Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Judges 2:6
And when Joshua had let the people go, the children of Israel went every man unto his inheritance to possess the land.
6. had sent the people away ] and J . sent the people away (exactly as Jos 24:28) from the great assembly at Shechem, at which the covenant had been renewed, and Joshua had delivered his parting exhortations, Jos 24:1-27 E. The words were allowed to stand here in spite of their inconsistency with Jdg 1:1. Jdg 2:6-9 = Jos 24:28; Jos 24:31; Jos 24:29-30, with minor alterations to suit the opening of a new book.
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
Jdg 2:6-10
The people served the Lord all the days of Joshua.
Joshua and another generation
I. The power of a great man to adapt himself to changing circumstances, and to be equally great under varying conditions. Many a man great in conquest is a nonentity in peaceful times. The great warrior does not always make a great statesman. Joshua, on the contrary, was the moral ruler of the nation in peace as well as the military commander of the army in war. The Romans are said to have conquered like savages and ruled like philosophic statesmen. Joshua, too, excelled in war and peace. Perhaps he was greatest in peace, because he that ruleth his spirit is better than he that taketh a city. Contrast Napoleon in St. Helena with Joshua at Timnath Heres.
II. The formative influence of one great life in giving character to an age. Such men as Joshua are necessarily exceptional, There is a Divine economy in the sending of great men. Like miracles, they must not be allowed to degenerate into commonplaces. There is a reserve in producing great leaders: they come one in a century–in some instances, one in a millennium. Men of the Joshua type are sent to give a character to their time. The history of the world is largely the history of single champions.
III. The limitations of a personal influence–even one of the most powerful kind; for we see here the strange capacity of one age to prove untrue to the best traditions of that which preceded it: There arose another generation, etc.
1. This generation suffered from the lack of direct personal testimony. They could not say, We speak that which we do know, and testify that which we have seen. All they knew was by hearsay, and spirituality must be very vigorous and intense to breathe life into hearsay.
2. These people sadly under-estimated, and therefore ignored, the value of historic record–knew not, etc. They severed themselves from the past.
3. This was an age of ease, and, as such, the least productive of noble manhood. These were poverty-stricken times. The nation was no longer braced by one common ambition, or bent upon one object. They had lapsed into a state of indolence and indifference. Moreover, there was no central supreme power, for they had leaders only in times of war, and the old leader and his subordinates were dead. This was a time when a great character was most needed to save the nation from degeneracy. Such ages often succeed the iron ages of history. I am not sure that we, as Christians, have not lost much of the robustness of the past age.
IV. What a responsibility is involved in this succession of ages to maintain the continuity, to be worthy followers of those who through faith and patience have inherited the promises; to be, of a truth, successors of the apostles and of other holy men!
V. Thank God, the record in our text is only fragmentary. That age was not a final break upon the progress of revelation. History is progressive after all. Span the centuries. Dont let the point of observation be too narrow or near. Ascending from lowlands to highlands there are undulations; but take a span large enough, and you will find that it is an ascent all the way. So in the history of our race. God has been advancing throughout all time in spite of the dark agesof the world, and in spite of human relapses into sin. (D. Davies.)
Man
I. The moral obligation of every member of our race (Jdg 2:7).
1. All creatures are the servants of God, but they serve Him in different ways.
(1) Some without a will. Inanimate matter and insentient life.
(2) Some with their will. Brutes–instinct.
(3) Some against their will. Wicked men and fallen angels.
(4) Some by their will. Saints and angels.
2. To serve Him in this way is the obligation of the race. But there is one condition indispensable to this–supreme love for Him as the Sovereign. This will–
(1) Induce man to attain an understanding of His law;
(2) prompt him cheerfully to obey it.
II. The service of one good man to our race.
1. That a man can induce his race to serve the Lord. Joshua did.
2. That a man, to do this, must himself be a servant of the Lord. Joshua was.
3. That, however useful a man may be to his race in this respect, he must die. Joshua died.
III. The melancholy succession of our race (verse 10).
1. The succession involves no extinction. The mighty generations that are gone live on some other shore.
2. The mode of the succession involves a moral cause. We say the mode, not the fact. If the race continue to multiply as now, the limitation of the worlds area and provisions would require a succession. This planet was probably intended as a stepping-stone to another. Had there been no sin, however, instead of the succession taking place through the grave, it might have been through a chariot of fire, as in the case of Elijah.
IV. The degenerating tendency of our race.
1. This degenerating tendency is often found stronger than the most elevating influences of truth. Peter fell in the very presence of Christ.
2. This degenerating tendency indicates the necessity of a conscious reliance upon the gracious help of God. (Homilist.)
Israels apostasy
I. The character of the Jews at the death of Joshua.
II. The apostasy of the succeeding generation.
1. The nature of their apostasy. God is jealous of His own honour; and to unite His name with idols, and to His worship to join the revolting orgies of Ashtoreth, was diabolism, and must be judged and punished.
2. Their apostasy was intensified by all the distinguishing privileges and blessings they had enjoyed. As virtue is proportioned in vigour to the temptations resisted, so transgression is proportioned to the forces of conscience, education, example and blessing which have been fought with and conquered. Nor was this all their sin. To the list must be added disobedience. They refused to execute the Divine command to expel the Canaanites from the land. It was terrible surgery, and not murder, that the Israelites were commanded to perform as touching the heathen idolators–a true and just surgery, cutting away unflinchingly the diseased part, that themselves might remain sound. Stopping short in the operation, they became infected with the moral leprosy which made the Canaanites loathsome to heaven and earth (Lev 18:21-30; Deu 12:30-32).
(1) Mercies despised, privileges scorned, pledges made to God in covenant and broken, become the foundation for towering iniquity. The best things perverted are the worst.
(2) Nothing is more fatal to the Christian calling than alliances with the ungodly. He who makes the experiment of such entangling alliances will speedily discover that his power is lost; that what he builds with one hand he pulls down with the other; that he does not win the world to God: the world wins him. It is a notorious fact that alliances with the wicked do not command the respect of the very men for whose favour they are formed. The world scorns those who sacrifice their religious principles to worldly policy or social ambitions.
III. The punishment of their apostasy.
1. No two ideas are more inseparably linked together than these two of sin and suffering. The one follows the other by a law as fixed and imperative as the agony of a burning hand. They are the twin serpents of the race, inseparable companions.
2. But all suffering is not penal. With respect to Gods people it is remedial and corrective. Moses Browne truly saith, A great deal of rust requires a rough file.
