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.