Introduction
to Judges: We learn in Judges that the ban upon the
enemies of the Israelites during their wars of conquest were not so thorough as
Joshua may have led us to believe. It is
the theme of Judges to show how a
remnant of the native peoples remained and how this remnant persisted as a
temptation for the Jews. The point
of these conquest stories seems to be to show that God’s people are a people
set apart. Their ways and the ways of
the world around them are not to be the same, nor are they to accommodate
themselves to other ways.
The
stories that make up judges are not all in chronological order. They seem to come from widely different
sources and times. The last several
chapters even seems to predate some of the earlier stories—involving as they do
characters within two generations of the wilderness generation.
The Eerdman’s Handbook says the date of the
conquest is at around 1240. The period
covered here is about 200 years, but some of the “periods of rest” recounted
here might have been times running concurrently in different parts of the
region
Judges
1 - In chapter 1, the people of the tribe of Judah
(and Simeon, helping out) are the first to go to war with the Canaanites and
Perizzites. They defeat them and catch
Adoni-bezek, cutting off his thumbs and big toes, presumably in retaliation for
having done this to other kings (70 of them according to him) in the past
(1:6-7).
Then they attack and take the city of
Jerusalem, “killing all its people and setting the city on fire” (1:8). Later,
in verse 21, it says the Benjaminites did not succeed in driving out the
Jebusites from Jerusalem but lived among them.
They go on to attack the Canaanite towns in
the hill country, the Negeb and the lowlands. They take Hebron and go on to Debir
(Kiriath-sepher). Caleb promises the victor there his daughter Achsah. Among
the other cities taken are Zephath, Hormah, Gaza, Ashkelon, Ekron with
territories around them. The only people
they had trouble defeating were the inhabitants of the plain because of the
“chariots of iron” they had (1:19).
Tribes of Joseph (Benjaminites?) also take
Bethel. Men of Manasseh do not succeed
in driving out the inhabitants of Beth-shean or Taanach, or Dor or Ibleam or
Megiddo. The Canaanites remained there
with them. And Ephraim settled among the Canaanites of Gezer; as did Zebulun at
Kitron and Nahalol. Asher shared the
towns of Acco, Sidon, Ahlab, Achzib, Helbah, Aphik and Rehob. Naphtali lived
among Canaanites at Beth-shemesh and Beth-anath.
The Amorites pushed the Danites out of the
lands they were given, back into the hill country of the north. Amorites lived among the tribes of Joseph in
Harheres, Aijalon, and Shaalbim, but “when the descendants of Joseph became
stronger, they forced the Amorites to work as slaves” (1:35).
Origen (185-254 AD)
De Principiis (First
Principles)
Chapter V
2 – “[E]very being which
is endowed with reason, and transgresses its statutes and limitations, is
undoubtedly involved in sin by swerving from rectitude and justice. Every
rational creature, therefore, is capable of earning praise and censure: of
praise, if, in conformity to that reason which he possesses, he advances to
better things; of censure, if he fall away from the plan and course of
rectitude, for which reason he is justly liable to pains and penalties.”
This
same reasoning applied to those we call the devil and his companions or angels.
Who are these characters named in Scripture? Origen goes into what he thinks is
referred to by these words – Satan, principalities and powers - and also those
beings referred to as “heavenly beings.”
And
what exactly is meant when humans are designated as “rational” and then divided
into different “orders”: the Lords’ people, the nations?
3 – He means to inquire
into whether these various beings were created exactly as they appear or
whether they were created with the ability to be “capable of either
condition.” Were the holy angels always
holy?
And
were the “principalities” and “powers” and “thrones” created to “hold sway over
others” or if they were given their powers “on account of merit.”
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