IV. Gods merciful provision for Israels deliverance. God answered the cries of distress by sending them Judges–men chosen and qualified to act as His vicegerents in the emergencies of the nation. Let no Christian despair or be discouraged even in the most adverse circumstances. Evermore it is true that Mans extremity is Gods opportunity. (W. G. Moorehead, D. D.)
There arose another generation after them, which knew not the Lord.
Israel forsaking God
With ages of schooling, and always the same lessons, mankind is slow to learn the absolute and unalterable conditions of prosperity; equally slow to note and steer clear of the reefs and shoals on which nationality after nationality has gone to wreck.
I. The drift of human nature. It is towards sin, and away from God. The Israelites were men no better and no worse than other men. Sentimental philosophers of the modern type may write out in soft phrase their exalted estimates of human nature; they may enlarge upon its beauties and excellences; but, in spite of their fancies and ecstacies, here the fact asserts itself in the record, as it does on every page of history, that human nature, left to itself, gravitates downward.
II. The influence of men in high station. The significant fact is recorded that the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua, etc. A great responsibility rests upon those who occupy prominent places in society or in the State–a responsibility that is not discharged by fidelity to the specific duties of their position. There is that undefined, incalculable something of influence which is inseparable from their station, which they are to guard and direct.
III. The danger of religious insensibility. It is twofold. There is danger that men will come into a state of mind and heart where they will be unmoved by Divine truth, and there is great danger in that state. The children of Israel did not sweep over at once and in a body into idolatry. They drifted, by slow and unrecognised gradations, from the service of God to the worship of Baal and Ashtaroth. Carelessness about single duties, indifference to single truths–here were the causes of their final detection. The process has been often repeated, is still in progress. Men and women walk our streets to-day utterly indifferent to the most solemn truths of religion, to whom all the truths of God were once intensely real. There was a time when conscience was quick, and the least wandering from duty brought sorrow and repentance. There was a time when immortality, with its heaven of blessedness and its land of infinite sorrow, loomed colossal on the horizon of thought. There was such a time, but it has passed, perhaps for ever. Neglect of duty, lack of watchfulness against sin, disobedience to many a heavenly calling–things like these, slight and unnoticed in themselves, have swept them away from the moorings of faith and interest, and they are adrift on the dark sea of unbelief and indifference.
IV. The secret of prosperity. The Israelites had all the human factors of success–a fruitful country, a genial climate, experience in the arts of war and peace, and the prestige of a triumphant march from Egypt to Canaan. These were seemingly enough to make them a power among the nations. But one thing, the indispensable thing, was missing–the Divine favour which they had forfeited by their sin. Is God for us or against us? is the decisive question. If He frown, empires with the glow of centuries of art and culture transfiguring them may crumble to dishonoured dust, and the shame of their defeat become greater than the splendour of their conquests. From the tawny sands that cover the old-time magnificence of Babylon and Nineveh, and the scores of historic centres that have faded out of sight, comes one and the same declaration, voiced by the desert wind that moans over their graves, Even so shall it be with the nations that forget God. And what is true of men in the mass is true of individuals. The conditions of real and enduring success in life are always the same. If God be for us, who can be against us? Many things are rightly estimated as elements in what is called a successful life. Enterprise, thrift, patience, energy–all these are helpful and desirable forces; but it still remains unalterably and everlastingly true that the sovereign maxim of political and social economy is that given long ago by Jesus on the mount: Seek ye first the kingdom of God, etc. (Sermons by the Monday Club.)
Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell
Verse 6. When Joshua had let the people go] The author of this book is giving here a history of the people, from the division of the land by Joshua to the time in which the angel speaks. Joshua divided the land to them by lot; recommended obedience to God, which they solemnly promised: and they continued faithful during his life, and during the lives of those who had been his contemporaries, but who had survived him. When all that generation who had seen the wondrous works of God in their behalf had died, then the succeeding generation, who knew not the Lord – who had not seen his wondrous works – forsook his worship, and worshipped Baalim and Ashtaroth, the gods of the nations among whom they lived, and thus the Lord was provoked to anger; and this was the reason why they were delivered into the hands of their enemies. This is the sum of their history to the time in which the angel delivers his message.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
When Joshua had let the people go; when he had distributed their inheritances, and dismissed them severally to take possession of them. This was done before this time, whilst Joshua lived; but is now repeated in order to the discovery of the time, and cause, or occasion of the peoples defection from God, and of Gods desertion of them.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
6-10. And when Joshua had let thepeople goThis passage is a repetition of Jos24:29-31. It was inserted here to give the reader the reasonswhich called forth so strong and severe a rebuke from the angel ofthe Lord. During the lifetime of the first occupiers, who retained avivid recollection of all the miracles and judgments which they hadwitnessed in Egypt and the desert, the national character stood highfor faith and piety. But, in course of time, a new race arose whowere strangers to all the hallowed and solemnizing experience oftheir fathers, and too readily yielded to the corrupting influencesof the idolatry that surrounded them.
Jud2:11-19. WICKEDNESS OF THENEW GENERATIONAFTER JOSHUA.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And when Joshua had let the people go,…. This is not to be connected with what goes before, as if that was done in Joshua’s lifetime; for during that, as is after testified, the people of Israel served the Lord; whereas the angel, in the speech to them before related, charges them with disobeying the voice of the Lord, making leagues with the inhabitants of the land, and not demolishing their altars, all which was after the death of Joshua; but this refers to a meeting of them with him before his death, and his dismission of them, which was either when he had divided the land by lot unto them, or when he had given them his last charge before his death, see Jos 24:28; and this, and what follows, are repeated and introduced here, to connect the history of Israel, and to show them how they fell into idolatry, and so under the divine displeasure, which brought them into distress, from which they were delivered at various times by judges of his own raising up, which is the subject matter of this book:
the children of Israel went every man unto his inheritance to possess the land; as it was divided to the several tribes and their families; which seems to confirm the first sense given, that this refers to the dismission of the people upon the division of the land among them.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
The account of this development of the covenant nation, which commenced after the death of Joshua and his contemporaries, is attached to the book of Joshua by a simple repetition of the closing verses of that book (Jos 24:28-31) in Jdg 2:6-10, with a few unimportant differences, not only to form a link between Josha and Jdg 2:11, and to resume the thread of the history which was broken off by the summary just given of the results of the wars between the Israelites and Canaanites ( Bertheau), but rather to bring out sharply and clearly the contrast between the age that was past and the period of the Israelitish history that was just about to commence. The vav consec. attached to expresses the order of thought and not of time. The apostasy of the new generation from the Lord (Jdg 2:10.) was a necessary consequence of the attitude of Israel to the Canaanites who were left in the land, as described in Judg 1:1-2:5. This thought is indicated by the vav consec. in ; so that the meaning of Jdg 2:6. as expressed in our ordinary phraseology would be as follows: Now when Joshua had dismissed the people, and the children of Israel had gone every one to his own inheritance to take possession of the land, the people served the Lord as long as Joshua and the elders who survived him were alive; but when Joshua was dead, and that generation (which was contemporaneous with him) had been gathered to its fathers, there rose up another generation after them which knew not the Lord, and also (knew not) the work which He had done to Israel. On the death and burial of Joshua, see at Jos 24:29-30. “ Gathered unto their fathers ” corresponds to “gathered to his people” in the Pentateuch (Gen 25:8, Gen 25:17; Gen 35:29; Gen 49:29, Gen 49:33, etc.: see at Gen 25:8). They “ knew not the Lord,” sc., from seeing or experiencing His wonderful deeds, which the contemporaries of Joshua and Moses had seen and experienced.
