47. Chosen Leaders and Lame Horses

The Judges of Israel

The Book of Judges neatly divides into two unequal parts.  The first section has to do with the judges which guided Israel.  The second part speaks of unguided people.

• Some scholars believe that this book covers about 400 years.  
• Some Jewish scholars hold that the Old Testament has 24 books in place of our 39. 
• They arrive at that number by combining certain books into one book; eg. 1st & 2nd Samuel is simply Samuel, the same is true for Kings and Chronicles.  
• Our 12 minor prophets, to them, are one book.  
• Some say that since the Hebrew alphabet has only 22 letters their Bible should have only 22 books.  
• To accomplish that feat they also add Ruth to Judges and Lamentations to Jeremiah.

Moses, Joshua and Gideon envisioned that Israel would be a theocratic state.  They saw it as possible that Jehovah would be the king of the country of Israel.  Gideon said to them, I will not rule over you, ... the LORD shall rule over you. Judges 12.3. 

The people, however, had other ideas.  When Joshua and his peers had passed away, the Bible says, Then the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and served the Baals; and they forsook the Lord God of their fathers. Judges 2:11.

History has shown that a theocratic nation will never happen before Jesus, the Messiah, returns and sets up Jehovah's kingdom on earth.  Until then it is necessary for every nation to have a human leader.  If there is no ruler in a nation to guide it, the nation quickly turns to anarchy.  In those days there was no king in Israel; everyone did what was right in his own eyes. Judges 21:25.

In the case of Israel, in the first part of Judges, the Lord raised up judges who delivered them out of the hand of those who plundered them. Yet they would not listen to their judges, but they played the harlot with other gods, and bowed down to them. Judges 2:16-17.

The cycle, which is repeated seven times, in the Book of Judges, is:

1. The Israelites forsake the Lord

2. They are punishment for sins

3. God raises up a deliverer and

4. peace is restored to the Israelites

These war stories, recorded in Judges, have all the intrigue (spies) and sly cunning (hidden daggers) needed, and tens of thousands of deaths on the battlefield, for making good war movies.  For people who like that sort of thing - I don't!

Here is a list of the judges who led Israel to war and the nations they overcame:

1. Othniel fought against Mesopotamia - Abram originally came from here.

2. Ehud fought against Moab - Moab was the son of Lot and his oldest daughter.  In this story, we see what far-reaching, negative, consequences sin can have.

3. Shamgar killed 600 Philistines with a cattle prod - The name Palestine comes from the word Philistine.

4. Deborah fought against the Canaanites - Canaan was the grandson of Noah.

5. Gideon fought against the Midianites - Midian was one of the sons of Abraham by his second wife.

6. Abimelech fought against Shechem - Abimelech was a Son of Gideon and he had 71 brothers.

Tola, lived in the mountains; Jair, had 30 sons.

7. Jephthah fought against the Ammonites - Ammon was the son of Lot and his youngest daughter.

Ibzan had 30 sons and 30 daughters; Elon, judged Israel 10 years; Abdon, had 40 sons.

Samson, the last judge in the Book of Judges - is known for his physical strength and moral weakness.

Lame Horses

But the Lord said to Joshua, ... You shall hamstring their horses. Joshua 11:6.  To hough their horses means to hamstring them. The word is neurokopein (in Greek) in the LXX. A horse is hamstrung when the sinews behind the hoof or hock are severed, thus rendering the horse useless. KJV Bible commentary.

There is an interesting conundrum in chapter 1: So the Lord was with Judah. And they drove out the mountaineers, but they could not drive out the inhabitants of the lowland, because they had chariots of iron. Judges 1:19.  

The writer makes it sound as if, when two armies are evenly matched, the Lord's army will win.  However, if the opposing side uses iron chariots than even the Lord loses the battle.

When things turn out negatively, perhaps the Lord will not be blamed for giving bad advice, the results may be attributed to the nation's, or an individual's, sin.  Often in the Bible, as we already noticed in the Books of Moses, when human ideas turned out well for the Israelites, the Lord gets the credit for the idea, even though it was a human's idea.  

It seems much more likely that one of Joshua's army leaders, rather than the Lord, came up with such a horribly inhumane thought as hamstringing the horses.

Actually, the idea of hamstringing horses, or even soldiers, is not altogether unheard of, either in ancient times or even in modern wars.

The following information is from a blog called, DAILYWRITINGTIPS:

David captured a thousand of his chariots, seven thousand charioteers and twenty thousand foot soldiers. He hamstrung all but a hundred of the chariot horses. 2 Samuel 8:4 (New International Version)

About 800 years later, during a battle between Romans and Carthaginians in 216 BCE, fleeing Romans were hamstrung as they ran. The Carthaginians concentrated on the Romans who were still fighting and went back later to kill the crippled soldiers at their leisure.

