# commentaries

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<p>Then three thousand men of Judah went down to the cave in the rock of Etam and said to Samson, Don’t you know that the Philistines are rulers over us?- </p><p>This was tacit recognition of the depth of their apostacy. They seemed to have no regret that they were fulfilling the many earlier prophecies that they would be dominated by their enemies if they were disobedient to Yahweh. The fact that Israel were dominated throughout Samson's life by the Philistines is proof enough that they were apostate at this time (<a href='B:70 13:1'>Jdg 13:1</a> cp. <a href='B:70 15:20'>Jdg 15:20</a>; <a href='B:70 16:31'>Jdg 16:31</a>).</p><p>What is this that you have done to us?- </p><p>Zorah, Samson's home town, was originally Judah's inheritance (<a href='B:60 15:33-36'>Jos 15:33-36</a>), but they spurned it, and passed it to Dan (<a href='B:60 19:41'>Jos 19:41</a>), who also weren't interested; for they migrated to the north and too over the land belonging to the less warlike Sidonians (<a href='B:70 18:2'>Jdg 18:2</a>; <a href='B:70 18:7-10'>Jdg 18:7-10</a>). Their selfishness is reflected by the way they chide with him: "What is this that you have done unto us?".</p><p>He said to them, As they did to me, so have I done to them-</p><p>See on <a href='B:70 13:5'>Jdg 13:5</a>. If we ask 'What exactly did they do to him? What did they kill and burn of his?', the answer must be 'His wife'. He perhaps felt that she was worth hundreds of them, and the burning of their livelihood, leaving famine in it's wake, was what they had done to him emotionally. Yet it is curious how he loved the Philistines and yet hated them.</p>


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<p>They said to him, We have come down to tie you up so that we can deliver you into the hand of the Philistines. Samson said to them, Swear to me that you will not kill me yourselves-</p><p>He had to beg his own people not to try to kill him themselves (even whilst he had long hair), because he knew that the strength he had was only for certain specific purposes- i:e:, to deliver God's people from the Philistines (15:12). </p><p>15:12 bind. The way they came to bind Samson has suggestions of Legion (<a href='B:490 8:29'>Luk 8:29</a>); perhaps they considered him to be mentally ill, and attributed his strength to fits? Or worse, did they consider the work of the Spirit of God to deliver them to be that of demons? If so, Samson was typifying the Lord's later experience (<a href='B:470 12:24-27'>Mat 12:24-27</a>). The way Jesus spoke of himself in this context as the stronger than the strong man (cp. Samson) encourages this view. And yet the strong man who was bound, i:e. the devil, can also be seen as a reference to Samson. Again, we are left with a difficult question: Was Samson telling them the truth when he said that his motive at Lehi was purely personal revenge? Or were they so unspiritual that he spoke to them on their level, even though at other times he pleaded with them to quit their idolatry (<a href='B:70 2:16-19'>Jdg 2:16-19</a>)? Or were his motives simply hopelessly mixed? Within him was a burning desire to do God's work; he was the one faithful Israelite who could chase 1,000; and yet in the company of his unspiritual brethren, he let his human side come out, and wrapped up his zeal for the Lord in human terms- even though there was some truth in how he expressed it. This kind of thing can so easily happen in our Christian experience; we bring out the worst in each other.</p>


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<p>They said, No, we will tie you up and deliver you into their hand, but we will not kill you. They bound him with two new ropes and brought him up from the rock- </p><p>The way they tie him up and he begs them not to kill him (15:12,13) hardly sounds like Samson judging Israel (:20). And yet this was his desire, and this is what God imputed to him, in the same way as he was a Nazarite to God (i:e. in God's eyes?) all his life (<a href='B:70 13:7'>Jdg 13:7</a>)- although he broke his Nazariteship by contact with dead bodies (<a href='B:70 14:19'>Jdg 14:19</a>; <a href='B:70 15:15'>Jdg 15:15</a> cp. <a href='B:40 6:6'>Num 6:6</a>) and probably by drinking wine at his wedding (<a href='B:70 14:10'>Jdg 14:10</a> " feast" = 'drinking', Heb:). This was not only imputed righteousness, but God counting the essential intentions of a weak willed man to him as if he had actually achieved what he fain would do.</p>


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<p>When he came to Lehi, the Philistines shouted as they met him, and the Spirit of Yahweh came mightily on him. The ropes that were on his arms became as charred flax, and his ropes dropped off his hands-</p><p>The Spirit likewise came upon him to kill the Philistines in Lehi (15:14). It wasn't a permanent strength. This is in harmony with the way in which the Spirit was used in the New Testament. The Spirit came upon the apostles and they were filled up with it, as it were, and then drained of it once the work was done; and had to be filled with it again when the next eventuality arose. The shouting of the Philistines recalled the roaring of the lion against Samson (<a href='B:70 14:5'>Jdg 14:5</a>). As in our lives, one experience prepares us for the next one, which occurs on a far greater scale than the first one.</p>


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<p>He found a fresh jawbone of an ass and struck down a thousand men with it-</p><p>Samson slaying Philistines with a jawbone suggests Shamgar slaying Philistines with an ox goad (15:15 cp. 3:31).</p><p>15:15 Samson grabbed a jaw-bone and exalted that with that he had slain a thousand men at Lehi. The word for "jawbone", Lehi, means literally 'that which is soft'. God was teaching him that His strength was only perfected in weakness. His words are a conscious allusion to <a href='B:60 23:10'>Jos 23:10</a> (and <a href='B:30 26:8'>Lev 26:8</a>): "One man of you shall chase a thousand: for the Lord your God, He it is that fights for you". It could be that he counted the bodies, or counted each man he slew, consciously trying to get up to 1,000 in order to fulfill the prophecy. Although !a thousand" may refer to a military unit rather than a literal number. Samson doesn't say that he alone killed the thousand men; he did it with the jaw-bone (coming from a Hebrew root meaning 'soft', 'weak'). This jaw bone is one of the seven weak things which are mentioned in Judges as being the tools of God's salvation: left handed man (<a href='B:70 3:21'>Jdg 3:21</a>); an ox goad (<a href='B:70 3:31'>Jdg 3:31</a>); a woman (<a href='B:70 4:4'>Jdg 4:4</a>); a nail (<a href='B:70 4:21'>Jdg 4:21</a>); a piece of a millstone (<a href='B:70 9:53'>Jdg 9:53</a>); a pitcher and trumpet (<a href='B:70 7:20'>Jdg 7:20</a>). God's people are likened to an ass frequently (<a href='B:10 49:11'>Gen 49:11</a>; <a href='B:10 49:14'>Gen 49:14</a>; <a href='B:290 1:3'>Isa 1:3</a>; <a href='B:300 2:24'>Jer 2:24</a>; <a href='B:350 8:9'>Hos 8:9</a>; <a href='B:490 13:15'>Luk 13:15</a>; <a href='B:490 14:5'>Luk 14:5</a>). The first two references would have been known to Samson at Lehi; and he may have reflected that the fact the firstborn of an ass must be redeemed by a lamb was prophetic of how Messiah would save all His otherwise condemned people (<a href='B:20 13:13'>Exo 13:13</a>; <a href='B:20 34:20'>Exo 34:20</a>). Could it not be that despite their cruel betrayal of him and utter faithlessness, dear Samson felt he was living out a kind of acted parable of what was possible for Israel: that through his zeal, and in his hands, the weak people of God could achieve the great victory over thousands which Moses and Joshua had earlier foretold? In this he was a superb type of the Lord.</p>


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<p>Samson said, With the jawbone of an ass, heaps on heaps; with the jawbone of a donkey I have slain a thousand men-</p><p>Samson's victory song at Lehi smacks of personal vengeance, showing how mixed were his motives. There is little suggestion of the humble servant merely doing God's will:</p><p>"With a donkey's jaw-bone</p><p>I have made donkeys of them.</p><p>With a donkey's jaw-bone</p><p>I have killed a thousand men" </p><p>(15:16 NIV).</p><p><a href='B:30 26:3-8'>Lev 26:3-8</a> had promised dramatic success against their enemies on the basis of obedience to the Law. The fact Samson had this power was therefore proof that he really was reckoned by God as zealously obedient to the Law; and yet he was like this in the midst of a sadly apostate Israel. This character study of Samson takes this view of his strength. This is in itself no mean achievement: to rise to a level of spirituality much higher than that achieved by the surrounding brotherhood.</p><p>Joshua's final exhortation to Israel contains a passage which reads as some kind of prophecy of Samson. It is proof enough that Samson is to be read as a symbol of Israel: "Be therefore very courageous to keep and to do all that is written in the book of the law of Moses... that you come not among these nations, these that remain among you (true in Samson's time)... but cleave unto the Lord your God…no man has been able to stand before you (this was Samson)... one man of you shall chase a thousand (cp. <a href='B:70 15:16'>Jdg 15:16</a>): for the Lord your God, He it is that fights for you (this was exactly true of Samson in <a href='B:70 15:18'>Jdg 15:18</a>)... take good heed unto yourselves... else if you go back, and cleave unto the remnant of these nations, even these that remain among you, and make marriages with them (as Samson did), and go in unto them, and they to you (cp. <a href='B:70 15:1'>Jdg 15:1</a>; <a href='B:70 16:1'>Jdg 16:1</a>, where Samson went in to the Philistine women): know for a certainty that the Lord your God will no more drive out any of these nations from before you (cp. <a href='B:70 16:20'>Jdg 16:20</a>); but they shall be snares and traps unto you (Delilah!)... and thorns in your eyes, until you perish" (<a href='B:60 23:6-13'>Jos 23:6-13</a>). This passage would associate Samson's God-given strength and victory over the Philistines with his obedience to God's word. It was not that Samson was just an arbitrary tool in God's hand. Frequently the things Samson says and does are full of allusion to various passages in the Law, and also earlier incidents recorded in Judges which would have been known to him probably as the oral word of God.</p>


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<p>When he had finished speaking he threw away the jawbone, and that place was called Ramath Lehi- </p><p>And yet it was out of that jawbone which he discarded that water came to save his life (:19). He had used and then as it were cast away his first wife and best man, considering that the end [defeating the Philistines] justified the means. He is perhaps being shown that his attitude was wrong. The value and meaning of the human person, even if they are Philistines, is such that nobody should ever just be used and discarded.</p>


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<p>He was very thirsty and called on Yahweh and said, You have given this great deliverance by the hand of Your servant; now shall I die for thirst and fall into the hand of the uncircumcised-</p><p>His request for water in that dry place was abundantly answered- in the same way as Yahweh had responded to exactly the same request from a faithless Israel in the desert (<a href='B:20 17:1-7'>Exo 17:1-7</a>; <a href='B:40 20:2-13'>Num 20:2-13</a>). And the way he names the well after the miraculous provision of water, and the way presumably the opened well remained (15:19), has links with pseudo-Israelite Hagar (Gen. 16:19; 21:19). And yet even in these similarities, it must be noted that there was a certain spiritual culture in Samson's prayer. He didn't make a direct, crude demand for water. He placed his situation before God, and left it to Him to respond as He knew best. This is a feature of many spiritual prayers: not to crudely, directly ask for the obvious; but to simply inform the Almighty of the situation, in faith.</p><p>Samson at Lehi saw them as unclean asses; and yet he loved their women. And yet in the midst of this almost arrogance, he cries: "I thirst", and so exhibits something of the spirit of Christ in His final hour of agony and ultimate conquest on the cross (<a href='B:500 19:28'>Joh 19:28</a>). Samson&nbsp; despised the uncircumcised Philistines, as he had been brought up to (<a href='B:70 14:3'>Jdg 14:3</a>). He knew they hated him and yet he loved them and yet he hated them- all this shows the complexity of human nature, and describes our attitude to the world and the things of the flesh. And yet the only real answer is to cut off the flesh; to gouge out the eye that offends; not to comfortably go along with the fact that we have such a love: hate relationship with the flesh. For we cannot serve two masters; we can only ultimately love one. The Lord we serve is in many ways a demanding Lord. &nbsp;</p><p>Samson dying of thirst crying desperately for water recalls Hagar's experience (15:19 cp. <a href='B:10 21:19'>Gen 21:19</a>).</p>


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<p>But God split the hollow place that is in Lehi and water came out of it- </p><p>This is the language of God's provision for Israel in the wilderness. The word translated "Lehi" is that for jaw bone (s AV), as if the water came out of the discarded jaw bone.</p><p>When he had drunk, his spirit came again and he revived, therefore its name was called En Hakkore- </p><p>We note how place names were altered or given to commemorate what had happened. The way that so many paganic place names survived in ancient Israel is a reflection therefore of how little effort they made to eradicate pagan influence- for they were mostly idolaters themselves.</p><p>Which is in Lehi to this day- </p><p>I would consider the book of Joshua to have largely been written by Joshua, under Divine inspiration, although edited [again under Divine inspiration] for the exiles. And the book of Judges likewise. For the exiles too were set to reestablish God's Kingdom in the land and to inherit it again as the Israelites first did. The phrase "to this day" occurs several times in Joshua / Judges, and appears to have different points of historical reference (<a href='B:60 4:9'>Jos 4:9</a>; <a href='B:60 5:9'>Jos 5:9</a>; <a href='B:60 6:25'>Jos 6:25</a>; <a href='B:60 7:26'>Jos 7:26</a>; <a href='B:60 8:28-29'>Jos 8:28-29</a>; <a href='B:60 9:27'>Jos 9:27</a>; <a href='B:60 10:27'>Jos 10:27</a>; <a href='B:60 13:13'>Jos 13:13</a>; <a href='B:60 14:14'>Jos 14:14</a>; <a href='B:60 15:63'>Jos 15:63</a>; <a href='B:60 16:10'>Jos 16:10</a>; <a href='B:60 22:3'>Jos 22:3</a>; <a href='B:60 23:8-9'>Jos 23:8-9</a>; <a href='B:70 1:26'>Jdg 1:26</a>; <a href='B:70 6:24'>Jdg 6:24</a>; <a href='B:70 10:4'>Jdg 10:4</a>; <a href='B:70 15:19'>Jdg 15:19</a>; <a href='B:70 18:12'>Jdg 18:12</a>). I would explain this by saying that the book was edited a number of times and the remains of those edits remain in the text. For God's word is living and made relevant by Him to every generation.</p>


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<p>He judged Israel in the days of the Philistines for twenty years-</p><p>God's intention was that Samson was to deliver Israel from the Philistines; but somehow he never rose up to it, and only 'began' to do it (<a href='B:70 13:5'>Jdg 13:5</a>). They remained under the Philistines, even during his ministry. And he was hardly accepted as Israel's judge / saviour, for they tied him up and handed him over to the Philistines. He made a few sporadic attempts in red hot personal zeal, confirmed by God, to deliver Israel. But he never rose up to the potential level that God had prepared for him in prospect. And yet for all this, he was accepted in the final analysis as a man of faith.</p>


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<p>Samson went to Gaza and saw there a prostitute, and went in to her-</p><p>The way this passage starts with "Then" (see Heb:, AV) is one of several classic conjunctions which occur in the Biblical record. The "But" of <a href='B:510 5:1'>Act 5:1</a> is another. After the spiritual and personal glory of the fight at Lehi, "Then..." Samson goes to Gaza and sees a whore. It may not have happened immediately afterwards (<a href='B:70 15:20'>Jdg 15:20</a>), but it seems purposefully placed where it is in the record. A similar example occurs in <a href='B:70 14:19-20'>Jdg 14:19-20</a> cp. <a href='B:70 15:1'>Jdg 15:1</a>: after repenting of his marriage with the Philistine girl and using his failure as an opportunity to seek occasion against God's enemies, Samson then relents and lets his human love for the girl take him over, and he goes to visit and sleep with her. And again in <a href='B:70 16:3'>Jdg 16:3</a>, we see Samson repentant as he lies there at midnight, and he rises up and in the spirit of the Lord's cross, carries away the gate of his enemies. And then, "it came to pass afterward, that he loved a woman..." (<a href='B:70 16:4'>Jdg 16:4</a>). He simply couldn't keep up the level of spiritual intensity which he fain would have. And again, we know much about this problem .</p><p>And yet Samson went to Gaza conscious that his people had failed to drive out the tribes there (<a href='B:60 11:22'>Jos 11:22</a>). Judah had captured it in Joshua's strength (<a href='B:70 1:18'>Jdg 1:18</a>), but had let the Philistines return. So Samson chose Gaza from spiritual motives; and yet he schemed out his plan to enable him to gratify his flesh. But Samson lay there only until the middle of the night. Then he "got up and took hold of the doors..." (<a href='B:70 16:1'>Jdg 16:1</a>; <a href='B:70 16:3'>Jdg 16:3</a> NIV):&nbsp; If he went in to spend the night there, he presumably entered the house at around 7 or 8. He had what he wanted, and then lay there thinking, the record seems to suggest, and decided to not lay there all night as he planned, but get up and do God's work. Whilst it is unrecorded, surely there were prayers of deep and fervent repentance as he lay there? His conscience likewise seems to have struck him after he attempted to marry the Philistine girl, and also when he burnt up the vineyards. And so again here. He may have justified his behaviour by reference back (in his deep subconscious, maybe) to how the spies sought to destroy Jericho by entering the city and lodging with a whore.</p><p>When Samson decided to attack Gaza by going into a harlot's house, he may have been consciously imitating the way the spies played their part in Jericho's destruction (16:1). And yet it was once again only a surface imitation. He fell for the 'little of both' syndrome, justifying it under the guise of Scriptural examples.</p>


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<p>The Gazites were told, Samson is here! They surrounded him and laid wait for him all night in the gate of the city, staying quiet all night and saying, Wait until dawn, then we will kill him-</p><p>See on <a href='B:230 118:10-12'>Psa 118:10-12</a>. The purpose of this final tragic chapter in Samson's life was to bring Samson to a final realization that there was no third way in the service of Yahweh: it's all or nothing. The Lord worked through Samson's 'little of both' syndrome. The Lord Jesus read the Samson record this way: He recommended that we too tear our eyes out to stop us stumbling from the path of total devotion (<a href='B:480 9:47'>Mar 9:47</a>). We all know how the story turns out. And it's one of those parts of Scripture which I for one don't reading. I don't want to go on from chapter 15 to chapter 16. I know what's coming, and I'd rather not be reminded of the whole tragic sequence. And yet it's there, absolutely for our learning. And Samson should have already learnt. As his first wife had vexed her with her words to tease his secret from him, so Delilah did. As the Philistines laid wait for Samson as he lay with the whore in Gaza (16:2), so they laid wait in Delilah's bedroom (16:9). He had already repented of using God's service as an excuse for satisfying his own flesh in the incident with the Gaza prostitute. He had bitterly walked away from his first Philistine wife. He burnt down the vineyards, recalling how he had foolishly strolled in them as a Nazarite. He must have looked back and seen how he had played with fire. And now, he goes and does it all again. He goes to the valley of Sorek, 'choice vines', and Samson falls for Delilah, 'the vine'. He went down to the vineyards again; the Nazarite tried to take fire into his bosom again.</p>


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<p>Samson lay until midnight, then arose and took hold of the doors of the city gate and the two posts, picked them up, along with the bar, put them on his shoulders and carried them up to the top of the mountain that faces Hebron-</p><p>"Samson lay till midnight, and arose at midnight" (16:3 AV) gives a different picture: of Samson 'laying' with her as a man lays with a woman, and then getting up and going out to do God's work. The interplay between sexuality and spirituality was never stronger.</p><p>The incident in Gaza is evidently typical of the Lord's work. There was Samson, "the splendour of the sun" , 'compassed in' by his enemies (as Christ on the cross, <a href='B:230 118:5'>Psa 118:5</a>; <a href='B:230 118:10-12'>Psa 118:10-12</a>) in Gaza ('fortified stronghold', cp. death). Then he arose in the darkness, rendered powerless the gates of death and carried them up 30 miles to a high altitude (cp. Heaven), to Hebron, 'the city of fellowship', where the tomb of Abraham was (<a href='B:10 23:19'>Gen 23:19</a>), and where Gentile giants had once lived (<a href='B:40 13:22'>Num 13:22</a>), conquered by faithful Israelites. Joshua had taken Hebron (<a href='B:60 10:36'>Jos 10:36</a>) but Israel had not followed up his victory, and the Philistines had returned; Caleb then took it (<a href='B:60 15:13'>Jos 15:13</a>), but again, by Samson's time, the Philistines were back. And Samson, although a type of Christ, was intensely aware of all this failure (cp. how he chose Gaza and Timnath, areas with a similar history, for his other exploits). It would seem that Samson killed the men at the gates, the leaders of the city, and then took the gates with him (16:3 cp. 2). The Hebrew used for Samson 'taking away' the gates is that translated 'possess' in the Genesis promises. Thus he possessed the gates of his enemies and slew their figureheads, as the Lord did through the cross. Samson obviously saw some specific meaning in taking the gates to Hebron and the tomb of Abraham. He surely saw that he was prefiguring Messiah's work of taking the gate of his enemies, as promised to Abraham. Or perhaps he saw himself as 'in' the Messiah, and sharing in what He would do in the future. Archaeologists have found tablets that refer to the power of Baal to possess the gates of all who oppose him; and Samson evidently wanted to show the superiority of Yahweh over Baal. The fellowship ('Hebron') which was enabled by the Lord's victory should never be undone by us; He died that He might gather together in one all God's people, to reconcile us all in one body both to each other and to God. To break apart the body is therefore to deny the essential intention of the cross. There are other points of contact with the Lord's passion. The men of Gaza laid wait in the gates of the city; they were therefore the rulers? But they decided to only kill him in the morning. The rulers of the Jews decided likewise.</p>


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<p>Afterward, he fell in love with a woman in the valley of Sorek, whose name was Delilah- </p><p>Samson had a mixed conscience when he slew the lion. He was in the vineyards, the very place where he shouldn't have been as a Nazarite, although he justified it by spiritual and even Biblical reasoning. He then burns up those vineyards in order to have a blameless conscience. He then loses that good conscience and cowers in the rocks. And then later he goes to the valley of Sorek (Heb. 'the vine') and forges a relationship with another worthless woman. Samson's marriage looks less acceptable in this context. So he returned to his old desire to walk near the forbidden fruit of the vine. His purges of conscience were temporary, and he returned to the old haunts and ways.</p>


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<p>The lords of the Philistines came to her and said, Entice him, and find out where his great strength lies, and how we might prevail against him to tie him up and subdue him. Then we will each one of us give you eleven hundred pieces of silver-</p><p><a href='B:240 6:26-27'>Pro 6:26-27</a>; <a href='B:240 7:1'>Pro 7:1</a> make clear allusion to Samson and Delilah, and they suggest that Delilah was a "whorish woman". In this case, her motivation for betraying Samson was fundamentally financial, apart from other lesser factors which there probably were. The bribe she was offered has been estimated in modern terms as around US$ 1 million (2019). And Judas likewise went to the chief priests and asked how much they would give him for betraying the Lord. Again, Samson was a type of Christ. This all indicates the unbelievable materialism which is in our natures: to betray a good man, even the Son of God, ultimately for pieces of metal. We must have all asked: 'Why, oh why, did Samson go on trusting her, when it was so obvious she was going to betray him?'. It may have been because she was an Israelitess (even if a renegade). The way she says "The Philistines are upon you!" (16:20) and the way the lords of the Philistines came up to her (16:5) may suggest this. Their offer of money to her was exactly after the pattern of the Jews' approach to Judas. The way "pieces of silver" feature in both records leads us to wonder whether the correspondence was so exact that she also betrayed the helpless Samson with a kiss, as Judas did. See on <a href='B:70 14:5'>Jdg 14:5</a>.</p><p>We note that the same sum of 1100 pieces of silver will occur in the next chapter; see on <a href='B:70 17:2'>Jdg 17:2</a>.</p>


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<p>Delilah said to Samson, Please tell me where your great strength lies, and how you might be tied up and subdued- </p><p>As his first wife had vexed her with her words to tease his secret from him, so Delilah did. But Samson didn't learn from his life, and this is the tragedy of so much spiritual failure- people don't learn from history, both their own and others.</p>


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<p>Samson said to her, If I am tied with seven fresh cords that were never dried, then shall I become weak like other men-</p><p>He&nbsp; teased Delilah to tie him with seven “cords” or AV "withs", the Hebrew word implying made from a vine. He just would mess with the forbidden. Samson tells Delilah that if he is bound, he will be weak "like one man" (16:7 Avmg:). This is surely an allusion to passages like <a href='B:30 26:8'>Lev 26:8</a> and <a href='B:60 23:10'>Jos 23:10</a> - that one man would chase many. Samson implies that he fights like he is many men; he appropriated those blessings to himself. He came to assume he had faith. Lifetime Christians have the same tendency, with the joy and vigour of first faith now far back in time. Samson had been bound before and had burst those bonds (<a href='B:70 15:13'>Jdg 15:13</a>); he seems to have assumed that one past deliverance was an automatic guarantee of future ones. His great zeal for the Lord's work seems to have lead him to chose the single life; and yet he evidently was in the habit of occasional affairs (<a href='B:70 14:3'>Jdg 14:3</a> "is there never..." ), using prostitutes and having on and off relationships with women like Delilah. Samson thought his devotion and the appalling apostacy of his brethren somehow justified it. Note how Timothy and Hezekiah seem to likewise have stumbled in their commitment to the single life.</p>


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<p>Then the lords of the Philistines brought to her seven fresh cords which had not been dried, and she tied him with them- </p><p>As this all happened in the bedroom (:9 NEV "inner room"), it seems to me that she used them in some kind of sexual bondage game. Yet as noted on :9, even at such a low spiritual point in his life, God's Spirit remained with him.</p>


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<p>Now she had an ambush waiting in the inner room- </p><p>The idea is, "the bedroom". See on :8. The Philistines are described as "abiding" in Delilah's house (16:9 AV)- a word normally used in the sense of 'permanently living'. It would seem that Samson didn't permanently live with her, but occasionally visited her, until at the end he was happy to live with her (she pressed him "daily"), co-habiting with her other Philistine lovers. With his hair shaven, he 'went out, as at other times'- deciding bitterly that he had really had enough, and once again he would walk out on her, this time for good, and would 'shake himself' and take a hold on himself. But this time it was too late.</p><p>She said to him, The Philistines are upon you, Samson! He broke the cords, as a string of tow is broken when it touches the fire. So his strength was not known-</p><p>The thongs burst from him as when string comes close to a flame. This is similar to the scene in <a href='B:70 15:14'>Jdg 15:14</a>, where because the Spirit was upon him, Samson became like a burning fire which snapped his bonds. See on :12.</p>


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<p>Delilah said to Samson, You have made a fool of me and told me lies! Now please tell me how you can be tied- </p><p>We are left to imagine all the crocodile tears and lies told by Delilah regarding how she set him up to be ambushed and slain by Philistines, whilst claiming she loved him.</p>


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<p>He said to her, If I am tied with new ropes with which no work has been done, then I shall become weak like other men-</p><p>Samson ends up bound (s:w. "tied") in fetters of brass. He was truly an Israelite in bondage to the Philistines, the very thing he had so despised and given his life to fighting against. But in these bondage fames with Delilah, he liked being tied up in bondage to a Philistine. We have a deep insight here into how he actually both loved and hated Philistine bondage. This inability to wholly dedicate himself to Yahweh's ways and people was to be his undoing.</p>


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<p>So Delilah took new ropes and tied him with them and said to him, The Philistines are upon you, Samson! The ambush was waiting in the inner room. He broke them off his arms like a thread- </p><p>In the next two occasions when Samson broke his bands (<a href='B:70 16:12'>Jdg 16:12</a>; <a href='B:70 16:14'>Jdg 16:14</a>), the language of breaking them as if there was fire within him (as in :9, see note there) doesn't occur. It may be that although the fire of the Spirit was within him, Samson came to feel that he, of his own ability, was doing the miracles: "he snapped the ropes off his arms...". There is even a sense of unjustified, egoistic sarcasm in the way he gets the Philistines to tie him with flimsy pieces of grass and then breaks them off and kills them.</p>


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<p>Delilah said to Samson, Until now you have fooled me and told me lies. Tell me how you can be tied. He said to her, If you weave the seven braids of my hair into the fabric on the loom, I will become as weak as other men-</p><p>See on <a href='B:230 118:10-12'>Psa 118:10-12</a>. He initially says: "If they bind me..." (16:7), but changes this to "If you..."; he knew beforehand that she would betray him, although couldn't admit it to himself. And so we see the complexity of Samson's situation. It was not that his telling of the secret to Delilah was necessarily a sin in itself. He trusted her and yet knew on another level she would betray him. This is just a part of human nature. It helps explain why the Lord Jesus knew from the beginning that Judas would betray him (<a href='B:500 6:64'>Joh 6:64</a>), and yet how He could really trust in Judas as his own familiar friend, confide in him (<a href='B:230 41:9'>Psa 41:9</a>), tell him that he would sit with the other eleven on thrones in the Kingdom (<a href='B:470 19:28'>Mat 19:28</a>). This was ever a serious contradiction for me, until considering the Samson : Delilah relationship in depth. A man can know something about someone on one level, but act and feel towards them in a quite different way than this knowledge requires. David likewise must have known Absalom’s deceit; but he chose not to see it, for love’s sake. “They also that seek after my life lay snares for me: and they that seek my hurt speak mischievous things [just as Absalom did in the gate]... but I, as a deaf man, heard not” (<a href='B:230 38:12-13'>Psa 38:12-13</a>). Paul surely knew how Corinth despised him, how little they knew and believed, and as he himself said, the more he loved them, the less they loved him. And yet in all honesty he could say: “As you abound in everything, in faith, and utterance, and knowledge, and in all diligence and in your love to us” (<a href='B:540 8:7'>2Co 8:7</a>). Yet the more abundantly he loved them, the less they loved him- not the more abundantly. Yet he saw them as loving him abundantly. One also gets the sense that the Gibeonites’ deception was somehow guessed by the elders of Israel, but against their better judgment they disregarded the telltale signs (<a href='B:60 9:7'>Jos 9:7</a>). Or Amasa, taking no heed to the sword in Joab’s hand... against his better judgment, surely (<a href='B:100 20:10'>2Sa 20:10</a>). This is a feature of human nature; the contradictions evident in the Jesus : Judas relationship and the Samson : Delilah relationship are only explicable for me by realizing this. The whole thing is an eloquent essay in the Lord's humanity and the depth of His 'in-loveness' with Judas the traitor.</p><p>And this Lord is our Lord, the same yesterday and today. Our self-knowledge will be deepened by realizing that we too have this spiritual schizophrenia: it's not that we are spiritual one day and unspiritual the next. We are both flesh and spirit at the very same moment. Appreciation of this will help us cope with the more evident failures of our brethren. It doesn't necessarily mean that they must be written off as totally unspiritual and insincere because of acts and attitudes of evident unspirituality. The Spirit is still there, at the very same moment. Think of how Samson slept with a whore until midnight, and then in faith rose up and was granted the Spirit to perform a great act of Christ-like, cross-like victory over the enemies of God's people.</p>


text:
<p>She wove his hair into the fabric and fastened it with the pin, and said to him, The Philistines are upon you, Samson! He awoke and pulled away the pin from the loom and the fabric-</p><p>The way Samson asked Delilah to fasten the hair of his head with a nail and then try to have mastery over him is a parody of what would have been a well known incident: Deborah's mastery over Barak (<a href='B:70 4:21'>Jdg 4:21</a>). This would indicate that Scripture was never far from his mind. In Samson's relationship with Delilah, he got closer and closer to the edge. Samson tells Delilah to bind him, then he gets closer to showing his hand: he asks her to do something to his hair. And then, he falls to the final folly. It could even be that after the previous teasings he left her completely (16:14 AV "he went away")- after the pattern of his previous twinges of conscience concerning his first wife, his love of vineyards, his lying with the whore in Gaza... But he evidently returned to her.</p>


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<p>She said to him, How can you say, ‘I love you’, when your heart is not with me? You have fooled me three times and have not told me where your great strength lies-</p><p>Even at his weakest, Delilah had observed that his heart wasn't with her: it was somewhere else, i:e. with the God of Israel.</p>


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<p>When she pressed him daily with her words, and urged him, he became tired to death-</p><p>Samson's marriage reflects a spiritual brinkmanship which was his spiritual undoing, however. For the same word is used concerning how Delilah&nbsp;later vexed him unto death with her words, and then Samson rose up and slew the Philistines with God's help. The same word is used concerning how the Gentile enemies of an apostate Israel would afflict them (<a href='B:50 28:53'>Deu 28:53</a>; <a href='B:50 28:55'>Deu 28:55</a>; <a href='B:50 28:57'>Deu 28:57</a>). Yet at this very same time, Samson had faith. But there came a time- there had to come a time, for the sake of Samson's eternal salvation- when this having a little of both had to be ended.</p>


text:
<p>So he told her everything, and said to her, No razor has ever come on my head, for I have been a Nazirite to God from my mother’s womb. If I am shaved, then my strength will go from me and I will become weak like any other man-</p><p>Samson's zeal to deliver Israel was confirmed by God, in that he was given gifts of Holy Spirit in order to enable him to deliver Israel. However, this doesn't mean that he himself was a man rippling with muscle. The Philistines wanted to find out the secret of his strength; it wasn't that he had such evidently bulging muscles that the answer was self-evident. He told Delilah that if his head were shaved, he would be like any other man. He was therefore just an ordinary man, made strong by the Father after the pattern of the Saviour he typified. It wasn't a permanent strength. This is in harmony with the way in which the Spirit was used in the New Testament. The Spirit came upon the apostles and they were filled up with is, as it were, and then drained of it once the work was done; and had to be filled with it again when the next eventuality arose. Indeed, the word baptizo strictly means 'to fill and thereby submerge'; hence the use of the term in classical Greek concerning the sinking of ships or the filling of a bottle. Therefore the idea of baptism with Holy Spirit could simply be describing a temporary filling of the Apostles with power in order to achieve certain specific aims.</p><p>If this is indeed how Samson experienced his fillings with the Spirit, it throws new light on the way he allowed Delilah to apparently suck information out of him. She asked for the secret of his strength; he knew she would betray him; he told her; she betrayed him, which meant a group of Philistine warriors came and hid themselves in the house (full known to Samson); and he then rose up and killed them, using the gift of God's Spirit. He was so sure that God would use him in this way, that he thought he could do anything in order to entice Philistine warriors into his presence- even if it involved gratifying his own flesh. The way he threw away the jawbone after killing 1000 Philistines at Lehi may suggest that&nbsp; he felt that now he had done the job, the instrument was useless; and he begged the Lord to give him drink. He knew that now he was an ordinary man again.</p>


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<p>When Delilah saw that he had told her everything, she sent for the lords of the Philistines saying, Come up once more, for he has told me everything. Then the lords of the Philistines came up to her, and brought the money with them-</p><p>It has been suggested from the way the Philistine lords are described as coming up to her, and the way in which she speaks of&nbsp; "the Philistines" (16:18-20), that she was in fact an apostate Israelitess. And thus he justified himself:&nbsp;We are left to ponder how Delilah lived after she had received all the money she clearly coveted. Was she happy? Did what she did buy her happiness? Clearly not.</p>


text:
<p>She made him sleep on her knees, and then she called for a man who shaved off the seven braids of his head. Then she began to torment him, and his strength left him-</p><p>See on <a href='B:140 33:12-13'>2Ch 33:12-13</a>; <a href='B:160 13:22'>Neh 13:22</a>. It should be noted that his strength was not somehow magically associated with his hair; his strength went from him because Yahweh departed from him (16:19,20). We have seen earlier that Samson was well into spiritual brinkmanship. It had characterized his life, according to the selection of incidents the record presents us with. The sequence of events is worth listing:</p><p>Delilah asked Samson to tell her his closest secret, </p><p>then Delilah bound Samson as he asked;</p><p>Samson awakes from a deep sleep with Delilah;</p><p>Delilah playfully afflicts Samson while he is bound and Samson overcomes Delilah (16:19 implies this happened each time);</p><p>Then Samson realizes Delilah has betrayed him;</p><p>and the Philistine warriors were there waiting in the bedroom.</p><p>Then Samson goes out of the bedroom, shakes himself and kills them.</p><p>Then Delilah says Samson doesn't really love her</p><p>- and they repeat the experience.</p><p>This is the classic material for love : hate relationships. At first sight, Samson appears an incomprehensible fool. But more extended meditation reveals the human likelihood of it all. She would've convincingly repented and asked for one last chance- time and again. It is hard not to interpret his sleeping exhausted with her and then the bondage session as some kind of sex game, followed by drinking alcohol so that he fell fast asleep [thus mocking his Nazirite vow]. And yet Samson thought he was strong enough to cope with it, as did Solomon years later. He may even have had some kind of desire to simply mock the Philistines when he suggested they should tie him up with seven pieces of grass. He seems to somehow have known that his first wife would wangle his secret from him and betray him, and thus he would have the opportunity to kill Philistines- even though he didn't intend to open his heart to her (<a href='B:70 14:16'>Jdg 14:16</a>). And now the same happened. He seems to have known that she would betray him, although he evidently thought better of her; for he was deeply in love with her.</p><p>The shame of the final fight is graciously unrecorded. The events of 16:19-21 seem a little out of sequence. It would seem that Delilah awoke Samson, and he thought he would go outside, shake himself and kill the Philistines whom he was sure were in wait. But she started to tease him as before in their games of bondage; but this time, "she began to subdue him, and he began to weaken" (16:19 LXX; one meaning of 'Delilah' is 'the one who weakens'). "Began" is a strange translation; it is often translated to profane / humble. She spiritually abused him. And then she called the Philistines. He was powerless, physically, beneath that woman, and was therefore no match for them. The fact she was physically stronger than him when the Spirit of the Lord left him is proof enough that he was not a physically strong man in his own right. The way the apostate woman subdued him physically, in the name of a love / sex game, would have remained in his memory. He, the strong man of Israel, had been conquered by a worthless woman. His humiliation was to be typical of Israel's: "children are their oppressors (cp. the young lad at the feast?), women rule over them" (<a href='B:290 3:12'>Isa 3:12</a>). It is quite possible that Peter had Samson in mind, when he wrote of how "they allure through the lusts of the flesh, through much wantonness... they themselves are the servants of corruption: for of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he brought in bondage. For if after they have escaped the pollutions of the world... they are again entangled therein, and overcome..." (<a href='B:680 2:18-20'>2Pe 2:18-20</a>). Samson had been spiritually overcome, and therefore physically he was overcome and brought in bondage.</p>


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<p>She said, The Philistines are upon you, Samson! He awoke out of sleep and said, I will go out as before and shake myself to be free of them. But he didn’t know that Yahweh had departed from him-</p><p>See on <a href='B:70 15:16'>Jdg 15:16</a>. The way Samson was so deeply sleeping on Delilah's knees that he didn't feel them shave him, and then he went out and shook himself (this seems a fair translation)- all this could suggest he was drunk. There is no concrete evidence for this, but his love of vineyards would suggest he had a yearning for the forbidden fruit. And Sorek means the vine, and "Delilah" can be understood as 'vine woman'. He had broken the Nazarite vow by touching dead bodies, he obviously thought that having unshaven hair was only tokenistic and irrelevant to the real spirit of Nazariteship, and therefore he may have reasoned that alcohol was also another tokenism. Thus his reductionism destroyed him (almost). Perhaps it was brought about by a wilful misunderstanding of God's waiving of the Nazarite ban on touching dead bodies; for after all, God had made Samson a Nazarite, and then empowered him to go and kill Philistines in personal combat, thereby touching dead bodies. So God waived one principle for a more important one; and yet Samson abused this, taking the principle far further than God intended, to the point that he ended up justifying sin as righteousness.</p>&nbsp;<p>"He didn't know that Yahweh had left him" is the depth of spiritual tragedy. The Lord Jesus may have had this in mind when He spoke of how the rejected would not know what hour He would come upon them (<a href='B:730 3:3'>Rev 3:3</a>). Samson went through the experience of rejection at the Lord's hands in advance of the actual judgment seat. He was set grinding in the prison- a figure which was later picked up as representative of the unbeliever generally (<a href='B:290 42:7'>Isa 42:7</a>; <a href='B:290 61:1'>Isa 61:1</a>; <a href='B:670 3:19'>1Pe 3:19</a>). He was as it were delivered to satan, that he might learn (<a href='B:610 1:20'>1Ti 1:20</a>); his own wickedness corrected him (<a href='B:300 2:19'>Jer 2:19</a>). And this finally brought him to himself. His experience was a pattern for the apostate Israel whom he loved. Yahweh forsaking His people is associated with them cutting off their hair in <a href='B:300 7:29'>Jer 7:29</a> - an evident allusion to Samson's shame. As the Philistines rejoiced over Samson and praised their god for their victory, so Babylon was to do years later, as Zedekiah like Samson had his eyes put out.</p>


text:
<p>The Philistines seized him and put out his eyes, and they brought him down to Gaza, bound him with fetters of brass, and made him work at grinding in the mill in the prison-</p><p>"Bound" is the word used for how Delilah had bound Samson with weak things like grass and hair, just as the Israelites had bound him before handing him over to the Philistines. The same word is used. He now found that he was unable to break what he was bound with. He was truly an Israelite in bondage to the Philistines, the very thing he had so despised and given his life to fighting against.</p><p>He was given women's work in prison, grinding at the mill, in order to rub the point in (<a href='B:20 11:5'>Exo 11:5</a>; <a href='B:470 24:41'>Mat 24:41</a>). 'Grinding' was some kind of figure of speech for the sex act (s:w. <a href='B:220 31:10'>Job 31:10</a>). The "fetters of brass" with which he was bound would have recalled his games of bondage with Delilah, and the same word is translated "filthiness" in a sexual context (<a href='B:330 16:36'>Eze 16:36</a>). The word used for 'prison' means literally 'house of binding'- an extension of Delilah's house, they would have joked. One can imagine how the story of how Delilah enticed him would have become the gossip of the nation.</p><p>The idea of binding the strong man must surely look back to Samson. The language can't just be accidentally similar (cp. <a href='B:70 16:21'>Jdg 16:21</a>). This means that the Lord saw Samson as the very epitome of Satan, even though ultimately he was a man of faith (<a href='B:650 11:32'>Heb 11:32</a>). Thus the Spirit doesn't forget a man's weakness, even though ultimately he may be counted righteous.</p>


text:
<p>However the hair of his head began to grow again after he had been shaved-</p><p>The record seems to suggest there was a link between the growth of his hair, and God giving him strength again. This doesn't mean that there was some metaphysical link between his strength and his hair. Rather does it show how God responded to his faith and what was behind the growth of his hair, and therefore gave him strength to destroy the Philistines. It would seem that Samson decided to keep the Nazarite vow again. He was in no position to offer the inaugatory sacrifice which the law required; and yet he threw himself upon God's grace, trusting that his zeal would be accepted by God; that he, the sinner and failure and shamer of Yahweh, could be allowed to make that special act of devotion in Nazariteship. And he was accepted in this, as witnessed by the great power of the death of Samson:&nbsp;</p><p>It must be emphasized that his strength was not tied up in his hair. He only ground in the prison a short time, until the great sacrifice was offered to Dagon in thanks for Samson's capture. In that time, his hair grew- but not very long, in such a short time (no more than months, <a href='B:70 16:22-23'>Jdg 16:22-23</a>). The growth of his hair is to be associated with his renewed determination to keep the Nazarite vow. He was reckoned by God as a lifelong Nazarite (<a href='B:70 15:7'>Jdg 15:7</a>); the time when his hair was cut was therefore overlooked by God. His zealous repentance and desire to respond to the gracious way in which God still recognized him as a lifelong Nazarite, although he wasn't one, inspired him to a real faith and repentance. It was this, not the fact he had some hair again, which lead to God empowering him to destroy the palace of Dagon.</p><p>The question arises: why did Samson tell Delilah that if his hair was cut, he would become weak? Surely he must have known within him that she would do it, in line with past experience? He went out as before to fight the Philistines, surely aware that he had been shaved, and yet assuming God would still be with him. He had come to realize that his long hair was not the real source of his strength, on some kind of metaphysical level. He saw that his strength was from the Spirit of God, not long hair or Nazariteship. He went out knowing, presumably, that his hair had been shaven, and yet still assumed he would have God's strength. And even when his hair began to grow again, he still had to pray for strength (<a href='B:70 16:28'>Jdg 16:28</a>). He fell into the downward spiral of reductionism. He figured that if his hair was shaved, well it was no big deal. He was supposed to be a Nazarite all the days of his life, and yet perhaps he came to reason that because he had touched plenty of dead bodies, he therefore needed to be shaved anyway (<a href='B:40 6:9'>Num 6:9</a>). He thought that therefore God would accept him in principle as a Nazarite even though he had broken the letter of Nazariteship, and therefore losing his hair was only a surface level indicator of spirituality:&nbsp;&nbsp; And yet there is also good reason to think that there was an association in Samson's mind between his hair and his God-given strength. For why did he " tell her all his heart" by saying that if he were shaved, he would lose his strength? And of course, when his hair was cut off, then his strength went. Samson saw a link between being a Nazarite and having strength (<a href='B:70 16:17'>Jdg 16:17</a>). When Samson went outside from Delilah and shook himself as he usually did, was he not shaking his hair free before attacking the Philistines, as if he saw in his hair the source of his strength? However, this must all be balanced against the evidence that Samson originally realized that his strength came from God, not his hair. Whilst he even had this realization, theoretically, when he gave Delilah the possibility of shaving him, he also at this time had the conception that his strength was associated with his hair length. I would suggest that this can be resolved by understanding that although his strength was not in his hair, this is how Samson came to see it. And therefore God went along with this view, and treated Samson as if his strength was in his hair. And therefore He departed from him when he allowed his hair to be shaved. If Samson had really told Delilah the truth about the source of his strength, he would have said: 'Faith, causing the Spirit of God to come upon me to do His work'. Samson knew this, and therefore he allowed her to shave him; and yet it was also true that in his heart of hearts, he also at the same time believed that his hair was the source of his strength. So he was the victim of reductionism, as well as tokenism. He came to see the mere possession of long hair as a sign of spirituality. And yet at the same time he reduced and reduced the real meaning of Nazariteship to nothing. Difficult as this analysis may be to grasp, I really believe that it has much to teach us; for the latter day brotherhood is afflicted with exactly these same problems.</p>