In the general survey of the times of the judges, commencing at Jdg 2:11, the falling away of the Israelites from the Lord is mentioned first of all, and at the same time it is distinctly shown how neither the chastisements inflicted upon them by God at the hands of hostile nations, nor the sending of judges to set them free from the hostile oppression, availed to turn them from their idolatry (Jdg 2:11-19). This is followed by the determination of God to tempt and chastise the sinful nation by not driving away the remaining Canaanites (Jdg 2:20-23); and lastly, the account concludes with an enumeration of the tribes that still remained, and the attitude of Israel towards them (Jdg 3:1-6).
Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament
| The Idolatry of the Israelites. | B. C. 1425. |
6 And when Joshua had let the people go, the children of Israel went every man unto his inheritance to possess the land. 7 And the people served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great works of the LORD, that he did for Israel. 8 And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the LORD, died, being a hundred and ten years old. 9 And they buried him in the border of his inheritance in Timnath-heres, in the mount of Ephraim, on the north side of the hill Gaash. 10 And also all that generation were gathered unto their fathers: and there arose another generation after them, which knew not the LORD, nor yet the works which he had done for Israel. 11 And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and served Baalim: 12 And they forsook the LORD God of their fathers, which brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them, and bowed themselves unto them, and provoked the LORD to anger. 13 And they forsook the LORD, and served Baal and Ashtaroth. 14 And the anger of the LORD was hot against Israel, and he delivered them into the hands of spoilers that spoiled them, and he sold them into the hands of their enemies round about, so that they could not any longer stand before their enemies. 15 Whithersoever they went out, the hand of the LORD was against them for evil, as the LORD had said, and as the LORD had sworn unto them: and they were greatly distressed. 16 Nevertheless the LORD raised up judges, which delivered them out of the hand of those that spoiled them. 17 And yet they would not hearken unto their judges, but they went a whoring after other gods, and bowed themselves unto them: they turned quickly out of the way which their fathers walked in, obeying the commandments of the LORD; but they did not so. 18 And when the LORD raised them up judges, then the LORD was with the judge, and delivered them out of the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge: for it repented the LORD because of their groanings by reason of them that oppressed them and vexed them. 19 And it came to pass, when the judge was dead, that they returned, and corrupted themselves more than their fathers, in following other gods to serve them, and to bow down unto them; they ceased not from their own doings, nor from their stubborn way. 20 And the anger of the LORD was hot against Israel; and he said, Because that this people hath transgressed my covenant which I commanded their fathers, and have not hearkened unto my voice; 21 I also will not henceforth drive out any from before them of the nations which Joshua left when he died: 22 That through them I may prove Israel, whether they will keep the way of the LORD to walk therein, as their fathers did keep it, or not. 23 Therefore the LORD left those nations, without driving them out hastily; neither delivered he them into the hand of Joshua.
The beginning of this paragraph is only a repetition of what account we had before of the people’s good character during the government of Joshua, and of his death and burial (Jos 24:29; Jos 24:30), which comes in here again only to make way for the following account, which this chapter gives, of their degeneracy and apostasy. The angel had foretold that the Canaanites and their idols would be a snare to Israel; now the historian undertakes to show that they were so, and, that this may appear the more clear, he looks back a little, and takes notice, 1. Of their happy settlement in the land of Canaan. Joshua, having distributed this land among them, dismissed them to the quiet and comfortable possession of it (v. 6): He sent them away, not only every tribe, but every man to his inheritance, no doubt giving them his blessing. 2. Of their continuance in the faith and fear of God’s holy name as long as Joshua lived, v. 7. As they went to their possessions with good resolutions to cleave to God, so they persisted for some time in these good resolutions, as long as they had good rulers that set them good examples, gave them good instructions, and reproved and restrained the corruptions that crept in among them, and as long as they had fresh in remembrance the great things God did for them when he brought them into Canaan: those that had seen these wonders had so much sense as to believe their own eyes, and so much reason as to serve that God who had appeared so gloriously on their behalf; but those that followed, because they had not seen, believed not. 3. Of the death and burial of Joshua, which gave a fatal stroke to the interests of religion among the people, Jdg 2:8; Jdg 2:9. Yet so much sense they had of their obligations to him that they did him honour at his death, and buried him in Timnath-heres; so it is called here, not, as in Joshua, Timnath-serah. Heres signifies the sun, a representation of which, some think, was set upon his sepulchre, and gave name to it, in remembrance of the sun’s standing still at his word. So divers of the Jewish writers say; but I much question whether an image of the sun would be allowed to the honour of Joshua at that time, when, by reason of men’s general proneness to worship the sun, it would be in danger of being abused to the dishonour of God. 4. Of the rising of a new generation, v. 10. All that generation in a few years wore off, their good instructions and examples died and were buried with them, and there arose another generation of Israelites who had so little sense of religion, and were in so little care about it, that, notwithstanding all the advantages of their education, one might truly say that they knew not the Lord, knew him not aright, knew him not as he had revealed himself, else they would not have forsaken him. They were so entirely devoted to the world, so intent upon the business of it or so indulgent of the flesh in ease and luxury, that they never minded the true God and his holy religion, and so were easily drawn aside to false gods and their abominable superstitions.
And so he comes to give us a general idea of the series of things in Israel during the time of the judges, the same repeated in the same order.