According to this quotation found on many forums, hamstringing is being used as a tactic of war in Zimbabwe:

The latest atrocities, as seen on CNN, are mutilations committed by the dissidents to serve as a warning to farmers not to return. Dogs are hung alive from hooks on farm gates, children’s pet ponies are having one of their front hooves chopped off and cows and sheep are being hamstrung.

45. Promises, Promises!

Make Your Choice

Your fathers, including Terah, the father of Abraham and the father of Nahor, dwelt on the other side of the River (Bible translations and commentaries agree that this refers to the Euphrates river, after all, that is where Abraham was born), in old times; and they served other gods.  

Joshua was not disturbed by the idea that their forefathers had served other gods.  Those who lived before Abram had never even heard of Jehovah.  Neither did Joshua try to minimize the idea that they were real gods, by saying something like, after all, they were just idols.  The early ancestors of the Bible had no hang-ups about being polytheists.  Polytheism is simply the way it is.

For more about this teaching see:

http://wwwthinkagai.blogspot.com/2012/05/many-gods-in-old-testament.html

Then I (Jehovah) took your father Abraham from the other side of the River. Joshua 24:2-3. Joshua gives a heartwarming speech about all the wonderful things that Jehovah had done for Abraham and his descendants all the way down to the conquering of the Promised Land. 

Joshua closes with these words, Now therefore, fear the Lord, serve Him in sincerity and in truth, and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the River and in Egypt. Serve the Lord! “And if it seems evil to you to serve the Lord, choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were on the other side of the River.  

You must decide, who will be your God.  You cannot serve the gods of your ancient forefathers' and Jehovah; or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you dwell; you cannot serve the gods your neighbours are serving and Jehovah. 

Let the Church listen well to that advice.

Joshua then gave the "altar call".  This brings the message real close to home, doesn't it? You cannot indulge in the sinful practices your non-Christian neighbours enjoy and serve Jehovah.  Joshua and Christ could have shared the podium; they both taught the same message. 

After laying the choice on the line and making the message clear, he gave them his decision, as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. So the people answered and said: Far be it from us that we should forsake the Lord to serve other gods. Joshua 24:14-16.

Here Joshua used some, good, old fashioned, reverse psychology.  He said to the people, “You cannot serve the Lord, for He is a holy God."  Take a look at yourself; 

• remember the way you complained in the wilderness; 
• remember your insurrection against Moses; 
• remember the fiasco in the battle at Ai, because of the sins of some soldiers. 

No! Jehovah is a jealous God; He will not forgive your transgressions nor your sins.  If you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, then He will turn and do you harm and consume you, after He has done you good.

The people's hearts had been stirred, they had come to a decision, so the people said to Joshua, “No, but we will serve the Lord!” So Joshua said to the people, “You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen the Lord for yourselves, to serve Him.” And they said, “We are witnesses!” Joshua 24:19-25.  They as much as said, if we ever turn our backs on Jehovah He has every legitimate right to punish us and forsake us because we have promised Him that we will always be true to Him.

Don't Neglect Your Promises

Then only fifty-five Bible verses later we have these sad words, Then the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, and served the Baals; and they forsook the Lord God of their fathers, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt; and they followed other gods from among the gods of the people who were all around them, and they bowed down to them. Judges 2:11-13.  

They had not eradicated the temptations and now they fell prey to them.  In our day we might say, they drank at the same bars; they caroused with their neighbours; they watched the same blasphemous TV shows; they also did not hold their wedding vows sacred.

Here is an example of how that goes: The youth pastor in a church was speaking to the young people about keeping their bodies pure and healthy.  This would certainly include giving up smoking because it is so unhealthy.  He must have been a good speaker; a number of young people came forward, gave up their cigarettes with a vow to the Lord that they would never smoke again.  In the afternoon when the cravings set in, the promises of some of them went up in smoke.

Whether it is smoking or some other problem we have I am sure that most of us can relate to the situation.  We decide never to do something again but that resolve is only good until that temptation comes along again.  

Is it possible that in any stage of our life, each of us, has one particular weakness?  Hebrews 12:1 puts that idea this way, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which so easily ensnares us.  In almost all translations of the Bible, the word, sin, is in the singular.  In the Greek text, it is, the most besetting sin.  Perhaps, as we have matured, many sinful practices have been put behind us.  Still, for each of us, there is that one "thing" we know we need to overcome.

