Upcoming Vacation

My family and I are going on a vacation for a couple of weeks, so starting tomorrow I may not be able to post every day. I will still do my daily reading, Lord willing, and I will try to post when I can - but I wanted to let you all know what is going on so that you don't worry at my intermittent silence over the coming days. For anyone interested, we will be posting details and perhaps pictures over at our family blog.

Judges 21

I knew that the results of the last chapter would not be good. Now the Israelites are regretful of their near-total destruction of the Benjamites. Instead of just living with their actions, they make it worse by wiping another whole Israeli city out and taking its virgin girls captive as wives for some of the remaining men. That isn't enough, so they also advise the Benjamites to kidnap the daughters of Shiloh. Frankly I don't understand why either of those groups of girls would be willing to submit to that sort of treatment, nor can I imagine that none of the other Israelites had friends or family in the towns that were wiped out; if you did, why would you allow this to happen? I think there are just a lot of cultural differences between our modern society and theirs, which probably account for many of the seemingly strange behaviors of those times. Women were obviously not treated as equals, and without a central leadership (no human king) we are told that 'each man did what he considered to be right' (verse 25). Anarchy, anyone?

Judges 20

I knew the events of the last chapter would not lead to anything good. The Israelites are rightly appalled at the behavior of those in the town of Gibeah, but their Benjamite brothers protect them rather than handing them over to be punished. Because of that, the whole country goes to war - and tens of thousands of soldiers are killed on both sides. Moreover, not only is Gibeah destroyed (a measure I can understand) but the whole Benjamite tribe is wiped out almost to a man. Even the women and children are erased, with only 600 men who escape the battles surviving. I'm pretty sure descendants of Benjamin still live today, though, so there should be some sort of resolution to this in the next and final chapter of Judges.

What surprises me here is the level of total warfare that is waged over this. In modern times we would call destruction of this degree 'genocide', and it was done by the Israelites against their own people. Why did all of them deserve to die? I understand killing the men responsible, and even the measure of destroying their city - and since the Benjamites sent soldiers to aid that city I understand defeating them too. However, it seems a bit much to go to the effort of them wiping out all the cities, towns, people and animals in that land; after all, what threat were they? Perhaps we should look back and shake our heads, or perhaps there is a lesson to be learned here about how war must sometimes be conducted. I just wish I knew which it was...

Judges 19

The story contained in this chapter is both sickening and saddening. We have another case like Sodom of a city so imbued with evil that they would rape guests, and at the same time a man who went out of his way to get his concubine back but then was willing to let her take the abuse that was demanded of him. Why would he go after her like that if he did not love her? Why would he let them do what they did to her if he loved her? Why would the people of a town be so evil? It all seems so pointless, but I'm sure that it is going somewhere; I guess we'll see tomorrow.

Judges 18

Well, this chapter didn't have nearly the bad consequences I was expecting it to have. Micah did have his priest and idols stolen, which was the least of what he deserved, but he wasn't punished or even reprimanded by God - nor were the Danites who stole his things, as best as I can tell. The final verses indicate that the tribe of Dan worshiped Micah's idol on their own until the time of the Exile; that means a few hundred years, and through the time of the various kings that Israel had. I am very surprised that God allowed that, but perhaps there was more to the story which was not recorded (or which is written elsewhere).

Judges 17

This short chapter describes the first 'cult' talked about in the Bible - and perhaps the only one, as I don't recall that being a theme or major issue anywhere else. The man named Micah and his family claim to be worshiping God, but he has idols and seems to have wrong impressions of what God's will is. Near the end he thinks that God will make him rich because he hired a Levite to serve as his priest - but I don't recall the Lord making any such statements previously. It will be interesting, and likely saddening, to see where this ends up.

Judges 16

It is pretty clear that Samson had women problems. I'm not sure what he did for the twenty years he led Israel, but his career started with a marriage gone bad, then he went in for a prostitute, and then fell in love with a woman who nagged him into giving away the secret of his strength. A flawed man, just like all of us, and it was his downfall.

In the end he got revenge, though, and the Bible says he killed more people in his death than he had in his life - which means quite a few, since he had already killed in excess of 1,030 (just in his early days).