I. The people of Israel forsook the God of Israel, and gave that worship and honour to the dunghill deities of the Canaanites which was due to him alone. Be astonished, O heavens! at this, and wonder, O earth! Hath a nation, such a nation, so well fed, so well taught, changed its God, such a God, a God of infinite power, unspotted purity, inexhaustible goodness, and so very jealous of a competitor, for stocks and stones that could do neither good nor evil? Jer 2:11; Jer 2:12. Never was there such an instance of folly, ingratitude, and perfidiousness. Observe how it is described here, v. 11-13. In general, they did evil, nothing could be more evil, that is, more provoking to God, nor more prejudicial to themselves, and it was in the sight of the Lord; all evil is before him, but he takes special notice of the sin of having any other god. In particular, 1. They forsook the Lord (Jdg 2:12; Jdg 2:13); this was one of the two great evils they were guilty of, Jer. ii. 13. They had been joined to the Lord in covenant, but now they forsook him, as a wife treacherously departs from her husband. “They forsook the worship of the Lord,” so the Chaldee: for those that forsake the worship of God do in effect forsake God himself. It aggravated this that he was the God of their fathers, so that they were born in his house, and therefore bound to serve him; and that he brought them out of the land of Egypt, he loosed their bonds, and upon that account also they were obliged to serve him. 2. When they forsook the only true God they did not turn atheists, nor were they such fools as to say, There is no God; but they followed other gods: so much remained of pure nature as to own a God, yet so much appeared of corrupt nature as to multiply gods, and take up with any, and to follow the fashion, not the rule, in religious worship. Israel had the honour of being a peculiar people and dignified above all others, and yet so false were they to their own privileges that they were fond of the gods of the people that were round about them. Baal and Ashtaroth, he-gods and she-gods; they made their court to sun and moon, Jupiter and Juno. Baalim signifies lords, and Ashtaroth blessed ones, both plural, for when they forsook Jehovah, who is one, they had gods many and lords many, as a luxuriant fancy pleased to multiply them. Whatever they took for their gods, they served them and bowed down to them, gave honour to them and begged favours from them.
II. The God of Israel was hereby provoked to anger, and delivered them up into the hand of their enemies, Jdg 2:14; Jdg 2:15. He was wroth with them, for he is a jealous God and true to the honour of his own name; and the way he took to punish them for their apostasy was to make those their tormentors whom they yielded to as their tempters. They made themselves as mean and miserable by forsaking God as they would have been great and happy if they had continued faithful to him. 1. The scale of victory turned against them. After they forsook God, whenever they took the sword in hand they were as sure to be beaten as before they had been sure to conquer. Formerly their enemies could not stand before them, but, wherever they went, the hand of the Lord was for them; when they began to cool in their religion, God suspended his favour, stopped the progress of their successes, and would not drive out their enemies any more (v. 3), only suffered them to keep their ground; but now, when they had quite revolted to idolatry, the war turned directly against them, and they could not any longer stand before their enemies. God would rather give the success to those that had never known nor owned him than to those that had done both, but had now deserted him. Wherever they went, they might perceive that God himself had turned to be their enemy, and fought against them, Isa. lxiii. 10. 2. The balance of power then turned against them of course. Whoever would might spoil them, whoever would might oppress them. God sold them into the hands of their enemies; not only he delivered them up freely, as we do that which we have sold, but he did it upon a valuable consideration, that he might get himself honour as a jealous God, who would not spare even his own peculiar people when they provoked him. He sold them as insolvent debtors are sold (Matt. xviii. 25), by their sufferings to make some sort of reparation to his glory for the injury it sustained by their apostasy. Observe how their punishment, (1.) Answered what they had done. They served the gods of the nations that were round about them, even the meanest, and God made then serve the princes of the nations that were round about them, even the meanest. He that is company for every fool is justly made a fool of by every company. (2.) How it answered what God has spoken. The hand of heaven was thus turned against them, as the Lord had said, and as the Lord had sworn (v. 15), referring to the curse and death set before them in the covenant, with the blessing and life. Those that have found God true to his promises may thence infer that he will be as true to his threatenings.
III. The God of infinite mercy took pity on them in their distresses, though they had brought themselves into them by their own sin and folly, and wrought deliverance for them. Nevertheless, though their trouble was the punishment of their sin and the accomplishment of God’s word, yet they were in process of time saved out of their trouble, v. 16-18. Here observe, 1. The inducement of their deliverance. It came purely from God’s pity and tender compassion; the reason was fetched from within himself. It is not said, It repented them because of their iniquities (for it appears, v. 17, that many of them continued unreformed), but, It repented the Lord because of their groanings; though it is not so much the burden of sin as the burden of affliction that they are said to groan under. It is true they deserved to perish for ever under his curse, yet, this being the day of his patience and our probation, he does not stir up all his wrath. He might in justice have abandoned them, but he could not for pity do it. 2. The instruments of their deliverance. God did not send angels from heaven to rescue them, nor bring in any foreign power to their aid, but raised up judges from among themselves, as there was occasion, men to whom God gave extraordinary qualifications for, and calls to, that special service for which they were designed, which was to reform and deliver Israel, and whose great attempts he crowned with wonderful success: The Lord was with the judges when he raised them up, and so they became saviours. Observe, (1.) In the days of the greatest degeneracy and distress of the church there shall be some whom God will either find or make to redress its grievances and set things to rights. (2.) God must be acknowledged in the seasonable rising up of useful men for public service. He endues men with wisdom and courage, gives them hearts to act and venture. All that are in any way the blessings of their country must be looked upon as the gifts of God. (3.) Whom God calls he will own, and give them his presence; whom he raises up he will be with. (4.) The judges of a land are its saviours.
IV. The degenerate Israelites were not effectually and thoroughly reformed, no, not by their judges, v. 17-19. 1. Even while their judges were with them, and active in the work of reformation, there were those that would not hearken to their judges, but at that very time went a whoring after other gods, so mad were they upon their idols, and so obstinately bent to backslide. They had been espoused to God, but broke the marriage-covenant, and went a whoring after these gods. Idolatry is spiritual adultery, so vile, and base, and perfidious a thing is it, and so hardly are those reclaimed that are addicted to it. 2. Those that in the times of reformation began to amend yet turned quickly out of the way again, and became as bad as ever. The way they turned out of was that which their godly ancestors walked in, and set them out in; but they soon started from under the influence both of their fathers’ good example and of their own good education. The wicked children of godly parents do so, and will therefore have a great deal to answer for. However, when the judge was dead, they looked upon the dam which checked the stream of their idolatry as removed, and then it flowed down again with so much the more fury, and the next age seemed to be rather the worse for the attempts that had been made towards reformation, v. 19. They corrupted themselves more than their fathers, strove to outdo them in multiplying strange gods and inventing profane and impious rites of worship, as it were in contradiction to their reformers. They ceased not from, or, as the word is, they would not let fall, any of their own doings, grew not ashamed of those idolatrous services that were most odious nor weary of those that were most barbarous, would not so much as diminish one step of their hard and stubborn way. Thus those that have forsaken the good ways of God, which they have once known and professed, commonly grow most daring and desperate in sin, and have their hearts most hardened.