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<p>The lords of the Philistines gathered together to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god and to rejoice, for they said, Our god has delivered Samson our enemy into our hand-</p><p>The Philistines didn't kill Samson immediately; they wanted to prolong the agony of his death. It was evidently their intention to kill him. Perhaps it was their plan to torture him and then finally torture him to death at the feast to their god- cp. the Lord's planned death at Passover. The great sacrifice which they planned to offer (Heb. 'kill') was probably Samson.</p>


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<p>When the people saw him, they praised their god. They said, Our god has delivered our enemy, the destroyer of our country who has slain many of us, into our hand-</p><p>See on <a href='B:70 14:14'>Jdg 14:14</a>. Gentiles praising their gods, mocking Yahweh, and then suddenly being destroyed was a scene repeated in <a href='B:340 5:4'>Dan 5:4</a>.</p>


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<p>When their hearts were merry they said, Call for Samson so that he can entertain us. They called Samson out of the prison, and he performed before them. They set him between the pillars-</p><p>Samson suddenly called up out of the prison house (16:25) recalls Joseph (<a href='B:10 41:14'>Gen 41:14</a>) and John the Baptist (<a href='B:470 14:9'>Mat 14:9</a>). The same Divine hand was at work in such different lives, leaving the same hallmarks behind in the record. And the more familiar and thoughtful we are about Biblical history, the more we too will perceive this.</p>


text:
<p>and Samson said to the boy who held him by the hand, Allow me to feel the pillars on which the house rests so that I can lean on them-</p><p>A read through all the recorded words of Samson will reveal a growing humility and spirituality. "Suffer me that I may... that I may" (16:26 AV) reflects a courtesy and humility distinctly lacking in his previous recorded speech. His growth came to its intended climax in the repentance and final peak of spirituality which he achieved in his time of dying. Or it may be that the utter exhaustion of Samson from their afflictions (prodding with sticks?) is revealed when he asks the lad "Suffer me..." (Heb. 'allow me to rest / take a break'). This pointed forward to the Lord's physical exhaustion, driven to the limit of human endurance, must be imagined.</p>&nbsp;<p>God patiently worked through the weakness of Samson to achieve not only a great final victory over the Philistines, but also Samson's own salvation. The way Samson asked the lad to guide him to the pillars in the Philistine language, learnt in his mis-spent relationships with women, the way he knew the architectural structure of the Dagon-temple, where presumably he had been in his earlier love-hate affair with the Philistines- God didn't reject him for these earlier failures, but worked with him, making use of the knowledge and experience which Samson had picked up along the road of earlier failure. This is how God works with us, too- if only we would have the humility to realize it. And the least we can do is to replicate it in our dealings with our failing brethren.</p><p>Samson dying between the two pillars is broadly similar, as a kind of silhouette, to the Lord's death between two other crosses. The way the lad (also a Hebrew? for they spoke the same language?) "held" Samson's hand is significant, for the same word is translated 'to strengthen / encourage'. Perhaps the lad strengthened Samson as the repentant thief did the Lord.</p>


text:
<p>Now the house was full of men and women. All the lords of the Philistines were there, and on the roof there were about three thousand men and women watching while Samson performed- </p><p>The destruction of them all would have left a huge hole in Philistine power. And yet still Israel failed to capitalize on this victory, for by Saul's time, Israel were effectively in bondage to them again.</p>


text:
<p>Samson called to Yahweh and said, Lord Yahweh, remember me please, and strengthen me please, just this once oh God, that I may with one blow be avenged on the Philistines for my two eyes-</p><p>&nbsp;Like Paul and the crucified thief, Samson by his death came to a deep realization of the reality of judgment to come: "Remember me" must be read in this context. It carries the connotation of 'remember me for good and therefore forgive me at the judgment' in <a href='B:230 25:6-7'>Psa 25:6-7</a>; <a href='B:490 23:46'>Luk 23:46</a>. It seems that Nehemiah was inspired by this at his end (<a href='B:160 13:22'>Neh 13:22</a>; <a href='B:160 13:31'>Neh 13:31</a>; did he too come to a finer realization of his failures at the end?). "Remember me" was a cry only used prior to Samson by men in weakness: <a href='B:10 15:8'>Gen 15:8</a>; <a href='B:60 7:7'>Jos 7:7</a>; <a href='B:70 6:22'>Jdg 6:22</a> (Gideon, Samson's hero, had used it). Yet now Samson appropriates it to himself in faith that he will be mercifully treated at the judgment. And his example in turn inspired Nehemiah. The intensity of Samson's repentance was quite something. It must have inspired Manasseh (<a href='B:140 33:11'>2Ch 33:11</a>), who like Samson was bound (16:21) and humbled (<a href='B:70 16:5'>Jdg 16:5</a>; <a href='B:70 16:16'>Jdg 16:16</a>; <a href='B:70 16:19'>Jdg 16:19</a> AVmg:)- and then repented with a like intensity. And Zedekiah went through the same basic experience, of capture by his enemies, having his eyes put out, his capture attributed to false gods; and he likewise repented (<a href='B:120 25:7'>2Ki 25:7</a>). &nbsp;</p><p>Samson is therefore listed amongst those who out of weakness were made strong (<a href='B:650 11:34'>Heb 11:34</a>). A character study of Samson must remember this about him. This could suggest that he was even weaker than a normal man; or it could be a reference to the way in which out of his final spiritual weakness and degradation he was so wonderfully strengthened.</p><p>But Samson's death plea for vengeance against the Philistines for his two eyes sounds woefully human. Indeed, the RSV and RVmg. speak of him asking for vengeance "for one of my two eyes", as if he felt that even if God gave the destruction he asked for, this would only half avenge him. This would indicate a real bitterness, an unGodly hatred of both sinner and sin. In some ways, for all the intensity of weeping before God in repentance (16:28 LXX), Samson had not progressed much from his attitude in <a href='B:70 15:7'>Jdg 15:7</a>, over 20 years before- where he once again had admitted that his motive for 'seeking occasion against the Philistines' was partly just personal revenge. The spirit of not avenging oneself but leaving it to God to do was evidently something he never quite rose up to in his life (<a href='B:520 12:19'>Rom 12:19</a>). "That I may be at once avenged of the Philistines for my two eyes" seems to be quite without any desire for the vindication of God's Name. Although it seems to me it was wrong, and betrayed some unspirituality, yet it is taken as the epitome of the desire of all the faithful for vindication through the coming of Christ (<a href='B:730 6:10'>Rev 6:10</a>). Samson died therefore with some unconquered weakness, just as we will and as will our brethren. Yet we are assured in <a href='B:650 11:34'>Heb 11:34</a> that he will be saved in the end.</p><p>In the time of his humbling and mocking, in the wake of years of spiritual self-assurance, Job set such a clear prototype of Samson that Samson surely must have realized this, as he ground in the prison house. Job too suffered from blindness in his afflictions (<a href='B:220 11:20'>Job 11:20</a>; <a href='B:220 17:5'>Job 17:5</a>; <a href='B:220 19:8'>Job 19:8</a>; <a href='B:220 30:12'>Job 30:12</a>).</p><p><a href='B:220 30:1'>Job 30:1</a> mocked by youth = <a href='B:70 16:26'>Jdg 16:26</a></p><p><a href='B:220 30:6'>Job 30:6</a> The wicked dwell in the rocks = <a href='B:70 15:8'>Jdg 15:8</a></p><p><a href='B:220 30:9'>Job 30:9</a> "Now I am their song, yes, I am their byword" = <a href='B:70 16:25'>Jdg 16:25</a></p><p><a href='B:220 30:11'>Job 30:11</a> "He has loosed my cord and afflicted me" = In <a href='B:70 16:8'>Jdg 16:8</a> the same word is used of the cords with which Samson was bound, and which the Philistines loosed. Only a short time later God was afflicting him through Delilah (16:19)</p><p><a href='B:220 30:12'>Job 30:12</a> "Upon my right hand rise the youth; they push away my feet... they mar my path, they set forward my calamity". This indicates Job's poor eyesight and how the youth abused him. = This is exactly what happened to Samson. The lad made him dance, according to Jewish tradition, by poking Samson with sticks (16:25,26)</p><p><a href='B:220 30:17'>Job 30:17</a> "My bones are pierced in me in the night season: and my sinews take no rest". = Both Samson and Job came to fellowship something of the Lord's future cross: the unnatural darkness, the pierced bones, the constant ache of sinews: as Samson ground and danced, and as the Lord heaved Himself up and down on His sinews to breathe.</p><p><a href='B:220 30:19'>Job 30:19</a> "He has cast me into the mire (sometimes an idiom for prison), and I am become like dust and ashes" = As Samson in prison came to be like an ordinary man (dust and ashes; 16:11).</p><p><a href='B:220 30:20'>Job 30:20</a> "I cry unto You... I stand up" = Samson cried to Yahweh, standing up (16:28)</p><p><a href='B:220 30:24'>Job 30:24</a> "Howbeit he will not stretch out his hand to the grave" = Samson likewise would have come to the hope of personal resurrection.</p><p>According to Samson's appreciation of these links, so he would have reaped encouragement and hope. Job's last words were followed by a final humbling, and then the glorious justification of himself and the judgment of his enemies, to culminate in his future resurrection. One hopes that Samson saw the point and grasped hold of the hope offered. And this is not all. There were other words in Job which would have so comforted Samson at the end: "Behold, God is strong... He withdraws not His eyes from the righteous... and if they be bound in fetters, and be held in cords of affliction; then He shows them their work, and their transgressions that they have exceeded. He opens also their ear to discipline, and commands that they return from iniquity... but the hypocrites in heart... cry not (as Samson did) when He binds them" (<a href='B:220 36:5-13'>Job 36:5-13</a>).</p><p>There is further evidence, from later Scripture, that Samson's zeal was born from the word. A character study of Samson needs to consider what later Scripture implies about him. It seems that Jeremiah was one of several later characters who found inspiration in Samson, and alluded to him in their prayers to God, seeing the similarities between his spirit and theirs:</p><p>"O Yahweh [Samson only used the Yahweh Name at the end of his life], You know: remember me [as Samson asked to be remembered for good], and visit me, and revenge me of my persecutors ["that I may at once be avenged of the Philistines"]... know that for Your sake I have suffered rebuke [the Philistines doubtless mocked Yahweh as well as Samson]. Your words were found, and I did eat them [cp. Samson loving the word and eating the honey which he "found" in the lion]: and Your word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of my heart... I sat not in the assembly of the mockers... I sat alone because of Your hand [Samson's separation from an apostate Israel]... why is my pain perpetual, and my wound incurable?" [the finality of his blindness] (<a href='B:300 15:15-17'>Jer 15:15-17</a>). If these connections are valid, Samson's love of the word was a very big part of his life.</p>


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<p>Samson took hold of the two middle pillars on which the house rested, and leaned on them, one with his right hand and the other with his left- </p><p>The way he chose to destroy the Philistines at the end by bringing down the posts of their temple (16:29,30) has some connection with the way he chose to take up the posts of Gaza. Perhaps he remembered his earlier failure and repentance in Gaza, and now he was back there (16:21), he repented again and wished to replicate his earlier repentance and victory for the Lord.</p>


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<p>Samson said, Let me die with the Philistines! He pushed with all his might and the house fell on the lords and on all the people who were there. So he killed more in his death than he killed in his life-</p><p>Samson's desire to die with the Philistines could be read as suicidal. In this case, he had elements of weakness at the end, and yet he was accepted as dying in faith. Or it could be understood that he wanted to die because he believed that through his death, he would achieve God's plan for taking the gates of his enemies. In this case he would have had the spirit of Christ.</p><p>Samson's death was died in faith, and at his time of dying he had been made strong out of weakness, on account of his faith (<a href='B:650 11:32-34'>Heb 11:32-34</a>). "Let me ('my soul', AVmg:) die with the Philistines" was surely a recognition that in his heart he had been a Philistine, for all his hatred of them and despising of them as uncircumcised, and thus outside the covenant (15:18). It could be that he was too hard on himself. Yet Samson wanted to receive the just desert for his life: to die with the Philistines. His mind may well have been on Scripture as he died, such as <a href='B:60 23:10-11'>Jos 23:10-11</a>, which spoke of how one man would chase a thousand (he had earlier appropriated this to himself in <a href='B:70 16:7'>Jdg 16:7</a>)- if Israel took good heed to their souls (AVmg:). And perhaps Samson realized that he hadn't taken good heed to his soul, and therefore had ultimately been unable to chase a thousand men. And yet he died in faith, even though with a deeply appreciated recognition of his sinfulness. As with Paul and Jacob, deep recognition of personal sinfulness was a feature of their spiritual maturity. And as with Jacob, Job and Moses, Samson seems to have reached a progressively higher appreciation of the Name of God. His calling on Yahweh Elohim at the end, weeping before Him, was the first and only time he ever used that title; and the first time we actually read the covenant Name on his lips (cp. <a href='B:70 15:18'>Jdg 15:18</a>).</p><p>Samson's recalls the words of <a href='B:650 2:14-15'>Heb 2:14-15</a> about the Lord Jesus: "through death he (destroyed) him that had the power of death". Through His own death, Christ destroyed the power of sin, epitomized in the dead Philistines. <a href='B:650 2:15'>Heb 2:15</a> goes on to say that the Lord delivered "them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage". Those words are packed with allusions to the time of the judges- Israel in hard bondage to their Philistine masters, living in fear, until judges or 'deliverers' like Samson delivered them from their oppressors. The same great relief which Israel felt after Samson's deliverances of them, can be experienced by us spiritually. The sins, the doubts, the fears which we all have as we analyze our spiritual standing, should melt away when we recall the great deliverance which we have received.</p>&nbsp;<p>The final effort of Samson, both to speak and to act, bowing himself (Heb. 'stretching himself out to his full extension') with all his spiritual and physical energy: this was the final effort of the Lord. Again, we see in both how we are lead to a final crescendo of spiritual effort at the end of life, although this may be articulated in various forms.</p><p>Samson died with a confession of unworthiness on his lips- in his case, that he deserved to die the death of a Philistine (<a href='B:70 16:30'>Jdg 16:30</a>)- but he will actually be in the Kingdom (<a href='B:650 11:32'>Heb 11:32</a>).</p>


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<p>Then his brothers and all the household of his father came down and took him, and brought him up and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol in the burial site of Manoah his father. He had judged Israel for twenty years-</p><p>The way the body was taken up by brave Israelites after Samson's death recalls the action of Joseph and Nicodemus:&nbsp; It was no accident that he was buried in the very place where his conscience was first awakened (<a href='B:70 13:25'>Jdg 13:25</a>); he maybe asked for this burial place, to show he had at last returned to his innocent spiritual beginnings.</p>


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<p>There was a man of the hill country of Ephraim whose name was Micah- </p><p>Judges 17-21 contain various pictures of and insights into the apostacy of the tribe of Dan, providing the backdrop for a character study of Samson. These chapters seem chronologically out of place; they belong before the Samson story. <a href='B:70 18:30'>Jdg 18:30</a> speaks of Jonathan the grandson of Moses, and <a href='B:70 20:28'>Jdg 20:28</a> of Phinehas the grandson of Aaron (cp. <a href='B:40 25:11'>Num 25:11</a>), which would place these events at the beginning of the period of the Judges, once Israel had first settled in the land. Dan's apostacy is suggested by the way in which he is omitted from the tribes of the new Israel in Revelation 7. Zorah, Samson's home town, was originally Judah's inheritance (<a href='B:60 15:33-36'>Jos 15:33-36</a>), but they spurned it, and passed it to Dan (<a href='B:60 19:41'>Jos 19:41</a>), who also weren't interested; for they migrated to the north and too over the land belonging to the less warlike Sidonians (<a href='B:70 18:2'>Jdg 18:2</a>; <a href='B:70 18:7-10'>Jdg 18:7-10</a>). Their selfishness is reflected by the way they chide with him: "What is this that you have done unto us?" (<a href='B:70 15:11'>Jdg 15:11</a>). See on <a href='B:70 13:1'>Jdg 13:1</a>.</p>


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<p>He said to his mother, The eleven hundred pieces of silver that were taken from you, about which I heard you utter a curse - I took them. His mother said, Yahweh bless you my son-</p><p>One theme of the history of Dan is the mixture between flesh and spirit, and this was to come to full term in the life of Samson. His idolatrous mother blesses him by Yahweh, and she is an idolater. 1100 pieces of silver would imply that this woman was very wealthy, for 10 pieces of silver a year was a good salary (:10), and so the apostacy we are to read of would likely have been amongst the wealthy leadership class. She had cursed the thief, but when she found it was her son, she turns the curse into a blessing. We compare this with how Jephthah didn't feel he could change such an oath once uttered. 1100 pieces of silver was exactly the amount of money which each prince of the Philistines was to pay Delilah for Samson's betrayal (<a href='B:70 16:5'>Jdg 16:5</a>). We wonder whether this woman may have been Delilah, or connected with her; for I gave some reasons for believing she was perhaps an Israelitess.</p>


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<p>He returned the eleven hundred pieces of silver to his mother and she said, I solemnly dedicate my silver to Yahweh for my son to make an engraved image and a molten image. Then I will give it back to you- </p><p>The idea seems to be that she would dedicate the money but somehow retain within her power. His repentance therefore cost him nothing, and neither really did her supposed sacrifice to Yahweh; whereas it is a principle of sacrifice that it must cost us something, we must be left in deficit after it, in real terms (<a href='B:100 24:24'>2Sa 24:24</a>). We see how deeply Israel had fallen into thinking that idolatry was justified, because it was a form of Yahweh worship. Their later placing of idols in the temple of Yahweh could only really have happened on that basis. And this has been the abiding temptation and tendency for God's people; to mix the flesh and the Spirit, to have a little of both, rather than making wholehearted commitment to Him. And it is seen too in the mixture of paganism with Biblical truths in the theology of standard Christianity.</p>


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<p>So he returned the money to his mother and she took two hundred pieces of it and gave them to the silversmith, who made it into an engraved image and a molten image, and they were put into Micah’s house- </p><p>And then the rest of the money she returned to Micah (see on :3). "Micah" means 'who is like Yah!'. His mother had named him like this and he probably would have agreed with his name, hence he kept it; but this was the mere externality of religious devotion. For clearly they were idolaters, wrongly claiming to serve Yahweh through serving idols. See on :3.</p><p>Or we can translate: "So he restored the money to his mother (and his mother took two hundred shekels), and she gave it to the founder". The 200 would be roughly one fifth of 1100, which means he may have given this to his mother in obedience to the Mosaic command of <a href='B:30 6:5'>Lev 6:5</a>. In which case we see how confused they all were, keeping parts of God's law and having a genuine conscience towards God; whilst being idolaters and very ignorant of His ways.</p>


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<p>This man Micah had a shrine, and he made an ephod and household gods and consecrated one of his sons to be his priest- </p><p>Micah was clearly a passionate religionist. The apostacy of such people was partly due to the failure of the priesthood. He therefore consecrated one of his sons to be a priest. Part of his apostacy, making his own holy place and ephod, was perhaps due to the fact that the sanctuary of Yahweh wasn't functioning properly. It was still in Shiloh (<a href='B:70 18:31'>Jdg 18:31</a>), but perhaps being abused as it was at the time of Eli, so that people didn't wish to attend it. Individual failure is always personally culpable, but this isn't to say that spiritual leaders aren't also to be held accountable by God for it.</p>


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<p>In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes- </p><p>This implies that the book of Judges as we have it was edited, under Divine inspiration, some time after Israel began to have kings. Perhaps during the exile, when again they had no king; and therefore the book becomes a warning to the exiles about likely apostacy. The lament may be that there was no authority, no teacher, no modelling of Godly living; because every man did what was right in his own eyes, rather than doing what was right in the eyes of Yahweh. For so often we read of Israel being condemned for doing what was wrong in His eyes. This is clear enough evidence that 'just follow your heart' is poor advice. For what is right in our own eyes results in the Godless confusion of what we find now at the time of the Judges. However it could be argued that having no human king was a good thing; for God didn't want them to have one. And therefore a situation where everyone judges things by their own judgment is in fact good; the problem was that the people didn't base their view upon God's word, His "eyes" or perspective, but solely upon their own unenlightened opinions.</p>


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<p>There was a young Levite who had been living in Bethlehem Judah- </p><p>I suggested on :3-5 that the apostacy of Micah and others like him was partly a result of the Levites to teach them a better way. And the absence of Levitical teachers, and the apparent non functioning of the sanctuary, would in turn have been a result of the people not paying tithes to the Levites so that they could do this teaching work. And so everything had spiraled downwards. Bethlehem was not a priestly city, and so this Levite had been living there but not working as a Levite. Presumably because his home city was a place where the tithes were not paid, this Levite had gone to live in Bethlehem looking for work.</p>


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<p>and he left the city to find a better place, and came to the hill country of Ephraim to the house of Micah- </p><p>The Levites has no inheritance of land, and so life was extremely difficult for them when they were not paid tithes by the other Israelites. They became like this man, wandering labourers who went looking for any kind of work just to keep them alive. He perhaps went to the house of Micah because he was evidently wealthy; for his mother had 1100 pieces of silver to spend on religion, when&nbsp; a good salary was 10 pieces / year. That money was 110 years of good salary. The Levite likely went there in the hope of finding work in the house of a rich man.</p>


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<p>Micah said to him, Where have you come from? He said to him, I am a Levite of Bethlehem Judah, and I am looking for a place to live- </p><p>Not having their own land, the Levites were homeless when the tithes weren't paid, or if their priestly allotment was taken from them by the tribe where the priestly city was. I noted on the distribution of the priestly cities in Joshua that many were in areas not subdued by Israel, or in remote, peripheral regions. So the Levites became landless labourers, often homeless.</p>


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<p>Micah said to him, Live with me and be unto me a father and a priest, and I will give you ten pieces of silver per year, a suit of clothing and your food. So the Levite agreed-</p><p>Micah asked the young Levite, who was “unto him as one of his sons”, to “be unto me a father and a priest” (<a href='B:70 17:10-11'>Jdg 17:10-11</a> - note the paradox), resulting in others likewise asking him to “be unto us a father and a priest” (<a href='B:70 18:19'>Jdg 18:19</a>). The point is, no matter how unqualified a person may be for the job, they may be pressed into being leaders because that’s what nominally religious people so desperately need. They need someone to call 'father'; and it seems Pharaoh treated Joseph in the same way (<a href='B:10 45:8'>Gen 45:8</a>). It is very noticeable amongst those who are themselves senior or heads of some kind of group, be it domestically or in the workplace. The way the Lord forbad this (<a href='B:470 23:9'>Mat 23:9</a>) was therefore tantamount to disallowing any merely 'religious' approach to God. He personally was to be understood as Father, and a personal relationship developed with Him.</p>


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<p>The young Levite was content to dwell with the man and became unto him as one of his sons- </p><p>The paradox is that this young man was wanted by Micah as a father to him. Even though he was of an age and maturity to merely be Micah's son. It was as if Micah's religious impulse led him to by all means want someone to be his spiritual senior, no matter how young or unqualified they were. And we see precisely this mentality in all cultures of our world today.</p>


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<p>Micah consecrated the Levite, and the young man became his priest, living in his house-</p><p>It was priests who were to consecrate Levites; but Micah is just taking bits and pieces from God's true religion and making them part of his own do it yourself religious system. And we see this going on all the time, both now and historically. Biblical verses and precedents are taken quite out of context, and mixed in with paganism and human ways.</p>


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<p>Then Micah said, Now know I that Yahweh will do good to me, since I have a Levite as my priest-</p><p>We feel almost sorry for Micah. He had a basic conscience, feeling struck by guilt that he had stolen a huge sum from his mother, equivalent to 110 years of good salary. He wants Yahweh in his life and His blessings, but he thinks it can be attained by mere externalities, and through worshipping other gods. He was desperate for teaching; and the Levite failed him in this, perhaps because he too had not been taught God's ways and law.</p>


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<p>In those days there was no king in Israel- </p><p>This seems to repeat <a href='B:70 17:6'>Jdg 17:6</a> "In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes". &nbsp;</p><p>This implies that the book of Judges as we have it was edited, under Divine inspiration, some time after Israel began to have kings. Perhaps during the exile, when again they had no king; and therefore the book becomes a warning to the exiles about likely apostacy. The lament may be that there was no authority, no teacher, no modelling of Godly living; because every man did what was right in his own eyes, rather than doing what was right in the eyes of Yahweh. For so often we read of Israel being condemned for doing what was wrong in His eyes. This is clear enough evidence that 'just follow your heart' is poor advice. For what is right in our own eyes results in the Godless confusion of what we find now at the time of the Judges. However it could be argued that having no human king was a good thing; for God didn't want them to have one. And therefore a situation where everyone judges things by their own judgment is in fact good; the problem was that the people didn't base their view upon God's word, His "eyes" or perspective, but solely upon their own unenlightened opinions.</p><p>And at that time the tribe of the Danites looked for a place to live in, because up until then they had not come into their inheritance among the tribes of Israel- </p><p>Even when God punished Israel, He seems to later almost take the blame for their judgments; thus He says that He left some of the Canaanite nations in the land to teach Israel battle experience (<a href='B:70 3:2'>Jdg 3:2</a> NIV). His grace is so positive about them in the way He writes about them. Yet elsewhere the presence of those remaining nations is clearly linked to Israel's faithlessness, and their survival in the land was actually part of God's punishment of Israel. Likewise "the coast of the children of Dan went out too little for them" (<a href='B:60 19:47'>Jos 19:47</a>), although actually "The Amorites forced the children of Dan into the mountain: for they would not suffer them to come down to the valley" (<a href='B:70 1:34'>Jdg 1:34</a>). When Dan fought against Leshem, this one act of obedience is so magnified in <a href='B:60 19:47'>Jos 19:47</a> to sound as if in their zeal to inherit their territory they actually found they had too little land and therefore attacked Leshem. But actually it was already part of their allotted inheritance. Yet God graciously comments: "all their inheritance had not fallen unto them among the tribes of Israel" (<a href='B:70 18:1'>Jdg 18:1</a>). In similar vein, He almost excuses Israel's apostasy by saying that they had not seen the great miracles of the Exodus (<a href='B:70 2:7'>Jdg 2:7</a>). "The portion of the children of Judah was too much for them" (<a href='B:60 19:9'>Jos 19:9</a>) almost implies God made an error in allocating them too much; when actually the problem was that they lacked the faith to drive out the tribes living there.</p>


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<p>The children of Dan sent five men of their family, men of valour, from Zorah and from Eshtaol, to spy out the land and to search it, and they said to them, Go, explore the land! They came to the hill country of Ephraim, to the house of Micah, and lodged there- </p><p>Zorah was Samson's hometown, and I suggested on <a href='B:70 17:1'>Jdg 17:1</a> that Judges 17-21 is further background about Samson. We see then that Samson's people had not inherited the land intended because they had not driven out the local inhabitants as God intended, and as was therefore potentially possible. And therefore they were looking to get more living space by settling another area which was easier to take over, taking a short cut to the Kingdom. The invasion of Laish (:7) was because "The children of Dan did not drive out the Amorite who afflicted them in the mountain; and the Amorite would not suffer them to come down into the valley, but they forcibly took from them the border of their portion" (<a href='B:60 19:47'>Jos 19:47</a> LXX).</p>


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<p>When they were near the house of Micah they recognized the voice of the young Levite, so they went in there and said to him, Who brought you here? What are you doing in this place? Why are you here?-</p><p>"Regarded the voice" may mean they noted that he had a different accent, and this corroborates with the way Ephraimites had a different accent to other Israelites (<a href='B:70 12:6'>Jdg 12:6</a>). Such internal harmony within the Biblical records is to me the clearest evidence of Divine inspiration.</p>


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<p>He said to them, This is what Micah has done with me, and he has hired me to be his priest-</p><p>This presumably implies that he showed them the ephod and other imitations of the tabernacle which Micah had made.</p>


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<p>They said to him, Please enquire of God to find out whether our journey will be successful-</p><p>We see again the deep religious conscience within these men of Dan, although it was so misplaced and mixed with idolatry.</p>


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<p>The priest said to them, Go in peace. Your way has the approval of Yahweh- </p><p>We get the impression that he just said this without making any semblance of looking at the mock ephod and urim and thummim which Micah had made. To claim to give Yahweh's approval in such an arbitrary way was really quite blasphemous.</p>


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<p>Then the five men departed and came to Laish. They saw that the people there lived in security like the Sidonians, quiet and unsuspecting, and they were prosperous, lacking nothing- </p><p>See on :2. <a href='B:140 2:14'>2Ch 2:14</a> says "Hiram" was "son of a woman of the daughters of Dan", whereas 1 King 7:14 says he was "the son of a widow of the tribe of Naphtali". Dan may refer to the town called Dan or Laish which was in the territory of Naphtali, but inhabited by Danites (<a href='B:60 18:27'>Jos 18:27</a>; <a href='B:60 19:47'>Jos 19:47</a>; <a href='B:70 18:7'>Jdg 18:7</a>). Here we see how an apparent discrepancy on a surface level reveals a deep evidence of the way the records do not contradict but dovetail perfectly, as we would expect of a Divinely inspired writing. But this is only apparent to those who respectfully search the entire scriptures, rather than bandying around a surface level contradiction with an eagerness which speaks more of their own fears the Bible is inspired than of deep factual persuasion.</p><p>Also they were far from the Sidonians and had no dealings with anyone else-</p><p>"With anyone else" could be "with Syria". They were on the very border of Syria. The idea would be that they were too far from Sidon to be helped by them, and had nothing to do with Syria over the border. This change to "Syria" requires only a 'daleph' and 'resh' to be confused in the Hebrew alphabet; and these letters have only a miniscule difference which in early printed form is often obscure. This would be an example of the Divinely inspired Bible being infallible apart from having some errors caused by copyists.</p>


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<p>The men returned to their brothers to Zorah and Eshtaol, and their brothers asked them, What did you find?-</p><p>The business of sending out spies, who return with a good report which is eagerly believed by their brethren, all has a kind of similarity to the spying out of the land of Canaan at the conquest. LXX "what did ye bring back?" recalls the fruit of the land being brought back to show the Israelites by Joshua and Caleb. And so is developed the theme of misplaced idealism. For they ought to have taken the land allotment which God gave them. But they didn't and sought an easier way, by attacking softer targets elsewhere. Samson himself continued this mixture of spirituality and human thinking.</p>


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<p>They said, Come on, let us go up against them, because we have seen the land, and it is very good. Do you doubt? Don’t hesitate; go in to take possession of the land- </p><p>As discussed on :2,8, they are mixing the flesh and the Spirit. They quote the words of Moses and Joshua about the land of Israel being a good land, and urge each other to take possess "of the land". But they had ignored that commandment and had not taken possession of "the land". Instead they were using those words to encourage themselves to massacre a group of unsuspecting people in a very limited "land".</p>


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<p>When you get there, you will find an unsuspecting people, and the land is large. God has given it to you, a place where there is no lack of anything that is in the earth- </p><p>The men of Dan here quote the words of <a href='B:50 8:9'>Deu 8:9</a>, but out of context. Those words were true of the entire land promised to Abraham. But the men of Dan didn't drive out the tribes from the land. Instead, they applied these words to a tiny, remote part of it in Laish, and encouraged themselves on the basis of these words to go and massacre a group of unsuspecting people and take their land- with the blessing of Micah's false gods.</p>


text:
<p>Six hundred armed men of the family of the Danites set out from there, out of Zorah and out of Eshtaol- </p><p>I have noted on previous verses that the Danites were liking to imagine that they were as Israel going up from Egypt to inherit the land of Canaan. In fact, they were leaving the area in the land they had been faithless to inherit, and were going to inherit just a tiny area where the people were weak. But they encourage themselves by alluding to the words of Joshua and Moses about inheriting the entire land. We therefore note that the 600 men "armed" or 'in ranks' may be seen as intended to imitate the six hundred thousand 'men in ranks' of Israel as they marched toward Canaan (<a href='B:40 11:21'>Num 11:21</a>). However, a group of "six hundred men" is found so often in the records that we suspect that it may not be literal, but rather refer to a military unit or subdivision (<a href='B:70 3:31'>Jdg 3:31</a>; <a href='B:70 18:11'>Jdg 18:11</a>; <a href='B:70 20:47'>Jdg 20:47</a>; <a href='B:90 13:15'>1Sa 13:15</a>; <a href='B:90 14:2'>1Sa 14:2</a>; <a href='B:90 23:13'>1Sa 23:13</a>; <a href='B:90 27:2'>1Sa 27:2</a>; <a href='B:90 30:9'>1Sa 30:9</a>; <a href='B:100 15:18'>2Sa 15:18</a>).</p>


text:
<p>They went up and encamped in Kiriath Jearim in Judah. That is why they called that place The Camp of Dan, to this day; it is behind Kiriath Jearim- </p><p>I would consider the book of Joshua to have largely been written by Joshua, under Divine inspiration, although edited [again under Divine inspiration] for the exiles. And the book of Judges likewise. For the exiles too were set to reestablish God's Kingdom in the land and to inherit it again as the Israelites first did. The phrase "to this day" occurs several times in Joshua / Judges, and appears to have different points of historical reference (<a href='B:60 4:9'>Jos 4:9</a>; <a href='B:60 5:9'>Jos 5:9</a>; <a href='B:60 6:25'>Jos 6:25</a>; <a href='B:60 7:26'>Jos 7:26</a>; <a href='B:60 8:28-29'>Jos 8:28-29</a>; <a href='B:60 9:27'>Jos 9:27</a>; <a href='B:60 10:27'>Jos 10:27</a>; <a href='B:60 13:13'>Jos 13:13</a>; <a href='B:60 14:14'>Jos 14:14</a>; <a href='B:60 15:63'>Jos 15:63</a>; <a href='B:60 16:10'>Jos 16:10</a>; <a href='B:60 22:3'>Jos 22:3</a>; <a href='B:60 23:8-9'>Jos 23:8-9</a>; <a href='B:70 1:26'>Jdg 1:26</a>; <a href='B:70 6:24'>Jdg 6:24</a>; <a href='B:70 10:4'>Jdg 10:4</a>; <a href='B:70 15:19'>Jdg 15:19</a>; <a href='B:70 18:12'>Jdg 18:12</a>). I would explain this by saying that the book was edited a number of times and the remains of those edits remain in the text. For God's word is living and made relevant by Him to every generation.</p>


text:
<p>They went from there to the hill country of Ephraim, and came to the house of Micah-</p><p>For 600 men to visit Micah would suggest that he was a well known leader in the area. We noted earlier that his mother gave him 1100 shekels of silver at a time when a good salary was 10 shekels / year:&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p>Then the five men who went to spy out the country of Laish said to their brothers, Do you know that there is in these houses an ephod and household gods, an engraved image and a molten image? Now therefore consider what you have to do- </p><p>The five spies had come to Micah for blessing on their journey, and obviously thought that Micah's set up of false gods modelled around imitations of Yahweh's sanctuary, along with a Levite for a priest, was all pretty cool. And they coveted it all for themselves. As in :25, they speak of their criminal and violent intents in an indirect way.</p>


text:
<p>They turned in there and came to the house of the young Levite, to the house of Micah, and asked him how he was- </p><p>They focus upon the Levite; he was clearly aware of their intentions, and was eventually not against them, as he saw he would get more income from being a spiritual father to a larger group. The landless Levite labourer who had come looking for work with Micah... became covetous and ended up with an excellent income.</p>


text:
<p>The six hundred armed men of Dan stood by the entrance of the gate- </p><p>They clearly so coveted Yahweh's supposed presence and help through the idols that they were willing to steal and kidnap to get it. They show the mixture of flesh and Spirit, of misplaced ideals, which were so typical of Samson their judge.</p>


text:
<p>The five men who had gone to spy out the land went in there and took the engraved image, the ephod, the household gods and the molten image; and the priest stood by the entrance of the gate with the six hundred armed men- </p><p>The idol paraphernalia required five men to carry it. It was not therefore huge.</p>


text:
<p>When these men went into Micah’s house and fetched the engraved image, the ephod, the household gods and the molten image- </p><p>The ephod was an imitation of the high priestly breastplate. The Hebrew reads strangely, as if the engraved image was the ephod, or closely associated with it. We fear that they had actually made an idolatrous image of Yahweh, exactly what he had forbidden. And they were worshipping the Baals in the name of Yahweh worship.</p><p>The priest said to them, What are you doing?- </p><p>The Levite was initially shocked, but soon went along with their evil plans. Although effectively they kidnapped him (:19).</p>


text:
<p>They said to him, Keep quiet, put your hand on your mouth and go with us, and be unto us a father and a priest. Is it better for you to be priest to the house of one man, or to be priest to a tribe and a family in Israel-</p><p>See on <a href='B:70 17:11'>Jdg 17:11</a>. Micah had asked the young Levite, who was “unto him as one of his sons”, to “be unto me a father and a priest” (<a href='B:70 17:10-11'>Jdg 17:10-11</a> - note the paradox), resulting in others likewise asking him to “be unto us a father and a priest” (<a href='B:70 18:19'>Jdg 18:19</a>). The point is, no matter how unqualified a person may be for the job, they may be pressed into being leaders because that’s what nominally religious people so desperately need. They need someone to call 'father'; and it seems Pharaoh treated Joseph in the same way (<a href='B:10 45:8'>Gen 45:8</a>). It is very noticeable amongst those who are themselves senior or heads of some kind of group, be it domestically or in the workplace. The way the Lord forbad this (<a href='B:470 23:9'>Mat 23:9</a>) was therefore tantamount to disallowing any merely 'religious' approach to God. He personally was to be understood as Father, and a personal relationship developed with Him.</p>


text:
<p>The priest’s heart was glad, and he took the ephod, the household gods and the engraved image, and went with the people- </p><p>Why was he glad? Probably his motives were mixed, for that is the theme of this history of the tribe of Dan at this time. He was glad he could 'serve' more people, in his mixed up way, even though he was an idolater; and also glad at the offer, presumably, of more money than he was previously earning.</p>


text:
<p>So they turned and departed, putting the little ones, the livestock and the goods in front of them- </p><p>Fearful that Micah would chase after them and attack them from the rear. Although Micah was outnumbered, he was so passionate about his idols and his priest that he was deemed capable of a very vicious attack upon them. Again we see the mixed motives of men at this time, burning down one side for Yahweh, and down the other for the flesh and idolatry.</p>


text:
<p>When they were a good way from the house of Micah, the men who were in the houses near to Micah’s house were gathered together and overtook the Danites- </p><p>Not only Micah but the folks in his village were passionately devoted to those idols. It wasn't a case of just making some more, but rather were they very deeply devoted to them. Again we see the mixed motives in them all.</p>


text:
<p>They shouted after the Danites, who turned round and said to Micah, What is the matter with you that you come with such a company?-</p><p>Although they were just presumably a few houses, all the men must have armed themselves and charged out against this far superior force. As noted on :22, they were so passionate about their idols.</p>


text:
<p>He said, You have taken away my gods which I made, and the priest, and have gone away, and what else do I have? How then can you say to me, ‘What is the matter with you?’- </p><p>Despite his wealth and position within society, Micah told the truth when he said that his own little religion, paganic and perverting of Yahweh worship as it was, was everything to him. "What else do I have?" he dolefully and truthfully lamented. And we see this attitude in so many people. Their religion is by far the most powerful passion in their lives. But this doesn't thereby justify them as true believers, for Micah was far away from true worship of Yahweh.</p>


text:
<p>The Danites said to him, Don’t argue with us, or angry fellows might attack you, and you will lose your life, with the lives of your household- </p><p>As in :14, they speak of their criminal and violent intents in an indirect way. They speak as typical criminals. 'You might just get attacked by a bunch of angry yobbos around here, you know. Best to go home, or else such a gang might not only kill you, but go to your houses and then murder all your families'. And yet they made this threat because they were so desperate to have those idols, which they thought meant Yahweh's blessing upon them. Again, we see how hopelessly mixed were their motives.</p>


text:
<p>The Danites went on their way, and when Micah saw that they were too strong for him, he turned and went back to his house- </p><p>Micah was willing to fight for his idols, such was his passion. But he realized he was outnumbered. A true believer in Yahweh would have believed that one in covenant with Yahweh could chase a thousand; and Judges has several examples of small groups defeating much larger armies. But Micah, for all his professed belief in Yahweh, was not a true believer, and assessed things in purely secular terms.</p>


