Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Judges 1:7
And Adoni-bezek said, Threescore and ten kings, having their thumbs and their great toes cut off, gathered [their meat] under my table: as I have done, so God hath requited me. And they brought him to Jerusalem, and there he died.
7. Threescore and ten kings ] Seventy is a round number; the sheikhs of the Canaanite towns were numerous, and they were continually fighting. Adoni-zedek was evidently a powerful and important chief among them, as is also implied by Jos 10:1 ff. His words are not so much a savage boast as an acknowledgment of the irony of fate, and of the divine justice of the lex talionis.
gathered their meat] used to pick up scraps, like dogs (St Mat 15:27; Odyss. xvii. 309), while the master sat on the ground, or, as in Saul’s time, on a seat by the wall, 1Sa 20:25. The captives were not, of course, actually under the table, which was a low stand supporting a round wooden or metal tray for the food.
And they brought him to Jerusalem ] The subject is naturally the same as in Jdg 1:6, i.e. the men of Judah, implying that Jerusalem was already in their hands; but Jdg 1:21 (see Jos 15:63) expressly states that this was not the case. Though the context does not favour such a construction, the subject may be taken as indefinite, ‘men brought him,’ ‘he was brought,’ i.e. by his servants. According to Joshua 10 Adoni-zedek was king of Jerusalem; his title may have been omitted in Jdg 1:5, as noted above.
In the original narrative Jdg 1:7 was probably followed by Jdg 1:19 ; Jdg 1:21 (corrected), which continue the history of Judah, and therefore should precede the accounts of the subordinate clans ( Jdg 1:10-17 ; Jdg 1:20). After Jerusalem ( Jdg 1:21), the next important place to be attacked would be Hebron ( Jdg 1:10).
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Threescore and ten kings – We may infer from this number of conquered kings, that the intestine wars of the Canaanites were among the causes which, under Gods Providence, weakened their resistance to the Israelites. Adoni-Bezeks cruelty to the subject kings was the cause of his receiving (compare the marginal references) this chastisement. The loss of the thumb would make a man unfit to handle a sword or a bow; the loss of his big toe would impede his speed.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 7. Threescore and ten kinds] Chieftains, heads of tribes, or military officers. For the word king cannot be taken here in its proper and usual sense.
Having their thumbs and their great toes cut off] That this was an ancient mode of treating enemies we learn from AElian, who tells us, Var. Hist. l. ii., c. 9, that “the Athenians, at the instigation of Cleon, son of Cleaenetus, made a decree that all the inhabitants of the island of AEgina should have the thumb cut off from the right hand, so that they might ever after be disabled from holding a spear, yet might handle an oar.” This is considered by AElian an act of great cruelty; and he wishes to Minerva, the guardian of the city, to Jupiter Eleutherius, and all the gods of Greece, that the Athenians had never done such things. It was a custom among those Romans who did not like a military life, to cut off their own thumbs, that they might not be capable of serving in the army. Sometimes the parents cut off the thumbs of their children, that they might not be called into the army. According to Suetonius, in Vit. August., c. 24, a Roman knight, who had cut off the thumbs of his two sons to prevent them from being called to a military life was, by the order of Augustus, publicly sold, both he and his property. These are the words of Suetonius: Equitem Romanum, quod duobus filis adolescentibus, causa detractandi sacramenti, pollices amputasset, ipsum bonaque subjecit hastae. Calmet remarks that the Italian language has preserved a term, poltrone, which signifies one whose thumb is cut off, to designate a soldier destitute of courage and valour. We use poltroon to signify a dastardly fellow, without considering the import of the original. There have been found frequent instances of persons maiming themselves, that they might be incapacitated for military duty. I have heard an instance in which a knavish soldier discharged his gun through his hand, that he might be discharged from his regiment. The cutting off of the thumbs was probably designed for a double purpose:
1. To incapacitate them for war; and,
2. To brand them as cowards.
Gathered their meat under my table] I think this was a proverbial mode of expression, to signify reduction to the meanest servitude; for it is not at all likely that seventy kings, many of whom must have been contemporaries, were placed under the table of the king of Bezek, and there fed; as in the houses of poor persons the dogs are fed with crumbs and offal, under the table of their owners.
