Further Disobedience And Oppression. Then the Israelites again did what was evil in the sight of the LORD; they served the Baals, the Ashtaroth (female deities), the gods of Aram (Syria), the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the Ammonites, and the gods of the Philistines. They abandoned the LORD and did not serve Him. Jdg 10:1
INTRODUCTION
This is a history of the chosen people during the 400 or 450 years which intervened between the death of Joshua and the time of Eli, Act_13:20. It is not a connected history, but a collection of outstanding incidents, which determined the fortunes of the chosen people, and gave special illustrations of the power of faith in God. The chief lesson of the book is the intimate connection between loyalty or disloyalty to God and the corresponding results in well-being or misery. This is distinctly stated in Jdg_2:11-23.
The judges were extraordinary agents of the divine pity and helpfulness, raised up as the urgency of the people’s need demanded, to deliver Israel from their oppressors, to reform religion, and to administer justice. Their administration was generally local, as Barak among the northern tribes, Samson in the extreme south, and Jephthah across the Jordan in Gilead.
It must not be supposed that Israel perpetrated an unbroken series of apostasies. Though these and their special deliverances occupy the major part of the book, there were evidently long interspaces of fidelity and prosperity. And in the darkest hours, there were probably large numbers who, amid the abominations, sighed and cried for a better day.
There are two appendices, relating events which took place not long after Joshua’s death, and therefore preceding the greater part of the history. We may almost consider the book of Ruth as the third. The touches of human characteristics are very vivid and instinctive, and the book deserves much more attention than it receives from the ordinary reader.
Israel’s Apostasies and Deliverances
INTRODUCTION, Jdg_1:1-36; Jdg_2:1-23; Jdg_3:1-432.
RULE OF THE JUDGES, Judges 3:5-16:31
Following repeated apostasy and oppression, the Israelites were successively delivered:
4. From the Kings of Midian by Gideon, Jdg_6:1-40; Jdg_7:1-25; Jdg_8:1-35
(Story of Gideon’s sons), Jdg_9:1-57
23. What was Israel’s besetting sin?
THE LORD RAISES UP JUDGES
TOLA AND JAIR
TOLA AND JAIR
After Abimelech died, Tola the son of Puah, the son of Dodo, a man of Issachar, arose to save Israel; and he lived in Shamir, in the hill country of Ephraim.
Tola judged Israel for twenty-three years; then he died and was buried in Shamir.
After him, Jair the Gileadite arose, and he judged Israel for twenty-two years.
He had thirty sons who rode on thirty donkeys, and they had thirty towns in the land of Gilead that are called Havvoth-jair (towns of Jair) to this day.
And Jair died and was buried in Kamon.
FURTHER DISOBEDIENCE AND OPPRESSION
Then the Israelites again did what was evil in the sight of the LORD; they served the Baals, the Ashtaroth (female deities), the gods of Aram (Syria), the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the Ammonites, and the gods of the Philistines. They abandoned the LORD and did not serve Him.
So the anger of the LORD was kindled against Israel, and He sold them into the hands of the Philistines and the Ammonites,
and they oppressed and crushed Israel that year. For eighteen years they oppressed all the Israelites who were beyond the Jordan in the land of the Amorites, which is in Gilead.
The Ammonites crossed the Jordan to fight against Judah, Benjamin, and the house of Ephraim, so that Israel was greatly distressed.
Then the Israelites cried out to the LORD [for help], saying, “We have sinned against You, because we have abandoned (rejected) our God and have served the Baals.”
The LORD said to the Israelites, “Did I not rescue you from the Egyptians, the Amorites, the Ammonites, and the Philistines?
Also when the Sidonians, the Amalekites, and the Maonites oppressed and crushed you, you cried out to Me, and I rescued you from their hands.
Yet you have abandoned (rejected) Me and served other gods; therefore I will no longer rescue you.
Go, cry out to the gods you have chosen; let them rescue you in your time of distress.”
The Israelites said to the LORD, “We have sinned, do to us whatever seems good to You; only please rescue us this day.”
So they removed the foreign gods from among them and served the LORD; and He could bear the misery of Israel no longer.
Comments by
F.B.Meyer
OnJudges 10:1-16
INVETERATE IDOLATRY
The scene is now removed to the tribes across the Jordan, especially those settled, in Gilead and its vicinity. The children of Ammon were the aggressors, and acquired such boldness as even to cross the Jordan and fight against Judah and Ephraim. “Israel was sore distressed.” Almost spontaneously we say, “Surely it served them right.” It seems incredible that, after all they had suffered on account of their idolatry, they should again relapse to Baal, and add further the gods of Zidon, of Moab, of Ammon and of Philistia. If Jehovah had finally cast them off, could they have complained? But as the psalmist puts it in his touching words, “God regarded their distress and heard their cry.” See Psa_106:3, etc.
All these things were written for our example and instruction. Israel did not forsake God more often than we have done. Life has been full of fits and starts, of backsliding and recommencement, of sin and repentance. We have nothing to say against Israel; let us look at home, and search our hearts, and thank the Lord that His mercy endureth forever, Psa_136:1-26.
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