text:
<p>They took what Micah had made and his priest and came to Laish, to a people unsuspecting and secure, and attacked them with the sword, and they burnt the city with fire- </p><p>Although Micah had paid for some of his idol paraphernalia to be made by others, he was ultimately the maker of it. The stress is that these things were what his hand had made. And there is an intended juxtaposition between their having the idols and the priest with them, and then slaying unsuspecting people without giving them the chance to first make peace and accept the God of Israel, as required in the law of Moses. They burnt the city with fire as if they were replicating Joshua's conquest of the land, again reflecting their terrible mixture of motives and desire to just take bits and pieces from Yahweh's ways and ignore the rest. Just as many do today. See on :28.</p>


text:
<p>There was no deliverer, because it was far from Sidon and they had no dealings with anyone else- </p><p>See on :7, probably "with Syria", the neighbouring power just over the border.</p><p>It was in the valley that lies by Beth Rehob. They built the city and lived there- </p><p>If they intended to live there, we enquire why their first burnt the city and then rebuilt it- when they could have lived in the houses already standing. I suggest that they burnt it because they wanted to appear to be following the law about devoting a city to Yahweh, and copying Joshua's example of burning some of the cities he took. But as explained in :27, they were utterly oblivious to whole masses of basic Mosaic teaching. Like many today, they thought that just obeying a few out of context Biblical principles would justify them living like any other unbeliever.</p>


text:
<p>They called the city Dan, after the name of Dan their father, who was born to Israel, but the name of the city before was Laish- </p><p>Unlike Israel very often did, they didn't allow the old names to remain, but renamed this after their ancestor Dan, meaning 'judgment'. Again we see an attempt to follow the culture of their Israelite religion on a surface level, when their hearts were far from it.</p>


text:
<p>The Danites set up for themselves the engraved image, and Jonathan the son of Gershom the son of Moses and his sons were priests to the tribe of the Danites until the time of the captivity of the land-</p><p>Judges 17-21 contain various pictures of and insights into the apostacy of the tribe of Dan, providing the backdrop for a character study of Samson. These chapters seem chronologically out of place; they belong before the Samson story. Here, <a href='B:70 18:30'>Jdg 18:30</a> speaks of Jonathan the grandson of Moses, and <a href='B:70 20:28'>Jdg 20:28</a> of Phinehas the grandson of Aaron (cp. <a href='B:40 25:11'>Num 25:11</a>), which would place these events at the beginning of the period of the Judges, once Israel had first settled in the land. Dan's apostacy is suggested by the way in which he is omitted from the tribes of the new Israel in Revelation 7.</p><p>"The land" is "the ark" in some manuscripts. See on :31. But I see no reason why the Assyrian or Babylonian captivities are not in view; for Judges was rewritten or edited under Divine inspiration during the captivity. This would mean that the Danites in this peripheral location on the very borders of the land quietly continued their apostacy all through the various reforms of the kings, as well as the time of David. And this is really what we understand from the many laments that Israel had persistently and consistently worshipped idols throughout their generations.</p>


text:
<p>So they set up for themselves Micah’s engraved image which he had made, using it all the time that God’s house was in Shiloh- </p><p>Here and :30 emphasize the "engraved image", and I suggested on :18 that this could have been an image of Yahweh- exactly what was prohibited so strongly. Clearly they didn't bother going to the sanctuary because they considered that they had their own absolutely legitimate sanctuary to Yahweh, replete with a direct descendant of Moses as priest. Even though he would not therefore have been a Levite. And they worshipped an image for Yahweh.</p><p>It is tempting to think that "until the captivity" in :30 is effectively parallel with 'the time God's house was in Shiloh'. I noted on :30 that the captivity in view may have been of the ark, and not of the people to Babylon or Assyria. The house or sanctuary of God was in Shiloh only until the time of Saul. When the ark went into captivity with the Philistines, and the sanctuary moved to Nob and then to Gibeon in the time of David, the time period in view may have finished. However I suggest that out of the three recorded places where the sanctuary was located (Shiloh, Nob and Gibeon), Shiloh was the nearest of them to Dan. The idea may therefore be that even when the sanctuary was relatively near them, they didn't go to it. They had their own sanctuary right in their own town. We note again the description of the sanctuary as "the house", even though no temple was then built- another reminder that these records were rewritten after the temple had been built, probably during the exile.</p>


text:
<p>In those days, when there was no king in Israel-</p><p>This seems to repeat <a href='B:70 17:6'>Jdg 17:6</a> "In those days there was no king in Israel; every man did what was right in his own eyes". </p><p>This implies that the book of Judges as we have it was edited, under Divine inspiration, some time after Israel began to have kings. Perhaps during the exile, when again they had no king; and therefore the book becomes a warning to the exiles about likely apostacy. The lament may be that there was no authority, no teacher, no modelling of Godly living; because every man did what was right in his own eyes, rather than doing what was right in the eyes of Yahweh. For so often we read of Israel being condemned for doing what was wrong in His eyes. This is clear enough evidence that 'just follow your heart' is poor advice. For what is right in our own eyes results in the Godless confusion of what we find now at the time of the Judges. However it could be argued that having no human king was a good thing; for God didn't want them to have one. And therefore a situation where everyone judges things by their own judgment is in fact good; the problem was that the people didn't base their view upon God's word, His "eyes" or perspective, but solely upon their own unenlightened opinions.</p><p>There was a Levite living on the farther side of the hill country of Ephraim, who took a concubine out of Bethlehem Judah- </p><p>Not having their own land, the Levites were homeless when the tithes weren't paid, or if their priestly allotment was taken from them by the tribe where the priestly city was. I noted on the distribution of the priestly cities in Joshua that many were in areas not subdued by Israel, or in remote, peripheral regions. So the Levites became landless labourers, often homeless. This Levite appears to have been somewhat better off, and had a relationship with a woman other than his wife from Judah, far from where he was living. He had presumably met her in his various travels as a landless man. But immediately we get the impression he is not going to be a spiritual man- for he had another woman apart from his wife.</p>


text:
<p>His concubine was unfaithful to him, and went away from him to her father’s house to Bethlehem Judah, and was there for four months- </p><p>Again the impression is reinforced that neither this Levite nor his woman on the side were very spiritual people. He was effectively unfaithful to his wife, and she was unfaithful to him. The fact she left him and returned to her family may have been because she feared he would physically abuse her- which he eventually does by cutting up her body into parts, showing himself no better than the men who raped her to death. And suggesting she indeed had reason to fear his abuse. Her unfaithfulness to him could have been punished by death. And yet the huge fuss made about her death therefore seems inappropriate to the fact that in God's book, she deserved death anyway.</p>


text:
<p>Her husband went after her to persuade her to return. He had his servant with him and a couple of donkeys, and she brought him into her father’s house. When her father saw him, he was pleased to meet him- </p><p>I noted on :2 that the Levite hardly loved his concubine. And yet it seems that on another level he did. This is typical of the theme of mixed motives in Judges. We note too that girl's father seemed to like her married lover. We get the impression that this was a case of male drinking partners getting on well with each other, and not interested in the fact she had been unfaithful; they just wanted to get the family relationship back together. She may well have been pregnant by the Levite- hence his interest in having her back. For he couldn't have really loved her to cut up her body as he later does. The "couple" of donkeys were literally two donkeys (:2). As he was wealthy enough to have a concubine, a servant and donkeys, we wonder why he didn't bring a third donkey- for the concubine to ride on. The conclusion is surely that he didn't care for her; and his desire to get her back may well have been because she was pregnant with his child.</p>


text:
<p>His father-in-law, the girl’s father, persuaded him to stay, and he stayed with him three days, eating and drinking and sleeping there-</p><p>Eating and drinking are associated with illicit sexual behaviour, so we wonder whether the "sleeping" was also in this area. Hence in :6 "enjoy yourself" comes after eating and drinking. We can assume that the drinking involved drinking alcohol to excess, and we note that the Levite mentions that he is carrying plenty of wine with him in :19. It all builds up the impression that this Levite is not a very spiritual person; and neither is his concubine nor her family.</p>


text:
<p>On the fourth day they arose early in the morning, and he got ready to depart- </p><p>LXX "he stood up to depart" could imply he had been drunk before that.</p><p>And the girl’s father said to his son-in-law, Strengthen yourself with something to eat and then go on your way- </p><p>The man clearly likes the Levite and wants him to stay with him at all costs, recalling the apostate Micah of Judges 17 by all means wanting the unspiritual Levite to stay with him.</p>


text:
<p>So they sat down, ate and drank together, and then the girl’s father said to the man, Please stay another night and enjoy yourself- </p><p>"Enjoy yourself" clearly suggests these men were drinking to excess and possibly misbehaving sexually; see on :4. AV "let thine heart be merry", the phrase used of the apostate Levite in <a href='B:70 18:20'>Jdg 18:20</a>.</p>


text:
<p>When the man got up to go, his father-in-law urged him to stay, so he stayed there again- </p><p>We get the impression that the Levite just couldn't resist the temptation to drink.</p>


text:
<p>On the fifth day he got up early to leave, and the girl’s father said, Please refresh yourself and stay until the afternoon; and they ate together- </p><p>They ate but didn't drink together as planned. The girl's father managed to delay him until afternoon, when the logical time to start the journey was in the morning (:9). But the Levite can't make an early start because he is always so drunk the night before, and can't get up early. That is the clear implication. We get the impression of weak will and carnality in this man. The record focuses upon the two men; the girl, who may well have been pregnant which was why he wanted her back so as to claim the child, didn't feature in their behaviour. The Levite is presented as not caring for her- building up to the impression that what he will do with her body and the fuss he will make is all hypocritical.</p>


text:
<p>When the man, his concubine and his servant got up to leave, his father-in-law, the girl’s father, said to him, Look now, it’s nearly evening; please stay all night. Stay here and enjoy yourself, and tomorrow set off early and go home- </p><p>Afternoon was an unwise time to start the journey, as they would need to find somewhere to stay at night; and travel was dangerous and lonely after dark. The truth is, this Levite is so alcoholic that he was always drunk at night, and so early morning starts weren't what he was capable of.</p>


text:
<p>But the man wouldn’t stay that night; he got up and departed, and went towards Jebus (that is Jerusalem) with his two saddled donkeys and his concubine- </p><p>We are left to wonder as discussed on :3 why a man wealthy enough to have a servant, a concubine and donkeys didn't bring a third donkey for the (pregnant?) concubine to ride. We get the impression from "his two donkeys and his concubine" that the concubine had to walk whilst he and his male servant rode the donkeys. Continually the impression is built up that he didn't really care for the girl at all, and the outcry he was to make was hypocritical.</p>


text:
<p>When they were near Jebus, the light was almost gone, and the servant said to his master, Please come and let us go into this city of the Jebusites, and stay the night there- </p><p>The servant was clearly fearful of travelling at night, knowing the dangers from wild animals and robbers. He had no particular fear of the Jebusites, showing that Israel was reconciled with the local inhabitants- because they worshipped the same gods.</p>


text:
<p>His master said to him, We won’t go into the city of a foreigner whose people are not Israelites; we will go on to Gibeah- </p><p>Again we see the theme of mixed hearts in Judges. The Levite is presented as very unspiritual; but he refuses association with non Israelites. He will not even sleep a night in a Gentile inn- although there was no Mosaic prohibition of coming into the home of a Gentile. We recall at the time of Peter that New Testament Judaism had made entering the home of a Gentile an unlawful thing. And it was the same hypocrisy behind this Levite here. The unspiritual Levite with his donkey is the image used by the Lord in His parable of the good Samaritan, and it also features an inn which the Levite refused to use to assist the injured man. The Lord therefore presents this Levite in a bad light.</p>


text:
<p>He said to his servant, Come and let us get to one of these places; we will spend the night in Gibeah or in Ramah-</p><p>These were about two or three hours journey further on from Jerusalem where they were.</p>


text:
<p>So they went on and towards evening they were near Gibeah, which belongs to Benjamin- </p><p>This was to be the "Gibeah of Saul". We note Saul was from such an unspiritual place with such an awful spiritual history. But for all that bad background, the Spirit of God would have turned him right around- had he wished it. For bad background is no obstacle to the transforming work of the Spirit.</p>


text:
<p>They stopped there to spend the night in Gibeah. They went in and sat down in the street, because no-one took them into his house for the night-</p><p>Again (see on :12), the Lord may have this incident in mind when He says that He will condemn those at the judgement who in this life did not take in strangers (<a href='B:470 25:43'>Mat 25:43</a>). We are intended to reflect that he would have been better treated had he arrived in Jebus that night than he was amongst the Israelites in Gibeah. The fact nobody showed hospitality was a reflection of the unspirituality of Gibeah. "The street" is better 'the square'.</p>


text:
<p>In the evening there came an old man from his work in the field. He was from the hill country of Ephraim and he lived in Gibeah, but the men of the place were Benjamites- </p><p>He was therefore from the same area where the Levite was living (:1). This was surely Divine providence. Perhaps the men of Gibeah were so xenophobic that they also hated even this old man who was from another tribe.</p>


text:
<p>When he saw the traveller in the street the old man said, Where are you going? Where have you come from?- </p><p>These words are a direct quote of the Angel's words to Hagar, when she is fleeing from Sarah and has nowhere to go, and faces death and danger alone in the desert (<a href='B:10 16:8'>Gen 16:8</a>). Clearly the old man was faithful to Yahweh and immediately thought in terms of Biblical and spiritual precedent, and wished to act as the Angel had acted to Hagar when He 'found' her. We should be the same, always thinking in terms of Biblical precedent.</p>


text:
<p>He said to him, We are on our way from Bethlehem Judah to the far side of the hill country of Ephraim. I am from there and I have been in Bethlehem Judah. I am going to the house of Yahweh, and no-one has taken me into his house- </p><p>This was a lie; the man was returning home, and not going to Bethel or to the sanctuary of Yahweh. We note the term "house of Yahweh" again indicates the records here were edited [under Divine inspiration] during the exile, or at least after the temple had been built. The Levite may mean that he was a Levite who served in God's house, and therefore Israel ought to have taken him into their houses; but they were so apostate and even against Yahweh's sanctuary and the Levites that they did not. He may also be implying that it was because he served in Yahweh's house that these apostates wouldn't have him in their houses. Which may have been true, but was very hypocritical for a man who has been drunk the last five days. Maybe indeed the Benjamites despised the sanctuary of Yahweh, and the Levites; and this was the real reason why Yahweh allowed their destruction at the hands of the brethren.</p>


text:
<p>Yet we have both straw and fodder for our donkeys and bread and wine also for me and for the maidservant and for the young man who is with us. We don’t need anything- </p><p>The fact the Levite mentions he has plenty of wine with him suggests he may well have been an alcoholic; for we recall him drinking wine to excess with his woman's father for some days before this journey. It all builds up the impression that this Levite with his donkey is not a very spiritual person, and the Lord's parable of the good Samaritan may well have this Levite in view- presenting him as an unspiritual man.</p>


text:
<p>The old man said, Peace to you! But I will provide for you; don’t stay all night in the street-</p><p>The story is clearly a repeat of the actions of Lot toward the Angels he met on the streets of Sodom. Again we are asked to see that situations repeat within the lives of God's servants. And we are to perceive this, being always comforted that we are not alone; the biographies we have in the Bible are to comfort us that we are not travelling unchartered territory, no experience is not completely unique to us.</p>


text:
<p>So he brought him into his house and gave the donkeys fodder, and they washed their feet and ate and drank-</p><p>The old man comes over as spiritually minded (:17) and although an old man, like a true seed of Abraham, still entertaining strangers:&nbsp;</p>


text:
<p>As they were enjoying themselves- </p><p>The same phrase is used about how the Levite got drunk repeatedly with his father in law. The Levite basically tells the old man that he has wine with him and they can have a nice time together with it, if he stays at his place (:19).</p><p>The wicked men of the city surrounded the house, beating on the door; they said to the owner of the house, the old man, Bring out the man who came into your house, that we may have sex with him!-</p><p>This is a repeat of the situation in Sodom, and "that righteous man" Lot is paralleled in the old man- weak, but spiritual and with God in his heart.</p>


text:
<p>The owner of the house went out to them and said to them, No my brothers, please don’t act so wickedly; since this man is my guest don’t do this disgraceful thing- </p><p>The culture of protecting guests was very strong, and the care of the man was partly from pride, and partly from genuine concern to protect a Levite. Again, as always in Judges 17-21, a case of mixed motives.</p>


text:
<p>Look, here is my virgin daughter and his concubine. I will bring them out now and you can use them and do with them what seems good unto you, but don’t do any such disgusting thing to this man- </p><p>The old man perceived, surely, the similarities with Lot in Sodom. For we saw on :17 how he knew the book of Genesis very well, and had already quoted from Genesis 17. And the events of Lot in Sodom were only a little later, in Genesis 19. So it may be that he made this desperate offer thinking that he was justified in it by Lot. He failed to perceive that the Biblical characters are not at all spotlessly righteous, and it is for us to perceive that and learn from their mistakes- rather than taking a simplistic approach which considers them all as pale faced, perfect saints. The wrath of Israel was upon Benjamin and Gibeah for what was done. But they were overlooking the fact that this man of Ephraim, with the full consent of the Levite, had in fact offered the Levite's concubine to these men. They had even invited them to do "whatever seems good unto you". And the men did so. And yet Benjamin's wrath ignores all this and focuses instead upon those they wish to focus their wrath upon. There is very much injustice and lack of consideration of all factors in their judgment of the situation. And one of the lessons from the errors all around in this narrative is that we are not to judge- simply because we cannot judge. We are incapable of factoring in everything.</p>


text:
<p>But the men wouldn’t listen to him, so the man took his concubine and brought her out to them and they raped her and abused her all night until the morning, and when the day began to dawn they let her go- </p><p>This fact was not given its full weight. It was the Levite who had given his concubine to them. Instead of giving his life for his wife, he gave her to humiliation and death in order to save his own skin. Again we see that the Levite didn't love the woman. And if he had, he would not have cut her body up.</p>


text:
<p>Then the woman went back and fell down at the door of the man’s house where her master was, and lay there until it was light- </p><p>"Her master" is a phrase suddenly used here and in :27. Perhaps the idea is that she belonged to the Levite. He was her master and should have been caring towards her as his property. He was not. And so the eager belief of the narrative that this poor man had cruelly lost his beloved wife... is suspect. It was created like that, and upon that was built in any case a huge over reaction. The implication is that she was alive when she got to the house; she was not murdered by the rapists. She died on the doorstep- because the Levite didn't open the door and pull her in.</p>


text:
<p>Her master got up in the morning and opened the door and went out to continue on his way, and there was his concubine fallen down at the door of the house with her hands on the threshold-</p><p>The idea may be that she had been trying to open the door, or at least knock upon it; hence GNB "with her hands reaching for the door". But the Levite, who surely didn't go to sleep that night, hadn't opened the door to pull her in and care for her. See on :26.</p>


text:
<p>He said to her, Get up, and let us be going! but there was no answer. Then he put her up on the donkey and set off for home- </p><p>This clearly reflects his despite of her. It was obvious that she was either dead, or severely wounded; likely she was covered with blood. But he gruffly tells her to get up and be going. There is no attempt to enquire of her welfare or to assist her. It is absolutely clear now that the Levite doesn't at all love or care for her; indeed it was him who had given her to the rapists. He was wrong, they were wrong- but Israel were to make the mistake of so much human 'judgment', and seek to find one party guilty and the other totally innocent.</p>


text:
<p>When he had come into his house, he took a knife and cut up his concubine, and divided her, limb by limb, into twelve pieces, and sent them throughout all the regions of Israel- </p><p>Again as noted on :28, we have the final evidence that he didn't love her. For a man would never do this to a woman he loved. He was clearly offended that nobody had taken him in, and that he had been threatened with male rape. And he was seeking to wreak a terrible vengeance against the city and tribe- because of his own hurt pride. The twelve pieces going to the twelve tribes would have included Benjamin.</p>


text:
<p>All who saw it said, Such a deed has never been done or seen from the day that the children of Israel came up out of Egypt until this day! Consider it! Decide what should be done- </p><p>The gruesome record of the Levite cutting up his wife’s body and sending parts of the body throughout all Israel has much to teach us of the power of the memorial service. It was done so that all who received the parts of that broken body would “take advice and speak [their] minds" (<a href='B:70 19:30'>Jdg 19:30</a>). It was designed to elicit the declaration of their hearts, and above all to provoke to concrete action. Splitting up a body and sharing it with all Israel was clearly a type of the breaking of bread, where in symbol, the same happens. Consider some background, all of which points forward to the Lord’s sufferings:</p><p>- The person whose body was divided up was from Bethlehem, and of the tribe of Judah (<a href='B:70 19:1'>Jdg 19:1</a>)</p><p>- They were ‘slain’ by permission of a priest</p><p>- They were dragged to death by a wicked Jewish mob</p><p>- They were “brought forth" to the people just as the Lord was to the crowd (<a href='B:70 19:25'>Jdg 19:25</a>)</p><p>- “Do what seemeth good unto you" (<a href='B:70 19:24'>Jdg 19:24</a>) is very much Pilate language</p><p>- A man sought to dissuade the crowd from their purpose- again, as Pilate.</p><p>There should be a like effect upon us as we receive the emblems of the Lord’s ‘broken body’- the inner thoughts of our hearts are elicited, and we are provoked to action.</p>


text:
<p>Then all the Israelites went out, and the congregation assembled as one man- </p><p>Religious people love to experience the unity which comes from having a common case of apostacy to fight against and judge. But this is not the unity of the Spirit.</p><p>From Dan to Beersheba and from the land of Gilead, to Yahweh at Mizpah- </p><p>Beersheba became effectively the southern border of Judah (<a href='B:60 15:28'>Jos 15:28</a>), hence the common phrase "from Dan [in the north] to Beersheba [in the south]". But this was not at all the southern border promised to Abraham, which was the "river of Egypt". God effectively recalculated the boundaries for Israel, as He came to realize that they simply didn't have the spiritual ambition to go and possess the full extent of the land promised to Abraham. Thus "the river" on the eastern boundary effectively was recalculated as the Jordan and not the Euphrates; and likewise the southern border shifted northwards from the brook of Egypt to Beersheba. God has a similar flexibility with us too.</p><p>The very extreme north of Israel's northern borders, in Dan or the former Laish, was inhabited by the apostates whom we have seen described in detail in Judges 17, 18. For them to go charging off in judgment upon Gibeah was grossly hypocritical, when they had slain a whole community of unsuspecting people in a primitive land grab, and installed a terribly apostate religious system there.</p>


text:
<p>The leaders of the people from all the tribes of Israel took their places in the assembly of the people of God, four hundred thousand armed soldiers- </p><p>"Thousand" especially when used in a military context often doesn't mean a literal 1,000, but rather means a military subdivision. This gathering is described from the point of view of the tribes generally, for "all the tribes of Israel" presumably excluded Benjamin. The record reminds us that for all the huge dysfunction at this time, they were called still "the people of God". We need to remember this when we understandably shake our heads at the dysfunction of our brethren.</p>


text:
<p>Now the Benjamites heard that the Israelites had gone up to Mizpah. The Israelites said, Tell us how this wicked thing happened- </p><p>The implication is that the Benjamites weren't represented at the Mizpah conference. The whole decision and chain of events was based solely on the word of the Levite, who we saw throughout Judges 19 was hardly a man of integrity. The basis upon which they judged the case was unwise in the extreme. We learn from <a href='B:70 21:5'>Jdg 21:5</a> that they had threatened death to anyone who didn't come to this gathering. So the Benjamites stood condemned to death just because they didn't attend a meeting. Just as some have been disfellowshiped for "long continued absence" from a church. This is not at all Biblical, and the attitude of the Israelites here was not at all in accord with the Law of Moses. Nor did they take any advice from God about this; they simply promised death to any who didn't attend their gathering. Perhaps this was why they thought they were justified in slaying the Benjamites- because they had broken the Israelites' self declared law and commandment to come to Mizpah.</p>


text:
<p>The Levite, the husband of the woman who was murdered, answered, I came to Gibeah in Benjamin, I and my concubine, to stay the night- </p><p>See on :3. He begins absolutely factually, although not volunteering that his woman had run away from him, had been unfaithful to him, and he and her father had been drinking for five days solid before the incident.</p>


text:
<p>The men of Gibeah came after me and surrounded the house at night. They intended to kill me, and they raped my concubine and she is dead- </p><p>Now he begins to twist his story. There is no record that the men of Gibeah wanted to kill him. It was not all the men of Gibeah, but a group of yobbos who were probably drunk, who had demanded gay sex with him. And he doesn't volunteer the fact that he himself suggested they rape his concubine, and he gave her to them with no attempt to defend her, but the opposite. He carefully avoids saying that they murdered her, just that "she is dead". For I suggested on <a href='B:70 19:26-27'>Jdg 19:26-27</a> that she made her way back to the door of the house, but he refused to open the door and help her. He was in fact responsible for her death. Nor does he mention his crude comment to her corpse in <a href='B:70 19:28'>Jdg 19:28</a>.</p>


text:
<p>I took my concubine and cut her in pieces and sent her throughout all the country of the inheritance of Israel because they have committed this disgraceful and abominable act in Israel- </p><p>"The inheritance of Israel" is a claim to great spiritual discernment, claiming to rightly perceive that all the land was Israel's inheritance, and implying a lament that they had not inherited all of it. "Disgraceful act" is AV "lewdness", and we note in <a href='B:30 19:29'>Lev 19:29</a> that one cause of "lewdness" in the land would be prostituting a woman and causing her to be a whore. But this is what the Levite had done by suggesting the men sleep with her, and facilitating this. And finally all Judah were to go into captivity for "lewdness" (s:w. <a href='B:300 13:27'>Jer 13:27</a>; <a href='B:330 16:27'>Eze 16:27</a>; <a href='B:330 23:29'>Eze 23:29</a>, especially the "lewdness" of the Levites, <a href='B:350 4:9'>Hos 4:9</a>). "Committed this... abominable act in Israel" is a direct quotation from the sons of Jacob wanting to destroy the entire town of Shechem for the apparent rape of Dinah (<a href='B:10 34:7'>Gen 34:7</a>). But Simeon and Levi, ancestor of this Levite, were condemned for what they did to Shechem. Their response was considered by God disproportionate. But the Levite quotes a Bible verse and precedent, without attention to context- which would have revealed that in fact the situation with the rape of Dinah was not a precedent for going in and destroying the town where the rape had occurred. And finally all Israel were to be condemned for having&nbsp; "Committed... abominable acts in Israel" (s:w. <a href='B:300 29:23'>Jer 29:23</a>). All the evidence therefore is that the course of judgment and action they were to now undertake was wrong and hypocritical.</p>


text:
<p>Now you Israelites, all of you, give your advice and counsel-</p><p>The fact they had gathered together in such numbers in response to the body parts being sent is evidence that their presence itself showed what they thought should be done. This request for advice was therefore a mere formalism and not at all sincere.</p>


text:
<p>All the people arose as one man saying, None of us will go to his tent, neither will any of us go home- </p><p>What we now read is a classic example of a groupthink overtaking an assembly. They were themselves deeply apostate and astray from God, lost in idolatry and apostacy. But the idea of punishing that which was obviously wrong was very attractive to them, and they experienced great unity amongst themselves in their desire to judge this matter harshly. They entered into a feeding frenzy against Gibeah and the Benjamites.</p>


text:
<p>This is what we will do to Gibeah: we will go up against it by lot- </p><p>They seem confident they could destroy such a small town, which could only muster seven hundred fighters [perhaps "hundred" is also a term for a military subdivision]. Their over confidence was going to be judged by God. For they are reasoning here like the Israelites did before they attacked Ai and were defeated.</p>


text:
<p>and we will take ten men of every hundred throughout all the tribes of Israel, and a hundred out of every thousand and a thousand out of ten thousand, to get food for the army so that when they come to Gibeah of Benjamin they can punish them for the disgusting thing they have done in Israel- </p><p>They decide the judgment and even the exact method of it without any request to God to guide them, and without hearing Gibeah's side. They decided the testimony of the Levite was true, purely on his say so.</p>


text:
<p>So all the men of Israel were gathered against the city, united as one man- </p><p>We think of the unity of Herod and Pilate when they had the common cause of destroying the Lord Jesus, and the unity of otherwise disparate forces and entities against the Lord Jesus in the latter day prophecies.</p>


text:
<p>The tribes of Israel sent men through all the tribe of Benjamin saying, What is this disgusting crime that has been committed among you?- </p><p>They assume the crime has been committed, and judgment has been passed and the men of Gibeah must be slain. They are not open to any further discussion nor consideration of evidence. Not that any counter evidence had even been presented. The alcoholic Levite had to be right, because this was the path they wished to take.</p>


text:
<p>Now surrender the wicked men of Gibeah so that we may put them to death and put away evil from Israel. But Benjamin would not listen to their brothers the Israelites- </p><p>The tragedy of this situation between "brothers" is emphasized by the Divine record. The reasoning of the Israelites is that the men of Gibeah were provenly wicked and must be put to death. A kidnapper also had to be "put to death" (<a href='B:20 21:16'>Exo 21:16</a>), and it could be argued that this is effectively what the Levite had done to his concubine. Why Benjamin refused to surrender the men of Gibeah is not recorded. But we imagine they disagreed with the way the judgment had been arrived at, and more than questioned the credibility of the sole witness, the Levite. That mixed up man was to have a lot of blood on his hands as a result of his hypocrisy, and desire to judge others for what in essence he himself was guilty of. And we see such people in the body of believers today. The punishment of being "put to death" was for murder (<a href='B:30 24:17'>Lev 24:17</a>), and we see from :4 that they were assuming that the men of Gibeah had murdered the woman. But they hadn't. She walked back to the house, and died due to the Levite's inattention. Homosexual sex was to result in being "put to death" (<a href='B:30 20:13'>Lev 20:13</a>). But whilst the men at Gibeah had wanted this, they didn't do it.</p><p>The argument was that they had to put away evil from Israel. But <a href='B:50 17:6-7'>Deu 17:6-7</a> was clear that this should never be done on merely the testimony of one man. The Israelites were directly breaking this commandment, as the Levite was the only witness at Mizpah: "At the mouth of two or three witnesses shall he who is to die be put to death. At the mouth of one witness he must not be put to death. The hand of the witnesses must be first on him to put him to death, and afterward the hand of all the people. So you shall put away the evil from the midst of you". We can imagine Benjamin raising all these objections- and being ignored. They had surely heard from the authorities in Gibeah their side of the story, and yet saw that the other Israelites were not open to it at all.</p>


text:
<p>The Benjamites gathered together out of their cities to Gibeah to go out to fight against the Israelites- </p><p>Again we note that they "gathered together", matching the earlier descriptions of them acting "as one man" in this matter. There was a groupthink mentality, a feeding frenzy which led to an obsession to judge and destroy, with no attention to facts nor to the Divine commands about how decisions should be arrived at in such cases. And this kind of thing goes on often enough within the body of believers today.</p>


text:
<p>The Benjamites numbered twenty six thousand swordsmen out of the cities, besides the seven hundred chosen men of Gibeah- </p><p>Gibeah must have been relatively small if they had only 700 fighters, a small proportion of the Benjamites. Although we recall that terms like "thousand" and "hundred" are often not literal, but refer to military subdivisions. LXX gives 25,000, which would more or less fit with the numbers in :44-46.</p>


text:
<p>Among all these soldiers there were seven hundred chosen men who were left-handed, each of whom could sling stones at a hair’s breadth and not miss- </p><p>Left handed people were considered strange and often relegated to the periphery of society in primitive societies; we see again how almost all the judges had something which made them despised and rejected. And yet it was exactly that group which God delighted to use to save His people (<a href='B:70 3:15'>Jdg 3:15</a>). We notice how God used left handed people to give David victory (<a href='B:130 12:2'>1Ch 12:2</a>), and to punish their hypocritical brethren (<a href='B:70 20:16'>Jdg 20:16</a>). He seems to rejoice in using those whom man despises.</p>


text:
<p>The men of Israel apart from Benjamin were four hundred thousand swordsmen, all warriors- </p><p>Again we note that terms like "thousand" and "hundred" are often not literal, but refer to military subdivisions.</p>


text:
<p>The Israelites went up to Bethel and asked counsel of God. They said, Who shall go up for us first to battle against the children of Benjamin? Yahweh said, Judah first- </p><p>This comes over as very hypocritical and inappropriate. They had not asked counsel of God about how to judge the matter. They had all eagerly condemned Gibeah to destruction, without referring to God, and in studied disobedience to His word (see on <a href='B:70 20:13'>Jdg 20:13</a>). Yet having made their own judgment, they then made a great show of asking His advice as to which tribe should lead the assault, or, should attack Gibeah first (<a href='B:70 20:18'>Jdg 20:18</a>). Yet God responded to their request. He said Judah should go first. He wanted to use this incident to punish Israel, as well as Benjamin. And as so often, His judgments are in terms of brethren destroying each other, rather than Him doing it directly Himself. <a href='B:70 21:15'>Jdg 21:15</a> notes that it was Yahweh who made a breach in Israel over this matter. He worked through it all. It was His way of judging His apostate, hypocritical people. Division and conflict amongst God's children is therefore somehow of Him- but it is His judgment upon the community.</p>


text:
<p>The next morning the Israelites got up and encamped against Gibeah- </p><p>Perhaps we are to understand that they ignored the command that Judah should go up first (:18); for it seems they all went up.</p>


text:
<p>The men of Israel went out to fight against Benjamin and took up battle positions against them at Gibeah- </p><p>As in :19, it is stressed that the Israelites went to fight against Benjamin, apparently ignoring the command that Judah should go up first (:18); for it seems they all went up. And this is twice stressed (:19,20). They were not really interested in following God's ways and word, as shown by the way they had misjudged the entire situation; see on :13.</p>


text:
<p>The Benjamites came out of Gibeah and destroyed twenty-two thousand Israelites on that day- </p><p>God had apparently sent the Israelites to their destruction by saying that Judah should go up first (:18). He was confirming His people in their misjudgments and lack of love toward each other; see on :18.</p>


text:
<p>The men of Israel encouraged one another and took up their positions again in the place where they had stationed themselves on the first day- </p><p>They make no new strategy. They encourage one another, as if they are doing God's work, fighting for the right cause. It was all such a case of misplaced ideals.</p>


text:
<p>They went up and wept before Yahweh until evening, and they asked Yahweh, Shall we go up to fight again against the Benjamites, our brothers? Yahweh said, Go up against them- </p><p>The request was really its own answer. Should they fight against "our brothers"? Obviously not. You do not fight and kill your brothers. The way they express the request like this surely suggests they were nagged in their conscience by the inappropriacy of fighting their brethren. See on <a href='B:70 21:3'>Jdg 21:3</a>. Their weeping before Yahweh recalls Joshua's after the defeat at Ai. They ought to have perceived the similarities; and realized that the defeat was because Israel had sinned. They were at fault. But they lacked the humility to realize this, and so Yahweh told them to go up again- to their destruction. As explained on :18, this was all God's judgment of His own people, but as often, He chose to work through people destroying themselves, rather than His direct destruction of sinners.</p>


text:
<p>The Israelites went against the Benjamites the second day- </p><p>"Went against", AV "came near against", is not quite the phrase we would expect to describe men going up against others in battle. It is the term used about 'coming near' in [often illicit] sexual encounter (<a href='B:10 20:4'>Gen 20:4</a>; <a href='B:30 18:6'>Lev 18:6</a>; <a href='B:30 18:14'>Lev 18:14</a>; <a href='B:30 18:19'>Lev 18:19</a>; <a href='B:30 20:16'>Lev 20:16</a>; <a href='B:50 22:14'>Deu 22:14</a>; <a href='B:240 5:8'>Pro 5:8</a>; <a href='B:290 8:3'>Isa 8:3</a>; <a href='B:330 18:6'>Eze 18:6</a>). The idea is that the Israelites were effectively raping the Benjamites, doing to them what they had accused the Benjamites of doing to the Levite's wife. See on :45.</p>


text:
<p>Benjamin went out against them from Gibeah the second day, and destroyed another eighteen thousand Israelite men, all armed with swords- </p><p>"The second day" doesn't have to mean the day after the battle on the first day; for in the gap between, Israel had been to Bethel to get God's advice. It is the second day of the battle recorded. The Israelites fought so weakly because surely they had a deep sense that this was not a battle they should be fighting- against their brethren. See on :23.</p>


text:
<p>Then the Israelites, all the people, went up to Bethel and wept and sat there before Yahweh and fasted that day until evening. They offered burnt offerings and peace offerings to Yahweh- </p><p>Peace offerings were offered in times of Israel's sadness and defeat (<a href='B:70 20:26'>Jdg 20:26</a>; <a href='B:70 21:4'>Jdg 21:4</a>) as well as in times of exaltation of spirit and joy. In our traumas of life, we need to remember that the only thing that matters is our peace with God, the joyful fact that we have nothing separating us. As Israel made their peace offerings at those times, so we too should consider the possibility of breaking bread, perhaps alone, as we meet the desperate traumas of our lives.</p><p>However the usual order is sin offering, burnt offering [speaking of subsequent dedication to God] and then the peace offering, celebrating the peace with God now enjoyed. But there is no mention of a sin offering. Israel still refused to accept how much they were in the wrong. For if they did, they would not have gone ahead with another battle against Benjamin. See on <a href='B:70 21:4'>Jdg 21:4</a>.</p><p>"All the people" is AV "and all the people", as if the massive losses meant that not only the soldiers but the common people were alarmed at the huge losses, and wanted to know whether they should continue.</p>


text:
<p>The Israelites asked Yahweh (for the ark of the covenant of God was there in those days- </p><p>Again as in :26 it is stressed that they asked Yahweh for guidance- when as a people they were generally very far from Him. Their desire for guidance indicates the problem of bad conscience they had, as well as the fact they had lost forty thousand in the previous two attempts to execute the judgment they had decreed without asking His guidance. Clearly any victory they may now win was going to pyrrhic [a victory at such cost it is hardly a victory].</p><p>"Those days" could refer to the days of this conflict; the ark had been brought from Shiloh to Bethel in order to seek God's blessing upon their judgment of their brethren. This was proof enough that the mere external symbols of religion did not at all imply God's blessings upon them.</p>


text:
<p>and Phinehas the son of Eleazar the son of Aaron ministered before it)- </p><p>Phinehas and the ark had come especially from Shiloh to Bethel for this situation, and was then returned to Shiloh (<a href='B:60 18:1'>Jos 18:1</a>; <a href='B:60 22:12'>Jos 22:12</a>; <a href='B:230 78:60'>Psa 78:60</a>). But&nbsp; the mere external symbols of religion did not at all imply God's blessings upon them.</p><p>Shall we yet again go out to fight against Benjamin our brother, or not? Yahweh said, Go up, for tomorrow I will deliver him into your hand-</p><p>See on <a href='B:70 18:30'>Jdg 18:30</a>. The sanctuary was presumably a day's journey away from Gibeah. Israel become the more desperate for Yahweh's guidance as their conscience niggled the more at them- for their request was really the answer. Fighting against their brother was wrong. As discussed on :18, this whole bloodbath was willed by God as a judgment upon all His people, at their own hands.</p><p><a href='B:70 20:29'>Jdg 20:29</a> Israel set ambushes all around Gibeah- </p><p>The strategy for taking Gibeah is very similar to that for taking Ai, and we wonder if the strategy was communicated to them by God in :28. They were to perceive the similarities. They had likewise been over confident of taking Gibeah, and they had so far failed because like Israel in the first battle of Ai, they were being punished because of their sins.</p>


text:
<a href='B:70 20:29'>20:29</a> Israel set ambushes all around Gibeah- The strategy for taking Gibeah is very similar to that for taking Ai, and we wonder if the strategy was communicated to them by God in <a href='B:70 20:289'>:28</a>. They were to perceive the similarities. They had likewise been over confident of taking Gibeah, and they had so far failed because like Israel in the first battle of Ai, they were being punished because of their sins.</p>


text:
<p>They went up against the Benjamites on the third day and set themselves in position against Gibeah as before- </p><p>"As before" invites us to imagine them clinging on in faith to God's words of :28 that "tomorrow I will deliver him into your hand". Through their unwisdom and wrong behaviour, they were being brought to faith in God's word.</p>


text:
<p>The Benjamites went out against them and were drawn away from the city. They began to fight the Israelites as before, on the highways on the way to Bethel and Gibeah, and in the field, killing about thirty men of Israel- </p><p><a href='B:60 8:13-16'>Jos 8:13-16</a> describes the strategy to take Ai in just the same terms. Clearly the same lesson was being taught- that victory was to only be through turning their backs before their enemies, a sign they were under Divine curse. Through realizing that, victory would be given.</p>


text:
<p>The Benjamites said, We are defeating them as before. But the Israelites said, Let’s retreat and draw them away from the city to the highways-</p><p>Israel were punished for their over confidence, thinking it needed only a part of their army to overcome Gibeah. And now the Benjamites are punished for their self confidence. Reliance in the arm of flesh is so displeasing to God.</p>


text:
<p>All the men of Israel arose up from their camp and set themselves in position at Baal Tamar, and the ambush charged from Maareh Geba- </p><p>We note the old paganic names were still used- another indication of the overall apostacy of all Israel. The Israelite army was split into three groups; the one at Baal-tamar, the one which formed the ambush behind Gibeah, and then the third which first directly approached Gibeah. This division into three companies echoes the strategy God used with Gideon.</p>


text:
<p>Ten thousand chosen men out of all Israel attacked Gibeah and the battle was severe, but the Benjamites didn’t know that disaster was upon them- </p><p>The severity of the battle at this point implies that even more Israelites died at this time. God was punishing His people, as He often did the Gentiles, by turning their swords against themselves. And conflict within the church is likewise His judgment.</p>


text:
<p>Yahweh defeated Benjamin before Israel, and the Israelites destroyed twenty five thousand one hundred armed Benjamites that day- </p><p>This describes the deaths on that day, not counting any previous deaths in the other battles on the other days. We note that Yahweh gave the victory; as discussed on :18 this was all of Him, He gave victories to both sides, He was the one who made the gap in Israel (<a href='B:70 21:15'>Jdg 21:15</a>), because this was His way of punishing His sinful people; see on :34.</p>


text:
<p>Then the Benjamites saw that they were defeated, for the men of Israel had given way to Benjamin, trusting in the ambush which they had set against Gibeah- </p><p>We would rather read that they had trusted in Yahweh, but it seems they trusted more in their battle strategy.</p>


text:
<p>The men in the ambush rushed into Gibeah, spread out and put all the city to the sword- </p><p>The battle strategy of Abimelech, setting an ambush (<a href='B:70 9:32'>Jdg 9:32</a>), rising early and rushing upon the city of his one time brethren (<a href='B:70 9:33'>Jdg 9:33</a>), was replicated by the Israelites in <a href='B:70 20:37'>Jdg 20:37</a>. The same Hebrew words are used. But it was a case of copying an example just because it was recorded in Divine history, following precedents which were in fact not at all good. Hollow imitation of the behaviour of others is an abiding temptation for us today.</p>