So God hath requited me.] The king of Bezek seems to have had the knowledge of the true God, and a proper notion of a Divine providence. He now feels himself reduced to that state to which he had cruelly reduced others. Those acts in him were acts of tyrannous cruelty; the act towards him was an act of retributive justice.
And there he died.] He continued at Jerusalem in a servile and degraded condition till the day of his death. How long he lived after his disgrace we know not.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Threescore and ten kings; which is not strange in those times and places; for these might be either, first, kings successively, and so there might be divers of those kings in one place, and so in others; or, secondly, contemporary kings. For it is well known that anciently each ruler of a city, or great town, was called a king, and had kingly power in that place; and many such kings we meet with in Canaan; and it is probable that some years before kings were more numerous there, till the greater devoured many of the less.
Having their thumbs cut off, that so their hands might be unable to manage weapons of war.
Gathered their meat under my table; an act of barbarous inhumanity thus to insult over the miserable, joined with abominable luxury.
God hath requited me: he acknowledgeth the providence and vindictive justice of God, which also Pharaoh did, and others too, without any true sense of piety.
They brought him; they carried him in triumph, as a monument of Gods righteous vengeance.
To Jerusalem; it being the metropolis of the nation.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
7. Threescore and ten kingsSogreat a number will not appear strange, when it is considered thatanciently every ruler of a city or large town was called a king. Itis not improbable that in that southern region of Canaan, theremight, in earlier times, have been even more till a turbulent chieflike Adoni-bezek devoured them in his insatiable ambition.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And Adonibezek said,…. To the men of Judah, after his thumbs and toes were cut off, his conscience accusing him for what he had done to others, and being obliged to acknowledge he was righteously dealt with:
threescore and ten kings, having their thumbs and their great toes cut off; that is, by him, or by his orders, whom he had conquered and made captives; according to Josephus g, they were seventy two; the number may be accounted for by observing, that in those times, as appears by the preceding book, every city had a king over it; and besides, these seventy kings might not be such who had had the government of so many cities, but many of them such who had reigned successively in the same city, and had fallen into the hands of this cruel and tyrannical king, one after another, and their sons also with them might be so called: and these he says
gathered [their meat] under my table: were glad to eat of the crumbs and scraps which fell from thence, and might in their turns be put there at times for his sport and pleasure, and there be fed with the offal of his meat, as Bajazet the Turk was served by Tamerlane, who put him into an iron cage, and carried him about in it, and used him as his footstool to mount his horse, and at times fed him like a dog with crumbs from his table h:
as I have done, so God hath requited me; whether he had any knowledge of the true God, and of his justice in dealing with him according to his deserts, and had a real sense of his sin, and true repentance for it, is not certain; since the word for God is in the plural number, and sometimes used of Heathen deities, as it may be here by him; however, the righteous judgment of God clearly appears in this instance:
and they brought him to Jerusalem; to that part of Jerusalem which belonged to the tribe of Judah; see Jos 15:8; here they brought him alive, and dying, buried him, as Josephus i says; which might be their view in carrying him thither, perceiving he was a dying man; or they had him thither to expose him as a trophy of victory, and as an example of divine justice:
and there he died: whether through grief and vexation, or of the wounds he had received, or by the immediate hand of God, or by the hands of the Israelites, is not said; neither are improbable.
g Antiqu. l. 5. c. 2. sect. 2. h Such dogs are called , in Homer. Iliad. 23. ver. 173. & Odyss. 17. ver. 227. i Antiqu. l. 5. c. 2. sect. 2.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
(7) Threescore and ten kings.The number might seem incredible, were it not that the title king was freely given to every petty Emir, and even to village Sheykhs. The seventy kings may have been the rulers of the towns which Adoni-bezek had taken in extending the territory of Bezek. Josephus says seventy-two kings (Antt. v. 2, 2), and this common variation is found in some MSS. of the LXX. The Persians treated their Greek captives in this way (Curtius, v. 5,6). Mutilation in the East was so common that it was hardly accounted cruel (Xen. Anab. i. 9-13). Cutting off the hand or foot was the prescribed Mohammedan punishment for theft in British India (Mill, iii. 447), and many mutilated persons are still to be seen in Northern Scinde (see Grotes Greece, xii. 235).
