Judges 1 - 13, Israel's Lather/Rinse/Repeat Cycle with God

     Back in the book of Joshua, there were a few peoples who were not put to death or driven out of the Promised Land by Israel.
    In Judges, there are a whole lot more. I don't know if they're just getting tired of the war (I know I'm getting tired of reading it.....), if their motivation is dying down, or if perhaps they are seeing benefits (temptations) of keeping these people around. The Caananites, the Amorites, The Jebusites, and the Phillistines, to name a few... Judges is a book of the Bible where things are happening fast & furiously. It's tough to summarize, but I will try.
After Joshua dies in chapter one, and the generation that was with him, the next generation is said to "not know the Lord." They do evil in the sight of the Lord, and serve Baal and Ashtaroth. (seems that anyone who was anyone back then had idols of these gods in their house......). Undoubtedly, Israel is under the influence of the other peoples living in the land. God pulls back some of his protection, and Israel becomes very distressed.
     God raises up "judges" to......well, judge Israel. To convict them of their sin. Tell them to repent. Lead them back to God. As soon as each judge dies, Israel begins intermarrying with all the other "ites" and serving idols again.
     God allowed Israel to serve under Mesopotamian rule for 8 years. God raises up Othniel to deliver Israel. For forty years after, all is well.
   Again, Israel rebels, and falls under Moabite rule for eighteen years. God raises up Ehud (who, for some reason, is noted to be left-handed) to deliver Israel. Ehud had a funny way of doing it too. He plunged a sword into the fat belly of the king and left the room, locking the doors. The servants assumed the king was taking a #2, and so they left him be for awhile. (I'm not joking....chapter 3, y'all...). All is well with Israel for eighty years.
  Then we have Deborah (a prophetess)  and Barak, who God raises up to deliver Israel from the Caananite king Jabin. The commander of Jabin's army is this guy named Sisera, who hops off his chariot and runs away while his army is being defeated. (If the book of Judges was ever made into a musical, they'd have to get John Cleese that role....). Anyway, he runs into a friend's tent, and finds the man's wife, Jael, there. He asks her for water, she gives him milk. He asks her to hide him, she drives a tent spike through his temple. Shortly thereafter, the king is destroyed as well.  Deborah and Barak sing a victory song of praise to the Lord which is 31 verses long. All is well in Israel for 40 years.
    Israel does evil again, and now they are oppressed by the Midianites.  The "angel of the Lord" appears to Gideon, whom the Lord raises up to deliver Israel. I want to take a moment and ponder this "angel of the Lord." When God spoke to Moses, He tended to do so directly. Now we have this "angel of the Lord" business. Is it an angel? Is it the Lord? Who is it? This "angel of the Lord", when speaking, glides back and forth between speaking first person AS God, and speaking as though a separate entity who is delivering God's message. Anyhow, Gideon is a bit chicken because he's considered to be one of the weakest of the weak. He tests God twice to be assured of the victory before proceeding. He lays out a fleece on the ground and asks God for the fleece to be soaked with dew in the morning, but the ground dry.  The next day, he wants the ground wet and the fleece dry. Gideon gathers up 32 thousand men. God doesn't want a huge army for this endeavor though, lest Israel should attribute the victory to their own strength, and not God's providential hand. So all the men who are "frightened" are sent packing. Ten thousand remain. Then God whittles the number down to 300 by selecting those who used their hand as a cup to drink from the water. Gideon takes a servant and goes to the Midianite camp, because the Lord tells him that he will feel confident of their victory after doing so. He hears a man speaking about a prophetic dream in which the Midianites are defeated by Israel. So Gideon and his men come to the Midianite camp, blow three hundred trumpets and shout, "A sword for the Lord and for Gideon!". God confuses the Midianites, they turn their swords on each other, and then run away.
   As Gideons's army is chasing the Midianites, Gideon asks the people of Succoth for some bread for his troops. Succoth will not give them bread since Israel has not captured the leaders of Midian yet.  Gideon vows revenge on them via physical torture with thorns and briers. The same thing happens with the people at Penuel, but the revenge shall be tearing down their tower. Gideon's army captures the Midian leaders, and Gideon gives his promised revenge to Succoth and Penuel.
 All is well in Israel for forty years. Then Gideon dies.....  Gideon had seventy sons, one of whom was Abimelech, born to Gideon by a concubine (mistress). Abimelech convinces the people of Shechem (land of his mother's clan) to make him a king. He kills all his brothers but Jotham, the youngest,  who hides. Then Jotham gives a speech to the leaders of Shechem, speaking in tree metaphors and asking them to think a bit on this King Abimelech shenanigan. Then he runs away to live in "Beer."  Surely enough, the people of Shechem begin to turn against Abimelech. War ensues. At one point, Abimelech is arranging to destroy a tower full of people by setting it on fire. A woman drops a millstone on him. He's dying, but not wanting to put killed by a woman, asks his servant to kill him with a sword. The servant obliges.
    Another judge is mentioned, by the name of Tola.... then there was Jair, who had thirty sons who rode on thirty donkeys.  Then Israel does evil again, and the Lord gives them up to their desires. They are oppressed by Phillistines, and the Ammonites.
   A man named Jephthah, son of a prostitute, was turned out of his father's house by his brothers, sans inheritence. He went away to "Tob" and collected some worthless friends. Some elders go and seek him out as Israel's next deliverer. Jephthah does a really dumb thing, which is that he promises the Lord that if the Lord delivers the enemy into his hands, he will sacrifice the first thing that comes up to him at his house to the Lord. They were victorious. The first thing to greet Jephthah at his house turns out to his daughter, his only child. What a very stupid, stupid man......... Nonetheless, he judged Israel for six years.
   Next is Ibzan, then Elon, then Abdon.
   Then Israel did evil again, and God gave them into the hands of the Phillistines for forty years. A man named Manoah had a wife who couldn't give him children. (have you ever noticed that in the Bible, infertility is always blamed on the female?) The "angel of the Lord" appears to her and tells her she will conceive a son who will begin to save Israel from the Phillistines. He is to be a Nazarite, and never cut his hair.
Samson is born......

Here is a picture of what the idols might have possibly looked like which Israel and her neighbors were worshipping.  (although in the Bible, they are usually made of gold). On the left is a "Baal", which can actually refer to any number of "false god" idols who were popular at the time. On the right is "Astheroth", a Caananite goddess of fertility that Israel was prone to worship alongside Baal. Her name goes by many different spellings like Astarte, Ashtart, etc, and was also worshipped by Egypt, Greece, and much of the Eastern Mediterrean population.