V. God’s just resolution hereupon was still to continue the rod over them, 1. Their sin was sparing the Canaanites, and this in contempt and violation of the covenant God had made with them and the commands he had given them, v. 20. 2. Their punishment was that the Canaanites were spared, and so they were beaten with their own rod. They were not all delivered into the hand of Joshua while he lived, v. 23. Our Lord Jesus, though he spoiled principalities and powers, yet did not complete his victory at first. We see not yet all things put under him; there are remains of Satan’s interest in the church, as there were of the Canaanites in the land; but our Joshua lives for ever, and will in the great day perfect his conquest. After Joshua’s death, little was done for a long time against the Canaanites: Israel indulged them, and grew familiar with them, and therefore God would not drive them out any more, v. 21. If they will have such inmates as these among them, let them take them, and see what will come of it. God chose their delusions, Isa. lxvi. 4. Thus men cherish and indulge their own corrupt appetites and passions, and, instead of mortifying them, make provision for them, and therefore God justly leaves them to themselves under the power of their sins, which will be their ruin. So shall their doom be; they themselves have decided it. These remnants of the Canaanites were left to prove Israel (v. 22), whether they would keep the way of the Lord or not; not that God might know them, but that they might know themselves. It was to try, (1.) Whether they could resist the temptations to idolatry which the Canaanites would lay before them. God had told them they could not, Deut. vii. 4. But they thought they could. “Well,” said God, “I will try you;” and, upon trial, it was found that the tempters’ charms were far too strong for them. God has told us how deceitful and desperately wicked our hearts are, but we are not willing to believe it till by making bold with temptation we find it too true by sad experience. (2.) Whether they would make a good use of the vexations which the remaining natives would give them, and the many troubles they would occasion them, and would thereby be convinced of sin and humbled for it, reformed, and driven to God and their duty, whether by continual alarms from them they would be kept in awe and made afraid of provoking God.
Fuente: Matthew Henry’s Whole Bible Commentary
Influence of Joshua, vs. 6-10
With verse six the inspired author goes back to the days of Joshua to show what conditions in Israel had been, which had been so altered by the time of the visit of the angel to Bochim. The people had gone to their inheritances from the presence of Joshua and had continued to serve the Lord. So great had been the influence of Joshua that faithfulness continued as long as his contemporaries among the elders lived. The reference to Joshua’s death and burial corresponds with the account of Jos 24:28-31. The difference in the name, Timnath-heres instead of -serah, is due to the Hebrew vowel pointing.
The problem in Israel occurred with the rise of the first generation born in the land. When the scripture states that it was a generation which knew not the Lord it speaks in a general sense. It means that those who did not know the Lord were the ones in power, because they were in the majority. The reference to their not knowing the works which the Lord had done for Israel not only means that they were not alive when the Lord did these miraculous things, but they also had no respect for what He had done either. A lot of children of Christian parents are still like that today, (Eph 6:1-3).
Fuente: Garner-Howes Baptist Commentary
CRITICAL NOTES.
Jdg. 2:6. And when Joshua had let the people go.] The visit and solemn message of the angel had led to tears. The temporary repentance was so general that the place of the visit was named after the weeping which it had produced. But tears for sin are of small use so long as the sin itself is not put away. Israel remained in league with the tributary Canaanites in spite of the tears. That being so, the sin went on to work out its inevitable calamities and to bring tears which were more abiding. These verses, from Jos. 24:28-31, are therefore quoted to contrast the fidelity of Israel under Joshua with the infidelity of Israel after the death of Joshua, and of his contemporary elders, who had seen the great works of Jehovah. The quotation, therefore, is not only appropriate; it is inserted as giving emphasis to Joshuas influence in the past, as laying an emphasis on Gods merciful keeping of His covenant while Israel remained faithful, and thus as giving a fearful emphasis to the facts which this history of the Judges records to show that the beginning of sin is the beginning of sorrows, and that the continuation of sin is their inevitable perpetuation and aggravation also.
Jdg. 2:7. All the days of the elders.] No exact term of years is assigned to the days of the elders, which must, therefore, remain uncertain. The length of Joshuas government is also uncertain. If, however, we assume Joshua to have been about the same age as his companion Caleb, as is probable, he would have been just eighty at the entrance into Canaan, and therefore thirty years would bring us to the close of his life. These elders would be all that were old enough to take part in the wars of Canaan, according to Jdg. 3:1-2; and therefore, reckoning from the age of twenty to seventy, we cannot be far wrong in assigning a period of about fifty years from the entrance into Canaan to the death of the elders, or twenty years after the death of Joshua, supposing his government to have lasted thirty years. [Speakers Commentary.]
Jdg. 2:9. Timnath heres.] Called in Jos. 19:50; Jos. 24:30, Timnath-serah. Cf. Preachers Commentary, p. 286. The difference of the names in the original is simply that of a transposition of the letters.
Jdg. 2:10. Which knew not the Lord.] That is, they knew Him not as their fathers did, who had seen so many of Jehovahs mighty works. It is not even meant that they were mentally strangers to the history of Gods goodness under Joshua; they knew not God in their hearts. They had no love to Him. The word is similarly used, in Exo. 1:8, of the king who knew not Joseph.
MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.Jdg. 2:6-10
REWRITTEN HISTORY
Nearly all of this paragraph is repeated from Jos. 24:28-31. The language here is almost identical with that in the earlier account, but the verses are not repeated in the same order, Jdg. 2:7 being placed here before the account of Joshuas death and burial. This is evidently done to throw stress on the defection of the Israelites, this being the particular subject on which the author of the Book of Judges is here dwelling. In the account in Joshua, Joshuas death and burial form the principal subject of the four verses common to both books. What is here given as Jdg. 2:7, is given there as a subordinate and incidental remark. In this chapter, Jdg. 2:7 takes precedence of the mention of Joshuas death and burial, because the degeneration of the Israelites since the death of Joshua has here become the main theme of discourse. This alone should be sufficient to prevent us from the mistake of the Speakers Commentary, in which the passages from the two books are copied out and placed side by side, with the idea of showing that the verses in Judges are merely a confused and aimless repetition of the earlier record. It is true that we have here a piece of rewritten history, but the rewritten history is not therefore without an object. The object of the recapitulation is evident. As he writes of the rebuke by the angel at Bochim, the author is reminded that no such remonstrance was ever needed in the days of Joshua, nor in the days of the elders who had seen the great works which the Lord wrought by Joshua. The history under the judges would form a dark contrast to the history under Joshua. In the latter, Gods mighty works have been invariably for Israel; in this history, which the author was now writing, God would often have to be shown as fighting against Israel. Under these circumstances, what could be more natural than that he should restate the record at the close of the Book of Joshua? The more exactly he copied the identical words there, the more clearly would it serve to show his purpose here: it would show why God had turned against the people whom He had aforetime so marvellously helped. In view of this, and of other features in the paragraph, the following points may be noticed:
I. The value of history. It is Gods monitor. It is in harmony with His own words. It shows us the ground for His rebukes. It explains His altered bearing towards nations and families and individuals. History, rightly read, would explain many of our reverses. History would interpret for us many of the Divine judgments. In addition to all this, history is full of incitements to a better and more spiritual life. It calls aloud to the backslider to return. It bids the prodigal son leave the swine and their coarse food and come home again to his father. It tells the penitent woman of One who is ready to forgive. It warns the Pharisee of all ages that the man of broad phylacteries and pompous prayers,stand to the front in the Temple as he may,is ever farther from heaven than the humble soul that cries, God be merciful to me a sinner! It says to every idolater of all times and kinds, All the gods of the nations are idols, but Jehovah made the heavens. History is the great rock of a mighty past, from which these and many similar truths are echoed on to us in modulations incessantly varied by many differing voices, which give their peculiar tone and cadence to each particular truth they illustrate and enforce.
As to the impulse which may come to us from history, Emerson says, with his usual deep insight: There is a relation between the hours of our life and the centuries of time. As the air I breathe is drawn from the great repositories of Nature, as the light on my book is yielded by a star a hundred millions of miles distant, as the poise of my body depends on the equilibrium of centrifugal and centripetal forces, so the hours should be instructed by the ages, and the ages explained by the hours. Again: All that is said of the wise man by stoic or oriental or modern essayist, describes to each reader his own idea, describes his unattained but attainable self. All literature writes the character of the wise man. Books, monuments, pictures, conversation, are portraits in which he finds the lineaments he is forming. The silent and the eloquent praise him, and accost him, and he is stimulated whenever he moves as by personal allusions. The student is to read history actively and not passively; to esteem his own life the text, and books the commentary. Thus compelled, the muse of history will utter oracles, as never to those who do not respect themselves. I have no expectation that any man will read history aright, who thinks that what was done in a remote age by men whose names have resounded far, has any deeper sense than what he is doing to-day. If any man would know the deep doctrine which is written in history that is most exalted, he must do and be the history over again. History will be to us what we are to it.
II. The peculiar value of the history of Gods more faithful servants. History, to the wise man, has both a negative pole and a positive. If our hearts are right before God, when we read of Jeroboam and Ahab and Manasseh and Judas Iscariot, history will repel us in another direction; but when we read of Moses and Joshua, Isaiah and John, the history will be drawn to us and we to it. In the measure in which our hearts are right, we shall take up the hidden power in the history, and shall make it our own. The holy yearnings and beliefs and joys of the godly dead will live again in us. Then, with their spirit taken up into our own spirit, their prayers and songs and holy deeds with our own individualism of life and opportunity, we shall reproduce also. Thus would God have us feel of each of His holier servants, He, being dead, yet speaketh,speaketh in my own heart, and in my own life. Sir John Lubbock tells us that savages have a great dread of having their portraits taken. The better the likeness, the worse they think it for the sitter; so much life could not be put into the copy except at the expense of the original. The holy dead have no such feelings of reservation. Paul said to his Corinthian brethren, Be ye followers of me, even as I also am of Christ. He who makes a vivid picture of godly history in his own mind, takes so much new life to himself from those who have gone before him as the actors of that history.
III. The advantage which comes from specially reviewing such history. There are particular places in our own experience where we all have need to go back and contemplate some particular section of the past. The chemists stores may not have medicine for all diseases; yet do the stores of history contain some warning against all our follies, some stimulant for all our weaknesses, some corrective for all our sicknesses. Just as the Word of God has some balm for each wound of sin, so have the lives of godly men some help which they can afford us in our moments of spiritual necessity. But the lives must be studied. Unread libraries benefit no one but the book-makers and the bookkeepers. Idle men should read of Paul; men who fear hardships should read of Livingstone; those who lack consecration should study the life of the self-surrendered Brainerd; the stern and harsh might sit with advantage at the feet of MCheyne. All men, everywhere and always, should sit at the feet of Jesus, and learn of Him. He is the bread of life in all lifes hunger, and the true physician in all lifes sicknesses. The wealth which we might each find in the lives of godly men is priceless, but it is all stored up again in the single life of Jesus Christ. In Him are hid all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. The Holy Spirit shows us here how we are to rebuke ourselves in sin, and encourage ourselves to holiness by lives like that of Joshua; the same Spirit waits to bring to our remembrance whatsoever has been said to us by the greater JOSHUA. He shall take of Mine, and shall show it unto you, is the Lords unfailing promise to every one who seeks to be a disciple indeed.
OUTLINES AND COMMENTS ON THE VERSES
I. THE INHERITANCE WHICH COMES TO A FAITHFUL LIFE.Jdg. 2:6
Joshua was faithful; he possessed Timnath-serah. The two and a half tribes were found faithful; they were sent with words of encouragement to their inheritance on the other side Jordan. Under Joshuas wise lead and good example all Israel was found faithful, and the people went every man into his inheritance to possess the land. There is no such thing as missing the rewards of true fidelity, even in this life. There is a spiritual possession for every heart that is true to God, true to men, and true to itself; and here, the acreage and fertility of the estate are always according to faithfulness.
If you serve an ungrateful master, serve him the more. Put God in your debt. Every stroke shall be repaid. The longer the payment is withholden the better for you; for compound interest on compound interest is the rate and usage of this exchequer. [Emerson.]