text:
<p>Now the appointed signal between the men of Israel and the ambush was that they should send up a great cloud of smoke out of the city- </p><p>This matches the signal of the sin glinting from Joshua's spear in the capture of Ai, and likewise the smoke signal from within the city. The similarities are so exact, because the point was that like Israel in the first battle of Ai, the 11 tribes had sinned and were being punished for it.</p>


text:
<p>Then the men of Israel would turn in the battle. Benjamin began to attack and killed about thirty of the men of Israel, for they said, Surely they are being defeated as before- </p><p>The whole account of the taking of Gibeah is repeated twice over, because we are really being urged to see the similarities with Ai; and take the implication that the Israelites had sinned as Israel had at that time and were being punished for it. It was they and not just the Benjamites who needed to eradicate evil from amongst them.</p>


text:
<p>But when the smoke began to go up out of the city, the Benjamites looked behind them and saw the whole city going up in smoke- </p><p>Exactly as in the capture of Ai (<a href='B:60 8:20'>Jos 8:20</a>); see on :39.</p>


text:
<p>Then the men of Israel turned on them and the men of Benjamin were terrified, seeing that disaster had come on them- </p><p>This is the fear of men facing condemnation. Why were they condemned? Not because of the reason that the other Israelites had given for their condemnation. For this was in any case a too heavy judgment for refusing to cooperate with the kangaroo court called by the Israelites. We recall how the Levite perhaps rightly claimed that he was given no hospitality because he was perceived as serving in the sanctuary at Bethel (<a href='B:70 19:18'>Jdg 19:18</a>). Maybe indeed the Benjamites despised the sanctuary of Yahweh, and the Levites; and this was the real reason why Yahweh allowed their destruction at the hands of the brethren.</p>


text:
<p>So they fled before the men of Israel towards the wilderness, but they could not escape the battle, and the Israelites who came out of the cities destroyed them there- </p><p>There was a widespread hatred of the Benjamites amongst the general population.</p>


text:
<p>They surrounded the Benjamites, chased them and ran them down as far as Gibeah toward the east- </p><p>This appears to be another Gibeah which was on the way towards the rock of Rimmon where they were aiming for (:45).</p>


text:
<p>Eighteen thousand valiant men of Benjamin fell- </p><p>See on :46. Albert Barnes in his commentary discerns here and in the surrounding verses a poetical form of language, as if this was a victory song later sung. To gloat over such a massacre was wrong, and soon the Israelites were going to be repenting for it. Such gloating at the time reflects again an unspirituality in Israel; for God Himself doesn't rejoice over the death of the wicked.</p>


text:
<p>They turned and fled toward the wilderness to the rock of Rimmon, and the Israelites killed five thousand of them along the way and chased them to Gidom, killing two thousand more-</p><p>AV "they gleaned of them in the highways five thousand men". But "glean" is s:w. abused, mocked, defiled. We are again given the impression that they treated Israel just as the men of Gibeah had treated the Levite's concubine. They were no better. See on :24.</p>


text:
<p>So that day twenty-five thousand valiant fighters of Benjamin were killed-</p><p>A "thousand" often refers to a military unit or subdivision, rather than&nbsp; literal 1,000. See on :47. 18,000 fell in :44, and then another 7,000 in :45, and 600 escaped (:47). The LXX gives different figures, but if we take those figures as they are, we conclude that the victories they won on the first and second days were achieved without loss. This meant that the men of Israel were slain very easily- they fought weakly because their conscience told them they were fighting for a wrong cause. The Benjamite victories were therefore clearly of God, as was their defeat in the third battle (:35) - all part of His way of judging His totally sinful people at the point of each others' swords.</p>


text:
<p>But six hundred men turned and fled toward the wilderness to the rock of Rimmon, and stayed there four months- </p><p>A group of "six hundred men" is found so often in the records that we suspect that it may not be literal, but rather refer to a military unit or subdivision (<a href='B:70 3:31'>Jdg 3:31</a>; <a href='B:70 18:11'>Jdg 18:11</a>; <a href='B:70 20:47'>Jdg 20:47</a>; <a href='B:90 13:15'>1Sa 13:15</a>; <a href='B:90 14:2'>1Sa 14:2</a>; <a href='B:90 23:13'>1Sa 23:13</a>; <a href='B:90 27:2'>1Sa 27:2</a>; <a href='B:90 30:9'>1Sa 30:9</a>; <a href='B:100 15:18'>2Sa 15:18</a>).</p>


text:
<p>The men of Israel went back to Benjamin and put to the sword everything in the towns, including the livestock, and anything they found. All the towns which they found they set on fire- </p><p>This is exactly the language used of the destruction of Canaanite cities by Joshua. We note they didn't take the animals for themselves. All was as it were sacrificed to Yahweh. They were treating their brethren like Canaanites. And yet we note that the tribes of Israel had at this point not to zealously driven out the Canaanites and possessed their land. Their apparent zeal to obey Yahweh's commands about the Canaanites was misplaced, a twisting of His word to justify their own bloodlust and self justification. Truly we are to take the lesson that in conflict between brethren, there are never victors, only losers.</p>


text:
<p>Now the men of Israel had sworn in Mizpah: Not one of us will give his daughter to a Benjamite as wife- </p><p>Here we have another repetition of theme, that of unwise oaths. For Jephthah had done the same. And it resulted at very best in his daughter going unmarried. We think too of Joshua's over hasty oath to the Gibeonites. We are to discern the hand of God in all these things and to learn from the repeated mistakes of His people as recorded in the Biblical record.</p>


text:
<p>The people came to Bethel where they sat until evening before God, raising their voices and weeping bitterly- </p><p>They had likewise sat before God, i:e. before His manifestation and presence in the ark and priesthood, when they had enquired why they had been defeated twice when fighting the Benjamites. It was tears all around, as they began to realize the extreme folly of what they had done. But it was grief they themselves had brought about. Their weeping before Yahweh recalls Joshua's after the defeat at Ai. The great victory they had just won was in reality a defeat for Israel. Because in conflict between brethren, there can only be losers. Any apparent victory is in fact a further loss.</p>


text:
<p>They said, Yahweh, the God of Israel, why has this happened to Israel, that there should be today one tribe missing from Israel?- </p><p>If Yahweh was indeed Israel's God, then to destroy a part of Israel was clearly to have sinned against Him. This is what we do whenever we separate or effectively cut off a part of the body of Christ. As noted on <a href='B:70 20:23'>Jdg 20:23</a>, the request was really its own answer. Should they fight against "our brothers"? Obviously not. You do not fight and kill your brothers. Why has this happened? Because they had done it. So often our prayers reveal their own answer. We see this in David's prayers as recorded in the Psalms. Some of them end up providing the answer to the opening question or struggle. This is one advantage of praying out loud, of verbalizing our questions to God. The answer sometimes becomes apparent just through the process of verbalizing our thoughts.</p>


text:
<p>Next day the people rose early and built an altar and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings- </p><p>Peace offerings were offered in times of Israel's sadness and defeat (<a href='B:70 20:26'>Jdg 20:26</a>; <a href='B:70 21:4'>Jdg 21:4</a>), as well as in celebration. In our traumas of life, we need to remember that the only thing that matters is our peace with God, the joyful fact that we have nothing separating us. As Israel made their peace offerings at those times, so we too should consider the possibility of breaking bread, perhaps alone, as we meet the desperate traumas of our lives.</p><p>But as in <a href='B:70 20:26'>Jdg 20:26</a>, we note that the usual order is sin offering, burnt offering [speaking of subsequent dedication to God] and then the peace offering, celebrating the peace with God now enjoyed. But there is no mention of a sin offering. Israel still refused to accept how much they were in the wrong.</p>


text:
<p>They asked, Who is there among all the tribes of Israel who didn’t come up to the assembly before Yahweh? For they had taken a solemn oath that anyone who didn’t come up to Yahweh to Mizpah should surely be put to death- </p><p>The implication of <a href='B:70 20:3'>Jdg 20:3</a> is that the Benjamites weren't represented at the Mizpah conference. And Israel had threatened death to anyone who didn't come to this gathering. So the Benjamites stood condemned to death just because they didn't attend a meeting. Just as some have been disfellowshiped for "long continued absence" from a church. This is not at all Biblical, and the attitude of the Israelites here was not at all in accord with the Law of Moses. Nor did they take any advice from God about this; they simply promised death to any who didn't attend their gathering. Perhaps this was why they thought they were justified in slaying the Benjamites- because they had broken the Israelites' self declared law and commandment to come to Mizpah.</p>


text:
<p>The Israelites grieved for Benjamin their brother. There is one tribe cut off from Israel this day- </p><p>Their requests to God for guidance about attacking Benjamin had featured the phrase "our brother". They ought to have followed their conscience toward God, and their sense that any murder of a brother must be wrong. Instead the power of groupthink and transferring the guilt of their own sins onto Benjamin was stronger than that. And now they grieve for what they had done. Their exclusion and cutting off of their brother had in fact diminished all Israel. And this is what we do to the body of Christ by cutting off parts of it; it is as Paul puts it, as bizarre as cutting off our own limbs. The body will not function well without those limbs.</p>


text:
<p>How shall we provide wives for those who remain, since we have sworn by Yahweh that we will not give them our daughters as wives?- </p><p>The easiest option would have been to just repent of their oath and let the remaining Benjamites marry women from other tribes. But for all their apostacy, they had a legalistic mindset. And there was a pride factor in their society when it came to not following through on an oath. As many do today, they went to the most bizarre lengths to get around the oath they had made, and to save face. And yet their bizarre method of getting around it was all the same unethical, and involved the massacre of yet more of their brethren at Jabesh Gilead, and the kidnapping of girls from Shiloh. It would have been far better to humble themselves and retract their rash oath. We see this lesson repeated in the rulers who swore too hastily, resulting in Daniel and John the Baptist suffering greatly- just because the rulers were too proud to take back their words.</p>


text:
<p>They asked, Which of the tribes of Israel didn’t come up to Yahweh to Mizpah? They found that none from the camp from Jabesh Gilead came to the assembly- </p><p>We note that they had not attempted to murder these people because they had not come to the meeting at Mizpah. And yet they apparently used Benjamin's absence from that meeting [when it was clearly biased against them from the start] as justification for slaying Benjamin (:5). So clearly the whole miserable, quasi legal process was set up from the start in order to cut off Benjamin. And this is how church politics so often goes, when there is a predetermined desire to cut someone off.</p>


text:
<p>For when the people were counted, none of the inhabitants of Jabesh Gilead were there- </p><p>We wonder why Jabesh did not attend. Perhaps they like Benjamin had seen through the manic feeding frenzy of the groupthink, and had objected to the absolutely unBiblical judgment being taken- with so much depending on just one questionable witness, with <a href='B:50 17:6-7'>Deu 17:6-7</a> being so totally ignored. See on <a href='B:70 20:13'>Jdg 20:13</a>. And yet still Israel were impenitent for all that; and they were to go ahead and punish Jabesh with a massacre, killing even innocent children, because of it. The implication is that absolutely every town of Israel outside of Benjamin was represented in this great assembly, including the totally apostate people of Laish of Dan (Judges 17, 18). Only Jabesh didn't come. This is the extent to which the people were caught up in a shark tank feeding frenzy of judgmentalism, self congratulation and hatred against their brethren. These things happen today; brethren are demonized and hated on a mass scale on flimsy grounds by brethren who are only as weak as themselves. It is a basic psychological reaction, the unchecked movement of the flesh rather than of the Spirit.</p>


text:
<p>The congregation sent twelve thousand valiant fighting men and commanded them: Go and put the inhabitants of Jabesh Gilead to the sword, including the women and children- </p><p>The idea was, a thousand from each tribe, following the principle of <a href='B:40 31:4'>Num 31:4</a>. Yet they were following an isolated Biblical precedent in a very misplaced way- for they were going to massacre innocent people, all because they were too proud to accept they had made a foolish oath (see on :7). We see here a common human feature- of apparent obedience to the letter of the law, whilst breaking the obvious spirit of the law. We think of the Jews being scrupulous to be ritually clean for the Passover- at which they crucified God's Son. It's a case of having a plank in our own eye whilst noticing the splinter in the eye of another.</p>


text:
<p>This is what you are to do: kill every male and every woman who is not a virgin- </p><p>Whilst it is not recorded that this was done, this massacre of their own brethren was necessitated by their refusal to humble themselves and retract their oaths, as discussed on :7. They had not really learned the depth of their sin- for here they were advocating the cutting off of yet more of their brethren in a massacre, for the sake of undoing the damage done by cutting off their brethren from Benjamin. They had not learned the lesson.</p>


text:
<p>They found among the inhabitants of Jabesh Gilead four hundred young virgins who had not known man by lying with him, and they brought them to the camp at Shiloh in the land of Canaan- </p><p>This may imply they did not in fact destroy Jabesh as they had promised to Yahweh to do, and as the elders had told them to do. The town was still inhabited at the time of <a href='B:90 11:1'>1Sa 11:1</a>. It seems they were very selective in their obedience, and yet claimed such utter and careful loyalty to Yahweh. The record continually demonstrates their hypocrisy and ignorance of true spirituality, whilst having a knowledge and apparent devotion to isolated parts of God's law. The same is seen amongst so many professing to be God's people today. Yet "saved alive" in :14 implies they did indeed massacre the town. The description of the conflict with Jabesh as a "war" in :22 suggests that there was indeed bloodshed, probably on both sides; and yet despite that, the required number of young female captives weren't taken. So all the bloodshed and "war" just didn't achieve the desired end anyway. The logical process in thought behind the decisions taken in all this appears very lacking in wisdom. Clearly they did not progress on God's advice, but only on their own.</p>


text:
<p>The whole congregation sent an offer of peace to the Benjamites who were in the rock of Rimmon- </p><p>They 'proclaimed peace', using the same phrase as in <a href='B:50 20:10'>Deu 20:10</a>: "When you draw near to a city to fight against it, proclaim peace to it". But the Israelites did this to the few remaining Benjamites after they had massacred most of them. This was typical of how Israel at this time were taking fragments of God's law and applying them, but absolutely out of context. Whilst they disregarded the majority of the Law, both in letter and spirit. And we see this in the wider Christian movement. Bits and pieces of Divine principle are used in a misplaced way, when the majority of God's revelation and will is ignored.</p>


text:
<p>So then Benjamin returned and they gave them the women whom they had saved alive from Jabesh Gilead, but they weren’t enough for them- </p><p>"Saved alive" implies they did indeed massacre the town. They had clearly had a bad conscience about fighting against Benjamin their "brother". But they fail to really grasp why that was wrong. For in the flush of final victory against Benjamin, they now go and do exactly the same sin of murdering their brothers. And in this case, for no reason other than that Jabesh hadn't come up to some kangaroo court they had set up to judge Benjamin. They were acting absolutely against God's will and without any seeking of His guidance. And all because, as discussed on :7, they lacked the faith to let God resolve the issue of the remnant of Benjamin having no wives; and because they lacked the humility to take back their oath not to let their daughters marry Benjamites.</p>


text:
<p>The people grieved for Benjamin because Yahweh had made a gap in the tribes of Israel- </p><p>AV "repented them", they had a change of mind. But this is not necessarily the same as perceiving their own moral wrong. There is no reference to their seeking counsel from God as to whether or not to massacre yet more of their brethren in Jabesh, which was apparently of another tribe and east of the Jordan [presumably it was near the wadi Jabesh which is east of Jordan]. The people had not asked counsel of God about how to judge the matter. They had all eagerly condemned Gibeah to destruction, without referring to God, and in studied disobedience to His word (see on <a href='B:70 20:13'>Jdg 20:13</a>). Yet having made their own judgment, they then made a great show of asking His advice as to which tribe should lead the assault, or, should attack Gibeah first (<a href='B:70 20:18'>Jdg 20:18</a>). Yet God responded to their request. He said Judah should go first. He wanted to use this incident to punish Israel, as well as Benjamin. And as so often, His judgments are in terms of brethren destroying each other, rather than Him doing it directly Himself. See on <a href='B:70 20:7'>Jdg 20:7</a>. It was Yahweh who made a breach in Israel over this matter. He worked through it all. It was His way of judging His apostate, hypocritical people. The same word is used of His making a breach upon Uzzah, in judgment (<a href='B:100 6:8'>2Sa 6:8</a>). A breach from Yahweh is a judgment for sin (<a href='B:290 30:13'>Isa 30:13</a>; <a href='B:330 22:30'>Eze 22:30</a> s:w:). Division and conflict amongst God's children is therefore somehow of Him- but it is His judgment upon the community.</p>


text:
<p>Then the elders of the congregation said, How shall we provide wives for those who remain, since the women are destroyed out of Benjamin?- </p><p>A wife is "from the Lord", not from purely human device. Massacring a town to steal their virgin daughters, and then kidnapping girls from a Passover dance... is all the way of the flesh. We see how misguided were these people, partly concerned with the Divine concept of raising up seed for their brother, and yet with no basic moral backbone at all. They would have been better to have faith that God would provide, in His own wonderful way- rather than massacring Jabesh and kidnapping girls.</p>


text:
<p>They said, There must be an inheritance for the surviving Benjamites so that a tribe will not be blotted out from Israel- </p><p>They are arguing from the basis of the levirate law, that brothers must somehow ensure that seed is raised up to their brother in the case of death. But, as noted on :16, they are focusing upon just one aspect of Divine truth, and ignoring the wider moral teachings of the Mosaic law and indeed of basic ethics and morality. "There must be an inheritance..." again reflects their legalistic mind, driven by a devotion to quasi logic to do things which were plain wrong on every count. An inheritance is "of the Lord", just as a wife is (:16); their attempt to play God in all this just made things far worse.</p>


text:
<p>We can’t give them wives from our daughters since the Israelites have taken this oath saying, ‘Cursed be he who gives a wife to Benjamin’- </p><p>I discussed on :7 how if they had humbled themselves and retracted their oaths, then they would not have needed to do the bizarre and sinful things which they did- massacre of Jabesh Gilead and kidnapping young girls. Their legalistic mindset is incredible; and yet they themselves were far astray from Yahweh themselves, and this was why they had been punished at the hands of the Benjamites, losing 40,000 men.</p>


text:
<p>They said, Look, there is an annual feast of Yahweh in Shiloh, which is on the north of Bethel, east of the highway from Bethel to Shechem, and south of Lebonah- </p><p>If the feast involved dancing (:21) then it was likely the feast of the Passover, with the girls replicating the dancing of Miriam and the women. The exact geographical description is given so that the Benjamites knew precisely where to go. But they ought to have been celebrating Yahweh's deliverance of His people by grace, rather than using it as an opportunity to kidnap wives for themselves.</p>


text:
<p>They instructed the Benjamites: Go and lie in wait in the vineyards- </p><p>This bizarre idea of grabbing young unmarried females was all necessitated by the impenitence of the Israelites and their refusal to humble themselves and retract their oath, as discussed on :7.</p>


text:
<p>and watch. When the daughters of Shiloh come out to join in the dances, then rush out of the vineyards and each of you catch a wife from the girls of Shiloh and go to the land of Benjamin- </p><p>The language of lying in wait in ambush and then rushing forward upon the unsuspecting is the language of how the Benjamites had finally captured Gibeah, and how Israel had captured Ai. Again, we see the misplaced idea of appealing to past precedent in God's dealings with His people. They wished to follow some aspects of God's ways in the past, whilst ignoring the vast majority of His teaching, even on a most basic moral level. And we wonder whether the majority of those identifying as 'Christian' at this point in world history are not similar.</p>


text:
<p>When their fathers or their brothers come to complain to us, we will say to them, ‘Allow them to do this because we didn’t get wives for them in the war- </p><p>The war is presumably the war against Jabesh of :12. The way it is called a "war" suggests the people of Jabesh fought back. There would have been yet more bloodshed, and it seems there were fewer virgin women captured than the Israelites had initially imagined.</p><p>You didn’t give them to them, so you are not guilty’- </p><p>Perhaps they mean 'Not guilty of breaking the oath not to give your daughter in marriage to Benjamites'. But the way of humility would have been to simply ask God to forgive them for a rash oath, or to just leave it all to God to decide, with faith He would somehow work it out. But when there is no human answer visible, then we tend to abandon faith in God and go for these kinds of bizarre human ways of resolving things.</p><p>Or the idea may have been that to give a daughter in marriage to a man of another tribe was a sin. But as the daughters had been taken away forcibly, it wouldn't count as a sin. We note their extreme legalism. And yet as legalists often do, they seriously contradicted themselves. For in this case, it would have been a sin for Benjamites to be marrying women from another tribe. So their solution to the problem was only leading people into sin. There seems no direct statement in the law of Moses that intermarriage amongst the tribes was a sin, although the implication of the principles of inheritance amongst the tribes was that it was far from ideal.</p>


text:
<p>So that is what the Benjamites did. They took wives for each of them from the girls who danced, and carried them off. They returned to their inheritance, rebuilt the cities and lived in them- </p><p>See on :22. Carrying them off implies to captivity. They were treating these Israelite girls as prey, taken in some Divinely sanctioned war. But God had not been consulted, and was not in any of this.</p>


text:
<p>Then the Israelites departed each to his tribe and family- </p><p>This is perhaps stating the obvious but in order that we imagine them returning home, with only tales of woe and not glorious victory. For they had lost 40,000 of their own men, and slain a huge number of their brethren both from Jabesh and all Benjamin. And arranged the kidnap of innocent girls from their families. Not much to boast about to their families. And so the point is made, that in conflict between brethren, there are only shameful losers.</p>


text:
<p>In those days there was no king in Israel; each man did that which was right in his own eyes- </p><p>This implies that the book of Judges as we have it was edited, under Divine inspiration, some time after Israel began to have kings. Perhaps during the exile, when again they had no king; and therefore the book becomes a warning to the exiles about likely apostacy. The lament may be that there was no authority, no teacher, no modelling of Godly living; because every man did what was right in his own eyes, rather than doing what was right in the eyes of Yahweh. For so often we read of Israel being condemned for doing what was wrong in His eyes. This is clear enough evidence that 'just follow your heart' is poor advice. For what is right in our own eyes results in the Godless confusion of what we find now at the time of the Judges. However it could be argued that having no human king was a good thing; for God didn't want them to have one. And therefore a situation where everyone judges things by their own judgment is in fact good; the problem was that the people didn't base their view upon God's word, His "eyes" or perspective, but solely upon their own unenlightened opinions.</p>


text:
<p>In the days when the judges judged, there was a famine in the land. A man of Bethlehem Judah went with his wife and two sons to live in the country of Moab- </p><p>The famine was because of Israel’s disobedience. The idea of famine was to bring the people back to God, but Elimelech [like many people today] responded poorly to it, and went away from God’s people by moving to Moab. In Moab he would be unable to come to the sanctuary, and his children ran the risk of marrying unbelievers; and seeing marriage required the father’s approval, their marriage out of the faith reflects poorly on Elimelech as well as on his sons. So we see how sin results in Divine intervention [famine, in this case]; that intervention is punishment, but it is aimed at reformation. But it can be taken the wrong way, and people who respond poorly to it are then driven even further from God. This is the way the downward spiral works; but the holy Spirit likewise is the dynamic of the upward spiral. See on :13.</p>


text:
<p>The name of the man was Elimelech- </p><p>'God is king', reflecting the belief at the time of the judges (:1) that Israel had no human king because Yahweh was their king. But he went to live in the land of Moloch, a form of the Hebrew melech; Moloch who was presented as the real king rather than Yahweh, and this family were happy to go along with that on a surface level.</p><p>His wife’s, Naomi; his two sons’, Mahlon and Chilion- </p><p>The names of the sons mean "sickly" and "wasting away". So we are given the impression of a "pleasant" woman ['Naomi'] with two sickly sons and a materialistic husband, ever seeking a better deal in life, which never worked out. To have just two sons was a very small family for those days; for we get the impression they had no other children. We can imagine the child deaths, miscarriages etc. which led her to feel that God was not completely with her. And yet it was through all this that she came to Him so strongly.</p><p>They were Ephrathites of Bethlehem Judah. They came into the country of Moab, and stayed there- </p><p>As he now shifted to Moab for a better life, perhaps he had already made such a shift before; because he was a man of Ephraim who had moved to Bethlehem in Judah. We are presented with a family who always wanted a better life, but it never quite worked out. We have surely met this type in our lives. We note that many of the histories of apostacy in the book of Judges feature people from Ephraim, and it seems we are intended to read Elimelech's move to Moab as a continuation of that sad theme. The whole point of the story is that out of such weakness, at least one person [Naomi] holds on, and through her, indirectly [through Ruth] a wonderful movement of God's Spirit is seen. And this too is a story we have all seen time and again.</p>


text:
<p>Elimelech, Naomi’s husband, died; and she was left, and her two sons- </p><p>See on :5. "Left" is usually translated "remained". The implication could be that she ought to have returned to Judah at this point, but she didn't. She is really the classic case of someone out of weakness being made strong; Esther is another example. She came to realize and experience that indeed Yahweh is a protector of orphans and widows (<a href='B:230 68:5'>Psa 68:5</a>). It may be significant that Naomi is Elimelech's wife in 1:1 but by 1:3 he is now called Naomi's husband; she has had to adopt the prominent role because of his illness and weakness.</p>


text:
<p>The sons took wives of the women of Moab; the name of the one was Orpah, and the name of the other was Ruth. They lived there about ten years- </p><p>The very phrase "the women of Moab" recalls Israel's apostasy with the women of Moab in <a href='B:110 11:1'>1Ki 11:1</a>; indeed the Midianite women who led Israel astray in <a href='B:40 25:18'>Num 25:18</a> were connected with Moab (<a href='B:40 22:4'>Num 22:4</a>). Moabites were not to come into the congregation of Yahweh (<a href='B:50 23:3'>Deu 23:3</a>; <a href='B:160 13:1'>Neh 13:1</a>). The fact the Moabite Ruth was accepted into that congregation in such a major way was therefore an example of God's great value of the human person as an individual, and He is willing as it were to break His own law to demonstrate the degree of that value He placed upon Ruth. With Elimelech dead, we can assume that Naomi was responsible for allowing these marriages to happen, because she refused to return to the land of Israel at that time (see on :3). In their culture, the mother had quite some role to play in the arrangement of marriages (see <a href='B:260 8:2'>Son 8:2</a>).</p>


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<p>Mahlon and Chilion both died, and the woman was bereaved of her two children and of her husband- </p><p>"Bereaved" is the word translated "left" in :3. We are given the impression of a woman who has the scaffolding around her life removed, bit by bit; for to lose all the men in her life was a major blow. And it brought her to passionate personal relationship with Yahweh. It seems she found Yahweh in Moab and not in Israel. And her commitment was so strong that it exuded from her, to the extent that Ruth was persuaded of Yahweh by her example. And this is the path so many must pass through; isolation and the removal of all human scaffolding leads us to personal relationship with our God.</p>


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<p>Then she arose with her daughters-in-law, to return from the country of Moab; for she had heard in the country of Moab how that Yahweh had visited His people- </p><p>"Visited His people" is an idiom for God’s action and intervention. It’s clearly not to be taken literally, and likewise the connected idiom of ‘coming down’ should not be read literally either. When God ‘came down’ in Christ, we are not to understand a literal descent of a pre-existent Christ to earth; but rather, the manifestation of God in His Son who was born on earth.</p><p>In giving them bread- The implication could be that there was a famine in Moab. Naomi's motives were not paramountly spiritual. Again, as noted on :2, she is moving around in search of a better life. We marvel at how God worked to get Ruth into Israel- the death of three men, the famine in Israel initially, the spiritual weakness of Elimelech, the punishment of the family (:21), the enduring faith of Naomi… all in order to bring Ruth into Israel. In the bringing of each person to Himself, there is likewise complex working with far-reaching effects upon unbelievers, for whom events have no personal meaning, and yet the events were for the sake of others. Thus large numbers of people suffered during the seven years famine in Egypt, with no personal meaning for themselves, because that famine was required to reunite the family of God.</p>


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<p>She left the place where she was, and her two daughters-in-law went with her. They began the journey to the land of Judah- </p><p>It seems the idea had been to accompany Ruth from where she was living in Moab, at least to the border of Judah. "Left the place where she was" uses the same words about Lot and his daughters leaving the place where they were in Sodom (<a href='B:10 19:12'>Gen 19:12</a>; <a href='B:10 19:14'>Gen 19:14</a>) to go to spiritual safety. And of course Moab was the fruit of Lot sleeping with his daughter when they did so. The allusion is therefore purposeful. The theme is as ever of spiritual weakness, and yet of people becoming strong for God out of that weakness.</p><p>The Hebrew is literally "To return to the land of Judah". I suggest the book of Ruth was written up or edited under inspiration in Babylon, as guidance and encouragement for those in captivity in Babylon to return to Judah. Despite having sinned and having endured judgment for that, and despite having lost many of their men folk, Judah were to follow Naomi’s example and return, taking any faithful Gentiles with them, and would like Naomi find unexpected blessing in the land, and a part in the family of Messiah.</p>


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<p>Naomi said to her two daughters-in-law, Go, return each of you to your mother’s house, Yahweh deal kindly with you, as you have dealt with the dead, and with me- </p><p>God blesses those who bless the seed of Abraham, even if the members of the seed are spiritually weak (see on 1:1). Naomi shows her awareness of the Abrahamic promises by wishing this blessing upon her daughters in law, whom she considered had been ‘kind’ to her sons and husband and to herself too. Presumably this was said at the border of Moab and Israel. The women had accompanied Naomi there and the idea was that they should not return. Women travelling alone was unusual. We get the distinct impression of Naomi as being totally without male support in her life. This all drove her towards Yahweh as her Father, protector, provider and redeemer.</p>


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<p>Yahweh grant you that you may find rest, each of you in the house of her husband. Then she kissed them, and they lifted up their voice, and wept- </p><p>"Find rest in the house of her husband" is an idiom for having a stable family life with children; note how <a href='B:80 3:1'>Rth 3:1</a> uses the same idiom: “Shall I not seek rest for you?” effectively means ‘I will try to set you up with marriage and a family’. The implication would therefore be that the women had not had children by Naomi’s sons, and the sons had both died suddenly. Naomi interpreted this as God’s judgment upon her (:20,21). Her bitterness with God was because she felt that her daughters in law had unjustly suffered [childlessness was seen as the greatest tragedy] only because of her and her family. Naomi is effectively telling these women that she considers that the God of Israel is responsible for their barrenness, and if they returned to their gods, and married one of their own people, they would likely have children and ‘find rest’ in family life. Ruth’s strong commitment to Naomi personally and to the God of Israel was therefore all the more remarkable; she accepted she may never have children, that Yahweh’s judgments upon His people sometimes affected Gentiles who happened to be involved… but she still so loved Him and wanted to devote herself to Him, despite His harder side. If there is really only one true God, then it is our duty to accept Him, even if we cannot attach meaning to events at the moment we experience them.</p><p>We note how Naomi openly and freely uses the word "Yahweh" (also in :8). Clearly she felt strong covenant relationship with Him.</p>


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<p>They said to her, No, but we will return with you to your people- </p><p>It was Naomi and not those Moabite girls who was returning. But they speak of "we will return" because they had come to so identify with Naomi. Or there may be the idea that they wanted to 'turn to' [another legitimate translation of shub, rendered here "return"] Naomi's people. Lot was the father of Moab, and the same words are used of how he was returned to his people by Abraham (<a href='B:10 14:16'>Gen 14:16</a>). The hint may be that they wanted to have this same grace shown to them due to the Abrahamic covenant. See on :15.</p>


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<p>Naomi said, Go back, my daughters. Why do you want to go with me? Do I still have sons in my womb, that they may be your husbands?- </p><p>"Go back" is the word for "return" in :10. Naomi is encouraging them to return or turn to their own people, and not hers. And Orpah accepts her encouragement (:15). Naomi apparently had only produced two sickly sons who survived to adulthood, and they had both prematurely died; and she felt herself to be barren. There was no legal requirement for a widow to marry the younger brother of a deceased husband, but it could be argued that any future children of Naomi had a duty to marry their late brother's wife and have children by her in his name. But that would be a very strict reading of the Mosaic legislation in this case, if not simply a wrong interpretation of the Levirate law. For the simple intention of the Levirate law was that if a man died, his brother was to marry his widow and have children by her. And it only applied to "brothers dwelling together". But Naomi has clearly thought it through; for all her apparent weakness and even apostacy as noted so far, she was aware of God's laws. Despite having nobody to teach her there in Moab and no written scripture with her [she was surely illiterate anyway], she remembered the Mosaic law and thought through its implications:&nbsp;However her very strict interpretation of them in this case may suggest she is seeking every reason to discourage the young women to follow her back to Israel. And this makes Ruth's decision the more commendable.</p>


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<p>Go back, my daughters, go your way; for I am too old to have a husband. If I should say, ‘I have hope’, if I should even have a husband tonight, and should also bear sons-</p><p>See on :11. She considered herself barren (:11), but even if she should be able to have children, and they were males, and they lived... it would mean the young women would have to wait to many years that they would likely then be infertile. So Naomi considers herself a woman without hope, in human terms. And it is for those who perceive their hopelessness that the hope of Israel means the most. She also considers the laws of levirate marriage as unable to provide a way out of her hopeless situation. This is perhaps why she doesn't even suggest that Ruth approach Boaz when they first arrive in Bethlehem. It was really a case of being surprised by grace when she finds that in the end, the levirate laws will in fact be used as the vehicle to effect for her such a great salvation for both her and Ruth.</p>


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<p>would you then wait until they were grown? Would you then refrain from having husbands? No, my daughters, for it grieves me much for your sakes, for the hand of Yahweh has gone out against me-</p><p>See on :11,12. "Grieves" is a form of the Hebrew word Mara. It would seem from :20 that Naomi, for all her awareness of God’s word and faith in Him, was consumed by bitterness; and she publically acknowledged this. She was bitter because she felt God had unfairly punished her daughters in law for her sin and the apostasy of her family. This is so often a reason for bitterness with God- a sense that His judgments are unjust, and that the innocent wrongly suffer. The book of Ruth concludes with a happy Naomi raising her grandson who is presented as being in the direct line of Messiah. But this was a woman consumed with bitterness earlier. One lesson is that God still works with and through bitter people, even those who are angry and cross at Him. Another lesson is that in the final end, God’s utter grace and love is revealed through all His workings, even if at some points during the process, His actions seem totally unjust to us. But in the final, bigger picture, we realize that this was in fact the way of Divine love and grace, so far above any human plan.</p>&nbsp;<p>She was grieved because she felt that the judgments upon her for her sin (see on :1) were of such a nature that they had seriously affected these two Gentile women, in that they had been left young widows without children. The fact the two sons and husband died apparently at the same time would lead to the impression that this was an act from God, which Naomi understood as judgment for sin. The fact she retains her love of God and wants to return to Israel is therefore commendable; she responded the right way to God’s intervention and judgment, rather than going further away from Him as she had done previously when He intervened (see on :1).</p>


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<p>They lifted up their voices, and wept again; and Orpah kissed her mother-in-law farewell, but Ruth stayed with her- </p><p>AV "Clave unto her", the same Hebrew word used of the ‘cleaving’ in marriage of <a href='B:10 2:24'>Gen 2:24</a>. And marriage has been the context of the discussion. Ruth is saying that she accepts childlessness and singleness, and in place of those things she wished to ‘cleave’ to Naomi, whom she saw as representative of Israel’s God. She was rewarded for this in an appropriate way- she wanted to dwell under the wings of Israel’s God (2:12), and He came to be manifested in Boaz, under the wings of whose garment she came (3:4,7,9).</p>


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<p>She said, Behold, your sister-in-law has gone back to her people- </p><p>The word for "gone back" is that translated "return" in :10. The girls had originally intended to 'return' or 'turn to' Naomi's people, but now Orpah had decided to return to her people and not Naomi's people.</p><p>And to her god. Follow your sister-in-law- </p><p>Cp. AV “her gods”. The contrast is between Orpah returning to her god [Chemosh?] and Ruth stating in the next verse that she wants to accept Naomi’s God [Yahweh]. "Follow" would imply 'follow her back to follow her god'. And putting it like that, Ruth felt she had no choice but to cross the border of Moab / Israel, and totally commit to Yahweh.</p>


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<p>Ruth said, Don’t entreat me to leave you, and to return from following after you- </p><p>She has a choice of following her sister in law to follow her gods, or to follow the apparently hopeless case Naomi, and follow her God Yahweh. It seems to me that it was Naomi's faith in her God despite her own personal weaknesses and Yahweh apparently failing to 'come through' for her in a short term sense... which actually attracted Ruth to Yahweh, through Naomi's example. The harder side of God is attractive in this sense. Because He is so evidently real and for real in human life. It is simply untrue that a God who appears to give immediate blessings is going to be the most attractive. The spiritually minded person will believe otherwise. See on <a href='B:80 2:23'>Rth 2:23</a>.</p><p>For where you go, I will go; and where you lodge, I will lodge. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God- </p><p>Ruth's rejection of her national gods and her people was a huge thing to do. We note that the name "Ruth" means "to water"; which was exactly what Moab had refused to do for Israel in <a href='B:40 25:1-3'>Num 25:1-3</a>. The hope of the restoration prophets was that a repentant Judah would return from the lands of the Gentiles, bringing with them Gentile converts. And I suggest the book of Ruth was rewritten in exile to support this, by demonstrating that it had happened before, historically. Not all Moabites were like Moab had been historically; a xenophobic Judah were to thereby remember that their own beloved king David was from Moabite stock, and any Gentile could come into the people of Israel. Evidence that the book has been rewritten is found in the impression that it was originally all in poetic form in very ancient Hebrew, but that appears to have been rewritten in a way which removes much of the poetic structure whilst adding later Hebrew words and Aramaisms (notably in <a href='B:80 1:13'>Rth 1:13</a>; <a href='B:80 4:7'>Rth 4:7</a>). Hence the need in <a href='B:80 4:7'>Rth 4:7</a> for the book to explain how things were done in "former times" in Israel.</p><p>The LXX of <a href='B:80 1:16'>Rth 1:16</a> is almost quoted by the Lord Jesus in an unusual way, at first blush. The Jesus who loved little children and wept over Jerusalem's self-righteous religious leaders, so desirous of their salvation, is the One who today mediates our prayers and tomorrow will confront us at judgment day. He is the same yesterday [as He was in His ministry], today [in His mediation for us] and for ever, as He shall be at His return. Perhaps the Lord called the disciples His “brothers” straight after His resurrection in order to emphasize that He, the resurrected Man and Son of God, was eager to renew His relationships with those He had known in the flesh. It’s as if He didn’t want them to think that somehow, everything had changed. Indeed, He stresses to them that their Father is His Father, and their God is His God (<a href='B:500 20:18'>Joh 20:18</a>). He alludes here to <a href='B:80 1:16'>Rth 1:16</a> LXX. Here, Ruth is urged to remain behind in Moab [cp. Mary urging Jesus?], but she says she will come with her mother in law, even though she is of a different people, and “Your people shall be my people, and your God my God”. This allusion would therefore be saying: ‘OK I am of a different people to you now, but that doesn’t essentially affect our relationship; I so love you, I will always stick with you wherever, and my God is your God’.</p>


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<p>where you die, will I die, and there will I be buried. Yahweh do so to me, and more also- </p><p>Ruth had learnt the Yahweh Name and already accepted Him as her God. Only a person who was in covenant with Yahweh could swear by Him, for in those days you took an oath by your gods (<a href='B:90 17:43'>1Sa 17:43</a>). The location of death and burial was significant to those who believed that their gods were geographically limited; you wanted to be buried in the land of your god so he could look after you. It's quite possible that Ruth and Naomi still had a somewhat limited view of Yahweh, as did Jonah and many others, thinking that He was the God of the land of Israel, and therefore must be served there. Their return to the land was a return to Yahweh. But of course the wonder of their stories, as they looked back at them, was that they had both effectively found Yahweh outside the land of Israel, and in a situation of great moral weakness and disobedience to Him. This was exactly the intention for the exiles in Babylon, for whom this book was likely rewritten and republished.</p><p>If anything but death part you and me- </p><p>The idea is that not even death would not part them, because Naomi says they will be united in their death and burial.</p>


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<p>When she saw that she was steadfastly minded to go with her, she stopped speaking to her-</p><p>It was Israel who were to be "strong" (s:w. "steadfastly minded") in order to leave Moab and enter the land of Israel in faith that Yahweh would go with them, and give them an inheritance in that land (<a href='B:50 31:6-7'>Deu 31:6-7</a>; <a href='B:60 10:25'>Jos 10:25</a>). Again we see the relevance for the exiles in Babylon, who were urged to likewise be "strong" (s:w:) and leave Gentile lands and come back to Judah (<a href='B:290 35:3'>Isa 35:3</a>; <a href='B:290 41:10'>Isa 41:10</a>).</p>


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<p>So those two travelled to Bethlehem- </p><p>AV "went until they came". This is the phrase repeatedly used of the travels of the patriarchs, who also left a Gentile land and came to inherit the land of Israel and enter relationship with Yahweh (<a href='B:10 11:31'>Gen 11:31</a>; <a href='B:10 13:3'>Gen 13:3</a>; <a href='B:10 26:13'>Gen 26:13</a>; <a href='B:10 28:15'>Gen 28:15</a>). Ruth is clearly presented as one who wished to act in faith as a true member of the seed of Abraham, and thereby to attain the "hope of Israel". We notice the intended contrast with Rachel, who died before she came to Bethlehem; the women likely passed by the spot where she died (<a href='B:10 35:16'>Gen 35:16</a>; <a href='B:10 35:19'>Gen 35:19</a>). The idea is that this wayward Israelitess and Gentile Ruth had more faith than Rachel, one of the founding mothers of Israel.</p><p>When they had come to Bethlehem, it happened that all the city was agitated about them, and they asked, Is this Naomi?- </p><p>They counted Ruth as part of Naomi; so the grammar demands. They were "agitated about them", asking "Is this [not "are these"] Naomi?". Her identity with Naomi was somehow apparent.</p>


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<p>She said to them, Don’t call me Naomi. Call me Mara; for the Almighty has dealt very bitterly with me- </p><p>She uses the term "Almighty" rather than Yahweh, although she knows the Name Yahweh (:21), because shaddai means 'fruitful', from shad, the breast. But she had lost the fruit of her womb and apparently didn't even have any grandsons. She believed in Yahweh passionately, so much so that Ruth came to believe in Him because of her; but she has her deep struggles with His justice, and was bitter ["Mara"] because her character reflected how she felt He had dealt bitterly with her. We see how struggles with God's "justice" do not completely preclude relationship with and faith in Him. There are many Biblical examples of that (like Job, David and Jeremiah). And our character and personality likewise is a reflection of our perceived experience of God. The convinced atheist will have an "empty" aspect to their personality because God is missing. Those who have experienced His grace will likewise have grace and patience as part of their characters.</p>


