The One Year Bible: Rock N' Roll Bible

 

The reading for the past two weeks finished out the second half of Joshua--which was mostly a rather dull recounting of how the Promised Land was divvied up among the people of Israel-- and ended with the charming story of Ruth and the prelude to the story of the prophet Samuel. In between was the book of Judges.  And wow, what a book! Cinematic, violent, and full of tough guys and even tougher women.  If it were a movie, it would be rated R, for sure.  And the soundtrack? It would have to rock n' roll.  I can just see the trailer--Ehud running King Eglon through with a sword (Judges 3:12-30), Jael handling business with Sisera (Judges 4:17-22), Gideon, Samson and his antics and you can totally hear Guns N' Roses "Welcome to the Jungle"  or Queen's "We Will Rock You" playing in the background.

I'm guessing I'm not supposed to suggest such a thing about the stories of the Holy Bible, but Judges just doesn't have that "Biblical" feel.  It feels like an action flick or a comic book film.  These judges are larger than life and there's never a dull moment in this book. It's not surprising that the only children's stories to come out of the book of Judges are Gideon and Samson (and even Samson is really pretty PG-13).  The rest of the stories don't go well with a Sabbath morning children's story.

On closer inspection, though, it's clear to me that most of the judges, even Samson with his storied strength, aren't very strong. They are fearful (Barak and Gideon), impulsive (Jephthah), petty and selfish (Samson), and just plain sick (The unnamed Levite who allowed his wife to be sexually assaulted and murdered).  None of them seem particularly bright, certainly not fit to be well. . .judging anyone.  I'm trying to think if there was even one judge who was actually a solid, decent man. 

The women of Judges, on the other hand, mean business. Whether it's the leadership of the prophetess Deborah, the fearlessness of Jael, the resolve of Jephthah's daughter, or even the savvy Delilah, who even if she wasn't exactly "good" was at least intelligent.  Certainly there are women in this book who suffer at the hands of awful men--the aforementioned Levite's concubine and the poor women of Shiloh--but I do appreciate the stories of the strong women of Judges.

Highlights from Joshua, 12:7 through the end of the book,  Judges, Ruth and 1 Samuel 1:1-8 (with selections from 1 Chronicles 2:9-55 and 1 Chronicles 4:1-23)

• Choose Today Whom You Will Serve: Joshua's Final Words to Israel

• Deborah Schools Barak, Jael Strikes Sisera

• 300: Gideon and His Men

• Jephthah Sacrifices His Daughter

• Samson: The World's Strongest Weakling

• The Horrifying Tale of the Levite and His Concubine

• Ruth: A Breath of Fresh Air

• The Prayer of Jabez

• An Introduction to the Parents of the Prophet Samuel

Fun Facts

• Do you know who really conquered Jerusalem? It's not clear at all.  The Bible gives contradictory accounts of the conquest of this most important city, sometimes in the same chapter! In the first chapter of Judges it appears Judah conquered Jerusalem in vs. 8, only for it be described in vs. 21 as remaining under the control of the Jebusites "to this day". There is at least one other account of Jerusalem being conquered (or not) before David is described as taking it later in the Bible.  In the research I did online, it appears there's some disagreement as to when exactly Jerusalem was conquered and by whom.  To me it seems possible that it might have been conquered and reconquered by the both the Jebusites and the people of Israel over the years.  That's a pattern of conquest of Jerusalem that has continued to the present.

• Did you know what happened to Gideon after his well-known victory over the Midianites with only 300 men? It's not pretty.  There are some atrocities committed by Gideon against some towns that refused to provide him and his men with food as he was concluding his defeat of the Midianites. Then there's some idol worship as Gideon creates an ephod which becomes an object of worship. Here Gideon humbly declines to lead the people of Israel, declaring "The LORD will rule over you", but then leads the people astray by making the ephod. Finally, after Gideon's death there is a violent conflict between seventy of his sons and his bastard child, named Abimelech for control of Shechem.  It's all very sad. Read about it in Judges 9.

• Do you know what would happen if you couldn't pronounce "shibboleth" correctly?  You got killed, that's what happened. This came about after the judge Jephthah had defeated the Ammonites. He got into a ridiculous fight with the tribe of Ephraim, who were angry because Jephthah hadn't called them to join the battle against the Ammonites (even though Jephthah had asked for their help and they had refused. Now that the victory is won, Ephraim wants to conveniently rewrite history and literally go to war over their version of events!). In the ensuing civil war, the word "shibboleth" was used a test to determine whether escaping fugitives from the battle were Ephraimites or not.  The men of Ephraim pronounced it "sibboleth" and got killed on the spot.  A pretty sitty deal for the men of Ephraim who couldn't manage that "sh" sound.

