past when He had told His people He would never break His covenant with them, that it was an everlasting covenant (Genesis 17:7, Leviticus 26:42).

(2) "'And you shall make no league with the inhabitants of this land; you shall throw down their altars,' but you have not obeyed My voice. Why have you done this?"

The Lord reminded the people that He had specifically commanded them not to make any covenant with the inhabitants of Canaan (Deuteronomy 7:2).  They were to destroy their pagan altars (Deuteronomy 7:5).  However, they had disobeyed Him, and He asked why they had done such a thing.

(3) "Therefore I also said, 'I will not drive them out from before you, but they shall be thorns in your sides, and their gods shall be a snare to you.'"

However, He also reminded them that He had said if they did not drive the inhabitants out of their land, He was not going to do it for them.  He had warned that those inhabitants would be thorns in their sides (Numbers 33:55), and their gods would ensnare them, drawing them away from the worship of the one true God.

(4) And it came to pass when the Angel of the Lord spoke these words to all the children of Israel, that the people lifted up their voices and wept.

After the Angel of the Lord had spoken those words to them, the people wept.  One wonders if they cried out of conviction in their consciences that they had sinned against their Lord, or if they cried because they selfishly feared what was coming to them because they had sinned.  I imagine it was a combination of the two.

(5) And they called the name of that place Bochim, and they sacrificed there to the Lord.

The people called that place where the Lord had spoken to them Bochim, which literally meant "weeping" or "weepers."  They then sacrificed there to the Lord.

(6) And when Joshua had let the people go, the children of Israel went every man to his inheritance to possess the land.

This is not to be understood as happening after the Angel of the Lord spoke to them.  This subject begins with the retelling of what had happened after Joshua had divided the land and everyone went to their own inheritance, and it will continue to explain how the people had behaved after that time.

(7) And the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua who had seen all the great works of the Lord which He did for Israel.

During the life of Joshua and the lives of the elders who had served with Joshua and had outlived him, the people served the Lord.  Joshua and the elders had personally seen all the great works of the Lord and could continually remind the people of them.  This is an almost precise retelling of Joshua 24:31.

(8) And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died one hundred and ten years old. (9) And they buried him in the border of his inheritance in Timnath Heres in the mount of Ephraim on the north side of the hill Gaash.

Joshua died at 110 years of age, and the people buried him in his inherited land in Timnath Heres in the mountains of Ephraim on the north side of Mount Gaash.  The account in Joshua called the place Timnath Serah, but "heres" and "serah" mean the same thing, "sun."

(10) And also all that generation was gathered to their fathers, and there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord nor the works which He had done for Israel.

That entire generation died out, and there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord nor the great works He had done for Israel.  I have to say, it seems the people of Joshua's generation must not have done a very good job of teaching their children the way they were supposed to (Deuteronomy 11:19).

(11) And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord and served Baalim.

That next generation of Israelites did evil in the sight of their Lord and served the false god, Baal.  Baalim was the plural of Baal as there were many Baals, Baal Peor (Numbers 25:3), Baal-Berith (Judges 9:4), Baal-Zebub (2 Kings 1:2), etc.

(12) And they forsook the Lord God of their fathers who brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods of the gods of the people who were all around them, and bowed themselves to them, and provoked the Lord to anger.

The people abandoned the worship of their Lord God and followed the false gods of the Canaanites who remained in their land all around them.  They bowed themselves to the false gods, giving them religious worship and honor, provoking the true God to jealous anger.  God's jealousy is not petty; it's zealous and passionate.  Because He loves us so fervently, He does not want us to fall under the spell of false gods that will only hurt and eventually kill us.  Those pagan gods are of Satan who only wants to steal, kill, and destroy (John 10:10).

(13) And they forsook the Lord and served Baal and Ashtaroth.

The people forsook the worship of their Lord and served the gods of Baal and Ashtaroth.  The Baals were male gods and the Ashtaroths were female gods.

