As if the rest of the book of Judges was not
strange enough, the last five chapters of the book become “curiouser and curiouser,”
to quote Lewis Carroll. In chapter 17, we have the story of an Ephraimite named
Micah who steals 1100 pieces of silver from his mother, but then his honesty
gets the better of him and he tells her what he has done. The mother, in turn,
dedicates the silver to the Lord, but amazingly, she does this for the purpose
of making an idol of cast metal. Beginning with this idol, Micah forms a shrine
and installs one of his sons as priest.
The author/editor of Judges comments on
this tale, “In those days there was no king in Israel; all the people did what
was right in their own eyes.” (Judges 17:6) Obviously, the author/editor of the
book of Judges is writing from the perspective of many years later when there
is a king in Israel. He sees the problem with the time of the judges as being
that the Israelites did not have a king, they did not have a central governing
authority to tell them how to act.
Next, a Levite from the land of Judah wanders
into the story and Micah makes him the priest over his shrine. Stunningly, the
Levite agrees to be a priest for hire, something which is completely contrary
to the guiding principles of Israel given by Moses, principles which emphasize
over and over again the importance of worshipping YHWH alone and worshipping
him at one central place: the Tabernacle.
At the beginning of chapter 18, the author/editor
reminds us once again: “In those days there was no king in Israel.” At this
time, the Danites, who are without an allotment of land, send five valiant men
to seek out a new home for their tribe in the north. These men meet up with the
Levite acting as priest over Micah’s shrine and ask him if their mission will
be successful. He tells them, “Go in peace. The mission you are on is under the
eye of the Lord.” (Judges 18:6)
These men find the ideal town, with
unsuspecting and unprotected inhabitants, that they can easily attack and
capture. The name of the town is Laish. The five valiant men return with 600
Danite fighting men to attack Laish; along the way, they steal Micah’s idol,
ephod and teraphim (household gods) along with Micah’s Levitical priest. Micah
chases after them but all to no avail because the Danites have an overwhelming
force.
As if all of these events were not stunning enough, once the Danites are
successful in capturing Laish, and renaming it after their forefather, Dan,
they set up the idol and install Jonathan, the grandson of Moses and his sons
as priests. The author/editor of Judges comments that the descendants of Moses
remained priests among “the Danites until the time the land went into
captivity.” (Judges 18:30) Note: Dan continued as a center of idol worship many
years later. See 1 Kings 12:29. Judges 18:30 appears to be a reference to the
Assyrian capture of the ten northern tribes of Israel beginning in 740 BCE. If
that is correct, then that puts the date of the final formation of the book of
Judges after 740.
Beginning in Judges 19, we have another hideous
story usually avoided in Sunday school curriculum. Another Levite (does the
author/editor of Judges have something against the Levites?) residing in
Ephraim, takes to himself a concubine. She becomes angry with her Levite
“husband” and returns home to her father in Bethlehem. The Levite goes to
retrieve his concubine, who appears to be his “property” throughout this story.
He is detained by his father-in-law’s typical Middle Eastern hospitality. When
he finally is able to leave with his concubine, they end up having to spend the
night in the town square of Gibeah. An old man takes pity on them and welcomes
them into his home. The men of the city, whom we are told are a “perverse lot”
come knocking on the old man’s door. As the men of Sodom did before them (has
one story influenced the other, or do both stories have the same source?) so
also these men ask to have the Levite sent out to them so that they may gang rape
him.
It should be noted that these men of Gibeah are not ancient
examples of men with a homosexual orientation. This threatened gang rape is a
way of humiliating a foreigner they do not want in their town, and they seem
perfectly pleased with gang raping the Levite’s concubine as an alternative.
The Levite hands over his concubine in order to
spare himself. When he picks her up in the morning, off the threshold of the
house, the concubine is near death, if not already dead (the story is unclear on this point). The Levite puts his concubine on his donkey and takes her home. Then
comes the most gruesome part of the story. He cuts up his concubine and sends
her body parts throughout Israel, summoning and inciting his fellow Israelites
to war against the men who raped his concubine. The Benjaminites refuse to hand
over the culprits in Gibeah and so war ensues. The Israelites seek God’s
direction in the battle and are, after some failures, eventually victorious.
However, after the war, the Israelites are grief-stricken.
How can they allow one of their own tribes to be wiped off the map? (The
Israelites, strangely, don’t seem to recognize or show any sorrow over the fact
that they are the ones who have virtually wiped Benjamin off the map.) Thus,
the Israelites devise a scheme to repopulate the tribe of Benjamin. The
Israelites cannot give up their own daughters to the remaining men of Benjamin
because they have taken a vow. But the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead did not
participate in the vow. Therefore, the Israelites attack one of their own
tribes, kill all the men and married women of Jabesh-gilead and give the 400
remaining virgins to the remnant of Benjamin.
However, 400 virgins are not enough to service
all the remaining men of the tribe of Benjamin. Therefore, the Israelites
encourage the men of Benjamin to steal for themselves some of the young women
of Shiloh while the Israelites look the other way. Obviously, throughout this
story we see that vows and tribal continuity are more important to the
Israelites than human life or respect for women.
The author/editor would agree with us in
viewing these final stories in the book of Judges as examples of morally
reprehensible behavior. Just in case we did not get the point, the
author/editor reminds us in the last verse of the book. “In those days there
was no king in Israel; all the people did what was right in their own eyes.”
(Judges 21:25)
Apparently, the author/editor of the book of
Judges thought that having a king in Israel was the answer to human depravity.
However, the rest of the Hebrew Scriptures will show us just how false this
notion is. No form of government, no law however divine, will stamp out human
sin. It will, in the end, take someone’s blood to do that.
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