• Do you know whether this quote comes from a movie or the Bible?  "Watch what you say! There are some short-tempered men around here who might get angry and kill you and your family." You can totally hear some mob boss murmuring those words in a not so thinly veiled threat. But no this isn't Goodfellas.  This would be the men of Dan in Judges 18 who were in the process of stealing an idol and a priest from the family of a guy named Micah.  When Micah chased after these guys and protested the theft, this was the men of Dan's reply.  Micah, just like a guy in a mafia film, got the hint and turned around and went home, helplessly accepting the theft.

• Do you know who Jabez' father is?  It's not clear in 1 Chronicles 4:9, the passage that launched a best-selling book and thousand Bible studies.  In the midst of the genealogy of Judah, where each man is listed as father of this person or that, we read "There was a man named Jabez" with no mention of who is father is (or for that matter who he might have fathered). This despite the fact that he is noted as being "more honorable than any of his brothers." We do have mention of his mother though because she gave him his name because of the pain she suffered during his birth. (Apparently Bruce Wilkinson, who started the Jabez craze, interpreted this as her "cursing" him, which is not at all obvious to me from the passage.  And there are people who take strong exception to Wilkinson's interpretation).  Back when "The Prayer of Jabez" was all the rage, I was never a big fan.  Something felt a little too convenient, a little too pat, with a whiff of prosperity gospel about the whole thing. It just seems like there's too much context missing to build a whole Bible study around this one guy, without cluttering it with your own biases.

What Stood Out To Me

The Violence

The violence in the book of Judges is graphic, constant and brutal.  It begins in the very first chapter with the relatively mild maiming of Adoni-bezek, a Canaanite king conquered by the tribe of Judah,  who had his thumbs and big toes cut off.  At least he lives. By the end of Judges we will see a woman sexually assaulted and murdered, and then her body cut into twelve pieces and sent to each of the twelve tribes of Israel. In between there is Ehud who coolly stabbed the corpulent King Eglon, with the sword literally getting lost in Eglon's rolls of fat. It's a scene that would fit comfortably in The Game of Thrones.  There is Shamgar, who's main claim to fame is that he killed 600 Philistines with an ox goad.  There is Jael, the woman who lured the general of the Israel's enemies into her tent under a pretense of protection (their families had been tight so Sisera had reason to trust her) only to drive a tent stake through his head while he slept.  Jael, is later described in a victory song in Judges 5 as "most blessed among women" a phrase I associate with the milder and less violent Virgin Mary. This song also takes cruel joy in imagining the experience of Sisera's mother as she waits expectantly--and in vain--for him return from battle. Rough stuff!) 

Then there's Samson who used violence his whole life to get what he wanted and to express his frustration. No one ever taught this man-child to use his words.  Samson's violence could be so casual, almost incidental, as in the case of killing the lion and then the murder of 30 men to pay off the Philistines who were tipped off on his riddle about the dead lion.  Whether destroying property or killing people, none of it was a big deal to Samson. He was a petty, small man, inclined to act impulsively and to think with his "small head" rather than the long-haired one on his shoulders.  Right up to the day of his death, violence was the answer to every question for Samson.

We also read about the poor people of Laish,  who were minding their own business not bothering anybody.  They were massacred by the tribe of Dan, who, having failed to conquer the land allotted to them when they arrived in Canaan, decided to go after the easy pickings of Laish instead. The town was inhabited by Sidonians who were too far from their countrymen to get any help.  The tribe of Dan were straight up bullies. 

And finally we have the Levite and his concubine, a gory story of the brutal gang rape and murder of a woman and then her subsequent dismemberment by her husband.  This eventually led to the tribe of Benjamin being almost entirely wiped out (Benjamites were responsible for the woman's grisly death), and the murder of the people of Jabesh-Gilead.