II. THE INFLUENCE EXERTED BY A FAITHFUL LIFE.Jdg. 2:7
The miraculous help which God gave to Joshua had a great influence. Joshua must have been led by it closer than ever to the Lord who gave him such great and repeated victories. The great works of the Lord influenced also the elders who had likewise seen them. But holy lives of leading men seem quite as influential as the miracles of Jehovah. The people who had not seen the miracles, served the Lord all the time they were led by the elders who had seen them. Every holy life is a miracle. The holy life of any man in a high position is as a miracle on a hill-top; the wonderful work of grace is well within the gaze of the surrounding and less-elevated multitude.
He who serves God in a lowly position can never serve Him in vain; he who occupies a high position is doubly responsible to walk worthily.
One man can lead many around him to serve the Lord, and they may be able to persuade many more.
People seldom improve when they have no other model to copy but themselves. [Goldsmith.]
Be a pattern to others, and then all will go well; for as a whole city is infected by the licentious passions and vices of great men, so it is likewise reformed by their moderation. [Cicero.]
Pious Joseph, by living in the court of Pharaoh, had learned to swear by the life of Pharaoh. A high priests hall instructed Peter how to disclaim his suffering Master. Fresh waters lose their sweetness by gliding into the salt sea. Those who sail among the rocks are in danger of splitting their ships. [Secker.]
Sometimes the sun seems to hang for a half hour in the horizon only just to show how glorious it can be. The day is done; the fervour of the shining is over, and the sun hangs goldennay redder than goldin the west, making everything look unspeakably beautiful with the rich effulgence which it sheds on every side. So God seems to let some people, when their duty in this world is done, hang in the west, that men may look on them and see how beautiful they are. There are some hanging in the west now. [Beecher.] So did Joshua hang in the west, after his more active course was accomplished, a beautiful and attractive sight to all Israel.
III. THE HONOUR WHICH MEN RENDER TO A FAITHFUL LIFE.Jdg. 2:8-9
And they buried him in the border of his inheritance. The words read as though well-nigh all Israel might have gathered to do honour to the memory of their faithful leader.
Those who have served the Lord most worthily must, nevertheless, be gathered to their fathers. Those who live to God do not cease to live when they die. Living above, with God, their memory is still cherished by their fellow-men below. In this twofold life Joshua still survives.
Many good men are hardly known till they have passed away. Most nations and families know their worthy dead far better than they knew them when living. Half the monuments of our public squares would never have been accorded but for the light which death shed forth upon the lives which they commemorate. He who is not known yet, if he is worthy to be known, will be known presently.
IV. THE REBUKE WHICH IS GIVEN BY A FAITHFUL LIFE.Jdg. 2:10.
One generation goes and another comes, but the Word of God abides for ever. It holds good for fathers and children; it judges ancestors and descendants. The new Israel had not beheld the deeds of Joshua and Caleb; but the God in whose spirit they were accomplished still lived. [Cassel.]
In some parts of England it is still common to walk in procession round the boundaries of the parish. By this means, the elder inhabitants acquaint the younger with the landmarks of their native place. It is needful that Christian fathers and mothers should often instruct their children in those moral and spiritual limits beyond which they dare not go. But for prayerful and watchful care in this there will arise another generation after them which know not the Lord.
NOTE.Further homiletical outlines on these verses will be found in the Preachers Commentary on the corresponding passage in Jos. 24:28-31, of the Book of Joshua.
Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell
General Religious Characterization of the Period Jdg. 2:6 to Jdg. 3:6
The Death of Joshua Jdg. 2:6-10
6 And when Joshua had let the people go, the children of Israel went every man unto his inheritance to possess the land.
7 And the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great works of the Lord, that he did for Israel.
8 And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died, being a hundred and ten years old.
9 And they buried him in the border of his inheritance in Timnath-heres, in the mount of Ephraim, on the north side of the hill Gaash.
10 And also all the generation were gathered unto their fathers: and there arose another generation after them, which knew not the Lord, nor yet the works which he had done for Israel.
6.
When had Joshua let the people go? Jdg. 2:6
Joshua had dismissed the Reubenites, Gadites, and Manassites from Shiloh when the period of the conquest was ended. He allowed them to go back to the land which had been promised to them by Moses (Joshua 22). He then called the elders of Israel to him at Shiloh and delivered the charge which is recorded in Joshua 23. Finally, he gathered all the tribes of Israel to Shechem. He called for the elders of Israel, their heads, their judges, and their officers. On that occasion, he delivered his famous challenge and urged them to choose whom they would serve. After this thrilling event, it is recorded that Joshua sent the people away, every man unto his inheritance (Jos. 24:28). This introduction to the book of Judges harks back to that meeting and sets the stage for the situation which demanded the raising up of the judges.
7.
In what sense did they serve God? Jdg. 2:7.
They served God most of all, but also followed pagan superstitions. They had expressly failed to drive out the inhabitants of the land and thus failed to serve the Lord completely by obeying this commandment which He had given them. They also had failed to throw down the altars of the Canaanites into whose land they had come. Generally speaking, however, they had served God. This syncretism continued to plague the people of Israel when the Northern Kingdom was finally carried into captivity by the Assyrians. The prophet recorded, . . . they did after their former manner. So these nations feared Jehovah, and served their graven images, their children likewise, and their childrens children, as did their fathers, so do they unto this day (2Ki. 17:40-41).
8.
What was the exact site of Joshuas grave? Jdg. 2:9
In Ungers Bible Dictionary are notes to the effect that heres of Timnath-heres is Serah spelled backwards. It is located twelve miles from Lydda. No place by this name appears on maps, and the spot which Unger favors is presently called Tibnah. Dr. Eli Smith, as reported in Smiths Bible Dictionary, suggested the site be identified with ruins of a place some twenty miles northwest from Jerusalem. At this point, there are, in a higher hill opposite, sepulchers hewn out of the rock equal in size and decoration to the tombs of the kings at Jerusalem. Since the site is evidently lost, we have also lost any identification of the tomb of Joshua.
9.
Why did the younger generation not know the Lord? Jdg. 2:10
The younger generation did not know the Lord because they chose not to follow in the footsteps of their fathers. They certainly knew who the Lord was. They knew of His wonderful works, but they were like the rebellious sons of Eli, who despised the Lords offerings and lived in a sinful way (1Sa. 2:13). They had heard how the Lord worked wonders on behalf of Israel, but they chose not to let these lead them to faith in Him.
Fuente: College Press Bible Study Textbook Series
(6) When Joshua had let the people go.Rather, And Joshua let the people go. This passage strongly tends to support the view that the events of the previous chapter, and the message at Bochim, occurred before Joshuas death. (Comp. Jos. 22:6; Jos. 24:28.)
