Hello Bible Adventurists,
Today’s reading is one of the hardest in the Bible. It is a low point for Israel. The reading is framed with,
“In those days Israel had no king: everyone did as they saw fit.”
Israel did have a king: God, they just forgot they were responsible to Him and his law. Israel made a vow of vengeance out of righteous anger without consulting God first. The Benjaminites misplaced their loyalty to family above loyalty to God. Almost 70,000 people died. A tribe was nearly extinguished. The people from Jabesh Gilead were made scapegoats for the vigilante overreach. It must have been unimaginable for the poor girls who were taken as wives for the surviving Benjaminites. I won’t even mention the actions of the Levite with respect to his concubine (common-law wife).
What started all this? This story has so many parallels to the story of Sodom and Gomorrah (which God wiped out). Certainly, this started with those men in Gilead who raped the concubine to death. To me that is a result of their sin, but not the sin itself. In Leviticus, we read about God’s laws against sexual misbehavior, so we know that people were behaving in those ways back then. It’s not new or enlightened. We also know He feels about that behavior. But in both stories, the disaster didn’t fall from unhidden sexual immorality. The disaster came when the sinners (and aren’t we all) tried to force others to join and be complicit in their sin against God. They tried to force good people to knowingly sin. I think this is a “last straw” for God.
“Everyone did as they saw fit,” but God was an afterthought, and His laws were casually followed at best and openly challenged at worst. I have to wonder if they said, “I’m spiritual, but just disagree with organized religion,” or “God and I have a special understanding so I don’t need to read scripture”? Throughout Judges, we have seen the cycle of 1) Worship (following God's rules) with God's blessing, 2) Rebellion, 3) a Reminder or Correction (usually foreign invasion and oppression) from God, 4) Repentance (a Judge points Israel back to God and sometimes assassinates the oppressor). This was a time of anarchy (no formal government) as God let Israel to rule themselves under His simple laws and the idea of "do unto others as you would have others do to you." Adam taught us it is too easy to ignore God's simple directions if we perceive a benefit or advantage. After this truly horrible chapter of Jewish history, the Israelites ask for a king. Maybe they think a king can keep them on the straight and narrow or at least keep them from destroying themselves.
We have a King. Let us follow His simple rules.
Happy Easter, He is Risen!
Tom