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<p>I went out full, and Yahweh has brought me home again empty- </p><p>To be "full" was one of the blessings for obedience to the covenant, and the potential gift of God to Israel when they first entered Canaan (<a href='B:50 6:11'>Deu 6:11</a>; <a href='B:160 9:25'>Neh 9:25</a> s:w:). But she had left Israel assuming that those blessings were not fulfilled. See on :2. Now she realized that she had seen the cup half empty instead of half full. To be empty was to be without blessing (<a href='B:10 31:42'>Gen 31:42</a>; <a href='B:20 3:21'>Exo 3:21</a>; <a href='B:50 15:13'>Deu 15:13</a>). Boaz later tries to indirectly persuade her that this was not the case ultimately (s:w. <a href='B:80 3:17'>Rth 3:17</a>). She returned to Israel and to Yahweh of her own initiative, and yet she says that Yahweh "brought me home", s:w. "returned" (:22 etc:). He worked, and still works, in confirming the desire of every person who seeks to turn or return to Him and the Hope of Israel. She felt that although she had not experienced blessing from Him, indeed she had lost the potential blessings and was without His blessings, yet still she wanted to return to Him. Contrary to Pentecostal reasoning, the experience of "blessing" was not what attracted her to Him. Rather she wanted to simply be in relationship with Him, like the prodigal son returning from Gentile lands not looking for any material blessing.</p><p>Why do you call me Naomi, since Yahweh has testified against me, and the Almighty has afflicted me?- </p><p>Judgment is now, in a sense. She felt that God had judged and as it were legally testified against her for her various weaknesses discussed earlier in this chapter; her seeking for a good life rather than putting God first, not returning to Israel when her husband died, allowing her sons to marry Gentiles etc. But what she was yet to realize was that the apparent affliction was but a prelude to her greater deliverance. Likewise God afflicted Israel in Egypt to the point that even Moses felt it was too much (<a href='B:20 5:22-23'>Exo 5:22-23</a>), but only that He might bring them out to inherit the land of Israel (<a href='B:10 15:13'>Gen 15:13</a>). The God who forbad the affliction of the fatherless and widow like Naomi and her sons (<a href='B:20 22:22'>Exo 22:22</a>) would not ultimately willingly afflict His people, but only with their restoration in view (<a href='B:110 11:39'>1Ki 11:39</a>; <a href='B:220 37:23'>Job 37:23</a>; <a href='B:310 3:33'>Lam 3:33</a>).</p><p>But at this point, Naomi appears to not grasp this. And yet for all that, her faith in Yahweh was such that she persuaded Ruth to forsake all and follow Him; for all this mystery of His ways with men and apparent affliction of people with no game plan toward salvation yet in view. Indeed the word she uses for "afflicted" is that translated "to do evil" or 'be wicked' with a moral dimension (s:w. <a href='B:10 19:7'>Gen 19:7</a>; <a href='B:10 38:10'>Gen 38:10</a>; <a href='B:30 5:4'>Lev 5:4</a>; <a href='B:230 64:2'>Psa 64:2</a>; <a href='B:230 92:11'>Psa 92:11</a>; <a href='B:290 31:2'>Isa 31:2</a> and often). She comes close to accusing God of being wicked in His treatment of her. This is how bitter she was. And yet this didn't preclude her desire to come to Him, and that desire and commitment to Him, the God whose ways she didn't understand, was so powerful that it converted Ruth to Him as well. We simply learn from this that solving all the problems of Divine justice is not actually required for a person to have relationship with Him. Indeed the very existence of those problems actually leads humble people to believe in Him. That is the paradox which is totally missed by those who seem to think that endless apologetics will pave the way for folks to therefore and thereby believe in God.</p>


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<p>So Naomi returned, and Ruth the Moabitess her daughter-in-law with her, who returned out of the country of Moab- </p><p>We notice the double stress upon how they "returned". As noted on :21, it was God who 'returned' them. She says that Yahweh "brought me home", s:w. "returned" (:22 etc:). He worked, and still works, in confirming the desire of every person who seeks to turn or return to Him and the Hope of Israel. There is another similarity here with Abraham, who felt God had made him leave his father's house and come to Canaan, even though this is what he had been commanded to do on his own initiative (see on <a href='B:10 20:13'>Gen 20:13</a>). Ruth returned or turned to Israel "out of" Moab, suggesting she came out from her own people in order to come to Yahweh; just as Abraham.</p><p>And they came to Bethlehem in the beginning of the barley harvest- </p><p>A reminder that there was indeed now bread in Israel. It would have been March or April, the time of Passover (<a href='B:20 9:31'>Exo 9:31</a>), heightening the connection between these women and Israel. For Israel left Egypt after being "afflicted" there (see on :21), to enter the land of promise.</p>


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<p>Naomi had a kinsman of her husband’s, a mighty man of wealth, of the family of Elimelech, whose name was Boaz-</p><p>"Kinsman" is literally 'one who knows'. Boaz ["strength", as in <a href='B:110 7:21'>1Ki 7:21</a>] is presented as a manifestation of Yahweh. He knew the situation exactly (:11), he was a gibbor ["mighty man"], with the wealth required to resolve the situation. And yet Naomi seems to have forgotten about him, or at least assumed her apostacy was such that he would be unable to assist. Again we see a similarity with the prodigal son, who returns to his father's relative wealth but with the assumption he might just be able to get a job as a day labourer with him. Indeed the parable of the prodigal has so many similarities with the story of Ruth. The connections suggest that Naomi had indeed sinned and wasted her inheritance in Moab. Boaz was a descendant of the prostitute Rahab and Salmon, a prince of Judah (<a href='B:470 1:5'>Mat 1:5</a>; <a href='B:490 3:32'>Luk 3:32</a>); and a case can be made that he was one of the spies who first spent the night at her brothel. So he had Gentile blood within him, and was aware that Gentile women, even questionable ones, could be accepted into the community of God's people.</p><p>The goel or redeemer role played by Boaz was representative of that played by Yahweh; the word is often used about His desire to be that redeemer figure for His people once they returned to the land. I suggested on <a href='B:80 1:16'>Rth 1:16</a> that the book was rewritten, under Divine inspiration, and applied to the exiles as an encouragement for them to return to the land, bringing Gentile converts with them.</p>


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<p>Ruth the Moabitess- </p><p>This is emphasized six times (<a href='B:80 1:22'>Rth 1:22</a>; <a href='B:80 2:2'>Rth 2:2</a>; <a href='B:80 2:6'>Rth 2:6</a>; <a href='B:80 2:21'>Rth 2:21</a>; <a href='B:80 4:5'>Rth 4:5</a>; <a href='B:80 4:10'>Rth 4:10</a>). The exiles who returned became very xenophobic against Gentiles, and one intention of the book of Ruth being reissued amongst them (see on :1) was to remind them that God deals with individuals, and there were faithful Gentiles as well as unfaithful Israelites.</p><p>Said to Naomi, Let me now go to the field, and glean among the ears of grain after him in whose sight I shall find grace- </p><p>If Naomi had Boaz in mind as a saviour, she surely would have suggested Ruth went and gleaned in his field. But she apparently doesn't suggest this, and is pleasantly surprised when she finds out Ruth happened to encounter Boaz. The encounter with grace is always a surprise to the recipient, for this is the nature of grace, and Naomi responds exactly as we would expect if she had indeed assumed Boaz would not help her. Ruth casts herself completely upon grace. To glean for dropped grain was for the poorest of the poor (<a href='B:50 24:19'>Deu 24:19</a>); and this is what they were.</p><p>We could however take the reference to Boaz in :1 as meaning that Ruth at least was aware of Boaz, and is describing him as the one in whose eyes she should find grace. It was Israel who were to find grace in Yahweh's sight (s:w. <a href='B:20 33:16'>Exo 33:16</a>); so perhaps the spiritually minded Ruth was looking for a person who would reflect Yahweh's grace to her. And indeed Boaz has been set up in :1 as a manifestation of Yahweh's strength and power to save. Ruth was proactive in seeking for grace, however, as we will see when she takes the initiative in proposing to Boaz that he marry her. We could also note that <a href='B:50 24:19'>Deu 24:19</a> doesn't make allowing gleaning a binding law upon landowners. The text simply states that "When you reap your harvest in your field and have forgotten a sheaf in the field, do not go back to get it. It shall be for the foreigner, for the fatherless and for the widow". By allowing gleaners to come and pick up dropped grain, Boaz's grace was going far beyond the letter of the law. This would account for the hint in :22 that not every landowner allowed gleaning in their fields. Likewise he extrapolates from the law of Levirate marriage to marry Ruth; but as noted on <a href='B:80 3:13'>Rth 3:13</a>, this&nbsp; showing far more grace than the law actually required, seeing that the Levirate law only affected "brothers dwelling together".</p><p>It could be argued from <a href='B:50 24:1'>Deu 24:1</a>; <a href='B:110 11:19'>1Ki 11:19</a>; <a href='B:190 5:8'>Est 5:8</a>; <a href='B:300 31:2'>Jer 31:2</a> cp. <a href='B:80 1:9'>Rth 1:9</a> that to find grace in the eyes of a man meant that he would marry her. Ruth perhaps entertained the hope or fantasy that she would find a wealthy landowner who would marry her. For this, humanly speaking, was the only way out of their desperate situation. It's rather like Joseph suggesting to Pharaoh that a man be appointed over Egypt's future harvests, and having the spiritual ambition to have himself in view for the appointment. Or Abigail asking David to "remember your handmaid" (<a href='B:90 25:31'>1Sa 25:31</a>), another possible idiom for marriage. And as with Ruth, that spiritual ambition paid off. What seemed impossible, that a Moabite Gentile beggar could marry a wealthy Israelite landowner and be welcomed into the community of Israel, actually came about. And I suggest Ruth had this spiritual ambition. Although when it began to come true, she was awed by the grace being shown to her.</p><p>She said to her, Go, my daughter- </p><p>Naomi was effectively a surrogate mother to Ruth. The idea of Ruth marrying Boaz had not initially even occurred to Naomi. She wishes her well in finding someone who would let her glean in their field, and that is all. It is only when Naomi tells her that a man called Boaz was kind to her, that the possibility appears to form in Naomi's mind. For levirate law didn't really envisage someone of such a distance from Ruth as Boaz marrying her to raise up seed. See on <a href='B:80 3:9'>Rth 3:9</a>.</p>


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<p>She went, and came and gleaned in the field behind the reapers- </p><p>The barley was reaped by women, who tied the reaped grain into bundles, which were then gathered together into shocks for transport by the men to the threshing floor. See on :7.</p><p>And she happened to come to the portion of the field belonging to Boaz, who was of the family of Elimelech- </p><p>They practiced strip farming, the strips being defined by landmarks. This situation arose because of the land being constantly split up in inheritances, and was one reason why the anonymous kinsman didn't want to mar his inheritance which he would leave by buying land which would revert to the son he was to have by Ruth, and would not remain in his name but in the name of that son. There was of course no "chance" to this ["she happened to:."]. One simple message of the book is that there is no chance. All was clearly meant to be, as God worked to respond to Ruth and Naomi's desire to come to Him. "She happened to come" is AV "Her hap was to light on...". The same phrase is used by Solomon in lamenting how such time and chance happens to all (<a href='B:250 2:14-15'>Ecc 2:14-15</a>; <a href='B:250 9:2-3'>Ecc 9:2-3</a>). He failed to learn the lesson from his great ancestor; that in fact there is no such thing as chance happening in the lives of those who love God.</p>


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<p>Behold, Boaz came from Bethlehem and said to the reapers, Yahweh be with you! They answered him, Yahweh bless you!- </p><p>We have here an insight into the spiritual mind of Boaz, openly using the Yahweh Name in the workplace. It is this kind of day by day spirituality which is the essence of the believing life. Yahweh's 'blessing' and 'being with' His people is however directly associated with generosity to those like Naomi and Boaz: "The foreigner living among you and the fatherless and the widow, who are within your gates, shall come and shall eat and be satisfied, that Yahweh your God may bless you in all the work of your hand which you do" (<a href='B:50 14:29'>Deu 14:29</a>). Perhaps the blessing called out upon Boaz by the people in his field was because they recognized that he was indeed blessing the foreigner, fatherless and widow. So his interest in helping Ruth and Naomi was genuinely spiritually motivated; the fact that Ruth was an eligible and perhaps attractive younger woman wasn't the primary motivation for his grace.</p>


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<p>Then Boaz said to his servant who was set over the reapers, Whose young woman is this?- </p><p>Boaz asking [in the Hebrew] whose is she, rather than who is she, might suggest it was love at first sight and he was immediately holding in mind the possibility of marrying her. It could be Ruth had the same feelings (see on <a href='B:80 2:13'>Rth 2:13</a>; <a href='B:80 3:2'>Rth 3:2</a>; <a href='B:80 3:10'>Rth 3:10</a>). The question 'Who is this?' as asked by Boaz of Ruth is to be understood as a statement of intended action and not read on face value. For he knew exactly who she was (:11). The same kind of question is asked by David about Bathsheba, even though he knew who she was because she lived next door to him and was the wife of his close friend (<a href='B:100 11:3'>2Sa 11:3</a>). Likewise when Saul enquires about who David is after his victory over Goliath (<a href='B:90 17:56'>1Sa 17:56</a>), it is not because he doesn't know him. For David had been already at the court of Saul. The question 'Who is this?' means that the questioner wants to do something for the person being enquired after.</p>


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<p>The servant who was set over the reapers answered, It is the Moabite woman who came back with Naomi out of the country of Moab- </p><p>This implies that she was already well known in the small town. Her Moabite nature is twice stressed.</p>


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<p>She said, ‘Please let me glean and gather after the reapers among the sheaves’. So she came, and has continued even from the morning until now, although she stayed a little in the house- </p><p>"The house" refers to a temporary booth where workers could take rest in the brutal heath. The law about gleaning didn't at all require that people should be allowed to glean right behind the reapers, "among the sheaves". It simply stated that if a sheaf was forgotten, the farmer should not return to collect it, but leave it in the field for the poor. That Ruth's utter poverty lead her to beg to be allowed to pick up the grain "among the sheaves" was far beyond this. That Boaz and his servant allowed it indicates how he saw beyond the letter of the law to the spirit, and this is what will be seen again in the very generous and far reaching extension he makes to the law of levirate marriage. The whole story is in fact about moving beyond the letter of the law to the spirit of it, which is grace. Ruth could be interpreted as being forward, but it seems to me that really she was driven to such going beyond the letter of the law because of her desperate need.</p>


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<p>Then Boaz said to Ruth, Listen, my daughter: Don’t go to glean in another field, and don’t go away from here, but stay here close to my maidens- </p><p>The girls in view are the reapers, for the reapers were usually women, and it was the men who gathered the sheaves into shocks and transported them to the threshing floor. We note how the Lord likens His Angels to reapers, when this was a typically female work.</p>


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<p>Let your eyes be on the field that they reap, and go after them- </p><p>"Go after" the other women is to be connected with how Boaz later commends Ruth for not 'going after' men in the hope of marriage (<a href='B:80 3:10'>Rth 3:10</a>). So we can conclude that he is directing her attention to the field before her; for already there was forming in his mind a plan to get a field for her of her very own. And by directing her eyes to the field he was surely hoping that the same possibilities would form in her mind too.</p><p>Haven’t I commanded the young men not to touch you? When you are thirsty, go to the vessels, and drink from that which the young men have drawn- </p><p>Boaz perhaps feared Ruth would go after the young men who were his harvesters. Although he and they greeted each other in spiritual terms, clearly that may have been a mere formality as they were likely to abuse a vulnerable single woman. He commends her later for not having gone after young men (<a href='B:80 3:10'>Rth 3:10</a>). It would seem that Boaz fell in love at first sight, but the basis of his attraction was her spirituality and devotion to Israel’s God (2:12,13).</p>


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<p>Then she fell on her face and bowed herself to the ground, and said to him, Why have I found grace in your sight, that you should take knowledge of me, since I am a foreigner?- </p><p>Falling on the face, bowing and saying these very words is all what Moses did before Yahweh in the context of entering the covenant and entering the land (<a href='B:20 33:12-13'>Exo 33:12-13</a>). Abraham and Joshua did likewise (<a href='B:10 17:3'>Gen 17:3</a>; <a href='B:10 17:17'>Gen 17:17</a>; <a href='B:10 18:3'>Gen 18:3</a>; <a href='B:60 5:14'>Jos 5:14</a>). All the way through, Ruth sees Boaz as representing Yahweh, and his acceptance of her and redemption of her represented that of Yahweh. For she had come to Israel primarily because of her commitment to Yahweh and the covenant.</p><p>But to 'find grace in the sight' of a man also means to be accepted by him as a wife (<a href='B:50 24:1'>Deu 24:1</a>). The words of both Ruth and Boaz always seem to have hints in them towards marriage; their feelings and hopes were clearly mutual, and this is the beauty of the story as romance. See on :13. Ruth is awed that he should give her grace in his eyes although she was a Gentile. She was aware of the prohibition upon Moabites entering Yahweh's congregation. But one of the themes of the book is that the spirit and not the letter of the law is to be followed. God cares for individuals and ultimately has relationship with persons rather than nations en masse. Ruth obviously lived in the hope that she could indeed enter the congregation of Yahweh and the letter of the law need not apply to her. She used the Yahweh Name and had specifically chosen to follow Naomi to Israel because of her commitment to Naomi's God, whom she had declared to be her God- whether or not&nbsp; God's people accepted her. She was therefore thrilled to see hints that Boaz likewise was thinking outside the box, beyond the constrictions of mere legalism. And in Boaz she sees the representation of Yahweh towards her.</p>


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<p>Boaz answered her, I have come to know all that you have done for your mother-in-law since the death of your husband; and how you have left your father and your mother and the land of your birth- </p><p>The reason for Boaz's kindness was not therefore that he simply was showing grace to some random stranger. He was aware of Ruth's story. From whom would he have known all Ruth had done for Naomi, unless he had spoken with Naomi? For they were relatives. This paves the way for my suggestion on <a href='B:80 4:3'>Rth 4:3</a>; <a href='B:80 4:5'>Rth 4:5</a> that Naomi, the seller of the land, had made a condition of buying the land that the purchaser also married Ruth. It could be that Naomi and Boaz had He respects how she left her parents- implying they were still alive.</p><p>Again there is a double entendre in Boaz's words. For in <a href='B:10 2:24'>Gen 2:24</a>, marriage is defined as leaving father and mother and being joined to our partner. He says that she has indeed left father and mother- to come to Israel. But his words are pregnant with the implication that now she had left father and mother, she was to marry. And his grace toward her in entering the marital covenant was to reflect Yahweh's covenant being extended to her. These ideas are developed in Ruth 3. planned the whole legal situation we encounter in Ruth 4.</p><p>And have come to a people that you didn’t know before- </p><p>She had of course "known" Israelites before. So Boaz is using the idea of 'knowing' in the Hebraic sense of having relationship with. She realized that relationship with Yahweh means a relationship also with His people. John's letters likewise point out how the vertical relationship with God must have a horizontal dimension also. Boaz realizes this and wants therefore to manifest Yahweh's acceptance of Naomi.</p>


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<p>May Yahweh repay your work, and a full reward be given you- </p><p>These are the very words of the new covenant offered to Judah in Gentile lands (<a href='B:300 31:16'>Jer 31:16</a>). Again, as noted on <a href='B:80 1:16'>Rth 1:16</a>, the book of Ruth was clearly rewritten with phrases and wordings designed to encourage the exiles to make the journey of Ruth and Naomi, and to accept Gentile converts and not oppress women, nor anyone, but to perceive the value of persons as Boaz had done. The fact Boaz says these words to her again shows him to be Yahweh manifest to her. He was to recompence her "labour" with practical care and the marriage covenant, and thereby was manifesting to her God's covenant acceptance of her.</p><p>John writes that it is our ‘labour’, in the sense of hard mental effort, to know Him and believe in Him, which will have a ‘full reward’ (<a href='B:700 1:8'>2Jn 1:8</a>). John here is alluding to the LXX of <a href='B:80 2:12'>Rth 2:12</a>, where a ‘full reward’ is given to Ruth for working hard all day gleaning in the fields. It may be that this allusion was because “the elect lady” addressed by John was in fact a proselyte widow, like Ruth. John's allusion indicates that he understands Boaz as using "labour" to refer to her mental labour of coming to faith in Yahweh. But the point is, we have to labour, as much as one might work hard walking around a lake or gleaning in the field, in order to know the Lord Jesus Christ. For He told those who walked around the lake that they should not do that labour for food, but for relationship with Him.</p><p>From Yahweh, the God of Israel, under whose wings you have come to take refuge-</p><p>Again, he sees himself as manifesting that refuge which Yahweh was extending over Ruth. This was why he was preserving her life and her personal safety as she worked in his fields. See on <a href='B:80 3:10'>Rth 3:10</a>. After "Yahweh, the God of Israel", the LXX adds “to whom you have come”, implying that Ruth’s motivation for coming to Israel was in order to come to the God of Israel and take her place under His wings.</p>


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<p>Then she said, Let me find grace in your sight, my lord- </p><p>As noted on :10, to 'find grace in the sight' of a man also means to be accepted by him as a wife (<a href='B:50 24:1'>Deu 24:1</a>). The words of both Ruth and Boaz always seem to have hints in them towards marriage; their feelings and hopes were clearly mutual, and this is the beauty of the story as romance. She was here summoning the courage to indirectly suggest to Boaz that he could accept her as his wife. In the same way as she had the courage to throw herself upon Yahweh and claim covenant relationship with him, despite being a Moabitess.</p><p>Because you have comforted me, and because you have spoken to the heart of your handmaid- </p><p>This is very much the language of the restoration prophets in their message of encouragement to Judah in Gentile lands to return to the land (Isaiah 40; Isaiah 1; <a href='B:290 66:13'>Isa 66:13</a>; <a href='B:330 3:10'>Eze 3:10</a>). As explained on <a href='B:80 1:16'>Rth 1:16</a>, the book of Ruth was rewritten under inspiration as encouragement to the exiles.</p><p>Although I am not as one of your handmaids- </p><p>This is one of a series of connections with the parable of the prodigal. As the son wanted to return to the Father as a servant although somewhat different from them, as he was a relative also, so Ruth felt. There’s an ambiguity in the last part of Ruth’s words here. It could be translated as “I don’t wish to merely be as one of your maidservants” (see NEB), with the implication, however vague, that she was thinking of marriage. This was then extended into the effective proposal she later makes to Boaz (see on <a href='B:80 3:2'>Rth 3:2</a>; <a href='B:80 3:10'>Rth 3:10</a>).</p>


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<p>At meal time Boaz said to her, Come here, and eat of the bread, and dip your morsel in the wine- </p><p>Bread and grape juice was indeed appropriate fare for workers in the oppressive heat of harvest. But the invitation from Boaz to Ruth to partake of "bread and wine" is framed as having religious overtones. For nearly all Biblical references to "bread and wine" together have a spiritual, covenantal dimension or context. He was again seeking to encourage her that she had indeed entered covenant with himself and with Yahweh whom he represented to her.</p><p>She sat beside the reapers, and they reached her parched grain, and she ate, and was satisfied, and left some of it- </p><p>The legal requirement was that a poor person could pick grain and rub it in their hands to give a little food (<a href='B:50 23:25'>Deu 23:25</a>). But this was taking that law way beyond what it said, in a spirit of grace. She was given no passing snack; she ate so much that she left some of what she was given. And we will see that this is what Boaz does with the levirate marriage law too. But the parched grain was extended to her by the reapers. They too had absorbed the spirit of grace shown by their master. And indeed, ways of grace are contagious. The superabundance of grace is shown by her having more than enough to eat, and taking back for Naomi what she had left over from the meal (:18).</p>


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<p>When she had risen up to glean, Boaz commanded his young men saying, Let her glean even among the sheaves, and don’t reproach her- </p><p>The women reaped, tying the reaped grain into bundles, which were then gathered together into shocks for transport by the men to the threshing floor. It was unsurprising that there should be some protest at this gleaner picking up as much grain as they themselves were going to take home. "Reproach" is the word used in the restoration prophecies of how a repentant, regathered Judah would not be reproached (<a href='B:290 45:17'>Isa 45:17</a>; <a href='B:290 50:7'>Isa 50:7</a>; <a href='B:290 54:4'>Isa 54:4</a>). Her boldness in asking to glean even among the sheaves was not forwardness; she was driven to it by hunger and poverty. And it was that same desperate but proactive seeking for grace which led her to as it were propose to Boaz. Ruth was childless and a widow, both of which were a reproach to a woman (<a href='B:10 30:23'>Gen 30:23</a>; <a href='B:290 4:1'>Isa 4:1</a>; <a href='B:490 1:25'>Luk 1:25</a>). Boaz again is hinting that he wished to take away her reproach amongst men- by marrying her. And it was Israel in exile who were a reproach (<a href='B:230 44:13'>Psa 44:13</a>), which could be removed from them by God's plan of redemption. "Fear not the reproach of men" (<a href='B:290 51:4'>Isa 51:4</a>) was God's word of restoration to the exiles, but it was based upon Boaz's words to Ruth. They would forget the reproach of their widowhood and never be ashamed again (<a href='B:290 54:4'>Isa 54:4</a>; <a href='B:300 31:19'>Jer 31:19</a>), after the pattern of Ruth.</p>


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<p>Also pull out some for her from the bundles, and leave it; let her glean- </p><p>Again, we see Boaz hugely expanding upon the letter of the law about gleaning. And it was this spirit which was to climax in his development of the levirate law of marriage to allow him to marry Ruth. But we note that he began with the law and extrapolated its spirit further; he didn't simply ignore it and act as he felt would be gracious according to his own native sense of justice and kindness. And there is a major lesson here. For so much that is claimed to be humanitarian aid is doing just that, and is not the same as the grace we see being developed, understood and practiced here. The law was a springboard toward grace, guiding the path and trajectory toward it; as Paul puts it, the law was a schoolmaster to lead men unto Christ.</p><p>And don’t rebuke her- </p><p>I noted on :16 that the restoration prophecy of <a href='B:290 54:4'>Isa 54:4</a> comforted the exiles that they would not be reproached again; and the same word for "rebuke" here is used in <a href='B:290 54:9'>Isa 54:9</a>, assuring them that their restoration would mean that they would not again be rebuked. Those prophecies were clearly allusive to the story of Ruth; she and Naomi are being held up as parade examples to the exiles, to return to their land and to their God. They were not to fear that their situation had put them on the wrong side of the letter of the Mosaic law, but to accept grace and reflect it to others, especially in how they treated women and Gentiles.</p>


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<p>So she gleaned in the field until evening; and she beat out that which she had gleaned, and it was about an ephah of barley- </p><p>The beating out and winnowing was done in the evening when there was generally a stronger wind. There were ten omers in one ephah, and one ephah of manna could feed a man for a day (<a href='B:20 16:16'>Exo 16:16</a>; <a href='B:20 16:36'>Exo 16:36</a>). So this was a huge amount of barley, enough to feed a man for ten days. The abundance of provision by Boaz is clear, but we note also the abundance of the harvest, when neighbouring Moab was perishing from famine. There is here confirmation that Yahweh was blessing Israel at this time.</p>


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<p>She carried it, and went into the city where her mother-in-law saw what she had gleaned. And she brought out and gave to her that which she had left after she herself had enough to eat- </p><p>I calculated on :17 that this was a huge amount of barley, enough to feed a man for ten days. She also took home for Naomi what was left over from the meal of :14. The impression is that Boaz has done what the Lord Jesus also did for the hungry [including Gentiles] who loved the God of Israel, providing them with superabundance of food so that there was much left over for people who were perishing with hunger. This was all consciously orchestrated by Boaz. He had gone way beyond the letter of the law and just wanted to articulate the lavishness of God's grace. And it is for us in our encounters with people to likewise lavish a reflection of the grace we have received.</p>


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<p>Her mother-in-law said to her, Where have you gleaned today? Where have you worked? Blessed be he who took notice of you!- </p><p>"Took notice" is s:w. "acknowledged" (<a href='B:10 38:26'>Gen 38:26</a>; <a href='B:50 21:17'>Deu 21:17</a>; <a href='B:50 33:9'>Deu 33:9</a>). Boaz had acknowledged her as a Gentile who was in covenant with Yahweh, had acknowledged her desire to be in His family. Just as Yahweh had done. The exiles (see on <a href='B:80 1:16'>Rth 1:16</a>) were likewise encouraged that they would be acknowledged and blessed (s:w. <a href='B:290 61:9'>Isa 61:9</a>).</p><p>She showed her mother-in-law with whom she had worked and said, The man’s name with whom I worked today is Boaz- </p><p>We may note that she speaks not of working for a man, nor of just being given gifts; but of working together "with" Boaz ["with" is stressed twice]. She answers the question as to "where" she worked by explaining with whom she had worked. We are increasingly getting the impression that Ruth and Boaz are unconsciously working together towards the same end conclusion, as lovers do. But as those who truly love God also do.</p>


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<p>Naomi said to her daughter-in-law, Blessed be he of Yahweh, Who has not left off His grace to the living and to the dead- </p><p>Clearly Naomi recognizes that Yahweh's grace was being articulated through that of Boaz. The Bible is clear that death is unconsciousness. But Naomi perceives that through being gracious to her and Ruth, Yahweh was also being gracious to their dead husbands. Both of them had not been spiritually strong, as discussed on Ruth 1. But His grace is very deeply perceived by Naomi; she sees His grace to her and Ruth as also in a way being grace shown to their husbands, despite their bad decisions during their lifetimes. And when analyzed, Divine grace does indeed appear to have ever increasing facets and aspects the more we consider it; His grace is therefore "manifold" or multi-coloured, as a crystal refracting light (see on <a href='B:670 4:10'>1Pe 4:10</a>). She may already have in mind now that if Boaz married Ruth and they had a child, this would be a grace to the dead Mahlon, as a seed would be raised up.</p><p>Naomi said to her, The man is a close relative to us, one of our near kinsmen- </p><p>The idea of the returned exile being saved by a goel, a redeemer, connects with the frequent descriptions of God as Judah’s redeemer at the time of the restoration; the word occurs multiple times in this context in the latter chapters of Isaiah. The possibility of a goel marrying Ruth had apparently not occurred to Naomi in <a href='B:80 1:11-13'>Rth 1:11-13</a>, where she understands the goel to only possibly marry herself, and then her resulting sons might then marry Ruth and Orpah. That the goel could marry Ruth had not previously occurred to her. Perhaps because this wasn't what the Levirate law legally required, or perhaps because she considered that no true Israelite ought to marry a Moabitess like Ruth. Or because she considered Boaz too old and possibly impotent. But now she sees beyond the letter of the law to the possibilities of grace. And this is indeed what affliction and providence lead us to.</p>


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<p>Ruth the Moabitess said, Yes, he said to me, ‘You shall stay close to my young men, until they have ended all my harvest’- </p><p>The end of all the harvest meant both the barley and wheat harvest which followed it (:23). It is emphasized that Ruth "Stay close" to the young women (s:w. :8,23). Yet she reports this to Naomi here as saying that she had been told to "stay close" to the young men. Exactly why is unclear to me. It is the same word used of how Ruth "clave" to Naomi (<a href='B:80 1:14'>Rth 1:14</a>). It is also the word of cleaving to a partner in marriage (<a href='B:10 2:24'>Gen 2:24</a>), and cleaving to Yahweh in covenant relationship (<a href='B:50 30:20'>Deu 30:20</a>; <a href='B:60 22:5'>Jos 22:5</a>; <a href='B:60 23:8'>Jos 23:8</a>). Boaz's servants were effectively him. The language is again to demonstrate that Ruth's cleaving to Boaz was an acted parable of her cleaving to Yahweh; and his usage of the word was surely to suggest that she might cleave to him in marriage. It was God's wish that His exiled people should cleave to Him (<a href='B:300 13:11'>Jer 13:11</a>).</p>


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<p>Naomi said to Ruth her daughter-in-law, It is good, my daughter, that you go out with his maidens, and that they not meet you in any other field- </p><p>This could mean that not every landowner allowed gleaning in their fields:&nbsp; <a href='B:50 24:19'>Deu 24:19</a> doesn't make allowing gleaning a binding law upon landowners. The text simply states that "When you reap your harvest in your field and have forgotten a sheaf in the field, do not go back to get it. It shall be for the foreigner, for the fatherless and for the widow". By allowing gleaners to come and pick up dropped grain, Boaz's grace was going far beyond the letter of the law. See on :2.</p><p>"Meet" is s:w. "entreat" in <a href='B:80 1:16'>Rth 1:16</a>. Naomi could see that others might be impressed by Ruth and want her association with them, perhaps with a view to marriage. But although Boaz was old, she was sure that he had to be the right candidate for Ruth because he was the relative who could raise up seed for Mahlon. She thereby put spiritual principle first. The levirate law didn't strictly apply to Ruth and she was free to marry whom she wished.</p>


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<p>So she stayed close to the maidens of Boaz, to glean to the end of barley harvest and of wheat harvest- For "stayed close", see on :21.</p><p>And she lived with her mother-in-law- </p><p>This may be a reminder that despite their feelings for each other, Boaz and Ruth didn't live together before their marriage. It was the fulfilment of Ruth's promise in <a href='B:80 1:16'>Rth 1:16</a>: "where you lodge, I will lodge". But it may also be an allusion to <a href='B:10 2:24'>Gen 2:24</a>, as there was in :11. Ruth lived with her mother, but she was to leave her and cleave to a husband. She had emigrated to Israel solely for the sake of relationship with Yahweh; she had begged Naomi not to entreat her to "leave" her (<a href='B:80 1:16'>Rth 1:16</a>). She was resigned to a single life for the sake of her devotion to Him. But she was to be surprised by grace; she was in fact going to do just that [in terms of <a href='B:10 2:24'>Gen 2:24</a>] when she married Boaz.</p>


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<p>Naomi her mother-in-law said to her, My daughter, shall I not seek rest for you, that it may be well with you?- </p><p>"Seek rest" is an idiom for finding a marriage partner. See on <a href='B:80 1:9'>Rth 1:9</a>. Ruth had given up any hope of this in order to follow Yahweh, and Naomi had stressed that returning to Israel with her would mean not finding rest in this sense. But now the possibilities of grace beyond the law occur to Naomi. The lights go on, as they have in the minds of all who start to perceive grace. It was a man who sought a wife, yet the record here stresses the initiative taken by Naomi and Ruth. <a href='B:300 31:22'>Jer 31:22</a>, in a restoration context, speaks of how “a woman shall compass a man” (AV), i:e. a woman would take the initiative. And this surely alludes to the story of Ruth and Naomi. God’s people were to take the initiative with their redeemer, believing He would respond.</p>


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<p>Now isn’t Boaz our kinsman, with whose maidens you were? Behold, he winnows barley tonight in the threshing floor- </p><p>Threshing floor at harvest time was an immoral place, associated with prostitutes and cheap women: "the harlots hire on every threshing floor of corn" (<a href='B:350 9:1'>Hos 9:1</a>). A case could be made (but see on :3) that the plan was that Ruth would come to Boaz at night whilst he was drunk, dressed up appealingly, and sexually compromise him into marrying her. This would’ve been so difficult for a woman like Ruth, who appears by all accounts an upright woman- more upright, if this were the case, than her Jewish mother-in-law who hatched the plan. The suggestion in :4 that Ruth lay down with him is indeed vague but could arguably suggest sexual contact; and "feet" there could be a euphemism as in <a href='B:330 16:25'>Eze 16:25</a>, a passage which as we shall show was in Naomi's mind. Uncovering the skirt is also capable of sexual interpretation; see on :9. The whole story, of deceiving a man into marriage, coming to him by night, when he’s likely slightly drunk... all recalls the situation of Jacob being tricked into marrying Leah [for surely Jacob couldn’t have been quite sober if he really didn’t know that the woman he was sleeping with wasn’t in fact his beloved Rachel]. The motif of deception appears common to both histories. The connection is heightened by the villagers wishing Ruth fertility like Rachel and Leah (<a href='B:80 4:11'>Rth 4:11</a>). They also wish her the fertility of Tamar (<a href='B:80 4:12'>Rth 4:12</a>)- who also deceived a man using sexual compromise. See on <a href='B:80 2:13'>Rth 2:13</a>. But Ruth was already known as a woman of integrity (:11), who wasn't chasing men (:10). This strongly weighs against the idea that she was practicing sexual manipulation.</p><p>But perhaps the simple reality was that "winnowing was generally done at night, in order to take advantage of the breeze". This meant that the grain remained there overnight, and Boaz perhaps Boaz slept by his corn because he feared it being stolen at night. Israel after all was emerging from a time of famine and the corn would have been valuable.</p>


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<p>Therefore wash yourself, anoint yourself, get dressed up, and go down to the threshing floor, but don’t make yourself known to the man until he has finished eating and drinking- </p><p>There is a lot more to this than Springsteen's "Put your makeup on, fix your hair up pretty / And meet me tonight in Atlantic City". Likewise the advice to wait until he has finished eating and drinking is not simply secular wisdom, waiting until his heart was merry. She does these things and then asks for Boaz to spread his skirt over her (:9), which although not recorded here, was also what Naomi told her to do. What is "more" to all this is that Ezekiel describes Israel's coming into covenant with God in the wilderness as involving bathing, washing, anointing and the spreading of the skirt of the covenant, which the historical record states was accompanied by Israel's representatives eating and drinking before Yahweh (<a href='B:330 16:8-12'>Eze 16:8-12</a>). And see on :5. Whilst Naomi's advice may all have been fair enough on the secular level, her language choice clearly indicates that she has the covenant at Sinai in mind. And Boaz is clearly represented as manifesting Yahweh to Ruth (see on <a href='B:80 2:1'>Rth 2:1</a>). Naomi and Ruth were not simply sexual manipulators, there was without doubt a deeply spiritual element in all this. Whether that was the sole aspect of the carefully planned encounter is open to debate, but that spiritual dimension cannot be denied.</p>


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<p>It shall be, when he lies down, that you shall note the place where he shall lie, and you shall go in, uncover his feet, and lay down; then he will tell you what you shall do- </p><p>Laying with a man and uncovering his feet could imply sexual contact; see on :2. "Feet" there could be a euphemism for the sexual organs as in <a href='B:20 4:25'>Exo 4:25</a> and <a href='B:330 16:25'>Eze 16:25</a>, a passage which as noted on :3 was in Naomi's mind. But she was apparently to note the place where he was laying, and only return to it later that night. And it was quite likely that the threshing floor had other men sleeping on it as well, protecting their piles of corn (see on :2).</p>


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<p>She said to her, All that you say I will do- </p><p>I noted on :3 that both women have consciously in mind the covenant at Sinai, and this is word for word the agreement made between Israel and Yahweh in <a href='B:20 19:8'>Exo 19:8</a>.</p>


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<p>She went down to the threshing floor, and did according to all that her mother-in-law told her- </p><p>Her complete obedience to the idea of entering covenant is emphasized. See on :5.</p>


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<p>When Boaz had eaten and drunk and his heart was merry- </p><p>The mention of this is an inconvenient truth for those who wish to portray Boaz and Ruth as parade examples of peerlessly spiritual believers who fell in love with each other. I have discussed on :2,4 whether Naomi and Ruth were being sexually manipulative in their plan. I overall decide against it. But it is simply so that human motivation is rarely pure, and faith is rarely total. The completed harvest was typically a time of sexual immorality and over eating and drinking. That Ruth should come to him precisely at this time, at night, and that he is described as having a merry heart from drinking... is all unfortunate for any argument for the peerless spirituality of Boaz and Ruth. The situation simply reminds us of their humanity. Ruth's, in that she apparently did capitalize upon Boaz's weakness, instead of inviting him to have a sober meeting with her to discuss things. Boaz's, in that every mention of a heart merry from drinking is in a very negative spiritual and moral context (<a href='B:90 25:36'>1Sa 25:36</a>; <a href='B:70 19:6'>Jdg 19:6</a>; <a href='B:70 19:22'>Jdg 19:22</a> cp. 18:20; <a href='B:110 21:7'>1Ki 21:7</a>). And yet it is through their weakness and humanity that their reality and spiritual greatness shines through. They, who were so weak and human, had such faith and spiritual insight.</p><p>He went to lie down at the end of the heap of grain. She came softly, uncovered his feet, and laid herself down- </p><p>Ruth seems to me to be a wonderful example of a spiritually ambitious person. It was unheard of in those times for a woman to propose to a man; yet by coming to him, uncovering his feet and laying under his mantle, she was stating that she wished to see him as a manifestation of God to her (<a href='B:80 3:7'>Rth 3:7</a>; <a href='B:80 3:9'>Rth 3:9</a> = <a href='B:80 2:12'>Rth 2:12</a>). She went&nbsp; after him, following him (<a href='B:80 3:10'>Rth 3:10</a>); the poor, landless Gentile aspired to be a part of a wealthy Jewish family, in order to fulfil the spirit of the Law. And she attained this. As noted on :1, this was to be the inspiration for the exiles, when a woman was to compass a man.</p>


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<p>It happened at midnight, that the man was startled and turned himself; and noticed a woman lay at his feet- </p><p>"Startled" is too mild a translation. The Hebrew is "trembled", and is used about trembling at the prospect of Divine judgment (<a href='B:290 32:11'>Isa 32:11</a>; <a href='B:330 32:10'>Eze 32:10</a> s:w:). Why would be tremble in this way if he awoke, sensing someone else near him, and find it to be the young woman whom he had his eye upon, and she was effectively proposing to him. Surely a different word would have been used, rather than one which expresses such fear and trembling in anticipation of judgment. He had got drunk (:7), and now he awakes, sober. He sees a woman near him, and he trembles at the thought that whilst drunk, he may have slept with one of the prostitutes who frequented harvest floors (<a href='B:350 9:1'>Hos 9:1</a>). He had done wrong in getting drunk. But because he realized this and trembled because of his failure, what might have been the night of his shame became the most wonderful night of his life, humanly speaking. The young woman of his dreams proposes to him. And so again we see Divine grace; that in the very midst of human failure, and recognition of that failure... God acts to pour out His grace. We have likely all experienced this in our lives, and we see it so wonderfully at this point in Boaz's life.</p>


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<p>He said, Who are you? She answered, I am Ruth your handmaid. Therefore spread your skirt over your handmaid- </p><p>But she had taken the initiative and spread his skirt over herself (:4,7). She was asking him to confirm the initiative which she had taken, and to manifest the God of Israel to her, under whose wings she had come from Moab to come under (<a href='B:80 2:12'>Rth 2:12</a> LXX). The same Hebrew words for ‘spread… skirt’ are those used to describe how the cherubim “spread their wings” (<a href='B:20 25:20'>Exo 25:20</a>; <a href='B:20 37:9'>Exo 37:9</a> etc:). She saw God manifest in that man, her goel / redeemer. To uncover the skirt of a person can mean to have sex with them (<a href='B:50 22:30'>Deu 22:30</a>; <a href='B:50 27:20'>Deu 27:20</a>). But clearly she wants marriage, redemption and family life rather than just sex. But this could play along with the possibility of sexual manipulation discussed on :2. For you didn't sleep sharing the same blanket unless you were married. But she asks him to do this because he is "a near kinsman", and not for passing pleasure or money. LXX, following the targum: "Let thy name be called upon thine handmaid to take me for a wife". Ruth was already known as a woman of integrity (:11), who wasn't chasing men (:10). This strongly weighs against the idea that she was simply practicing sexual manipulation; although see on :7</p><p>For you are a near kinsman- </p><p>But legally, in terms of levirate law, Boaz wasn't the goel. And he wasn't even the closest relative. The levirate law operated when "brothers dwell together". And that wasn't the case. Under Mosaic law, a Moabite woman was not to be married. At best it could be argued that a relative of Elimelech's could marry Naomi and raise up seed to him. But she was barren. It was a stretch of levirate law for Boaz to marry Ruth, let alone that she should take the initiative and proposition him to that effect. The idea of Ruth marrying Boaz had not initially even occurred to Naomi, so we can deduce from <a href='B:80 2:2'>Rth 2:2</a>. I suggest that Ruth was not simply being a forward, manipulative woman. She and Naomi had thought through the levirate law, and were seeking to extend its implications according to the spirit of grace rather than law. See on :12.</p>