The Ill-Considered Vows

Jephthah was a rough man from a rough background.  But he was a judge who delivered Israel.  When challenging the Ammonites, he laid down this dare: " You keep whatever your god Chemosh gives you, and we will keep whatever the LORD our God gives us" (Judges 11:24).  If only Jephthah could have followed his own advice.  He spoke boldly about how God would give them victory, but he didn't entirely trust God.  Just to be sure, he vowed to sacrifice as a burnt offering the first thing that came out of his home to greet him if God gave him a win. Now there was no precedent for this type of sacrifice or this type of vow in Mosaic law. God had pretty strict rules on what, when and where a burnt offering was to be made. Jephthah wasn't following any of that.   And the worst  part is, when his daughter came rushing out of the house, rejoicing in her dad's triumph, Jephthah kept the vow!  This despite, specific instructions from God on how to get out of an ill-considered vow.  His daughter stoically accepted her fate, only asking for some time to mourn with her friends the life she would have had before allowing herself to sacrificed. 

 Another ill-considered vow arrives at the sordid end of the book of Judges. Eleven of the twelve tribes of Judah have banded together to virtually erase the tribe of Benjamin for their role in the assault and murder of the Levite's concubine. This civil war was won at great cost, as the united tribes were repulsed three times before finally defeating Benjamin.  This suggests to me that the Levite wasn't exactly innocent either as he was the one who stood by and allowed his wife to be cast to the Benjamite wolves.  There was a price to be paid for his sin too. 

Anyway, Israel vowed that they would not give any of their daughters in marriage to the tribe of Benjamin.  Once the bloodletting was over and Israel realized they'd almost wiped out their brother, remorse set in.  But the they were bound by their oath. Their horrific solution was a fitting end to a blood soaked book.  They found the men of one town--Jabesh-Gilead--who had not joined them in the war, and massacred everyone in that town except for the virgin girls.  These girls were given out to the men of Benjamin that remained.  However, they were still short on girls for the tattered remnants of Benjamin.  So they had these last men hide out in the fields near Shiloh where a festival was going on.  When the young women came out to dance, the men were instructed to rush in and grab a woman they liked and make her his wife.  When the fathers and brothers of these girls came to complain they were encouraged to hush up and let it go.  After all, this way, the tribe of Benjamin survived, and yet the people of Israel kept their vow since the men of Shiloh didn't technically "give" their daughters in marriage.  They were taken. (Liam Neeson would not have done well in the town of Shiloh).

In the concubine, the women of Jabesh-Gilead, and the girls of Shiloh we once again see women paying the price for men's boneheaded decisions.

"Every man did what was right in his own eyes"  

This phrase appears a number of times throughout the book of Judges.  It's a statement that this was a kind of "Wild West" period for Israel. Every man was a law unto himself, with glory for the strong (and "going down in a blaze of glory" if you weren't careful).  People did what they wanted.  You could have your own priest apparently, as revealed in the story of Micah, who hired himself a priest and set up his own private system of worship of the Lord, complete with a sacred ephod and some idols (Never mind that none of this was according to God's instructions).  This lasted until both idols and priest were usurped by ruffians from the tribe of Dan.  That's the thing about everyone doing what they want.  Such an approach favors the strong.

We tend to read the statement "all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes" as a statement of the moral environment at the time. But that's not what the author of Judges seems to be saying.  It seems to be more on a commentary on the lack of king, as the phrase is often paired with the statement that Israel had no king. It's about a lack of order, a lack of consistency rather than a lack of moral fiber.  But when Israel shifted to a monarchy, it's fundamental moral and spiritual problems weren't solved. Israel was simply more uniform in it's abandoning of God, following the leadership of the king in doing so rather than their own inclinations. I just think it's worth noting this is a statement about the disorganization of Israel rather than a condemnation of following individual conscience.

Ruth

After the machismo of Judges, Ruth comes as a breath of fresh air. Finally, we meet in Ruth and Boaz people of integrity, humility, and courage. The book of Judges is populated by men with rock star egos, the type who sleep with lots of women and are likely to trash hotel rooms (or rip the gates off a city or burn down someone's farmland).  The book of Ruth is a departure from all that.  It's a beautiful, quiet story of loyalty, compassion, and love in the wake of tragedy.  There are still the cultural practices that seem a bit strange to modern readers, but the spirit is different.  The rock n' roll ethos of Judges is exciting and entertaining for sure, but in the end these guys don't have staying power.  They are not built for the long term, and they don't represent what God is about. Ruth's quiet commitment to Naomi and her God, her hard work gleaning in the fields to provide for her mother-in-law, Boaz's generosity, care and appreciation for Ruth don't get the adrenaline pumping. But they are the values that are close to the heart of God and they come as a welcome relief.