Gathered their meat under my table.The words their meat are wanting in the original. Adoni-bezek, with cruel insolence, treated these subject Sheykhs like dogs which eat of the fragments that fall from the table of their lords (Mat. 15:27). Posidonius says that the king of Parthia used to fling food to his courtiers, who seized it like dogs (Athen. 4:152). The existence of these feuds among the Canaanites would render the task of the Israelites more easy.
As I have done, so God hath requited me.Comp. Jdg. 8:19; 1Sa. 15:33, As thy sword hath made women childless, so shall thy mother be childless among women; Jdg. 15:11, As they (the Philistines) did unto me, so have 1 (Samson) done unto them; Jer. 51:56, The Lord God of recompences shall surely requite thee; Exo. 18:11, For the thing wherein they sinned came upon them. (See Mat. 7:2; Gal. 6:7; Jas. 2:13.) The word used for God is Elohim. In Greek theology this punishment of like by like is called the retribution of Neoptolemus, who murdered Priam at an altar, and was himself murdered at an altar (Pausan. v. 17, 3). The fate of Phalaris, burnt in his own brazen bull (Ovid, De Art. Am. i. 653), and of Dionysius (lian, Var. Hist. ix. 8), were also prominent illustrations of the law. We must not suppose that this Canaanite prince worshipped Jehovah, but only that he recognised generally that a Divine retribution had overtaken him. It is one of the commonest facts of history that
Even-handed justice
Commends the ingredients of the poisoned chalice
To our own lips.
This truth, that wherewithal a man sinneth, by the same also shall he be punished, is magnificently, if somewhat fancifully, worked out in Wisdom 11, 17, 18
They brought him to Jerusalem.Rabbi Tanchum, author of the celebrated traditional Midrash (or exposition), says that this notice must be prospective, i.e., it must refer to a time subsequent to the conquest of Jerusalem mentioned in the next verse. It may, however, merely mean that they kept him with them in their camp when they advanced to the siege of Jerusalem; or the they may refer to his own people. The Israelites may have contemptuously spared his life, and suffered him to join his own people, as a living monument of Gods vengeance. In any case the name Jerusalem is used by anticipation, for it seems to have been called Jebus till the days of David. As it is also called Jebusi (i.e., the Jebusite) in Jos. 15:8; Jos. 18:16, probably the name of the town comes from that of the tribe, and the derivation of it is unknown. The meaning dry suggested by Ewald is very uncertain.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
7. Threescore and ten kings The chief of every petty village was styled a king. This accounts for the number of maimed wretches who scrambled or cravenly begged for the crumbs beneath this brutal conqueror’s table. We need not understand that all these seventy kings were under his table at one time, but during his reign. “Conceive,” says Kitto, “what must have been the state of the country and people among whom such a scene could exist. What wars had been waged, what cruel ravages committed! Those are certainly very much in the wrong who picture to themselves the Canaanites as ‘a happy family,’ disturbed in their peaceful homes by the Hebrew barbarians from the wilderness!”
God hath requited me The guilty conscience, goaded to confession by signal retribution, quickly finds for its woe a moral cause. So the guilty sons of Jacob remembered their sin against Joseph when they found themselves involved in distress in Egypt. Gen 42:21. So Herod was ready to see in the wonder-working Jesus the murdered John Baptist risen from the dead. Mat 14:2.