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<p>He said, Blessed are you by Yahweh, my daughter. You have shown more grace in the latter end than at the beginning, inasmuch as you didn’t go after young men, whether poor or rich- </p><p>Heb. "You have made this last kindness greater than the first". His idea may be that she had not gone chasing men in Moab, because she wanted to follow Yahweh and not the gods of those men. That was her first grace. And now she had shown another grace or kindness, in that she wanted to marry Boaz because she perceived him to be a spiritual man and manifestation of Yahweh; and because she chose him specifically because of her respect in the principles, although not the letter, of the levirate laws of the covenant. He rightly perceives that his wealth was not an item of attraction. His usage of the word grace / kindness is slightly out of context, but we can understand it if he saw that out of it all, it was a kindness to him for a young, attractive widow to offer to marry him as an old man. Jewish tradition claims that he died soon after their marriage; perhaps his old age was one reason why the idea of Boaz marrying Ruth didn't initially occur to her. It can also be understood that her first kindness was to her late husband and his family. She wanted to raise a Godly seed for him, even though he was apparently weak in faith; and so her first kindness was that she had refused her Moabite suitors after his death. And now the second kindness was in being willing to marry an old Israelite man in order to continue her kindness to her first husband, by raising a Godly Israelite seed for him.</p><p>Boaz here recognizes that Ruth is ‘going after’ him. He feels she is showing him grace- reciprocating the grace he had shown her in the harvest fields. Just as he had invited her to see God’s skirt spread over her (<a href='B:80 2:12'>Rth 2:12</a>), so she is asking him to spread his skirt over her. Her ambition in effectively proposing to Boaz, a Gentile nobody proposing herself to a man of the Jewish establishment, is indeed inspirational. See on 2:13. The GNB probably catches the idea: "You are showing even greater family loyalty in what you are doing now than in what you did for your mother-in-law”. This is looking very positively on Ruth- she was desperately poor, childless despite a previous marriage, and to throw herself on a rich distant relative in the hope of marriage and long term support was all absolutely human and natural. But Boaz, with the imputation of goodness which comes from being in love, saw her boldness and desperation in a very positive light. He liked to think of it as her showing grace to him, the old guy.</p>


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<p>Now, my daughter, don’t be afraid; I will do to you all that you say- </p><p>Again, as noted on :5, this is the language of the covenant at Sinai. Ruth does all Naomi says, and Boaz does all Ruth says. The power of faithful, spiritually minded women is being emphasized, in a male dominated society. We note that both Boaz and Naomi call her "daughter".</p><p>For all my people in this city know that you are a worthy woman- </p><p>That Ruth was already known as a woman of integrity rather precludes the possibilities discussed on :2 that there was an element of sexual manipulation going on. Although human behaviour and motivation is rarely pure, and we cannot totally rule it out, as discussed on :7. "Worthy" is the same word translated "wealthy" in <a href='B:80 2:1'>Rth 2:1</a>. Boaz was a worthy / wealthy man, and Ruth was a worthy woman, who was to be also wealthy when she married Boaz. They were perfectly suited for each other in moral and spiritual terms, and "all my people in this city", all the family [including the nearer kinsman], knew this. If this reading is correct, the idea of them getting married would not have come as a shock to the elders of the city in Ruth 4. It also confirms my suggestion later that Boaz and Naomi had agreed that the condition of buying her field was that the purchaser marry Ruth. They had had the two months or so of barley and wheat harvest (<a href='B:80 2:23'>Rth 2:23</a>) to work things out and have some kind of courtship.</p>


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<p>Now it is true that I am a near kinsman; however there is a kinsman nearer than I- </p><p>But I explained on :9 that the levirate law didn't really define Boaz as any kind of goel. He was only that through a seeking to extend its implications according to the spirit of grace rather than law. But he goes along with the idea. She appeals to grace, and he already understands that grace goes beyond the letter of the law. <a href='B:50 24:19'>Deu 24:19</a> doesn't make allowing gleaning a binding law upon landowners. The text simply states that "When you reap your harvest in your field and have forgotten a sheaf in the field, do not go back to get it. It shall be for the foreigner, for the fatherless and for the widow". By allowing gleaners to come and pick up dropped grain, Boaz's grace was going far beyond the letter of the law. This would account for the hint in <a href='B:80 2:22'>Rth 2:22</a> that not every landowner allowed gleaning in their fields. And he was a descendant of the Canaanite prostitute Rahab, who had been allowed to marry into the princely line of Judah (<a href='B:470 1:5'>Mat 1:5</a>).</p>


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<p>Stay this night- </p><p>This presumably was because it was dangerous for a woman to walk at night, or because he didn't want Ruth to be thought of as a threshing floor prostitute (<a href='B:350 9:1'>Hos 9:1</a>) by being spotted walking near the threshing floor alone late at night. I suggested on :2 that Boaz slept by his corn to protect it from wandering thieves. But by saying this, he sets himself up already as her protector.</p><p>And it shall be in the morning, that if he will perform for you the part of a kinsman, so be it; let him do the kinsman’s part- </p><p>Although as explained on :12 the whole idea of Boaz being the goel was a long stretch of the law, he was willing to take the spirit of the law and extend it by grace. But this didn't mean that he therefore disregarded the original principle behind the grace he was willing to show. And he therefore is careful not to simply flout Divine law and principle in the expression of grace. And this is an important principle to grasp for all time. Seeing he was clearly in love with Ruth, this was no painless formality for him.</p><p>But if he will not do the part of a kinsman for you, then will I do the part of a kinsman for you, as Yahweh lives. Lie down until the morning-</p><p>The levirate laws stated only that the brother of the dead was to perform the duty of levirate marriage. And the duty only concerned "brothers dwelling together". Seeing Elimelech had left Israel, this hardly applied in this case. We get the sense throughout that Boaz wants to marry Ruth; and that he was showing far more grace than the law actually required. Just as he allowed gleaners in his fields, extrapolating from the letter of the law towards a far more gracious position; see on <a href='B:80 2:2'>Rth 2:2</a>.</p>


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<p>She lay at his feet until the morning. She rose up in the dark; for he said, Let it not be known that a woman came to the threshing floor- </p><p>This could be what he said to himself, explaining his reasoning for sending her away before others had woken up. I suggested on :13 that he asked her to stay the night because&nbsp; it was dangerous or unseemly for a woman to walk alone at night. He was concerned that people didn't think he had slept with her. Perhaps the thinking of the Mishnah (Yeb. 2:8) was already current, whereby "a man suspected of having sexual relations with a gentile woman is excluded from performing the levirate with her".</p>


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<p>He said, Bring the mantle that is on you, and hold it. She held it; and he measured six measures of barley, and laid it on her; and he went into the city- </p><p>By removing her "veil" [AV in order to hold the barley, she was effectively removing the sign of her widowed status. Surely there were other means of transporting it, but Boaz is acting in faith that indeed he will marry her.</p>


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<p>When she came to her mother-in-law, she said, How did it go, my daughter? She told her all that the man had done to her- </p><p>"Had done" rather than "had said" is perhaps significant. We could read her as meaning that he had promised to marry her. But again we cannot escape the thought that what he had "done" to her was to sleep with her or at least be sexually intimate with her, as discussed on :2. The huge amount of barley given her in :17 would then be some form of payment or at best concession that he had not acted completely correctly by her. Perhaps this whole question is indeed raised by the text, but left tantalizingly unanswered. It would be part of the story line which intrigues and holds attention, and leaves us with the caveat that for all their faith and spirituality, Ruth and Boaz were not sinless but still human.</p>


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<p>She said, He gave me these six measures of barley; for he said, ‘Don’t go empty to your mother-in-law’- </p><p>"Empty" here is s:w. <a href='B:80 1:21'>Rth 1:21</a>, where Naomi laments that she is "empty": "I went out full, and Yahweh has brought me home again empty". To be "full" was one of the blessings for obedience to the covenant, and the potential gift of God to Israel when they first entered Canaan (<a href='B:50 6:11'>Deu 6:11</a>; <a href='B:160 9:25'>Neh 9:25</a> s:w:). But she had left Israel assuming that those blessings were not fulfilled. See on <a href='B:80 1:2'>Rth 1:2</a>. Now she realized that she had seen the cup half empty instead of half full. To be empty was to be without blessing (<a href='B:10 31:42'>Gen 31:42</a>; <a href='B:20 3:21'>Exo 3:21</a>; <a href='B:50 15:13'>Deu 15:13</a>). And so here Boaz tries to indirectly persuade her that this was not the case ultimately; she was going to receive blessing such as she could never have imagined, even in this life. She felt that although she had not experienced blessing from Him, indeed she had lost the potential blessings and was without His blessings, yet still she wanted to return to Him. Contrary to Pentecostal reasoning, the experience of "blessing" was not what attracted her to Him. Rather she wanted to simply be in relationship with Him, like the prodigal son returning from Gentile lands not looking for any material blessing- and yet all the same finding it.</p>


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<p>Then she said, Sit still, my daughter, until you know how the matter will end; for the man will not rest- </p><p>"The matter will end" uses the word usually translated "fail". The idea could be "Wait and see whether our plan has failed". "The matter" is the Hebrew translated elsewhere as "word" or "thing". Not one word failed of God's plan to bring Israel from Moab into the land and give them an inheritance there (s:w. <a href='B:60 21:45'>Jos 21:45</a>; <a href='B:60 23:14'>Jos 23:14</a>). And neither would this word for Ruth's redemption fail either.</p><p>Until he has finished the thing this day- </p><p>Literally, "fulfilled the word". And Boaz did do so, manifesting God to the exile Naomi and the Gentile Ruth. The very same phrase is used of God fulfilling His prophetic word of restoration through the decree of Cyrus to restore Judah from Gentile lands to Israel (<a href='B:150 1:1'>Ezr 1:1</a>). See on <a href='B:80 1:16'>Rth 1:16</a> for the relevance of Ruth to the restoration.</p>


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<p>Now Boaz went up to the gate- </p><p>This fits exactly with Bethlehem being built on a ridge. The accuracy of fine details like this throughout the Biblical record confirm that indeed the Bible is not a fictional work of men but the inspired words of God.</p><p>And sat down there. When the near kinsman of whom Boaz spoke came by he said to him, Come over here, friend, and sit down! He turned aside, and sat down- </p><p>The near kinsman sits down, and in :2 the elders sit down. This all leads on from the information in <a href='B:80 3:18'>Rth 3:18</a> that Ruth too is sitting down, but at home, nervously and eagerly awaiting the result of the sitting down of the men. This is all part of the inspired story line and suspense. For we all want to know whether Ruth ends up having to marry a man who doesn't love her when she has already a lover. The narrative of loveless marriages, girls loving men whom they can't marry and marrying men they don't love and who don't love them... this has for ever been the stuff of Middle Eastern stories. And there is that intrigue inserted into this story, a kind of carrot to get human attention- in order to introduce us to some of the profoundest issues of Divine and human grace.</p>


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<p>He took ten men of the elders of the city, and said, Sit down here. They sat down- </p><p>Note the emphasis upon sitting down; see on :1. It's as if the cameraman of Divine inspiration is zoomed in close on the men in the scene; truly we can play Bible television with these verses.</p>


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<p>He said to the near kinsman: Naomi, who has come back out of the country of Moab, is selling the parcel of land, which was our brother Elimelech’s- </p><p>Just as Boaz had no legal necessity to allow gleaning in his fields, nor was he legally obligated to be the goel to Ruth (see previous discussions in Ruth 2, 3), so he here appears to be somewhat stretching legal truths. For this is the first we hear of Naomi owning land. Mosaic law didn't allow inheritance by a widow (<a href='B:40 27:8-11'>Num 27:8-11</a>); the property was to pass to the husband's family, not to his widow. Elimelech had long since left Israel and forsaken his inheritance, and we would assume that his parcel of land had passed already to someone else. And there appears no legal requirement for the kinsman to consider the land as jointly owned now by Ruth and Naomi, and to make purchase of the land contingent upon marrying Ruth and having children by her. The issue of property seems unrelated to the levirate law which Boaz was seeking to apply to himself. Surely he could have offered Ruth in marriage to the near kinsman, and married her if he refused.</p><p>We naturally enquire why he raises this issue of property. There are various options. It could simply be that there were Jewish laws in place at the time which we don't have access to, and Boaz is alluding to them. For in practice, the Mosaic laws would have required other practical laws added to them in order to enable to functioning of society in practice. Or perhaps the parcel of land in view had been inherited by Naomi from her father, in a situation akin to that of Zelophehad's daughters in Numbers 27; or maybe Naomi was related to her husband Elimelech, which might explain their lack of children and poor health of the two who survived to adulthood. Or perhaps it belonged to Naomi in the sense that it should have passed to Mahlon and Chilion, but as they were dead, she was their legal representative and had the right to dispose of it as they were childless (:9). Or "The property was perhaps promised to Naomi as a marriage-gift or bequeathed to her at marriage to provide for her husband's predeceasing her without leaving a child".</p><p>It was absolutely possible for women to inherit property from their father (as in <a href='B:220 42:13-15'>Job 42:13-15</a>), and for a woman who had been a period in Gentile lands to return to Israel and have her inheritance restored (<a href='B:120 8:1-6'>2Ki 8:1-6</a>). Because of her poverty, Naomi was selling the land which somehow she had legally inherited. But the need to marry Ruth if the land was purchased is not in accordance with any Mosaic legislation or even logic. Therefore it has been suggested that :5 should be translated&nbsp; "On the day you acquire the field from Naomi's hand, I am acquiring Ruth the Moabite, the wife of the deceased, to raise up the name of the deceased over his inheritance". And on reflection, the near kinsman pulls out of the property acquisition because he can see legal problems developing in the next generation if Ruth has children who would also claim it.</p><p>Maybe Boaz raises this whole issue of the property simply because he indeed did want to keep the land in the power of Ruth, and he wanted to make his advertising of his marriage to Ruth somehow incidental. He would then be using the property issue as a kind of blind, a distraction, to take attention away from his declaration of intent to marry Ruth. But we wonder why the night before he had told Ruth that he would like to be her goel, but there was a nearer kinsman who legally could do this.</p><p>My preferred answer is that Naomi, the seller, had made a condition of buying the land that the purchaser also married Ruth. Any children Ruth had would then inherit the land. And therefore Boaz had been unable to agree immediately to marry Ruth because he needed to get the near kinsmen with the first right of purchase to actually not purchase it.</p><p>I conclude, therefore, that between them, Boaz and Naomi are seeking to expand the spirit of the levirate law of Deuteronomy. The spirit of that law was that the widows should be protected and be given children. By various mechanisms and schemes, they were expanding and keeping the spirit of the law but not the letter. Yet they didn't disregard the letter of the law, but sought to give the near kinsman the opportunity to buy the field and formally turn down the chance of marrying Ruth. This is in harmony with the way that Boaz had expanded the spirit of the law about not fetching home a forgotten sheaf to mean that he allowed women to glean in his field. And this is exactly the spirit of Yahweh's redemption of His people.</p>


text:
<p>I thought to disclose it to you saying, ‘Buy it in the presence of those who sit here, and of the elders of my people’. If you will redeem it, redeem it; but if you will not redeem it, then let me know. You have first right to redeem it; and I am next in line. He said, I will redeem it- </p><p>See on :3 for the various options of interpretation. John the Baptist's comment that he came "after" Jesus, and that Jesus was the redeemer rather than he himself (<a href='B:500 1:15'>Joh 1:15</a>) contain a strange allusion to the words of the redeemer-who-was-incapable-of-redeeming in <a href='B:80 4:4'>Rth 4:4</a>. Boaz told him that "I am after thee" (AV, NEV "next in line"), but in the end the incapable-redeemer plucked off his shoe as a sign of unworthiness to redeem (<a href='B:80 4:7'>Rth 4:7</a>). And John surely also had this in mind when he commented that he was unworthy to unloose Messiah's shoe (<a href='B:500 1:27'>Joh 1:27</a>). The allusions are surely indicative of the way John felt like the unworthy / incapable redeemer, eclipsed before Boaz / Jesus.</p>


text:
<p>Then Boaz said, On the day you buy the field from the hand of Naomi, you must buy it also from Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of the dead, to raise up the name of the dead on his inheritance- </p><p>I concluded on :3 that Naomi, the seller, had made a condition of buying the land that the purchaser also married Ruth. The record doesn’t state contact between Boaz and Naomi; although see on <a href='B:80 2:11'>Rth 2:11</a> for the suggestion that they worked out this plan together in the months of barley and wheat harvest. Naomi had told Ruth to just sit tight and wait and see what Boaz would arrange over the next 24 hours. We note too that Boaz didn’t give the anonymous kinsman the full picture- he firstly mentioned the land for sale / redemption, and only then mentions that this would involve marrying Ruth and raising children by her in the name of Elimelech. The Levirate law only required brothers to raise up children to their dead brother. Elimelech had not died childless, so there was no legal requirement to raise up children in his name. Ruth’s former husband had no living brothers. Therefore Boaz was operating according to the spirit of the law and not the letter of it; there was no legal requirement for the kinsman to marry Ruth and have children by her. But Boaz seems to be playing legal and psychological games to make the anonymous man turn down the offer of marrying Ruth- so that Boaz could then marry her on the basis that this was his legal necessity. The truth seems to be that he fell in love with her at first sight, and was going through all this appearance of legal necessity in order to somehow legitimize that fact. We likewise noted how he spoke of Ruth and Naomi’s manipulation and desperate appeal to him for help to in fact be a display of Divine grace (see on <a href='B:80 3:10'>Rth 3:10</a>).</p>&nbsp;<p>If in some way the levirate law was being strictly followed, and I discussed possibilities for this line of thought on :3, then we reflect that the principle would have often required men to become polygamous. A man "must redeem" the property of a dead relative in some cases by marrying his wife; but this would have resulted in polygamy. Boaz himself may have been already married. There are times when the standards of God contradict each other, on a surface level.</p>


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<p>The near kinsman said, I can’t redeem it for myself, otherwise I will spoil my own inheritance. Take my right of redemption for yourself; for I can’t redeem it- </p><p>Land at that time was organized according to strips of land within a field, rather than owning a field. Even wealthy Boaz only owned part of the field (2:3). Strip farming was very inefficient; upon death, land was split up between the children, and then when they died, the land was split up even further. The anonymous man didn’t want to have any more children because it would mean that what he was leaving as an inheritance would be even more reduced and divided. But because of that, he remains anonymous. He was concerned about what would happen over the next generation or so. By contrast, Boaz wasn’t worried about splitting up yet further the inheritance which he was leaving- and because of that, he left an inheritance which was recorded and stretched right down to the Lord Jesus.</p><p>It seems to me that the nameless relative in Ruth 4 was like so many people today. He was interested in getting a bit more land to add to his stack; but he didn't really care for the redemption of his brother, and pulled out of the whole thing once he learnt he would have to marry another wife and have more children. He said he couldn't do this because he would spoil [AV] or endanger [NIV] his inheritance. We know that at this time, strip farming was being practiced- whereby a field was split up into parts, each of which belonged to a different person (<a href='B:80 2:3'>Rth 2:3</a>). By having more children, the man would have to split up his land into yet more parts so that each son had his strips. And the son he had by Ruth would be counted as Mahlon's son, in the spirit of the levirate marriage laws. And so his bit of land would then be separate from the land strips the man was intending to give to his existing children. Ultimately this could lead to the man's total inheritance becoming almost worthless if it was just split into tiny strips because he had too many children.</p><p>I like how the NIV has the man speaking of 'endangering' his inheritance. He was like so many people- he had say a 20 year horizon, genuinely concerned about what was best for his children in the short term, rather than thinking about his responsibility to his brother. He saw 'danger' in doing that. It could be argued that the 50 year Jubilee law meant that the land boundaries returned to how they originally were after 50 years... so perhaps [although it's hard to work out how the Jubilee law worked in practice] he was worrying about something which only had meaning for the next few decades [if that]. He wasn't a bad man; just one who was fearful and wouldn't look beyond the next 20 years or so. And I suggest the genealogy at the end of Ruth 4 comments upon this- that man is anonymous, his name never went down in history, whereas Boaz who loved his brother and didn't focus solely on his own immediate family went on to be the ancestor of both David and the Lord Jesus Himself.</p><p>Another possibility is that the man thought that marriage to Ruth was bound to spoil or destroy his inheritance or family, as she had that of Elimelech. He considered her a femme fatale. He may have seen this as just judgment for marrying a Moabitess. And he wasn't going to do the same. In this case we see how utterly wrong he was. He would be representative of the legalistic Jewish xenophobes of the postexilic period- who missed out on so much because of their attitudes.</p>


text:
<p>Now this was the custom in former time in Israel- </p><p>It can be noted that there are Aramaic terms in this verse. This confirms my suggestion on <a href='B:80 1:16'>Rth 1:16</a> that the book of Ruth was rewritten in exile, presenting Naomi and Ruth as examples to the exiles who were likewise intended to return to their land their God. This would explain why at this point, the author or editor sees the need to explain what the customs were "in former time in Israel", because the readership would not know this.</p><p>Concerning redeeming and concerning exchanging, to confirm all things: a man took off his shoe, and gave it to his neighbour; and this was the way of affirmation in Israel- </p><p>This custom indicates that the law of <a href='B:50 25:9'>Deu 25:9</a> had been somewhat reduced in severity and altered. For there is no mention of spitting. We could read this as an indication of Israel’s apostasy from God’s law; or we could consider that even in Old Testament times, the essence of the Law was what was important rather than keeping the letter of it. However I have suggested on :3-5 that the levirate law did not at all require anyone to marry Ruth. Perhaps that is why the spitting was not done, only the removal of the shoe as a sign that they had indeed made the agreement.</p>


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<p>So the near kinsman said to Boaz, Buy it for yourself. He took off his shoe- </p><p>We notice that this was done "in the presence of the elders" (:2), just as was required by the law of <a href='B:50 25:7-9'>Deu 25:7-9</a> if the levirate law was not followed. But there was no spitting in the face, because actually the law did not require the kinsman to marry Ruth. That was an extension of the law being added by Boaz and Naomi. However :7 may imply that this whole things was nothing to do with levirate law in itself, and taking off the shoe was simply a token of confirmation of an agreement.</p>


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<p>Boaz said to the elders and to all the people, You are witnesses this day, that I have bought all that was Elimelech’s, and all that was Chilion’s and Mahlon’s, from the hand of Naomi- </p><p>Presumably by this point, Naomi has appeared on the scene. Clearly there has been more collusion between her and Boaz than is recorded. The order Elimelech - Chilion - Mahlon may reflect the order in which they had died.</p>


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<p>Moreover Ruth the Moabitess, the wife of Mahlon, I have purchased to be my wife, to raise up the name of the dead on his inheritance, that the name of the dead not be cut off from among his brothers, and from the gate of his place. You are witnesses this day- </p><p>They were standing in the gate of his place, in the gate of Bethlehem (:1). Although Mahlon had been but a child when he left Bethlehem, he was still counted as being from there and somehow was rooted to the land of his inheritance. "To raise up the name of the dead on his inheritance" seems another attempt to connect the property issue to the marriage of Ruth (see on :3). This was not a connection strictly made by the levirate law. The seed did not have to be raised upon the geographical land inheritance of the deceased person. But that would indeed have been according to the spirit of the law; but it was not the letter. Naomi's selling of the land conditional upon the purchaser marrying Ruth was (see on :5) was therefore a reflection of how she [and Boaz] had worked out the spirit of the law. And indeed there is the nail-biting moment when the nearer kinsman has the opportunity to marry Ruth. When she's in love with Boaz and he with her. This arose because of their genuine desire to be obedient to the law. So in terms of the narrative, this statement of Boaz that he is going to marry Ruth leaves us all with the same sense of relief and triumph which we imagine in his voice.</p>


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<p>All the people who were in the gate and the elders said, We are witnesses- </p><p>Passers by had crowded around the seated elders to witness what was happening. Marriage was to be publically testified. There was not necessarily any documentary evidence, but marriage was publically acknowledged by the surrounding society in whatever form was then current. This can help us in defining marriage today.</p><p>May Yahweh make the woman who has come into your house like Rachel and like Leah, who built the house of Israel; and treat you worthily in Ephrathah, and bring you fame in Bethlehem- </p><p>See on <a href='B:80 3:2'>Rth 3:2</a>; <a href='B:80 4:12'>Rth 4:12</a>. We recall that Elimelech was from Ephrath (<a href='B:80 1:2'>Rth 1:2</a>), and perhaps Boaz was too, as he was a relative of Elimelech. The people perceived that Boaz wanted to build up the family of Elimelech, which had been wiped out by the death of his sons childless and his apparent failure to have any other children. This was grace indeed, to be so concerned about building up your brother's family, when Boaz surely had his own family. But it was as a result of this concern that his name is remembered; because we know nothing of his children, but we do know that his child by Ruth led to the Lord Jesus. "Worthily" is the word for "virtuous", used of Ruth in <a href='B:80 3:11'>Rth 3:11</a>. They were seen as a match for each other, as they were both virtuous people.</p>


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<p>Let your house be like the house of Perez, whom Tamar bore to Judah, of the seed which Yahweh shall give you of this young woman- </p><p>Tamar’s fertility was legendary because despite being in middle age, one act of intercourse resulted in her having two children [twins]. The comparison with Rachel and Leah also seems forced, because they both had fertility problems; we have an example here of people using traditional terms of blessing, rather like singing hymns, without putting any meaning into the words. What unites all these three women is the fact that they were sexually manipulative, and this would support the impression we could possibly take from the record of Ruth’s approach to Boaz that night at the threshing floor.</p>


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<p>So Boaz took Ruth, and she became his wife; and he went in to her, and Yahweh gave her conception, and she bore a son- </p><p>The rubric for procreation usually found in the Bible is that a man goes in to a woman, she conceives and bares a child. But here there is added that "Yahweh gave her conception". We wonder if she had been barren before. Perhaps that is why she more easily resigned herself to coming to Israel to serve Yahweh and being Naomi's carer, resigning the hope of remarriage. She imagined that if she did remarry, it would be a sad marriage [for those times] as she would be barren. However, her enthusiasm for Boaz, himself an old man, and the whole plan about him marrying her to raise up seed for Mahlon, was therefore all done even more in faith.</p>


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<p>The women said to Naomi, Blessed be Yahweh, who has not left you this day without a near kinsman; and let his name be famous in Israel- </p><p>The 'being a kinsman' to Naomi was felt to have only been achieved when a son was born. But grammatically, the near kinsman who would be famous and a restorer of life (:14) appears to refer to the baby boy. And this would then look forward to how this child's descendant would ultimately be the Lord Jesus, the ultimate restorer of life.</p>


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<p>He shall be to you a restorer of life, and sustain you in your old age, for your daughter-in-law, who loves you, who is better to you than seven sons, has borne him- </p><p><a href='B:290 56:3-8'>Isa 56:3-8</a> seems to allude to Naomi, Ruth and Boaz. The "dry tree" who was a eunuch [Boaz? Naomi?] and the Gentile [Ruth] who had taken hold of the covenant would be given a destiny "better than of sons and daughters", a quotation from <a href='B:80 4:15'>Rth 4:15</a>. Naomi has said she is barren (see on <a href='B:80 1:11'>Rth 1:11</a>), and we can deduce from <a href='B:80 4:13'>Rth 4:13</a> that Ruth was also. And at his age perhaps Boaz was impotent. Perhaps this was why the idea of Ruth marrying him didn't initially occur to Naomi. Out of every human inadequacy and impossibility, God raised up a seed, through using two women and a man who had faith that "God is able". And that seed was to continue to the conception of the Lord Jesus by the faithful virgin Mary, also from Bethlehem.</p><p>Hezekiah apparently chose to be a eunuch for the Kingdom's sake. There is the implication in <a href='B:290 56:3-8'>Isa 56:3-8</a> that his example inspired others in Israel to make the same commitment. They are comforted by Isaiah: "Neither let the eunuch say, Behold, I am a dry tree. For thus saith the Lord unto the eunuchs that keep my Sabbaths, and choose the things that please me, and take hold (the same Hebrew word is used five times about Hezekiah, <a href='B:140 29:3'>2Ch 29:3</a>; <a href='B:140 29:34'>2Ch 29:34</a>; <a href='B:140 31:4'>2Ch 31:4</a>; <a href='B:140 32:5'>2Ch 32:5</a>; <a href='B:140 32:7'>2Ch 32:7</a>) of my covenant; even unto them will I give in mine house, and within my walls a place and a name better than of sons and daughters: I will give them an everlasting name, that shall not be cut off". Hezekiah had lamented that he would die without a seed (<a href='B:290 38:12'>Isa 38:12</a> Heb:; Isaiah 53), and so did those who had also become (in their minds?) eunuchs for the sake of the Kingdom. There was that human desire for a seed, a "house" to perpetuate their name. But they are promised a name in God's house (family) in the Kingdom, better than of sons and daughters in this life. This alludes to <a href='B:80 4:15'>Rth 4:15</a>, where Ruth is described as being better than sons to Naomi. In other words, Ruth's having a child was a living exemplification of the Kingdom now. How God acted with her is how He will with all His people, who put Him first and take hold of covenant with Him.</p>


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<p>Naomi took the child and laid it in her bosom, and became nurse to it- </p><p>The barren Naomi (see on <a href='B:80 1:11'>Rth 1:11</a>) is portrayed as becoming able to nurse the baby. That would have been a miracle, reflective of the new life God was giving to all involved. Or it could be that she symbolically held the child to her breast, rather like Bilhah giving birth upon Rachel's knees so that Rachel could claim the child as hers (<a href='B:10 30:3'>Gen 30:3</a>).</p>


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<p>The neighbouring women gave him a name, saying, There is a son born to Naomi! And they named him Obed. He is the father of Jesse, the father of David-</p><p>The naming of a child by women rather than the father is unusual (<a href='B:490 1:62'>Luk 1:62</a>). Perhaps it was because Boaz died soon after the marriage, as Jewish tradition claims. But it fits in with the theme in the book of the meaning and power of women, in a male based society. "Obed" means 'servant' and this was not a great name for a child in those times, especially for the son of a wealthy man like Boaz. But the spirit of the family was such that they perceived the spirit of servant leadership.</p>


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<p>Now this is the history of the generations of Perez: Perez became the father of Hezron- </p><p>The genealogy now given jumps many generations and so those who are mentioned must all have purpose. Beginning with Perez, son of Tamar who played the prostitute to Judah, we surely have Tamar [who was likely also a Gentile] being paralleled with Ruth. This could confirm the theme of sexual manipulation discussed on <a href='B:80 3:2'>Rth 3:2</a>. But I think the similarity is more in that they had both worked out the spirit of the law, and then went out and in their own ways tried to practice it with the appropriate men in their lives.</p>


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<p>and Hezron became the father of Ram, and Ram became the father of Amminadab- </p><p>Comparing with 1 Chronicles 2, some generations are skipped. But the point is that it included Amminadab, meaning "my kinsman, or paternal uncle (ammi) is generous". The idea is being presented that generosity and being a true kinsman redeemer ran in the family. Not only Boaz had been like this, but his ancestor too. The idea is that this would characterize the line of David, and would come to full term in the Messianic Son of David.</p>


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<p>and Amminadab became the father of Nahshon, and Nahshon became the father of Salmon- </p><p>Amminadab, the generous kinsman like Boaz (see on :19), had a descendant called Nahshon, meaning 'snake'. The abrupt juxtaposition is so that we understand that spirituality is not at all inherited genetically. It is a case of consciously choosing to follow good examples.</p>


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<p>and Salmon became the father of Boaz, and Boaz became the father of Obed-</p><p><a href='B:470 1:5'>Mat 1:5</a> says that Salmon had Boaz by Rahab. Yet Rahab lived some time earlier. I therefore suggest that Salmon was the ancestor of Boaz [not the literal father], through the child he had from Rahab. This is mentioned to highlight the fact that Boaz was descended from Rahab, and therefore was generous to the strangers and saw nothing wrong with a Moabitess marrying into the congregation of Yahweh.</p>


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<p>and Obed became the father of Jesse, and Jesse became the father of David- </p><p>The function of the narrative is to set up David as the intended outcome to a line which had arisen out of barren, Gentile women, domestic tragedy, servant leadership (see on :17), faith and perception of grace. And this is the line which the New Testament genealogies show continued to the Lord Jesus.</p>


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<p>Now there was a man of Ramathaim Zophim, of the hill country of Ephraim, and his name was Elkanah, son of Jeroham, son of Elihu, son of Tohu, son of Zuph, an Ephraimite- </p><p>We note that this continues on from Judges-Ruth, where people from Ephraim are generally apostate. So here we have an example of a family holding on to the covenant amidst general apostacy from it. Elkanah means "God obtains" and his father "Tohu" means "depression", and he was to be taught the meaning of his name through obtaining Samuel after the years of Hannah's depression. We too are set up by God with challenges and things we need to perceive, and are led by Him to that understanding- including through the experiences of our partners.</p>


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<p>He had two wives; the name of one was Hannah and the name of the other Peninnah; Peninnah had children but Hannah had no children- </p><p>Issues related to barrenness are so common in the lives of the Old Testament faithful. To not have children was seen as the ultimate poverty and sign of God's lack of blessing. The equivalent in modern society may be a sense that God has not come through for us in life as we think He ought or might have done; whether or not the issue is fertility. "Hannah" means Yah's gift or grace; and like Elkanah (see on :1), she had to be brought to understand God's intention for her, and to realize that children like all blessings don't come automatically but are God's gift by grace. "Peninnah" means rubies, and perhaps <a href='B:240 31:10'>Pro 31:10</a> has her in view when saying that the virtuous woman (cp. Hannah) is worth more than rubies / Peninnah.</p>


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<p>This man went up out of his city from year to year to worship and to sacrifice to Yahweh of Armies in Shiloh- </p><p>Elkanah is presented as faithful to the covenant. And yet the Mosaic commandment was that every male should appear before Yahweh three times / year (<a href='B:20 23:17'>Exo 23:17</a>). But he went up only once / year, and yet is presented as a righteous man. Clearly most of God's people didn't keep the law of Moses perfectly, and yet legitimate relationship with God was still possible:&nbsp; And yet the fact that was true, was therefore by His grace alone.</p><p>The two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, priests to Yahweh, were there- </p><p>Phinehas means "mouth of a serpent", Hophni is less clear, possibly "one who punches / slaps with his hands". Strange names for men who were supposed to be priests, and a reflection on Eli. "Eli" could be a variation on El, but it seems more likely to mean high / proud one. And for all his apparent humility, that was indeed his problem in the end.</p>


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<p>When the day came that Elkanah sacrificed, he gave to Peninnah his wife and to all her sons and her daughters portions- </p><p>The idea may be that they ate a peace offering together, presided over by Elkanah, and he shared out the portions of the sacrifice to the whole family to eat, including little children. They ate of the symbol of the covenant relationship which their parents had, and this may or may not be helpful in formulating an understanding of whether children should partake of the bread and wine in our dispensation.</p>


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<p>but to Hannah he gave a double portion, for he loved Hannah, but Yahweh had shut up her womb- </p><p>"But Yahweh had shut up..." may hint that Elkanah's high view of Hannah was not at that point shared by God. He gave her, literally, "the nose portion". This could be a metaphor for "double", or it could be read literally, as if the gift of this part of the animal was a symbolic sign of favouritism. We will note on 1 Samuel 2 that she says many things which seem to betray a very unspiritual and bitter heart, even though she was of a woman of faith. We note again the usage of contemporary medical understandings ["phenomenological language"], a point to bear in mind when we come to the language of demon possession used to describe mental illness in the New Testament. For infertility is not due to a literally closed womb.</p>


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<p>Her rival provoked her severely, to make her fret because Yahweh had shut up her womb- </p><p>We have the situation of Rachel and Leah repeated again, whereby the barren wife was loved more by the husband and was provoked by the other partner. It is commendable however that she didn't resort to trying to get her husband to sleep with another woman and bear a child symbolically for her. The way circumstances repeat in life and between persons, both contemporary with each other and historically, is typical of how God works; we are intended to see the similarities with others and take lessons and encouragement. This is what makes the Bible a living word, because the characters selected for us to meet are all designed to speak directly to us in our lives, and to confirm our deep sense that man is not alone, and nothing we pass through is in fact totally unique to us. Peninnah made Hannah "fret" (<a href='B:90 1:6'>1Sa 1:6</a>), and yet when she has Samuel she asks God to "thunder", s:w. "fret", against her enemies, clearly having Peninnah in view (<a href='B:90 2:10'>1Sa 2:10</a>). Hannah imagines He will do this when His "anointed king" is reigning, and clearly she understood Samuel to be that. He didn't become that; and the fact he anointed David to be king rather than himself being anointed is pointed poof of the fact that her bitter expectations and hopes didn't come true as she intended. There seems no forgiveness, just a desire for judgment and to make Peninnah feel the same way as she had been made to feel; and a desire for the manifestation of the anointed King in order for her to see her enemy made to feel how she had felt, and worse.</p>


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<p>This went on year after year when she went up- </p><p>It is again emphasized that they made once yearly pilgrimages to the tabernacle. And yet the Mosaic commandment was that every male should appear before Yahweh three times / year (<a href='B:20 23:17'>Exo 23:17</a>). But Elkanah went up only once / year, and yet is presented as a righteous man. See on :3. This is another indication that Hannah was not the peerlessly spiritual woman which she is sometimes made out to be.</p><p>To the house of Yahweh- </p><p>The temple of Yahweh wasn't then built, so this anachronism may reflect how these historical books were rewritten under Divine inspiration, after the exile. Or it could simply be that a more permanent structure had been built for the tabernacle.</p><p>She provoked her, therefore she wept and didn’t eat- </p><p>The idea may be that she didn't eat of the peace offerings, because she didn't feel at peace neither with God nor with the rest of the family because of Peninnah being so horrible to her.</p>


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<p>Elkanah her husband said to her, Hannah, why do you weep? Why don’t you eat? Why is your heart grieved? Am I not better to you than ten sons?- </p><p>Perhaps he alludes to the happy Naomi, for whom her daughter in law's love was better than seven sons. And he wonders why Hannah can't be like her. Weeping and not eating could be associated with fasting; but also it could be the psychological outcome of cruel teasing and provocation. Or perhaps there was a little of both. The loss of appetite associated with her depression turned into fasting before Yahweh for a child. Or as suggested on :8, it may mean she declined to partake in the eating of the peace offering.</p>


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<p>So Hannah rose up after they had eaten and drunk in Shiloh. Now Eli the priest was sitting on his seat by the doorpost of Yahweh’s temple- </p><p>We have just read that she didn't eat (:7,8), which I suggested may mean she declined the meat and wine of the peace offering. But now she did, because her mood had changed because she had decided to make a vow (:11) and pray for a child with a prayer believed in so strongly that she believed and felt as if she had received the answer; for that is the true nature of faith in prayer (<a href='B:470 21:22'>Mat 21:22</a>).</p>


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<p>She was in bitterness of soul and prayed to Yahweh and wept bitterly- </p><p>I suggested on :9 that what we now read may be explaining how it came about that she was not eating and drinking the peace offering again, when previously she had not been. When we read in :18 that after her vow she ate, this would be linking back to :9. Who we are as persons is effectively our prayer and plea to God. This conception of prayer explains why often weeping, crying, waiting, meditating etc. are spoken of as "prayer" , although there was no specific verbalizing of requests (<a href='B:230 5:1-2'>Psa 5:1-2</a>; <a href='B:230 6:8'>Psa 6:8</a>; <a href='B:230 18:1-3'>Psa 18:1-3</a>; <a href='B:230 18:6'>Psa 18:6</a>; <a href='B:230 40:1'>Psa 40:1</a>; <a href='B:230 42:8'>Psa 42:8</a>; <a href='B:230 64:1'>Psa 64:1</a> Heb:; <a href='B:230 65:1-2'>Psa 65:1-2</a>; <a href='B:230 66:17-20'>Psa 66:17-20</a>; <a href='B:450 8:22'>Zec 8:22</a>). The association between prayer and weeping is especially common: <a href='B:90 1:10'>1Sa 1:10</a>; <a href='B:230 39:12'>Psa 39:12</a>; <a href='B:230 55:1-2'>Psa 55:1-2</a>; <a href='B:500 11:41-42'>Joh 11:41-42</a>; <a href='B:650 5:7'>Heb 5:7</a>, especially in the Lord's life and the Messianic Psalms. "The Lord has heard the voice of my weeping. The Lord has heard my supplication; the Lord will receive my prayer" (<a href='B:230 6:8-9'>Psa 6:8-9</a>) crystallizes the point.</p>


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<p>She vowed a vow and said, Yahweh of Armies-</p><p>Poor Hannah was driven through the sorrow of her life to coin the phrase "Yahweh of hosts" for the first time in Scripture, so strong became her sense of the strength and manifestation of Yahweh in His Angels. The close association between Angels [Yahweh's hosts] and answered prayer resulted in many of the early believers conceiving of God in terms of an Angel, as Jacob in particular did. Hannah is another example; she prayed to the Lord of Hosts (Angels) to "look on the affliction of Your handmaid"; and the Angels are God's eyes through which He looks on us. She came to pray "before the Lord" (:15)- i:e. before the Angel dwelling over the ark. Angels are associated with conception- the cases of Samson, John and Jesus quickly spring to mind.</p><p>If You will indeed look on the affliction-</p><p>She was thinking of Leah, who considered the end of her barrenness to have been Yahweh looking on her affliction (<a href='B:10 29:32'>Gen 29:32</a> s:w:). She formed her faith from considering this Biblical precedent. But the same phrase is also used of Yahweh's deliverance of Israel from Egypt (<a href='B:20 3:7'>Exo 3:7</a>; <a href='B:20 4:31'>Exo 4:31</a>; <a href='B:50 26:7'>Deu 26:7</a> etc:). She reasoned that the God who had done that for His people could just as easily give her conception.</p><p>Of Your handmaid and remember me and not forget Your handmaid, but will give to Your handmaid a boy, then I will give him to Yahweh all the days of his life, and no razor shall come on his head- </p><p>She wanted not merely a child to remove her reproach amongst men, but specifically a male so she could present him as a Nazirite to God. Although they were not Levites, by promising him as a Nazirite she was effectively asking for him to be counted as a Levite. Hannah's request in <a href='B:90 1:11'>1Sa 1:11</a> that God look upon her affliction and answer it was heard, and she became an inspiration to her descendant David; who often makes the same request, unashamed to be inspired by the example of a woman (s:w. <a href='B:100 16:12'>2Sa 16:12</a>; <a href='B:230 9:13'>Psa 9:13</a>; <a href='B:230 25:18'>Psa 25:18</a> and so often in the Psalms). See on :15.</p><p>It seems from :21 that they were in the habit of making a vow every year, hence Hannah decides to vow that if she has a son, she will give him to Yahweh's service.</p>