(14) And the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel, and He delivered them into the hands of spoilers who spoiled them, and He sold them into the hands of their enemies round about so that they could not any longer stand before their enemies. (15) Wherever they went out, the hand of the Lord was against them for evil, as the Lord had said, and as the Lord had sworn to them, and they were greatly distressed.

The anger of the Lord was hot against His people; it burned as a flame that consumed them.  He delivered them into the hands of their enemies all around them and allowed those enemies to plunder them of their goods and substance.  They could no longer stand before their enemies.  Wherever they went, in anything they undertook, the Lord was against them, as He had warned them He would be (Leviticus 26:15-25).  The people were greatly distressed.  The Lord used His punishment to bring His people back to Him, their only source of life and blessing (Deuteronomy 30:19, Leviticus 26:23-24).  It's because of His love for His people that He chastises them in order to save them from eternal damnation.

(16) Nevertheless, the Lord raised up judges who delivered them out of the hand of those who spoiled them.

However, in His mercy, the Lord raised up judges who delivered His people out of the hands of their enemies.  That is the subject of this book of the Bible, the judges who ruled Israel in the times between the death of Joshua and the rise of Samuel.

(17) And yet they would not hearken to their judges, but they went a whoring after other gods and bowed themselves to them. They turned quickly out of the way which their fathers walked in, obeying the commandments of the Lord; they did not do so.

Yet the people would not listen to their judges but went after other gods and bowed down before them.  The Bible calls it whoring because it was spiritual adultery.  They turned from the way of their fathers who walked in the way of the Lord, obeying His commandments.  This generation of people did not do as their fathers had done.

(18) And when the Lord raised them up judges, then the Lord was with the judge and delivered them out of the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge, for it repented the Lord because of their groanings by reason of them who oppressed them and vexed them.

When the Lord raised up a judge, He was with that judge and would deliver His people out of the hands of their enemies all the days of that judge.  This repenting of the Lord just meant that He changed course.  He felt compassion for His people who groaned under the oppression of their enemies and turned back toward them, sending them judges to guide them and deliver them from their oppressors.

(19) And it came to pass, when the judge was dead, they returned and corrupted themselves more than their fathers in following other gods to serve them and to bow down to them; they did not cease from their own doings nor from their stubborn way.

However, when that judge died, the people returned to their corruption and served other gods.  They became more corrupted than their fathers ever were, probably seeking new gods and being more constant in their worship of those false gods.  Even though the Lord had been with the judge and therefore with them, they never ceased from their corrupt doings and were stubborn in their own ways.

(20) And the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel, and He said, "Because this people has transgressed My covenant which I commanded their fathers and have not hearkened to My voice, (21) I also will not henceforth drive out any from before them of the nations which Joshua left when he died, (22) That through them I may prove Israel, whether they will keep the way of the Lord to walk in it, as their fathers did keep, or not."

The anger of the Lord was hot against His people every time they fell back into idolatry after He had sent them a judge.  He said that because that generation of people had transgressed His covenant with their forefathers and would not hearken to His commandments, He would not continue to drive out the nations that still remained in their land after Joshua's conquest.  Through those nations that remained in Israel, He would try His people's faith, whether they would return to the ways of their one true God and walk in His ways as their forefathers had done, or if they would not do so.

(23) Therefore the Lord left those nations without driving them out hastily, neither did He deliver them into the hand of Joshua.

Because God knew from the beginning that His people would repeatedly fall back into their corrupt ways, He purposely left some of those nations and did not deliver all of them into the hand of Joshua.  They were designed to be a check on His people.  It was obvious that had He completely driven out all the inhabitants of the land, the people would have completely abandoned their God.  By allowing them to be persecuted by their enemies, it made the people dependent on their Lord, realizing that He was their only source of life and supplier of all their needs.  It's an important lesson to learn that God, in His mercy, does not give us all that we desire, for if He did, we would not recognize our need for Him, and we would surely fall into the ways of the world which lead only to destruction and death.