They brought him to Jerusalem That is, his own people brought him thither, for Jerusalem was yet in the hands of the Canaanites. The Israelites could have had no worthy object in carrying off with them the mutilated king, and the next sentence, commencing with the subject the children of Israel, indicates that the verb brought, in this verse has a different subject.
Accordingly, the next verse shows how Judah followed up his victory, and proceeded to attack Jerusalem, whither the defeated Canaanites had fled.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
‘ And Adonibezek said, “Threescore and ten kings, having their thumbs and their great toes cut off, gathered their meat under my table. As I have done, so God has requited me.” And they brought him to Jerusalem and there he died .’
He received what was his due for he had done this to his enemies and had further humiliated them by making them fight for scraps of food tossed to them from his table. The kings would be petty kings, ruling cities and small towns, although he was probably speaking broadly of leading men in general, and, as was common with war leaders, exaggerating.
“Seventy” is a round number indicating divine perfection (perfection in the eyes of the gods), seven intensified. Seven was seen as such a number throughout the ancient world. Thus he saw the number of kings he had so mistreated as a goodly number.
“As I have done, so God has requited me.” He recognised the justice of the situation, and the writer wishes us to recognise it too. Those who misuse others bring judgment on their own heads.
“And they brought him to Jerusalem and there he died.” He may have been badly wounded, or his wounds may have gone gangrenous for he died shortly after. ‘Brought him to Jerusalem’ signifies ‘to the district round it’, for their next task was the subjugation of that city.
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
Jdg 1:7 And Adonibezek said, Threescore and ten kings, having their thumbs and their great toes cut off, gathered [their meat] under my table: as I have done, so God hath requited me. And they brought him to Jerusalem, and there he died.
Ver. 7. And Adonibezek said. ] Perhaps he repented a little, as did afterwards Antiochus, Licinius, and other tyrants, who yet acknowledged that God’s heavy hand was just upon them; but surely a fame of ingenuity he hath gotten him, for confessing God’s art of justicing in that most exact way of counter-passion or retaliation, such as did Adamussim aequiparare, et in librili perpendere, as Favorinus speaketh: a the scales were even: his cruelty in the one, his punishment in the other. This if he had thought on, and taken up in time, he might have haply redeemed his present sorrows and sufferings. Sethon king of Egypt
“ Qui Pharios currus regum cervicibus egit, ”
made his tributary kings draw his chariot by turns, till one time he espied one of those kings to look back earnestly on the wheel, and demanding the reason thereof, was answered by him, that with much comfort he beheld the lowest spokes turn uppermost by course. Whereupon, apprehending the moral, he left off that proud and barbarous custom. b
Having their thumbs and their great toes cut off.
Gathered their meat under my table.
As I have done, so God hath requited me.
“ Neque enim lex iustior ulla est,
Quam necis artifices arte perire sua. ” – Ovid.
Constantine the Emperor put out his uncle’s eyes, and five years after had his own eyes put out by his own mother Irene. f Phocas, the traitor, had his arms, feet, and genitals cut off in like manner as himself had served his sovereign Mauricius. Archbishop Arundel and Stephen Gardiner were smitten in their tongues and famished, as they had silenced preachers, spoken swelling words against the professors of the truth, and brought a famine of the word. g Charles IX of France, author of the Parisian massacre, h and Felix, earl of Wartenburg, i who threatened to ride up to the spurs in the blood of the Lutherans, were stewed in their own broth, choked in their own blood: they had “blood given them to drink, for they were worthy.” What wouldst thou have done with me, said Tamerlane to Bajazet, if it had been my fortune to have fallen into thy hands? I would, said Bajazet, have enclosed thee in a cage of iron, and so in triumph have carried thee up and down my kingdom: even so, said Tamerlane, shalt thou be served. j
And there he died,
a Gell., lib. xx. cap. 1.
b Isaacson, Chron., p. 61.
c Perk., Of Man’s Imagin.
d Speed, p. 766.
e Naucler. Gen. xxix.
f Bucholc.
g Act. and Mon.
h Annal. Gall.
i Flac. Illyr.
j Turk. Hist., p. 220.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
7 Even as Sodom and Gomorrha, and the cities about them in like manner, giving themselves over to fornication, and going after strange flesh, are set forth for an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.