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<p>As she continued praying before Yahweh, Eli saw her mouth-</p><p><a href='B:580 4:2'>Col 4:2</a> alludes to the LXX of this verse, bidding us all be like Hannah and continue in prayer; I noted on :11 that her example served as a template for David, as it should for us.</p>


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<p>Now Hannah spoke in her heart, only her lips moved but her voice was not heard. Therefore Eli thought she was drunk- </p><p>The tacit implication is that Eli had seen drunk people in the tabernacle before. The low level of spirituality in Israel is a continued theme of the Old Testament. We also have a reflection of how unspiritual and solely "religious" was Eli; the concept of praying silently rather than out loud was totally foreign to him. There is also the implication that Eli didn't hear her voice, but God did.</p>


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<p>Eli said to her, How long will you be drunk? Put away your wine from you- </p><p>It's possible that most of the then existent Old Testament was rewritten under inspiration in the exile. Hannah becomes the template for the exiles; for they too were "afflicted" as she was (:11), and are described as drunk but not with wine who would be justified and their tormentors punished, surely an allusion to Hannah (<a href='B:290 51:21'>Isa 51:21</a>; <a href='B:290 51:23'>Isa 51:23</a>). See on :15.</p>


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<p>Hannah answered, No, my lord, I am a woman of a sorrowful spirit- </p><p>Israel in affliction in Egypt were of sorrowful spirit (s:w. <a href='B:20 6:9'>Exo 6:9</a>). As noted on :11, she clearly had God's past salvation of His people from Egypt in mind. She felt that her domestic situation was as theirs, and likewise believed that God could miraculously save her from it. We note that this is the extent of depression and desperation that is inflicted by those who goad others over their supposed spiritual inferiority and God's supposed displeasure with them. We think of those disfellowshipped or tormented by others over their marital status, to the point&nbsp; they feel driven to suicide.</p><p>I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink, but I poured out my soul before Yahweh- </p><p>It was Judah in captivity whose soul was poured out (s:w. <a href='B:310 2:12'>Lam 2:12</a>; <a href='B:310 2:19'>Lam 2:19</a>); see on :14. And David again took inspiration from his ancestor Hannah in speaking of himself likewise in <a href='B:230 42:4'>Psa 42:4</a>; see on :11.</p>


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<p>Don’t count your handmaid a wicked woman, for I have been speaking out of the abundance of my complaint and my provocation- </p><p>She meant, she had been speaking to God in her heart. "Wicked woman" is AV "daughter of Belial", the term used of Eli's sons. She may be implying that she was not in fact drunk as Eli's sons often were. In this case, Eli criticized her for doing what his sons did. It's a psychological classic, taking out on someone else what should be directed to ones own family.</p>


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<p>Then Eli answered, Go in peace, and may the God of Israel grant your petition that you have asked of Him- </p><p>Eli's unspirituality is again revealed, for he thinks that prayer is simply asking God for petitions. But in fact she had been pouring out her soul to God, telling Him all her feelings about the provocation of Peninnah (:16). Let us also not think that prayer is simply requests; read David's prayers in his Psalms, and see how few of his words are actually requests.</p>


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<p>She said, Let your handmaid find grace in your sight- </p><p>Corrupt and unspiritual as Eli was, she still saw him as Yahweh's representative. His acceptance of her therefore encouraged her that God likewise had accepted her.</p><p>So the woman went her way and ate, and her face wasn’t sad any more-</p><p>She ate, of the peace offerings. I suggested on :9 that the mention of the fact that she again "ate" is then explained by :10-17. Her newfound joy was because she had the faith that feels and acts as if what we asked for has been granted, even though we don't yet have it (<a href='B:470 21:22'>Mat 21:22</a>).</p><p>The LXX adds that they stayed in an inn. Hannah’s song was clearly a major influence in the mind of Mary. But there are some background similarities as well as the verbal ones. The LXX of <a href='B:90 1:18'>1Sa 1:18</a> [not the Hebrew text] speaks of Elkanah and Hannah staying in a katalyma on their journey to Shiloh- the very word used of the “inn” in whose stable Mary had to stay. If we ask why Mary based her song so heavily on that of Hannah, we find a clue in considering how she was greeted by the Angel as “favoured” (<a href='B:490 1:28'>Luk 1:28</a>). The Greek kecharitomene virtually translates the Hebrew name ‘Hannah’. The record is written in Greek, but Mary was a Jewess and spoke Aramaic and Hebrew; and probably the Angel spoke to her in those languages. So the link would have been all the stronger- ‘Hail, Hannah-like one’. And this set the mind of Mary thinking about Hannah, and in the days between hearing these words and meeting Elisabeth, Mary had perceived the similarities between her position and that of Hannah. She allowed the spirit of Hannah to genuinely become hers, in perceptive obedience to the Angel’s bidding. She came to share God’s perception of her as a woman like Hannah. ‘Hannah’ comes from the Hebrew root hnn – favour. Mary is told that she has been favoured / ‘Hannah-ed’ by God (<a href='B:490 1:30'>Luk 1:30</a>)- as if to lead her to see the similarities between her and Hannah. And she responds magnificently, by alluding to Hannah’s song so closely. Tragically as we shall see, she later came to be more influenced by the world’s perception of both herself and her Son. The theme of joy is very great in her song- again, because she was obedient to the greeting “Hail!”, literally, ‘rejoice!’.</p><p>The points of connection between the songs of Hannah and Mary's Magnificat are really quite detailed: </p><p><a href='B:90 1:3'>1Sa 1:3</a> = <a href='B:490 1:7'>Luk 1:7</a>; <a href='B:90 1:18'>1Sa 1:18</a> = <a href='B:490 1:38'>Luk 1:38</a>; <a href='B:490 1:30'>Luk 1:30</a>; <a href='B:90 2:1'>1Sa 2:1</a> = <a href='B:490 1:46'>Luk 1:46</a>; <a href='B:90 1:11'>1Sa 1:11</a> = <a href='B:490 1:48'>Luk 1:48</a>; <a href='B:90 2:2'>1Sa 2:2</a> = <a href='B:490 1:49'>Luk 1:49</a>; <a href='B:90 2:4'>1Sa 2:4</a> = <a href='B:490 1:51'>Luk 1:51</a>; <a href='B:90 2:3'>1Sa 2:3</a> = <a href='B:490 1:51'>Luk 1:51</a>; <a href='B:90 2:4'>1Sa 2:4</a> = <a href='B:490 1:52'>Luk 1:52</a>; <a href='B:90 2:8'>1Sa 2:8</a> = <a href='B:490 1:52'>Luk 1:52</a>; <a href='B:90 2:5'>1Sa 2:5</a> = <a href='B:490 1:53'>Luk 1:53</a>; <a href='B:90 2:10'>1Sa 2:10</a> = <a href='B:490 1:69'>Luk 1:69</a>; <a href='B:90 2:26'>1Sa 2:26</a> = <a href='B:490 2:52'>Luk 2:52</a>.</p>


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<p>They rose up in the morning early and worshipped before Yahweh and returned home to Ramah, and Elkanah lay with Hannah his wife, and Yahweh remembered her- </p><p>The worship may imply thankfulness. As noted on :18, Hannah really believed the prayer would be heard, even though she had not yet tried to conceive again. "Remembered" doesn't mean God had forgotten. The word is often used of what man does to God, and is translated "burn [incense]" and other terms appropriate to prayer to God. There is a mutuality between God and man, which especially functions through prayer. We 'make mention' of things to God in prayer, and He respects that and in turn, in His own council of Heaven, mentions or makes a mark for us in response. This is why the Hebrew for "ask" is the same for "heard" regarding prayer and the answers to prayer. See on :20.</p>


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<p>When the time had come, Hannah conceived and bore a son- </p><p>The time coming is applied to both the conception and the birth of the child. With respect to the conception, the idea would be that God indeed had specified a time for this in His plan for Hannah from the beginning of the world. But all the same, without Hannah's intense prayer, this would not have been actualized. And it follows therefore that there are so many potentials which aren't actualized by intense prayer.</p><p>And she named him Samuel, saying, Because I have asked him of Yahweh-</p><p>"Samuel" means both 'asked of God' and 'heard of God'. This exemplifies what was discussed on :19; that God and man are in mutual relationship. What we ask, He hears in the sense of answering. Samuel's name memorialized how she had asked and had such faith in the answer coming.</p>


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<p>The man Elkanah and all his household went up to offer to Yahweh the yearly sacrifice and his vow- </p><p>It seems they were in the habit of making a vow every year, hence Hannah decides to vow that if she has a son, she will give him to Yahweh's service. LXX adds "and his tithes". It was surely clear that the tithes were being abused by Eli's family, but Elkanah still brought them. Their abuses led to men sinning against Yahweh by not bringing tithes and offerings (<a href='B:90 2:23-24'>1Sa 2:23-24</a>). But Elkanah is commended for not being amongst those made to stumble in this way. See on :25.</p>


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<p>But Hannah didn’t go up, for she said to her husband, Not until the child is weaned, then I will bring him that he may appear before Yahweh and stay there forever- </p><p>The idea may be that she didn't go up because she had no vow to bring, whereas Elkanah did (:21); because her fulfilment of her vow would be when Samuel was old enough to be brought to the temple and left there, as a living sacrifice. We see here Hannah's individual, personal relationship with Yahweh; her vow was different to that of her husband's. This was at a time when religion was largely a male preserve, and the woman just followed along with the husband's religion. Elkanah encouraged her to do what was right to her.</p>


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<p>Elkanah her husband said to her, Do what seems good to you. Wait until you have weaned him, only may Yahweh establish His word. So the woman waited and nursed her son until she weaned him-</p><p>I noted on :22 that Elkanah encouraged her to do what was right to her. And this reflects how within a good, spiritual marriage, the devotions of the wife and husband may be quite different. Hence the significance of LXX "but may the Lord establish that which comes out of thy mouth". He saw Samuel as her project whilst he had his own projects for Yahweh, his vows he brought yearly; but Samuel was his wife's project.</p>


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<p>When she had weaned him she took him up with her, with a three-year-old bull, an ephah of meal and a bottle of wine, and brought him to Yahweh’s sanctuary in Shiloh- </p><p>The age of the bull was perhaps to represent Samuel, who would have been weaned by three years old (see on <a href='B:90 2:11'>1Sa 2:11</a>). If Samuel was only three years old when given to Eli, his later spiritual maturity and devotion is the more remarkable; for he grew up surrounded by bad examples, and only the annual visit of his parents to impart true spiritual guidance. The bread ["meal"] and wine were associated with the voluntary peace offerings. This formed the basis for the later institution of bread and wine in the breaking of bread. If we ask "And where is the animal that is devoted and eaten?" the answer would be that it represents the Lord Jesus and also ourselves, as living sacrifices (<a href='B:520 12:1'>Rom 12:1</a>) because we are "in Him".</p><p>The child was young-</p><p>Evidence enough that a child can still serve God.</p>


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<p>They killed the bull and brought the child to Eli- </p><p>The "they" is presumably Eli's sons, whom we learn usually abused the offering and took it all for themselves. But just as Elkanah still offered tithes despite the abuse of them by these men (see on :21), so Hannah offered the bull. She knew it was done to Yahweh despite the abuse of His representatives. She separated church from God, in a way which many fail to do today.</p>


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<p>She said, Oh my lord, as your soul lives, my lord, I am the woman who stood by you here, praying to Yahweh- </p><p>We note that she doesn't swear as Yahweh lives, as is commonly found in the Bible, but by Eli's own life. Perhaps she felt that Yahweh was no authority to Eli to make an oath by. We note that this way of swearing by the life of the person being spoken to [rather than by Yahweh] is used of men to Saul (<a href='B:90 17:55'>1Sa 17:55</a>), by Uriah to David when he knew David had slept with his wife (<a href='B:100 11:11'>2Sa 11:11</a>) and by Hannah to Eli (<a href='B:90 1:26'>1Sa 1:26</a>). In every case the implication is that the speaker didn't think that the person being addressed really feared Yahweh.</p>


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<p>For this child I prayed, and Yahweh has given me my petition which I asked of Him- </p><p>As Yahweh gave her, so she wanted to give to Yahweh (:28). This is the irresistible motivating power of grace, once it is perceived.</p>


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<p>Therefore I have given him to Yahweh- </p><p>AV "lent". It is rendered by many versions as "given" because she seems to have totally and absolutely given Samuel to Yahweh for all his life, with no intention of getting him back. However, we can still read "lent" if she had a Kingdom perspective; she looked forward to receiving back the sacrificed relationships in the Kingdom, just as we can.</p><p>As long as he lives he is given to Yahweh. Eli worshipped Yahweh there-</p><p>This is an attempt to interpret "he worshipped Yahweh there". But I think the "he" refers to Elkanah, unless we apply it to Samuel, who was still so young. And then his worship becomes parallel with Hannah pouring out her heart to Yahweh in the next chapter, making this a repeat of the situation earlier, and continuing the theme of this lovely couple each independently pursuing their devotion to Yahweh in unique ways.</p>


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<p>Hannah prayed, and said: My heart exults in Yahweh!- </p><p>Prayer is largely carried out in the mind – how we ‘speak in the heart’ is effectively read as our prayer to God. We find the phrase used about how Abraham’s servant prayed, ‘speaking in his heart’ (<a href='B:10 24:45'>Gen 24:45</a>). Thus our self-talk merges into prayer; Hannah’s “prayer” appears to have been the same (<a href='B:90 2:1'>1Sa 2:1</a>). Solomon’s prayer for wisdom is described by God as “in your heart” (<a href='B:140 1:11'>2Ch 1:11</a>). This close link between thought and prayer is developed in the Lord’s teaching in <a href='B:480 11:23-24'>Mar 11:23-24</a>: “Truly I say unto you, Whosoever shall say unto this mountain, Be taken up and cast into the sea; and shall not doubt in his heart, but shall believe that what he says comes to pass; he shall have it. Therefore I say unto you, All things you pray and ask for, believe that you receive them, and you shall have them”. Our self-talk is to be fantasy about the fulfillment of our prayers. Yet how often do we hit ‘send’ on our requests to God, like scribbling off a postcard, and hardly think again about them?</p><p>My horn is exalted in Yahweh- </p><p>The allusion may be to the way women wore a protruding head dress which was lifted higher the more children they had. But it is righteousness which exalts the horn, and not the biological experience of childbearing; for the wicked also have horns (<a href='B:230 75:10'>Psa 75:10</a>; <a href='B:310 2:17'>Lam 2:17</a>). She may have had in view the idea that her child was to be the anointed Messianic seed (the term is used about Him in :10; <a href='B:230 89:24'>Psa 89:24</a>). But her proud assurance of this was misplaced, for it was Samuel who was chosen not to be anointed, but to anoint David.</p><p>My mouth boasts over my enemies because I rejoice in Your salvation- </p><p>Hannah had remarkable faith, as noted throughout 1 Samuel 1. But like all of us, she had weaknesses, and those weaknesses were elicited by the situation she now suddenly found herself in. Instead of rejoicing in her blessings and new stage of life, she becomes boastful and distinctly vengeful in her attitude to Peninnah. There is no appeal to the other woman to repent, no forgiveness, only an eager desire for the direct judgments upon her, now that Hannah considered herself justified by God through her having had a child. "Enemies" may be an intensive plural for her one great enemy, Peninnah. Or it may be that she felt mocked for her infertility by a whole set of people, over whom she felt she could legitimately boast in the song she is now composing and singing.</p>


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<p>There is none as holy as Yahweh, for there is none besides You, nor is there any rock like our God-</p><p>David in his Psalms repeatedly alludes to the song of his ancestor Hannah. He effectively quotes this verse in <a href='B:100 22:32'>2Sa 22:32</a>; although I argue throughout 1 Samuel 2 that Hannah's was apparently lifted up with pride and the vengeance of the underling who has overcome the oppressor. And there is reason to think that David had elements of this weakness too. He thought it was acceptable to be like this because Hannah had been. And that is the problem with setting bad examples. See on :5.</p><p>I explained on <a href='B:90 1:18'>1Sa 1:18</a> the detailed points of contact between Mary's magnificat, and Hannah's song of praise. But Mary was spiritually discerning enough to avoid the sense of pride and vengeance which fills Hannah's song in places. The points of connection between the songs of Hannah and Mary's Magnificat are really quite detailed: </p><p><a href='B:90 1:3'>1Sa 1:3</a> = <a href='B:490 1:7'>Luk 1:7</a>; <a href='B:90 1:18'>1Sa 1:18</a> = <a href='B:490 1:38'>Luk 1:38</a>; <a href='B:490 1:30'>Luk 1:30</a>; <a href='B:90 2:1'>1Sa 2:1</a> = <a href='B:490 1:46'>Luk 1:46</a>; <a href='B:90 1:11'>1Sa 1:11</a> = <a href='B:490 1:48'>Luk 1:48</a>; <a href='B:90 2:2'>1Sa 2:2</a> = <a href='B:490 1:49'>Luk 1:49</a>; <a href='B:90 2:4'>1Sa 2:4</a> = <a href='B:490 1:51'>Luk 1:51</a>; <a href='B:90 2:3'>1Sa 2:3</a> = <a href='B:490 1:51'>Luk 1:51</a>; <a href='B:90 2:4'>1Sa 2:4</a> = <a href='B:490 1:52'>Luk 1:52</a>; <a href='B:90 2:8'>1Sa 2:8</a> = <a href='B:490 1:52'>Luk 1:52</a>; <a href='B:90 2:5'>1Sa 2:5</a> = <a href='B:490 1:53'>Luk 1:53</a>; <a href='B:90 2:10'>1Sa 2:10</a> = <a href='B:490 1:69'>Luk 1:69</a>; <a href='B:90 2:26'>1Sa 2:26</a> = <a href='B:490 2:52'>Luk 2:52</a>.</p><p>The evident allusions Mary makes back to Hannah’s song could be read as reflecting what had actually been wrought in Mary’s own person and experience by some kind of persecution in her childhood. And it drove her within herself. It seems that she had been deeply humbled in order for her to be highly exalted. One wonders if she had been sexually abused. If Joseph was indeed much older than her, then we can understand how it happened that this girl, mature as she was beyond her years, got attracted to an older and spiritual man. Her spirituality and intelligence [for her allusions to Scripture indicate a fine appreciation of so much] would have been enough to spark plenty of village jealousy. </p>


text:
<p>Talk no more so exceedingly proudly- </p><p>Hannah comes over as hypocritical as she has just announced that she will be speaking proudly and hardly against her "enemies" now that she has had a child.</p><p>Don’t let hardness come out of your mouth, for Yahweh is a God of knowledge, though actions be not weighed-</p><p>Hannah had reflected upon God’s omniscience; and on this basis she tells Peninnah not to be proud and not to use hard words against her, exactly because of this: “Talk no more so exceeding proudly; let not hardness [AVmg:] come out of your mouth: for the Lord is a God of knowledge, and by him actions are weighed” here and now, because He sees and knows all things (<a href='B:90 2:3'>1Sa 2:3</a> AV); even though it appears that they are not being weighed, because His judgments aren't immediately apparent (so NEV, RVmg:). The word is used of how God weighs thoughts (<a href='B:240 16:2'>Pro 16:2</a>; <a href='B:240 21:2'>Pro 21:2</a>; <a href='B:240 24:12'>Pro 24:12</a>), but here of actions. We could conclude that therefore the thought is the action, as the Lord Jesus taught; or that Hannah was over emphasizing the external rather than seeing that it is the thoughts of the heart which are the essential issue.</p>


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<p>The bows of the mighty men are broken-</p><p>Seeing children are as arrows (<a href='B:230 127:4-5'>Psa 127:4-5</a>), the bow may refer to the womb, in Hannah's mind. And she is now wishing her barrenness upon her enemies who had once mocked her. This is hardly the right attitude, and she repeats it in :5. But as noted on :2, this is an idea alluded to by David in his victory song of <a href='B:100 22:35'>2Sa 22:35</a>.</p><p>Those who stumbled are armed with strength- </p><p>"Stumbled" is a word mostly used about spiritual stumbling. And yet Hannah is revealed as a woman of great faith in 1 Samuel 1. But she seems now to see that part of her life as stumbling, and her arrogant boasting as spiritual strength.</p>


text:
<p>Those who were full have hired themselves out for bread- </p><p>This is an idiom for prostitution. It's as if Hannah wishes Peninnah to be divorced by Elkanah and left on the street starving and needing to sell her body for food. The past tense may simply express Hannah's intention and desire for how things would be in the future, expressed in the past tense because of her confidence and strong desire that this would happen. Yet in line with the second half of the verse, hunger is understood as the hunger of the womb. So Hannah could be saying that she wishes Peninnah to now hunger, to become desperately barren, willing to prostitute herself to get conception. This is as Hannah also wished in :4.</p><p>Those who were hungry are satisfied. Yes, the barren has borne seven- </p><p>Again we see how past tenses are used in order to express intention and an assured future. Hannah was confident she would go on to have seven children. She didn't; including Samuel she had six. She had only asked for a single child, but now she had Samuel she assumed she was going to be totally fertile. This was a presumption upon God's grace, and yet He still kindly gave her further conception. But not up to the "seven" she here confidently boasts of.</p><p>She who has many children languishes- </p><p>The languishing could be in the sense of being unable to have more children; see on :4,5. But it is also a word used of mourning the dead, which would then lead on to :6 if this is the context. It is as if Hannah wishes Peninnah's children to die, for Elkanah to divorce her and for her to become a prostitute selling her body for bread (:5). The bitterness is terrible, and sadly recalls Sarah's bitterness with Hagar. Without doubt, Sarah was wrong. And yet Hannah follows her example here, just as David will later follow Hannah's wrong example. See on :2.</p>


text:
<p>Yahweh kills and makes alive; He brings down to Sheol and raises up- </p><p>Hannah feels that she has been dead [useless and non existent in society without children, cp. "the deadness of Sarah's womb", <a href='B:520 4:19'>Rom 4:19</a>], and now made alive. But she seems to want the converse to happen; she wants Peninnah to now be made 'dead', perhaps in becoming barren as Hannah had been. . But she may literally have in view a desire for Peninnah and her children to die; for Sarah, whose wrong example she was unconsciously following, wanted Hagar and Ishmael dead and therefore cast them out into the desert to die.</p>


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<p>Yahweh makes poor and makes rich. He brings low and He also lifts up- </p><p>Instead of simply exalting that she had been lifted up (s:w. :1 "exalted"), she wishes to see Peninnah brought down. This is a classic psychological reaction of the downtrodden who are now exalted; but it is not the way of the Spirit. Hannah lacked grace. However we see in these statements that the negative side of life, the bringing down, the making poor, is attributed solely to Yahweh as in <a href='B:290 45:5-7'>Isa 45:5-7</a>. Clearly Hannah didn't believe the good comes from God and the evil from some cosmic Satan figure. See on :32.</p>


text:
<p>He raises up the poor out of the dust. He lifts up the needy from the dunghill- </p><p>Despite being apparently middle class, Hannah felt as a desperate beggar at the bottom of society. Perhaps she had Job in mind, for the story of Job would have been well known to her. But he was lifted up through recognizing his pride, and Hannah doesn't appear to have done that.</p><p>To make them sit with princes and inherit the throne of glory- </p><p>This and Hannah's song and experiences are alluded to in <a href='B:230 113:7-9'>Psa 113:7-9</a>. She is presented there as representative of Israel, particularly the exiles in Babylon. Her hope was that Samuel, whose destiny she saw as tied u[ with herself, would be not only a priest [although he was not strictly a Levite] but also a prince / king reigning upon a throne of glory, a term which clearly has Messianic Kingdom overtones. This is all similar to the idea of <a href='B:230 110:4'>Psa 110:4</a>, where the Messiah was to be a king-priest, not a Levite, but a priest "after the order of Melchizedek". "He settles the barren woman in her home, as a joyful mother of children" (<a href='B:230 113:9'>Psa 113:9</a>) continues the allusion to Hannah continues; but she was representative to the "barren woman" of Israel in exile (<a href='B:290 54:1'>Isa 54:1</a>), who was to be blessed with many children (<a href='B:290 49:12'>Isa 49:12</a>; <a href='B:290 49:18'>Isa 49:18</a>; <a href='B:290 49:20'>Isa 49:20</a>; <a href='B:290 54:2-3'>Isa 54:2-3</a>; <a href='B:290 60:5'>Isa 60:5</a>; <a href='B:550 4:27'>Gal 4:27</a>). But Samuel didn't do this; instead it was he who set up another man [David] and his family to do so.</p><p>For the pillars of the earth are Yahweh’s; He has set the world upon them- </p><p><a href='B:90 2:8'>1Sa 2:8</a>; <a href='B:100 22:8'>2Sa 22:8</a> speak as if Heaven / the sky rests on the mountains, from where earth seems to touch the heavens (<a href='B:290 13:5'>Isa 13:5</a>), with the stars stretched out in the north (<a href='B:220 26:7'>Job 26:7</a>). This reflected the geo-centric view held by people at the time. The point surely was that however people understood creation to have happened, God had done it, and in wisdom. Likewise the technically incorrect view of demons as causing mental illness is reflected in the language of the New Testament.</p>


text:
<p>He will keep the feet of His holy ones, but the wicked shall be put to silence in darkness; for no man shall prevail by strength- </p><p>The experience of Divine grace and answered prayer led her to over simplistically conclude that she was a "holy one" and Peninnah the wicked. She thinks that her pregnancy somehow empowered her to condemn Hannah to condemnation at the last day. What she says is true, but the way she expresses these Divine truths smacks of pride and inappropriate personal condemnation of others. And we who likewise hold Divine truth and experience His grace must take the lesson.</p>


text:
<p>Those who strive with Yahweh shall be broken to pieces. He will thunder against them in the sky-</p><p>Peninnah made Hannah "fret" (<a href='B:90 1:6'>1Sa 1:6</a>), and yet when she has Samuel she asks God to "thunder", s:w. "fret", against her enemies, clearly having Peninnah in view. Hannah imagines He will do this when His "anointed king" is reigning, and clearly she understood Samuel to be that. He didn't become that; and the fact he anointed David to be king rather than himself being anointed is pointed poof of the fact that her bitter expectations and hopes didn't come true as she intended. There seems no forgiveness, just a desire for judgment and to make Peninnah feel the same way as she had been made to feel; and a desire for the manifestation of the anointed King in order for her to see her enemy made to feel how she had felt, and worse.</p><p>Yahweh will judge the ends of the earth. He will give strength to His king and exalt the horn of His anointed- </p><p>She considers Samuel as becoming the anointed [the first occurrence of the word 'Messiah'] king. But her dogmatic statement here was not to come true. Samuel didn't want Israel to have a human king and Hannah appears not to appreciate this as she ought to have done. And it was his duty to anoint David to become king.</p>


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<p>Elkanah went home to Ramah, but the child served Yahweh before Eli the priest-</p><p>Again we note how a child can acceptably serve Yahweh. The mention of Elkanah returning leads us to wonder whether Hannah initially remained there with the three year old Samuel; see on <a href='B:90 1:24'>1Sa 1:24</a>.</p>


text:
<p>Now the sons of Eli were men of Belial; they didn’t know Yahweh- </p><p>Even in the Old Testament, sin was personified as ‘Belial’. The personification of sin was known throughout the Bible. And so it is in the New Testament, as the great enemy / satan of believers. It really has to be accepted that ‘Devil’ and ‘Satan’ are used to personify sin, because if we read these words as always meaning a literal being, then we have serious contradictions. We note that it's quite possible to do religious duties as did Eli's sons, without knowing / having relationship with Yahweh.</p>


text:
<p>The custom of the priests with the people was that when any man offered sacrifice, the priest’s servant came, while the flesh was boiling, with a three-pronged fork in his hand- </p><p>God was and still is intensely aware of every detail of what they did apparently in secret. He noticed that the fork had three prongs. The style of the record is as if there is a video camera trained upon the servant. And the recording is kept until today; see on :13.</p>


text:
<p>He thrust it into the pan, kettle, cauldron or pot; all that the fork brought up the priest took for himself. So they did in Shiloh to all the Israelites who came there- </p><p>We notice the zoomed in focus of the camera, as it were. The fork was thrust in, and it brought up meat which the priest's took away for themselves rather than offered to Yahweh. See on :13.</p>


text:
<p>Moreover, before they burnt the fat, the priest’s servant came and said to the man who sacrificed, Give meat to roast for the priest, for he will not accept boiled meat from you, but raw- </p><p>The order given in <a href='B:30 3:3-5'>Lev 3:3-5</a>; <a href='B:30 7:29-34'>Lev 7:29-34</a> was that the fat must be burnt to Yahweh first, before the breast and shoulder were waved or 'heaved' before Yahweh, symbolically given to Him, and only then could the priests take it. But Eli's sons were too impatient for this and just grabbed what they wanted as soon as they saw it, exactly the spirit of our age. There was no recognition that whatever they had was really God's, and given to them only as His representatives. The habit of thanking God for our meals ought to be strongly established amongst all true Christian believers.</p>


text:
<p>If the man said to him, Let the fat be burned first, and then take as much as you want; he would say, No, give it to me now, and if you don’t, I will take it by force- </p><p>Their sin was in how they saw the meat and wanted it immediately, as did Esau. They were unwilling to experience delayed gratification through firstly giving to God, however symbolically.</p>


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<p>The sin of the young men was very great before Yahweh, for they despised the offering of Yahweh- </p><p>The word for "offering" here is minchah, that used specifically of the bloodless offerings of flour etc. The idea may be that when people saw the larger sacrifices being abused, they didn't want to offer anything at all to God, no matter how tokenistic. They failed to perceive the difference between God and church. Disillusion with the visible people of God, especially their leadership, led to not serving God. Elkanah, as noted on 1 Samuel 1, overcame this- and he needs to be the example to many. "Despised" is the word for "blasphemed". We blaspheme God by not offering to Him, even if we blame the church. We note too that the greatest sin is to make others turn away from God.</p>


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<p>But Samuel ministered before Yahweh, being a child, clothed with a linen ephod- </p><p>The "but" places the child Samuel in contrast to the sons of Eli. The phrase "minister before Yahweh" is only used of the priests ministering in the holy place, where incense was offered (<a href='B:140 29:11'>2Ch 29:11</a>). We wonder how a child, who was not of the tribe of Levi, could do this, and wear a linen ephod whilst doing so. The remarkable truth seems to be that because Eli's family didn't do even the most basic work at the sanctuary, the young Samuel did it. The connection between the ephod and the robe made for him each year (:19) would suggest that his mother had the spiritual vision to realize this and try to make the appropriate priestly clothing for him. Truly this was a family who saw beyond the letter of the law to the spirit of it. See on :19.</p>


text:
<p>Moreover his mother made him a little robe and brought it to him from year to year, when she came up with her husband to offer the yearly sacrifice- </p><p>I suggested on :18 that the child Samuel, a non Levite, was doing the priestly work because Eli's family refused to do it, or perhaps just told him to do it. The Hebrew words for "robe" and "ephod" in :18 only occur together in the descriptions of the "robe of the ephod" worn by none other than the High Priest (<a href='B:20 28:4'>Exo 28:4</a>; <a href='B:20 28:31'>Exo 28:31</a>; <a href='B:20 29:5'>Exo 29:5</a>; <a href='B:20 39:22'>Exo 39:22</a>). The young Samuel apparently did the work of the High Priest. His example and spiritual ambition inspired David, who he was to anoint, to likewise wear such a robe and ephod (<a href='B:130 15:27'>1Ch 15:27</a>).</p>


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<p>Eli blessed Elkanah and his wife and said, Yahweh give you children by this woman for the petition which was asked of Yahweh. They went to their own home- </p><p>Eli is somewhat male centred. He is really addressing Elkanah, and implying that he would be blessed with more children because "this woman", his wife, had prayed and dedicated the resulting child to Yahweh. Eli tacitly recognizes that he had been wrong in assuming Hannah had been drunk; he realizes now that she had indeed been praying with a paradigm of intensity unknown to him. Eli comes over so often as genuine enough; but it was his weakness in allowing his sons to blaspheme and cause others to stumble which led to his condemnation. The challenge to us is that major weakness in one area of life is not as it were compensated for, at least it wasn't in Eli's case, by an otherwise generally reasonable and spiritual service of God.</p>


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<p>Yahweh visited Hannah and she conceived and bore three sons and two daughters. The child Samuel grew before Yahweh-</p><p>This blessing- possibly implying quintuplets conceived at the same time- is directly connected to the blessing uttered by Eli in :20. Although Eli was condemned, Yahweh worked through him. The similarities with Sarah noted earlier in this chapter continued; for again Yahweh "visits" to grant conception. See on <a href='B:10 18:10'>Gen 18:10</a>.</p>


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<p>Now Eli was very old, and he heard all that his sons did to all Israel, how they lay with the women who served at the door of the Tent of Meeting- </p><p>His great age is perhaps mentioned to imply that he had for decades heard of what his sons were doing, and had only rather lamely rebuked them rather than insisting that the abuses end. These women are the supporting women of <a href='B:20 38:8'>Exo 38:8</a> who looked ahead typically to those women who were to support the Lord Jesus, the true tabernacle which the Lord God pitched. Again, as in :17, the greatest dimension to sin is in making others stumble. "Served" is literally 'assembled in bands', as if their ministry was quite highly organized. See on <a href='B:90 3:11'>1Sa 3:11</a>.</p>


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<p>He said to them, Why do you do such things? For I hear of your evil deeds from all the people- </p><p>Being blind, he only "heard" of these things rather than saw them. Consistently, the Biblical record has the ring of internal consistency and credibility to it. People complained to him, but he is condemned for not disciplining his sons. So we can conclude that his words here were said as a formality and half heartedly. He would only have been condemned so strongly if it had indeed been within his power to change things.</p><p>Samuel was in his 50s or 60s at the time of <a href='B:90 8:1'>1Sa 8:1</a> when he made his corrupt sons judges over Israel. Eli had become judged of Israel at age 58 (<a href='B:90 4:15'>1Sa 4:15</a>; <a href='B:90 4:18'>1Sa 4:18</a>). It seems that Samuel's later life had unfortunate parallels with that of Eli. Eli may well have had his sons Hophni and Phinehas in his 50s, because his daughter in law was pregnant at the time of his death at 98. It would seem that when Samuel was about the same age as Eli, he also had sons, who turned away from God just as had Eli's sons. And the people likewise complained (<a href='B:90 8:4'>1Sa 8:4</a> = <a href='B:90 2:23'>1Sa 2:23</a>). The fact Samuel made them judges despite their immorality would suggest he had gone the way of Eli in turning a blind eye to them. So although Eli's bad example to Samuel was apparently ignored by him and Samuel's spirituality was commendable, finally in later life it seems that example did rub off upon him.</p>


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<p>No my sons, it is no good report that I hear; you make Yahweh’s people disobey- </p><p>We can make others sin (<a href='B:20 23:33'>Exo 23:33</a>; <a href='B:90 2:24'>1Sa 2:24</a>; <a href='B:110 16:19'>1Ki 16:19</a>). There is an urgent imperative here, to really watch our behaviour; e.g. to not drink alcohol in the presence of a brother whose conscience is weak. The making of others to stumble is the repeated reason given for God's wrath with this family.</p><p>Eli did rebuke his sons; but in God’s eyes he didn’t (<a href='B:90 2:24'>1Sa 2:24</a> cp. 3:13). He said words for the sake of saying words, but in his heart he didn’t frown upon them. Eli appeared to discipline his sons. But he couldn’t have really done this from his heart, or he wouldn’t have been condemned for not controlling them. He honoured his sons above God, to make himself “fat with the chiefest of all the offerings”.</p><p><a href='B:90 1:21'>1Sa 1:21</a> LXX adds&nbsp; that Elkanah brought "his tithes". It was surely clear that the tithes were being abused by Eli's family, but Elkanah still brought them. Their abuses led to men sinning against Yahweh by not bringing tithes and offerings. But Elkanah is commended for not being amongst those made to stumble in this way.</p>


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<p>If one man sins against another, God will judge him; but if a man sins against Yahweh, who shall entreat for him?-</p><p>To sin against God's people is to sin against Yahweh, just as Saul's persecution of Christians was effectively done to the Lord Jesus. The Father and Son are so closely identified with their people, they feel all that is done to us as done to them. Man is not alone, even in the most painful sufferings at the hands of others.</p><p>We see here in this verse a hint towards the lack of the Lord's mediation available at that time. But sinners against Yahweh, such as Israel, had had a mediator- Moses. But these men had no such mediator. And yet the question is perhaps rhetorical; although Eli didn't quite understand that. The answer was: the child Samuel, who points ahead to the future mediator, the Lord Jesus (<a href='B:610 2:5'>1Ti 2:5</a>). For Eli as the high priest ought to have been the mediator, but he was precluded from doing so by his own unspirituality.</p><p>However, they didn’t listen to their father, because Yahweh intended to kill them- </p><p>And yet Eli was condemned for this. The situation was therefore of his making, but Yahweh confirmed that situation. He works in the same way today. There are a number of other passages which mention how "it was of the Lord" that certain attitudes were adopted by men, resulting in the sequence of events which He desired (<a href='B:60 11:20'>Jos 11:20</a>; <a href='B:90 2:25'>1Sa 2:25</a>; <a href='B:110 12:15'>1Ki 12:15</a>; <a href='B:140 10:15'>2Ch 10:15</a>; <a href='B:140 22:7'>2Ch 22:7</a>; <a href='B:140 25:20'>2Ch 25:20</a>). It is tempting to read <a href='B:70 14:4'>Jdg 14:4</a> in this context, meaning that God somehow made Samson desire that woman in order to bring about His purpose of freeing Israel from Philistine domination. The fact a man does something "of the Lord" doesn't mean that he is guiltless. In the same context of God's deliverance of Israel from the Philistines, men who did things "of the Lord" were punished for what they did (<a href='B:50 2:30'>Deu 2:30</a>; <a href='B:90 2:25'>1Sa 2:25</a>; <a href='B:140 22:7'>2Ch 22:7</a>; <a href='B:140 25:20'>2Ch 25:20</a>):&nbsp; God through His Spirit works to confirm men in the path they wish to go. And this is the huge significance of the work of the Holy Spirit in our lives today.</p>


text:
<p>The child Samuel grew and increased in favour with Yahweh and with men-</p><p>As noted on :25, Samuel is being set up as a type of the Lord Jesus, the mediator whom Eli should have been (<a href='B:490 2:52'>Luk 2:52</a> quotes this about the Lord).</p>


text:
<p>A man of God came to Eli and said to him- </p><p>The visit of the man of God to condemn Eli was the more remarkable because there "was no frequent vision" at that time (<a href='B:90 3:1'>1Sa 3:1</a>). God was making a special effort to appeal to Eli.</p><p>Thus says Yahweh, ‘Did I not reveal Myself to the house of your father when they were in Egypt, in bondage to Pharaoh’s house?- </p><p>The reference is to the calling of the tribe of Levi "out of all the tribes of Israel" (:28). "Revealed" in <a href='B:90 3:7'>1Sa 3:7</a>; <a href='B:90 3:21'>1Sa 3:21</a>; <a href='B:90 9:15'>1Sa 9:15</a> is the word used of how Yahweh had revealed Himself to the tribe of Levi and called them to be His priests (<a href='B:90 2:27'>1Sa 2:27</a>), and Eli as it were was in the loins of his father Levi, according to the principle of <a href='B:650 7:10'>Heb 7:10</a>. But the line of Levi and Eli had potentially been rejected because of Eli's apostasy. The Divine intention was to replace them with Samuel as a prophet-priest and perhaps king (<a href='B:90 2:10'>1Sa 2:10</a>). But this potential was only partially fulfilled by Samuel, and despite possibilities in David and Solomon, it only came to full term in the person and work of the Lord Jesus. It seems that some unrecorded appearance of God to call the tribe of Levi is being referred to.</p>


text:
<p>Did I not choose him out of all the tribes of Israel to be My priest, to go up to My altar, to burn incense, to wear an ephod before Me? Did I not give to the house of your father all the offerings of the children of Israel made by fire?- </p><p>I have suggested that already, the non Levite child Samuel was doing these things. And he was wearing an ephod, which I suggested on :18 was one with religious significance. Eli and his sons had passed off the work of the high priesthood to the child Samuel. And their attitude was now being confirmed, in that this meant that the calling of them and their tribe was going to be abrogated. And this is indeed the nature of condemnation; it is a giving of a person what they themselves have wanted and according to their own desires.</p>


text:
<p>Why then do you despise My sacrifice and My offering which I have commanded for My dwelling, and honour your sons above Me, to make yourselves fat with the best of all the offerings of Israel My people?’-</p><p>The danger of materialism is the assumption that we are ultimate owners of what we 'have'. When Eli and his sons kept part of God's sacrifices for themselves, he was condemned: "You trample upon My sacrifice and My offering" (<a href='B:90 2:29'>1Sa 2:29</a> RVmg:). This is what we are doing by considering that anything that is God's is in fact ours- we are trampling upon that which is His. And this verse is alluded to in <a href='B:650 10:29-30'>Heb 10:29-30</a> - we can indeed trample upon God's sacrifice today.</p><p>Eli honoured his sons above God, to make himself “fat with the chiefest of all the offerings”. The description of Eli as being fat surely reflects his guilt (<a href='B:90 2:29'>1Sa 2:29</a>; <a href='B:90 4:18'>1Sa 4:18</a>). And yet he appeared on the surface to run his family life on a spiritual footing. His merely surface level rebuke of his sons is revealed as having a motivation in the fact he was himself benefitting from their misbehaviour.</p><p>Eli, although apparently righteous himself in many ways, was rejected specifically because "he frowned not" upon his sons' apostasy; he personally was counted as 'kicking' at God and profiteering from His sacrifices, even though he himself seems to have truly loved God (<a href='B:90 2:29'>1Sa 2:29</a>; <a href='B:90 4:18'>1Sa 4:18</a>). Because Eli wouldn't exercise discipline, he was somehow seen as committing those very things which he failed to rebuke. The man who wouldn’t discipline his wayward ox was to be treated like as if he had committed the crime the ox did, and therefore must die if the ox killed a man (<a href='B:20 21:29'>Exo 21:29</a>).</p>