Here are some words of advice from Solomon, who was known for being the wisest of men. When you make a vow to God, do not delay to pay it; For He has no pleasure in fools. Pay what you have vowed—Better not to vow than to vow and not pay. Ecc. 5:4-5.  In other words, don't play games with Jehovah!

Joshua had warned them: if you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, then He will turn and do you harm and consume you.  The Israelites had vowed and they broke their vows and their history tells us the results of shrugging off their vows and following lesser gods.

We can easily see North America following in those footsteps to destruction.  The motto, "In God we trust", sounds so pious, and so empty of meaning for most North Americans.  

In Canada, many are pleased that we can honestly say that Canada is a post-Christian country.  We should again hear the words of Joshua, if you forsake the Lord and serve foreign gods, then He will turn and do you harm and consume you.

44. Unfinished Business

Unfinished Business

to the Reubenites, the Gadites, and half the tribe of Manasseh Joshua spoke, saying, “Remember the word which Moses the servant of the Lord commanded you, saying, ‘The Lord your God is giving you rest and is giving you this land.’ ... But ... all your mighty men of valor, shall help them, (the other nine and a half tribes) until the Lord has given your brethren rest, as He gave you, and they also have taken possession of the land which the Lord your God is giving them. Then you shall return to the land of your possession and enjoy it. Joshua 1:12-15.

Notice that in chapter 11, Joshua took the whole land, according to all that the Lord had said to Moses; and Joshua gave it as an inheritance to Israel according to their divisions by their tribes. Then the land rested from war.  If we study a map of the division of Palestine by Joshua we see that the whole country was designated to the various tribes.  

However, if we follow the book of Joshua in chronological order, by the end of chapters thirteen and fifteen there are still some areas that have not been taken in spite of the fact that chapter 11 says Joshua took the whole land ... and Joshua gave it as an inheritance to Israel.

there remains very much land yet to be possessed. “This is the land that yet remains: all the territory of the Philistines and ... the five lords of the Philistines - (and the list continues to contain about fourteen more "tribes"). Joshua 13:1-3.  However, the Jebusites, the inhabitants of Jerusalem, (which were never conquered) are not even mentioned in that list.  Some other areas were never completely taken, but still, Joshua sent the two and a half tribes back to their territory East of Jordan because, as he said, now the Lord your God has given rest to your brethren, as He promised them.

Of those inhabitants, we read that the children of Judah could not drive them out; but the Jebusites dwell with the children of Judah at Jerusalem to this day. Joshua 15:63.  However, later, in Joshua's farewell address he contradicted that former statement; And the men of Jericho fought against you ... and the Jebusites. But I delivered them into your hand. Joshua 24:11.  It seems as if the history of conquering the Promised Land, in the days of Joshua, must be taken with a grain of salt because the facts do not all lineup.

Now these are the nations which the Lord left, that He might test Israel by them, ... five lords of the Philistines, all the Canaanites, the Sidonians, and the Hivites who dwelt in Mount Lebanon, from Mount Baal Hermon to the entrance of Hamath. And they were left, that He might test Israel by them, to know whether they would obey the commandments of the Lord, which He had commanded their fathers by the hand of Moses. Judges 3:1-4.  This paragraph raises some serious questions:

1. If the Philistines, Canaanites, etc. were not yet removed from their territories how was Joshua able to divide up the land and allot certain areas to the Israelites?

2. Why did Joshua send the soldiers of the two and a half tribes back home before the wars were finished?

3. Why did Joshua say that the land rested from war before they had finished their mission? Jehovah had said, you shall possess this land from the wilderness and this Lebanon as far as the great river, the River Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, and to the Great Sea toward the going down of the sun, shall be your territory. Joshua 1:4.

the children of Dan went up to fight against Leshem and took it; and they ... took possession of it, and dwelt in it. This is the inheritance of the tribe of the children of Dan. Joshua 19:47-48.  

Later, in Judges 18, we find this story, in those days the tribe of the Danites was seeking an inheritance for itself to dwell in; for until that day their inheritance among the tribes of Israel had not fallen to them.

There is a statement I have quoted several times already, but it fits here again: The recording of history with literal exactness of detail is a fairly modern development. At the time, (the Bible was written) precise fact was far less important than the spiritual message of the stories shared.  Jesus and His Times, Readers Digest, 1987.

4. Did they quit warring before they should have and then turn around and blame the Lord for the fact that the natives were left alive?  The writer said they were left, that He might test Israel by them.  Maybe that wasn't Jehovah's plan at all.

5. If that was His plan and His purpose we must ask: did Jehovah not know whether they would obey the commandments of the Lord?

For more on the subject of Jehovah not knowing everything, I suggest: http://wwwthinkagai.blogspot.com/2012/05/jehovahs-limitations.html