Ver. 7. Giving themselves over ] In scortationem effusae, wearying and wearing themselves out with that beastly sin, habet; as did Proculus, Messalina, and Lais, who died in the act of uncleanness. ( , Athen. xiii.) The word here used signifies, saith Aretius, Scortationi immori, et contabescere illius desiderio, To waste and consume with that cursed concupiscence. Such a one was that filthy lecher mentioned by Luther, who desired no other heaven than to live always here, and be carried from one stews to another. He died between a couple of notorious strumpets.
And going after strange flesh ] See Trapp on “ Gen 19:5 “
Are set forth ] Gr. , are thrown forth.
For an example ] Herodotus saith the like of the destruction of Troy, that the ruins and rubbish thereof are set forth for an example of this rule, , that God greatly punisheth great offences.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
gathered. i.e. [the pieces].
as = according as.
God Hebrew. Elohim. App-4.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
their thumbs: Heb. the thumbs of their hands and of their feet, This was not an unusual act of cruelty in ancient times towards enemies. – Alian informs us, that in after ages “the Athenians, at the instigation of Cleon, son of Cleoenetus, made a decree that all the inhabitants of the island of Agina should have the thumb cut off from the right hand, so that they might ever after be disabled from holding a spear, yet might handle an oar.” It was a custom among those Romans who did not like a military life, to cut off their thumbs, that they might be incapable of serving in the army; and for the same reason, parents sometimes cut off the thumbs of their children.
gathered: or, gleaned
as I have: Exo 21:23-25, Lev 24:19-21, 1Sa 15:33, Isa 33:1, Mat 7:1, Mat 7:2, Luk 6:37, Luk 6:38, Rom 2:15, Jam 2:13, Rev 13:10, Rev 16:6
Reciprocal: Gen 19:36 – General Gen 29:25 – wherefore Gen 42:21 – we saw Gen 44:16 – God hath Exo 14:26 – the waters Exo 21:24 – General 1Sa 11:11 – slew 2Sa 1:10 – slew 2Sa 10:19 – servants 1Ki 16:11 – he slew 1Ki 20:1 – Thirty and two 1Ki 21:19 – In the place 2Ki 11:16 – there was she slain 2Ch 12:6 – the Lord 2Ch 23:15 – they slew her there Est 8:12 – one day Psa 9:16 – known Psa 10:14 – to requite Psa 59:11 – Slay Psa 107:40 – contempt Psa 149:8 – General Pro 12:10 – but Jer 34:17 – behold Jer 50:15 – as she Jer 51:49 – As Babylon Lam 1:18 – Lord Eze 31:11 – he shall surely deal with him Dan 11:18 – he shall cause Joe 3:7 – and will Oba 1:15 – as Luk 7:29 – justified
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Jdg 1:7. Threescore and ten kings Anciently each ruler of a city or great town was called a king, and had kingly power in that place; and many such kings we meet with in Canaan; and it is probable that, some years before, kings had been more numerous there, till the greater destroyed many of the less. Add to this, that it is likely some of these seventy kings had reigned in one and the same place, and had successively opposed him. Have gathered their meat under my table An act of barbarous inhumanity, thus to insult over the miserable, joined with abominable luxury. So that it appears, by his own confession, he had been proud and insolent, as well as cruel, to a most high degree; and therefore what befell him may well be considered, which indeed he acknowledges, as a just punishment inflicted upon him by the order of Divine Providence. As I have done, so hath God requited me This, his acknowledgment of Gods justice in his punishment, hath made some think he became a penitent and convert to the true religion. He speaks not of gods, as was customary with the heathen, but of God, in the singular number; and this appearance of penitence and faith in the true God might possibly be the reason why the Israelites spared his life.