text:
<p>Therefore Yahweh the God of Israel says, ‘I said indeed that your house, and the house of your father, should walk before Me forever’. But now Yahweh says, ‘Far be it from Me. Those who honour Me I will honour, and those who despise Me shall be despised- </p><p>The idea is, despised by God. To be despised by the God of all grace... is indeed a fearsome thing. "Despised" is the word used for the sin of presumption (<a href='B:40 15:31'>Num 15:31</a>), and this is what Eli had committed. But having been told this, he could still repent; for Judah despised God's word until there was no remedy, the implication being that each time they were told what they were doing, they could have repented (s:w. <a href='B:140 36:16'>2Ch 36:16</a>). And it is the word used by Nathan to David of what he had done (<a href='B:100 12:9-10'>2Sa 12:9-10</a>), and he repented in response to the prophetic word of rebuke. But Eli didn't. We see here how God can make an "eternal" statement, but it is in fact conditional upon preconditions which He may not at the time specifically express. He speaks His purpose, but He can change it according to human action (Jeremiah 18).</p><p>Because of His capacity to imagine, to see possible futures, we can better sense the poignancy behind His words in places like <a href='B:290 48:18'>Isa 48:18</a>: "O that you had hearkened to my commandments!", "Oh that they would have a mind such as this always" (<a href='B:50 5:29'>Deu 5:29</a>), "O Israel, if you would but listen to me" (<a href='B:230 81:8'>Psa 81:8</a>; <a href='B:230 81:13'>Psa 81:13</a>). It's as if He could see the potentially happy future which they could've had stretching out before Him. And so we can better understand the sadness with which God had to tell Hophni and Phinehas: "I thought this, that your house, and the house of your father, would eternally serve Me: But now, the Lord, says, Be it far from Me; for them that honour Me I will honour, and they that despise Me shall be despised" (<a href='B:90 2:30'>1Sa 2:30</a>). He as it were limited His omniscience in order to enter into real time relationship with Eli and his family. Note how God opened His heart to those who had so hurt Him, at the very time they had hurt Him- just as Paul did to Corinth. Such sharing of dashed hopes with those who have dashed them seems to be part of what condemnation is all about; and, given Paul's doing this to the Corinthians, it is perhaps even a useful tool for we who cannot condemn others, but may need to walk separately from them in this life.</p>


text:
<p>The days are coming when I will cut off your arm and the arm of your father’s house so that there shall not be an old man in your house- </p><p>The father's house in view was that of Levi, who is the "father" referred to in :27,28. To cut off the arm was an idiom for removing from power. Eli was an old man and had therefore been High Priest a long time (see on :22). But this would not happen again. The implication seems to be that the cutting off of Eli and his sons (which happened at the same time) would be the point at which the house of Levi would be cut off from the priesthood. But this potential plan didn't happen, although it seems at the time that Samuel was intended to take over effectively as High Priest. But the Levitical High Priesthood did continue; it seems that Samuel didn't live up to his potential, although he does act as a priest as does David. The power of tradition trumped his potential calling, as happens so often with those called to new paradigms of service.</p>


text:
<p>In distress you would look with envy upon the wealth which I would have given Israel, but there shall not be an old man in your house forever- </p><p>Eli was told of “all the wealth which God would have given Israel”, which his behaviour had now disallowed. Knowing this, women like Hannah clearly hoped and prayed that their sons would be Messiah (<a href='B:90 2:10'>1Sa 2:10</a> = <a href='B:230 89:24'>Psa 89:24</a>); for they perceived that the outworking of God’s purpose was open to change. The wealth of Israel is paralleled with there being an old man in the house / tribe of Levi; the blessing of the people would have been parallel with the blessing of Israel. But their apostasy was the poverty of Israel. And yet Hannah has spoken of the rich becoming poor and the poor rich, with her having in view how Samuel and herself were the poor who would be made rich (:7). Again we see that the priesthood of Eli could have been replaced by that of the non-Levite Samuel.</p>


text:
<p>Any man of yours whom I shall not cut off from My altar, will only blind your eyes with tears and grieve your heart; all the increase of your house shall die in the prime of life- </p><p>The original is unclear as to whether Eli's eyes would be blinded with tears, or whether any who were not cut off in violent death would be blinded. But there is also the possibility as in GNB: "Yet I will keep one of your descendants alive, and he will serve me as priest. But he will become blind and lose all hope, and all your other descendants will die a violent death". Whichever option we take, it speaks of a future which was only a potential possibility. For Eli and his sons died at the same time. I suggest that all these potential pathways of cursing upon Eli didn't quite come about as was potentially possible, just as Samuel didn't become the anointed Messianic king-priest which he might have been (:10). The unclarity of the text is purposeful because it reflects the various possible paths of judgment; the very existence of them all reflects God's extreme sensitivity to human behaviour and the various outcomes He finds appropriate to them all.</p>


text:
<p>This will be the sign to you which will come on your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas: in one day they shall both die- </p><p>The idea of a sign to Eli was surely that he was to take note of it and then repent. But it seems the die the sons died, he also died. It was as if he refused to respond to it, and therefore was slain the same day. And so the idea of the "sign" was that it was to be immediately responded to. Eli died at a great age; God had been so patient with him, giving him so many opportunities to repent, and then at the very end of his life , on the very last day of it, he was given the fulfilment of this sign to urge him personally towards repentance. And still he refused, being concerned merely about the loss of the ark as a religious symbol.</p>


text:
<p>I will raise up for Myself a faithful priest who will do according to what is in My heart and My mind. I will build him a sure house, and he shall minister before My anointed one forever- </p><p>Again we see various potential fulfillments here. A faithful priest was to be raised up to minister before the anointed one, the Messianic king, who apparently was potentially Samuel (see on :10). But no such faithful priest was raised up in Samuel's time, nor did he become a king. These words were reapplied therefore to Saul and David whom Samuel would anoint, although neither of them had a specific priest ministering before them. And it is David who is presented as the man after God's own heart and mind (<a href='B:90 13:14'>1Sa 13:14</a>); yet he was the anointed one and not the priest. The promise of a "sure house" could have had fulfilment in Solomon (<a href='B:110 11:38'>1Ki 11:38</a>), in contrast to God's destruction of Eli's household; and yet that also failed. So we see that none of the potential fulfillments fully came about, because of various human failures in living up to the potentials. And so these words are reapplied and reinterpreted towards fulfilment in the Lord Jesus. For all others, for whatever reason, had let the baton drop.</p>


text:
<p>Each one who is left in your house shall come and bow down to him for a piece of silver and a loaf of bread, and shall say, ‘Please put me into one of the priests’ offices, that I may eat a morsel of bread’-</p><p>The Lord's parable of the prodigal seems to gave this in mind. The son asks to return to the family home not with the rights of a blood descendant, but just as a labourer and servant in order to eat bread. If indeed the Lord had this verse in mind, He would be hinting that even in this case, repentance was possible. This bowing down to the faithful priest of :35 never apparently happened, and so again [as noted throughout this section] we are left with the impression that there were various potential pathways for fulfilment, different possible scenarios, which didn't all come strictly true to the letter.</p>


text:
<p>The child Samuel ministered to Yahweh before Eli-</p><p>The phrase "minister before Yahweh" is only used of the priests ministering in the holy place, where incense was offered (<a href='B:140 29:11'>2Ch 29:11</a>). We wonder how a child, who was not of the tribe of Levi, could do this, and wear a linen ephod whilst doing so. The remarkable truth seems to be that because Eli's family didn't do even the most basic work at the sanctuary, the young Samuel did it. The connection between the ephod and the robe made for him each year would suggest that his mother had the spiritual vision to realize this and try to make the appropriate priestly clothing for him. Truly this was a family who saw beyond the letter of the law to the spirit of it. See on <a href='B:90 2:18-19'>1Sa 2:18-19</a>.</p><p>The word of Yahweh was precious in those days; there was no frequent vision- </p><p>This would mean that the visit of the man of God to condemn Eli in <a href='B:90 2:27'>1Sa 2:27</a> was the more remarkable because there "was no frequent vision" at that time (<a href='B:90 3:1'>1Sa 3:1</a>). God was making a special effort to appeal to Eli.</p>


text:
<p>At that time, when Eli was laid down in his place (now his eyes had begun to grow dim, so that he could not see)- </p><p>Blindness is repeatedly used in the Old Testament as a sign of Divine judgment. The impression is that his declining eyesight was connected with the waning of the lamp of God in the tabernacle that night (:3). We get the impression that the message he is about to receive is yet another appeal to him, as was the prophetic word of <a href='B:90 2:27'>1Sa 2:27</a>.</p>


text:
<p>and the lamp of God hadn’t yet gone out, and Samuel had laid down in Yahweh’s sanctuary where the ark of God was- </p><p>The lamp was intended never to go out. We have here the impression of the oil lamps now waning and about to go out, connecting with the impression we have of Eli's declining light as his eyesight slowly failed in :2. God's presence in the tabernacle was in decline, but this was because Eli had not made the effort to keep that light burning, passing the job to young Samuel, who lit the lamps at evening and then went to sleep. We could reason that it was when the lamp had gone out that then the prophetic word of condemnation came to Samuel. The "lamp of God" going out was representative of the end of God's relationship with His people (<a href='B:140 29:7'>2Ch 29:7</a>), and is the term used of the faithful line having a lamp of God burning in Jerusalem (<a href='B:110 15:4'>1Ki 15:4</a>). But in Eli's time, the lamp was allowed to burn out, because the priests couldn't be bothered to keep it burning. And this therefore came to represent the extinguishing of the light of Eli's household.</p>


text:
<p>Yahweh called Samuel, and he said Here I am- </p><p>Notice the fascinating repetition within <a href='B:90 3:4-6'>1Sa 3:4-6</a>; <a href='B:90 3:10'>1Sa 3:10</a>; <a href='B:90 3:16'>1Sa 3:16</a>: the Angel calls Samuel’s name, and he replies “Here am I”. Then Eli calls his name for the first time, and Samuel likewise responds “Here am I”- insisting that Eli has already been calling him, when in fact it had been the Angel. Clearly the Angel spoke to Samuel with the voice of Eli! Could this imply that that Angel was Eli’s guardian? At very least it reflects how closely sensitive and understanding the Angels are to their charges on earth- they can imitate the exact intonation of their voices! By all means compare this with how the early believers were sure that what appeared to be Peter standing at the door was his Angel- they imagined that his guardian Angel looked exactly like him.</p>


text:
<p>He ran to Eli, and said, Here I am, for you called me. He said, I didn’t call; lie down again. He went and lay down- </p><p>We note Samuel's running in response to God's word, in line with the idiom of 'running' as meaning response to God's message (<a href='B:340 12:4'>Dan 12:4</a>; <a href='B:230 119:32'>Psa 119:32</a>; <a href='B:230 119:60'>Psa 119:60</a>; <a href='B:230 147:15'>Psa 147:15</a>; <a href='B:370 8:11-12'>Amo 8:11-12</a>; <a href='B:420 2:2'>Hab 2:2</a>; <a href='B:500 8:37'>Joh 8:37</a> RV; <a href='B:600 3:1'>2Th 3:1</a> Gk:).</p>


text:
<p>Yahweh called again, Samuel! Samuel arose and went to Eli and said, Here I am; for you called me. He answered, I didn’t call my son; lie down again- </p><p>See on :4. "My son" reflects how in Elkanah's absence from maybe the age of three (<a href='B:90 1:24'>1Sa 1:24</a>), Eli was effectively Samuel's father. He is the more commendable for being spiritually strong for Yahweh when his adoptive family were so far from Him.</p>


text:
<p>Now Samuel didn’t yet know Yahweh, neither was the word of Yahweh yet revealed to him- </p><p>Despite this, he was still ministering to Yahweh, even though he had no personal relationship with Him and was aware of this in that he omitted using the term Yahweh (see on :10). For that is the usual sense of "knowing" in a Hebraic sense. This is mentioned to explain why Samuel was so slow in realizing that this was a Divine prophetic call and not Eli calling him. "Revealed" in <a href='B:90 3:7'>1Sa 3:7</a>; <a href='B:90 3:21'>1Sa 3:21</a>; <a href='B:90 9:15'>1Sa 9:15</a> is the word used of how Yahweh had revealed Himself to the tribe of Levi and called them to be His priests (<a href='B:90 2:27'>1Sa 2:27</a>), and Eli as it were was in the loins of his father Levi, according to the principle of <a href='B:650 7:10'>Heb 7:10</a>. But the line of Levi and Eli had potentially been rejected because of Eli's apostasy. The Divine intention was to replace them with Samuel as a prophet-priest and perhaps king (<a href='B:90 2:10'>1Sa 2:10</a>). But this potential was only partially fulfilled by Samuel, and despite possibilities in David and Solomon, it only came to full term in the person and work of the Lord Jesus.</p>


text:
<p>Yahweh called Samuel again the third time. He arose and went to Eli and said, Here I am; for you called me. Eli perceived that Yahweh had called the child- </p><p>This perception would have been mixed with a premonition that this child was his replacement, seeing he had earlier been warned that he was as it were not hearing his own calling as high priest (see on <a href='B:90 2:27'>1Sa 2:27</a>).</p>


text:
<p>Therefore Eli said to Samuel, Go, lie down, and if He calls you, say, ‘Speak, Yahweh, for Your servant hears’. So Samuel went and lay down in his place- </p><p>Eli is to be commended for being prepared to accept that Yahweh was having a relationship with Samuel because he had failed. Many jealous people, such as Saul, would have ten wanted to destroy Samuel. But Eli wasn't like that. He comes over as completely passive, although happy to get fat on the abuses performed by his sons. But the condemnation of him is severe. He is a parade example of the significance of sins of omission.</p>


text:
<p>Yahweh came and stood and called as at other times, Samuel! Samuel! Then Samuel said, Speak; for Your servant hears- </p><p>This coming and standing of Yahweh was presumably in the form of an Angel. We note Samuel omits to use the term "Yahweh", contrary to how Eli had instructed him (:9 'Speak, Yahweh, for Your servant hears’). It is noted on :7 that Samuel didn't yet know Yahweh.</p>


text:
<p>Yahweh said to Samuel, Behold, I will do something in Israel which will make both the ears of everyone who hears it tingle- </p><p>Samuel as a child had to tell Eli of God's rejection of him, a message he also heard at night, and His replacement of him with someone else. This prepared Samuel for doing this very same thing years later, with Saul (<a href='B:90 15:16'>1Sa 15:16</a>); and to some extent, he too failed in ways similar to Eli, and was in a sense replaced. Whilst it's impossible to attach meaning to events at the time they happen, they potentially prepare us for later use by God if we are willing to be used.</p><p>Eli and his sons were surely unpopular, because the people complained to Eli about all the abuses going on (<a href='B:90 2:22'>1Sa 2:22</a>). The result was that they gave up offering sacrifices (<a href='B:90 2:17'>1Sa 2:17</a>). And yet Yahweh foresaw that the people would be shocked at the judgment to come upon the family. We see here how people need religion, to the point of accepting awful abuses and being deeply upset when the abusers are judged; even though they notice and complain about the abuses. This kind of thing, especially in the areas of sexual and financial abuse, is too often seen in religion gone wrong today.</p>


text:
<p>In that day I will perform against Eli all that I have spoken concerning his house, from beginning to end- </p><p>And yet I noted in 1 Samuel 2 that there were various potential judgments upon Eli's house. But the essence of God's judgment was to be performed even if not the letter of it.</p>


text:
<p>For I have told him that I will judge his house forever for the iniquity which he knew- </p><p>The judgment was eternal not in the sense that they would experience eternal conscious punishment; but the consequences of rejection would be eternal in that they were missing out on eternity. And losing a potentially possible eternity is therefore in that sense an eternal judgment.</p><p>Because his sons brought a curse on themselves and he didn’t rebuke them- </p><p>Eli did rebuke his sons; but in God’s eyes he didn’t (<a href='B:90 2:24'>1Sa 2:24</a> cp. 3:13). He said words for the sake of saying words, but in his heart he didn’t frown upon them. Eli appeared to discipline his sons. But he couldn’t have really done this from his heart, or he wouldn’t have been condemned for not controlling them. He honoured his sons above God, to make himself “fat with the chiefest of all the offerings”. We too can go through the motions of spirituality without believing it. Even external acts of apparent righteousness can be sin.</p>


text:
<p>Therefore I have sworn to the house of Eli, that the guilt of Eli’s house shall not be removed with sacrifice nor offering forever-</p><p>We compare this with the observation that the blood of bulls and goats could never remove sin or guilt of itself (<a href='B:650 10:4'>Heb 10:4</a>). The guilt could only anyway be removed by faith in the future Messianic sacrifice, better than any animal offering. Again we see that the judgment upon persons was a reflection of what the position which the person themselves had arrived at. They had no desire for forgiveness nor any vision towards the future Messianic sacrifice; and so they were judged with the curse of sacrifice never removing their guilt. David surely looked back to this when he confessed that sacrifice and offering could not remove his sin, only God's grace (<a href='B:230 40:6'>Psa 40:6</a>).</p>


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<p>Samuel lay until the morning, and opened the doors of the house of Yahweh. Samuel feared to show Eli the vision- </p><p>This is a common theme, of men fearing to tell others the prophetic vision. We think of Daniel dumb with fear before telling the vision to Nebuchadnezzar. It is our own narrative almost daily, as we fear to tell others God's word as it really is, fearing their rejection.</p>


text:
<p>Then Eli called Samuel and said, Samuel, my son! He said, Here I am- </p><p>"Here" translates hinneh, a word with the same consonants as the name of his mother Hannah. It was almost as if he were saying "I am Hannah". In that moment he felt unity with his mother, in obedience to God's word.</p>


text:
<p>He said, What was it that He said to you? Please don’t hide it from me- </p><p>Surely Eli knew that this was another message of condemnation for him. But he wanted to know it, just as Zedekiah urged Jeremiah not to hide from him the message of his own damnation (s:w. <a href='B:300 38:14'>Jer 38:14</a>).</p><p>May God deal with you severely if you hide anything from me of all the things that He said to you- </p><p>This was no mere threat from Eli. We are not to hide God's word from those for whom it was intended at our hands. One theme of the history here is the critical significance of sins of omission. Omitting to discipline sons, omitting to declare God's word... all merited severe judgment.</p>


text:
<p>Samuel told him everything- </p><p>Literally, "every word". Samuel is presented as a new Moses, for this phrase is used repeatedly about him and his mediation for Israel.</p><p>And hid nothing from him. He said, It is Yahweh- </p><p>By Eli commenting “It is the Lord”, he meant ‘It is the word of the Lord’; but he saw God as effectively His word. “The word”, the “word of the Kingdom”, “the Gospel”, “the word of God” are all parallel expressions throughout the Gospels. Our attitude to God’s word is our attitude to Him. "The word was God". David "despised the commandment (word) of the Lord... you despised me" (<a href='B:100 12:9-10'>2Sa 12:9-10</a>). David learnt that his attitude to God's word was his attitude to God- for the word of God, in that sense, was and is God. By our words we personally will be condemned or justified- because we too ‘are’ our words.</p><p>Let Him do what seems good to Him- </p><p>This kind of fatalism isn't right. It seems a similarly faithfulness Hezekiah alludes to it in <a href='B:290 39:8'>Isa 39:8</a>: "Then Hezekiah said to Isaiah, Yahweh’s word which you have spoken is good. He said moreover, For there will be peace and truth in my days".</p>


text:
<p>Samuel grew, and Yahweh was with him, and he let none of His words fall to the ground- </p><p>The words in view are presumably the intention to raise up the non-Levite Samuel as a replacement priest and mediator for Israel. But as noted on 1 Samuel 2, God's purposes and intentions for Samuel went as far as establishing him as a Messianic king, prophet and priest who would rebuke Yahweh's enemies (<a href='B:90 2:10'>1Sa 2:10</a>). But Samuel let the ball drop to some extent and this was not finally achieved in him. But from God's side, His words did not fail. Prophecy therefore doesn't fail or "fall to the ground" but the potential fulfillments may not come about.</p>


text:
<p>All Israel from Dan to Beersheba knew that Samuel was established to be a prophet of Yahweh- </p><p>Samuel was apparently required to speak forth his words of judgment upon Eli to all Israel, otherwise the ears of Israel could not have tingled at hearing the message (:11). This would have resulted in a difficult life for Samuel at Shiloh, with Eli and his sons aware of what he was saying about them. Perhaps the subsequent account of the death of the family in 1 Samuel 4 is now included to show how this verse came to be true. When the prophecy of Samuel about them was suddenly fulfilled, all Israel would have known that Samuel was indeed a prophet. For short term fulfillments were required in order to legitimize a prophet (<a href='B:50 18:22'>Deu 18:22</a>).</p>


text:
<p>Yahweh appeared again in Shiloh, for Yahweh revealed Himself to Samuel in Shiloh by the word of Yahweh- </p><p>"Revealed" in <a href='B:90 3:7'>1Sa 3:7</a>; <a href='B:90 3:21'>1Sa 3:21</a>; <a href='B:90 9:15'>1Sa 9:15</a> is the word used of how Yahweh had revealed Himself to the tribe of Levi and called them to be His priests (<a href='B:90 2:27'>1Sa 2:27</a>), and Eli as it were was in the loins of his father Levi, according to the principle of <a href='B:650 7:10'>Heb 7:10</a>. But the line of Levi and Eli had potentially been rejected because of Eli's apostasy. The Divine intention was to replace them with Samuel as a prophet-priest and perhaps king (<a href='B:90 2:10'>1Sa 2:10</a>). But this potential was only partially fulfilled by Samuel, and despite possibilities in David and Solomon, it only came to full term in the person and work of the Lord Jesus.</p>


text:
<p>Now Israel went out against the Philistines to battle and encamped beside Ebenezer, and the Philistines encamped in Aphek-</p><p>"Ebenezer" is "rock of help", but Yahweh was no longer the rock for Israel. Eli epitomized Israel; Jeshurun like Eli (:18) had "become fat" and despised Yahweh as their rock (<a href='B:50 32:15'>Deu 32:15</a>), and so He was not a rock of defence for them (<a href='B:50 32:30'>Deu 32:30</a>; <a href='B:50 32:37'>Deu 32:37</a>).</p>


text:
<p>The Philistines put themselves in position against Israel; when they joined battle Israel was defeated by the Philistines, who killed about four thousand Israelite soldiers- </p><p>The description of the drawing up of battle lines and camps recalls the description of the conflict with the Philistines when David saved Israel by slaying Goliath. The contrast seems intentional. God's plan through Samuel and David was to salvation, whereas Eli and his sins led Israel to defeat and their own destruction.</p>


text:
<p>When the people had returned to the camp the elders of Israel said, Why has Yahweh struck us today before the Philistines?- </p><p>They realized that this was no mere bad luck, but that God was working through the Philistines. To be smitten by enemies was part of the curse for disobedience to the covenant. That was the answer, but rather look at themselves self critically and perceive their sins, the people blamed a lack of external religion- in that they blamed what had happened instead upon not having the ark with them. The ark was never presented as a talisman nor was there a command to take it with them into battle. This was purely their assumption.</p><p>Let us bring the ark of the covenant of Yahweh out of Shiloh that it may go with us and save us out of the hand of our enemies- </p><p>This is the language of Yahweh personally going with Israel and saving them out of the hand of their enemies. But as so many do today, Israel had replaced content with form, personal relationship with God with a hollow trust in wooden formalism and mere religion. For no gold box could save Israel.</p>


text:
<p>So the people sent to Shiloh and they brought from there the ark of the covenant of Yahweh of Armies, who sits above the cherubim; and the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were there with the ark of the covenant of God- </p><p>There is a juxtaposition between the presence of Yahweh at the ark, and the corrupt sons of Eli being present "with" the ark. The opposition may be between their being "with" the ark, but Yahweh being "above" it. Being in the presence of the ark had done those men no spiritual good, and so it was vain to suppose that being "with" it would provide salvation. His presence "above" the ark may also suggest that Yahweh and the ark were not the same thing at all.</p>


text:
<p>When the ark of the covenant of Yahweh came into the camp all Israel shouted with a great shout, so that the earth resounded- </p><p>Such was the depth of their belief in mere religion. This is the language of deep religious joy (<a href='B:110 1:45'>1Ki 1:45</a>; <a href='B:150 3:12-13'>Ezr 3:12-13</a>; <a href='B:400 2:12'>Mic 2:12</a>). One lesson we learn is that religious passion, deep faith in the external symbols of the religion (the ark, in this case) is absolutely nothing to do with really knowing God in relationship. I have suggested that the historical records of the Bible were rewritten under inspiration in Babylon, with special reference to the events of the restoration. In this case the connection would be with the great shout and echoing land of <a href='B:150 3:12-13'>Ezr 3:12-13</a> when the rebuilt temple was dedicated. But some wept at that time; for it had not been built according to the commandments of Ezekiel 40-48, and therefore the more spiritually minded wept as they realized that the temple and kingdom had not been restored as potentially possible. The connection of the language is in that here again the people had shouted with passion and the earth had echoed- but Yahweh was not among them, and they were slain. The ark was for them just a box and not the real presence of God. They wrongly equated God with the symbolism of Him, assuming that God was with them if the ark was with them (:7).</p>


text:
<p>When the Philistines heard the noise of the shout they said, What does the noise of this great shout in the camp of the Hebrews mean? When they understood that the ark of Yahweh had come into the camp- </p><p>Note the parallel in :7 between the ark coming into the camp, and God coming into the camp [as they understood it]. Like Israel, they wrongly equated God with the symbolism of Him, assuming that God was with them if the ark was with them. Form replaced content. The externalities overshadowed and then eclipsed the essence.</p>


text:
<p>they were afraid, for they said, God has come into the camp. They said, Woe to us! Nothing like this has happened before- </p><p>God's experience with Israel led to His humiliation before the nations. Seeing the ark represented the very presence of God, the capture of the ark was in a sense the capture of God (<a href='B:90 5:7'>1Sa 5:7</a>; <a href='B:90 5:11'>1Sa 5:11</a> cp. 4:7). <a href='B:230 78:61'>Psa 78:61</a> comments: "He delivered his power to captivity, his glory to the hand of the foe". And likewise at the cross, crucifixion meant humiliation in some sense for God.</p>


text:
<p>Woe to us! Who can deliver us out of the hand of these mighty gods? These are the gods that struck the Egyptians with all kinds of plagues in the wilderness- </p><p>They refer to Yahweh in the plural, and we wonder if this too was how Israel conceived of their God. For Aaron had made the gold calf and told them that "these be your gods, O Israel, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt" (<a href='B:20 32:4'>Exo 32:4</a>). The desire to believe in a plurality of gods somehow beneath the banner of "one God" is a basic human tendency in all religious systems, and came to term in the false doctrine of the Trinity. And yet we see how jumbled was the message which had come down to the Philistines- that the Egyptians had been plagued "in the wilderness" by the multiple gods of Israel. It is a sign of Divine inspiration and purpose that the basic message about Yahweh has been accurately preserved in His word.</p>


text:
<p>Be strong, and behave like men, you Philistines, so that you will not be servants to the Hebrews as they have been to you. Strengthen yourselves like men and fight!-</p><p>These words are quoted about our call to likewise bravely fight against apparently impossible odds- and win (<a href='B:530 16:13'>1Co 16:13</a>). This indicates how context [contrary to what is often claimed] is not always the critical issue in interpretation. For typical of Hebrew midrash, the New Testament quotations of Old Testament phrases are often without any attention to context, just taking phrases of Old Testament scripture and applying them to some other context. When you go back and look at the surrounding context of the Old Testament quotation, there is often no relevance nor appropriacy at all (although sometimes there is).</p>


text:
<p>The Philistines fought and Israel was defeated and they fled every man to his tent and there was a very great slaughter, for thirty thousand Israelite foot soldiers were killed- </p><p>The Hebrew word translated "thousand" doesn't literally mean 1,000 in every occurrence; it can refer to a grouping or family, and in a military context, to a regiment or military subdivision. But the slaughter was far greater than at the first battle. This was clearly punishment for misusing the ark of God as mere religious tokenism and as a totem for good luck and success. With what hurt must God view the similar usage of the symbol of the cross, and the taking of His Name in vain today.</p>


text:
<p>The ark of God was taken, and the two sons of Eli, Hophni and Phinehas, were killed-</p><p>As discussed on :7, the taking of the ark of God into captivity was in a sense God going into captivity. It seems the ark was taken before the men were killed. But the order is reversed in :17 to reflect how much the ark meant to Eli. And yet his love of external religion didn't mean he was thereby spiritual nor saved from his condemnation.</p>


text:
<p>A man of Benjamin ran out of the army that day and came to Shiloh with his clothes torn and earth on his head- </p><p>There may be some significance to this in that it was Benjamin who were chosen by God through Samuel as the first kingly tribe.</p>


text:
<p>When he came, Eli was sitting on his seat by the road watching, for his heart trembled for the ark of God- </p><p>The paramount importance given to the ark is continually stressed. He was worried far more about the ark than about his sons. And yet his lack of discipline of his sons led to his condemnation. His love of the religious externalities didn't save him.</p><p>When the man came into the city and reported what had happened, all the city cried out- </p><p>The record emphasizes Eli’s love for the ark; even after the shock of hearing that his sons had been killed, it was only when he heard that the ark had been taken that he had a stroke and died (:18). Likewise his daughter in law died with mourning for the ark on her lips (:22). But this love of the external things of one’s religion (see on :10) wasn’t the same as true spirituality. For all Eli’s love of the things associated with the true God, he was severely condemned for not having the glory of God and care for His people at heart (see on <a href='B:90 3:13'>1Sa 3:13</a>). It’s not difficult to love the external trappings of our religion- the church hall, the social events, the regular activities, the general ambience. But this isn’t the same as true spirituality.</p>


text:
<p>When Eli heard the noise of the crying he said, What does this noise mean? The man hurried and told Eli- </p><p>The historical records were rewritten under inspiration in exile, with the Babylonian captivity presented as having been experienced in essence in Israel's earlier history. This is a parade example, for the phrase "the noise of the crying" is used in <a href='B:300 25:36'>Jer 25:36</a> of how the shepherds of Israel (cp. Eli and his sons) would make a noise of crying at the Babylonian invasion (also in <a href='B:430 1:10'>Zep 1:10</a>).</p>


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<p>Now Eli was ninety-eight years old, and his eyes were bad so that he could not see- </p><p>We noted on <a href='B:90 3:2-3'>1Sa 3:2-3</a> that at that point Eli's eyes had begun to grow dim, and this is associated with the waning and extinction of the oil lamp which was intended to burn always before Yahweh. Now, Eli is completely blind. The light has gone out within him and within the tabernacle.</p>


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<p>The man said to Eli, I am the one who came out of the army, and I fled today from the battle. He said, What happened, my son?- </p><p>Fleeing before enemies was a sign Israel had broken covenant. This is the point of the history here. Mere possession of the ark and ritual obedience was just mere religion, and was not at all associated with the real, saving presence of God amongst men. This was all so relevant to the exiles, for whom these histories were later rewritten and presented.</p>


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<p>The man who brought the news answered, Israel has fled before the Philistines and there has been a great slaughter among the people. Your two sons Hophni and Phinehas are dead, and the ark of God has been captured- </p><p><a href='B:90 2:34'>1Sa 2:34</a> had given Eli this very sign: "This will be the sign to you which will come on your two sons, Hophni and Phinehas: in one day they shall both die". The idea of a prophetic sign to Eli was surely that he was to take note of it and then repent. But it seems the die the sons died, he also died. It was as if he refused to respond to it, and therefore was slain the same day. And so the idea of the "sign" was that it was to be immediately responded to. Eli died at a great age; God had been so patient with him, giving him so many opportunities to repent, and then at the very end of his life , on the very last day of it, he was given the fulfilment of this sign to urge him personally towards repentance. And still he refused, being concerned merely about the loss of the ark as a religious symbol.</p>


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<p>When he made mention of the ark of God- </p><p>Eli, although apparently righteous himself in many ways and loving the ark of God above all, was rejected specifically because "he frowned not" upon his sons' apostasy; he personally was counted as 'kicking' at God and profiteering from His sacrifices, even though he himself seems to have truly loved God (<a href='B:90 2:29'>1Sa 2:29</a>; <a href='B:90 4:18'>1Sa 4:18</a>). Because Eli wouldn't exercise discipline, he was somehow seen as committing those very things which he failed to rebuke. The man who wouldn’t discipline his wayward ox was to be treated like as if he had committed the crime the ox did, and therefore must die if the ox killed a man (<a href='B:20 21:29'>Exo 21:29</a>).</p><p>Eli fell off his seat backward by the side of the gate and his neck broke and he died, for he was an old man and heavy. He had judged Israel for forty years- </p><p>He honoured his sons above God, to make himself “fat with the chiefest of all the offerings”. The description of Eli as being fat surely reflects his guilt (<a href='B:90 2:29'>1Sa 2:29</a>; <a href='B:90 4:18'>1Sa 4:18</a>). And yet he appeared on the surface to run his family life on a spiritual footing.</p>


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<p>His daughter-in-law, Phinehas’ wife, was pregnant, near the time of delivery. When she heard the news that the ark of God was taken and that her father-in-law and her husband were dead, she went into labour and gave birth, but was overcome by her pains- </p><p>If Eli was 98 (:15) and his daughter in law was young enough to have a child, we can conclude that she was much younger than Phinehas, who was likely in his 70s. He was known for sleeping with other women, so we can assume he had had a number of relationships.</p>


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<p>As she was dying the women attending her said, Don’t be afraid, for you have given birth to a son. But she didn’t answer, neither did she pay any attention- </p><p>The possibility of future things continuing through her son was unimportant to her. For her, the present glory of being in the High Priestly family, even though that family had been condemned to destruction, was everything. And the ark likewise was everything for her, the quintessence of her religion, without which all was meaningless. She is similar to Eli in that the ark meant more to her than anything else (:18).</p>


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<p>She named the child Ichabod saying, The glory has departed from Israel, because the ark of God was taken, and because of her father-in-law and her husband- </p><p>Phinehas' wife honestly thought that her apostate husband and father-in-law were "the glory of Israel". But she was not without some spirituality, or at least religiosity, because she considered the ark to be the even greater glory of Israel (:22). As noted on :18, like Eli, she considered the ark more important than anything else, even her family. And yet this is the point- that mere love of religious symbolism is nothing at all in spiritual terms.</p>


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<p>She said, The glory has departed from Israel, for the ark of God is taken- </p><p>The relevance to the exiles is that the shekinah glory had literally departed from Jerusalem when the Babylonians captured Jerusalem and Judah went into captivity; "departed" is the word used for the exile. The visions Ezekiel showed progressive departure of "the glory of the God of Israel" (<a href='B:330 8:4'>Eze 8:4</a>) from the temple to the East of Jerusalem and then further away to Babylon. And the painful thing for Judah was the ark was apparently lost. But the spiritually minded would have seen from the connection with the ark's previous captivity that actually the presence of God and the ark were two different things. The ark was not to be seen as a mere piece of religious and nationalistic symbolism. The loss of it was not to be mourned unduly because personal relationship with God was still possible, and that is of paramount value.</p>


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<p>Now the Philistines had taken the ark of God, and they brought it from Ebenezer to Ashdod- </p><p>This continues the theme developed in 1 Samuel 4 of how having the ark as mere religious symbolism was not the same as having relationship with God. It was taken away from Ebenezer, the rock of help, for God was no longer their rock; see on <a href='B:90 6:15'>1Sa 6:15</a>; <a href='B:90 7:12'>1Sa 7:12</a>. And yet misusing it was going to bring judgment. This was relevant encouragement to the exiles as they mourned how the temple vessels had been taken to Babylon and were being misused, as in the drinking feast of Daniel 5. "Ashdod" is a form of the word translated "spoiler" or "robber" frequently used of Babylon (<a href='B:290 33:1'>Isa 33:1</a>; <a href='B:300 4:13'>Jer 4:13</a>; <a href='B:300 4:20'>Jer 4:20</a>; <a href='B:300 6:26'>Jer 6:26</a>; <a href='B:300 9:19'>Jer 9:19</a> and often). These historical records were intended to be discerned by the exiles as speaking to them:&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>


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<p>They took the ark of God into the house of Dagon and set it beside Dagon- </p><p>This connects with how the Babylonians took the temple vessels into the houses of their gods in Babylon.</p>


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<p>When the people of Ashdod arose early the next day, Dagon had fallen on his face to the ground before the ark of Yahweh- </p><p>The phrase 'fell on his face to the ground before' is usually used of worship. Although the ark was indeed just a wooden box, God would not be mocked, and expressed His wish that the Philistines would quit their fish god Dagon and worship Him. See on :12.</p><p>They took Dagon and set him back in his place- </p><p>This need to "set him back in his place" connects with the mockery of idol worship found in the restoration prophets. The same phrase is used in :11. The worshippers of Dagon had to return their god to his place by themselves; but the ark was returned to its place by God working through the oxen and cart, which represented the cherubim.</p>


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<p>When they arose early the next morning, Dagon had fallen on his face to the ground before the ark of Yahweh and the head of Dagon and both the palms of his hands were broken off, lying on the threshold. Only Dagon’s torso was intact- </p><p>A fish has no head, palms nor hands. The idol image was reduced to all it was- a mere fish. We saw on :3 that the phrase 'fell on his face to the ground before' is usually used of worship. It was God's intention that the Philistines come to acknowledge His supremacy, and perceive their idols for what they were, stripped of all they had added to them. "Torso" is not in the original; literally, "only Dagon was left to him".</p>


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<p>Therefore neither the priests of Dagon nor anyone who comes into Dagon’s house will tread on the threshold of Dagon in Ashdod, to this day- </p><p>The Philistines are therefore those who jump over the threshold, but that term is used to describe the priests of Yahweh's temple who were no better (<a href='B:430 1:9'>Zep 1:9</a> "In that day, I will punish all those who leap over the threshold, who fill their master’s house with violence and deceit"). The priests may particularly be in view, whose master was Yahweh and whose house, the temple, they had defiled by their idolatry. The idea is that the temple of Yahweh had been effectively turned into that of pagan gods- despite Josiah's apparent reforms. This whole message is a stern warning against mere tokenism in repentance and reform, and challenges to the core all our self-examination and the results thereof. These priests were filling Yahweh's house with the rewards of their violence and deceit. Typical of the prophets, Zephaniah focuses upon the apparently negligible (the personal gains arising from deceit) rather than what we might consider the more obvious issues of offering children to Moloch.</p>


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<p>But the hand of Yahweh was heavy on the people of Ashdod and those nearby, and He destroyed them, afflicting them with tumours- </p><p>This is the reference of <a href='B:230 78:66'>Psa 78:66</a>, which refers to how the ark was taken from Shiloh in Ephraim into the land of the Philistines, who were smitten in their private parts with tumours; but then the ark was returned, not to Shiloh in Ephraim, but to Kirjath Jearim in Judah, and thence to Jerusalem in Judah. But the question for us is the degree to which God ordered this transfer of the ark from Shiloh to Jerusalem (as the pro-Davidic author of Psalms 78 claims); or whether David manipulated it that way, and God went along with it.</p>


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<p>When the men of Ashdod saw what was happening they said, The ark of the God of Israel must not stay with us, for His hand is severe on us and on Dagon our god- </p><p>This was a tacit recognition that the God of Israel was real, and was greater than their god Dagon. Yet like many, they preferred to trundle along undisturbed in their religious ways, even when they had been demonstrated as false and the true way offered to them. They didn't want His abiding presence to continue with them; for "stay" is the usual word used for God's dwelling or abiding amongst His people.</p>


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<p>They sent therefore and gathered all the lords of the Philistines together and said, What shall we do with the ark of the God of Israel? They answered, Let the ark of the God of Israel be carried over to Gath. They carried the ark of the God of Israel there- </p><p>As noted on :7, they could have had the presence of Israel's God amongst them, but they chose not to. The language recalls how the Gentile inhabitants of the land asked the Lord Jesus, the true ark, to leave them- even when He had done great miracles amongst them (<a href='B:470 8:34'>Mat 8:34</a>).</p>


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<p>But after they had carried it there, the hand of Yahweh was against the city, causing panic, and He struck the men of the city, small and great, and tumours broke out upon them- </p><p>I suggest that this was not because God didn't want the ark nor His presence to be amongst them. He did. The punishment was because they were misusing the ark. "Tumours" were the punishment for&nbsp; disobedience to the covenant (<a href='B:50 28:27'>Deu 28:27</a>). The Philistines were being punished in this way because they had been called to accept Yahweh's covenant but had refused, as noted several times throughout this chapter.</p>


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<p>So they sent the ark of God to Ekron. As the ark of God came to Ekron, the Ekronites cried out, They have brought the ark of the God of Israel to us, to kill us and our people!- </p><p>Perhaps the thought was that Ekron worshipped Baal Zebub and not Dagon, and therefore the ark of Israel's God would be vanquished by that god (<a href='B:120 1:2'>2Ki 1:2</a>). But the entire Philistine confederacy knew that they were spiritually beaten before Yahweh. Literally, as in :11, “to me, to slay me and my people” (as AVmg:). The implication is that this was a message from the god of Ekron, tacitly recognizing that he was no match for Yahweh. See on <a href='B:90 6:9'>1Sa 6:9</a>.</p>


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<p>They sent therefore and gathered together all the lords of the Philistines, and they said, Send away the ark of the God of Israel, and let it go back to its own place so that it does not kill us and our people. For there was a deadly panic throughout all the city; the hand of God was very heavy there- </p><p>See on :10; <a href='B:90 6:20'>1Sa 6:20</a>. The same phrase for "go back to its own place" is used in :3, where the worshippers of Dagon had to return their god to his place by themselves; but the ark was returned to its place by God working through the oxen and cart, which represented the cherubim.</p><p>God's experience with Israel led to His humiliation before the nations. Seeing the ark represented the very presence of God, the capture of the ark was in a sense the capture of God (<a href='B:90 5:7'>1Sa 5:7</a>; <a href='B:90 5:11'>1Sa 5:11</a> cp. 4:7). <a href='B:230 78:61'>Psa 78:61</a> comments: "He delivered his power to captivity, his glory to the hand of the foe". And likewise at the cross, crucifixion meant humiliation in some sense. But the point for the exiles to understand from this record was that even in captivity, Yahweh was still alive and active, and would not be mocked. We too are to personalize the history of Israel and see it speaking to our situations.</p>


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<p>The men who didn’t die were struck with the tumours, and the cry of the city went up to Heaven- </p><p>A cry going up to heaven is the language of God's sensitivity to situations upon earth. The subtext is clearly that God was sensitive even to the sufferings of His Gentile enemies. And as noted on :3, it was God's desire that the Philistines repented. He was not at all heartless towards them.</p>


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<p>The ark of Yahweh was in the country of the Philistines for seven months- </p><p>LXX adds "And their land swarmed with mice" (as in :4). The question of course which dominated their thinking was whether their sufferings were all just coincidence, or whether this was due to Israel's God. And yet at the end of 1 Samuel 5 it is clear they recognized the supremacy of Yahweh; and yet by all means men seek to wriggle and squirm against the most evident proof, even if they are brought to admit His existence and activity, they will still seek to dismiss it later (see on :9). This is why "evidences for the existence of God" are not ultimately powerful of themselves; there has to be a movement within the heart of those experiencing them, and a conscious desire not to deny them further.</p>


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<p>The Philistines called for the priests and the diviners, asking, What shall we do with the ark of Yahweh? Show us how we should send it back to its place- </p><p>Circumstances repeat within the lives of God's people, both over time and space. The calling of diviners for help when they were clearly beaten and revealed as having no wisdom... all recalls the situation when seeking to interpret the visions of Pharaoh and the kings in the book of Daniel. There is the same hallmark left from the same Divine hand that was operating. And the continuities in God's operations can be perceived within our own lives, and between our lives and those of others contemporary with us. This is one advantage of meeting together in fellowship with other believers; if we talk about His hand in our lives [rather than social chit chat] we perceive that man is not alone, the same God is working and has worked in others' lives as He does in our life. See on :20.</p>