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE TIMES OF THE JUDGES, Jdg 2:6-23.
This section, containing a general account of the period of the Judges, is naturally introduced by a connexion with the account of Joshua’s last labours and death, as recorded in Jos 24:28-31. This introductory passage serves to show that while Joshua lived, and for some time after, the nation deserved no such rebuke as the Angel gave at Bochim, and hence this passage cannot be a direct continuation, chronologically, of the narrative which precedes, for here it is expressly declared that the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua and of the elders that survived him. The reader must bear in mind that this book is not so much a history in the chronological order of events, as a series of historical paintings for the illustration of a few great principles of the Divine administration. The fidelity of Israel during the days of Joshua and the elders is here presented as a notable contrast to their apostasy from God in the days immediately ensuing. The record of this apostasy is necessary to prove the fulfilment of Jehovah’s words in the third verse. The enormity of their disobedience is enhanced by the consideration that it took place in the Promised Land, into which they had been introduced by the miraculous interposition of Jehovah.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
A Flashback To The Days of Joshua And the Days of Faithfulness ( Jdg 2:6-9 ).
Jdg 2:6
‘ Now when Joshua had sent the people away, the children of Israel went every man to his inheritance to possess the land.’
What a time of triumph and hope that had been. Joshua had sent them to their inheritances strong in faith. They had been confident that this was their inheritance from God through the covenant, and that nothing could finally stand against them. They must empty it of Canaanites and set up a new manner of life, the way of life of Yahweh. But that had been then. How different it was now. Doubt, and fear, and trouble through the years, with more troubles to come, as the book will demonstrate. And why? Because their ‘knowing of Yahweh’ had grown dim (Jdg 2:10).
Faith to remain firm has to be constantly renewed. That was the purpose of their gatherings at the central sanctuary. But it had to be accompanied by obedience to remain afire. And that had been what was lacking. Their faith was half-hearted. Is ours?
Jdg 2:7
‘ And the people served Yahweh all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great work of Yahweh that he had wrought for Israel.’
For forty or so years the people had remained faithful to Yahweh and His covenant, during which period Joshua had died, and then the elders who had served with him who had outlived him also died. Some few had, as children, seen the great works that God had wrought in Egypt and at Sinai and in the wilderness, others the great works since leaving Kadesh, including the continued provision of manna to keep them alive (Jos 5:12). They had experienced the crossing of Jordan and the first unbelievable act of God at Jericho. And reminders of these things at the regular covenant feasts (see Joshua 24) had kept their faith alive.
Jdg 2:8
‘ And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of Yahweh, had died, being a hundred and ten years old.’
Compare Gen 50:26. Here had been another Joseph. One hundred and ten years was seen by the Egyptians as the perfect life span, a tradition seemingly carried on in Israel at this stage. As with all numbers in these early narratives, they are not to be taken too literally. It is a round number indicating the perfect fulfilment of his life and only secondarily indicating a good old age.
“The servant of Yahweh.” Here was one man who had been true to Yahweh, no longer the servant of Moses but ‘the servant of Yahweh’, a type of the great Servant yet to come (Isa 52:13 to Isa 53:12). It had been the title of honour given to Moses at his death (Deu 34:5; Jos 1:13; Jos 8:31; Jos 8:33; and regularly) and later to Joshua at his death (Jos 24:29). It was the final accolade. It was given to no one else by man.
Jdg 2:9
‘ And they buried him in the border of his inheritance in Timnath-heres, in the hill country of Ephraim, on the north of the mountain of Gaash.’
Timnath-heres is called Timnath-serah in Jos 19:50; Jos 24:30, the letters of “serah” being there inverted from “heres,” which means the sun. This may have been in order to avoid connection with idolatrous religion of sun worshippers. There may have been a number of mountains called Heres for this reason (Jdg 1:35; Jdg 8:13; Isa 19:18 Hebrew).
Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett
The Corruption of the People and its Punishment
v. 6. And when Joshua had let the people go, v. 7. And the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that outlived Joshua, v. 8. And Joshua, the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died, being an hundred and ten years old, v. 9. And they buried him in the border of his inheritance in Timnath-heres, v. 10. And also all that generation, v. 11. And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord, v. 12. And they forsook the Lord God of their fathers, v. 13. And they forsook the Lord, v. 14. And the anger of the Lord was hot, v. 15. Whithersoever they went out, the hand of the Lord was against them for evil, v. 16. Nevertheless the Lord raised up judges, which delivered them out of the hand of those that spoiled them, v. 17. And yet they would not hearken unto their judges, v. 18. And when the Lord raised them up judges, then the Lord was with the judge, v. 19. And it came to pass, when the judge was dead, that they returned, v. 20. And the anger of the Lord was hot against Israel; and He said, Because that this people hath transgressed My covenant which I commanded their fathers, v. 21. I also will not henceforth drive out any from before them of the nations which Joshua left when he died; v. 22. that through them I may prove Israel whether they will keep the way of the Lord to walk therein, as their fathers did keep it, or not. v. 23. Therefore the Lord left those nations, without driving them out hastily; neither delivered He them into the hand of Joshua.
Fuente: The Popular Commentary on the Bible by Kretzmann
Jdg 2:6-9. And when Joshua had let the people go This is an important passage, and by some interpreters misunderstood; they have fancied, that in it the historian continues the relation of what had happened since the death of Joshua: upon this foundation, Houbigant conceives that there is a transposition; and accordingly he begins this chapter with Jdg 2:6-10, following them with Jdg 2:1-5, and then goes on with Jdg 2:11; an alteration, for which, says Mr. Chais, there appears no necessity: the series of the chapter evidently destroys the supposition above advanced. The sacred writer, having just related the reproaches delivered by the angel of the Lord against the Israelites, would now shew his readers how and when the nation had incurred those reproaches. To this end, he carries the matter as far back as possible; and first he ascends to that happy period when, Joshua having finished the division of the conquered country of the Canaanites, the Israelites went each to his inheritance and possessed it, and dwelt in the portion of the land which had fallen to his lot. This division was, in fact, the immediate work of Providence. Lots were cast before the Lord; he had presided over them, and, without doubt, Joshua, who had used such fine exhortations to the two tribes and a half beyond Jordan, when they set out to take possession of their territories, failed not strongly to recommend religion and obedience to the other tribes, on settling them in the lands which had been assigned to them; which he repeated before his death in the most affecting manner. See on Joshua 24. All of them therefore, equally instructed, and impressed with gratitude, had entered upon their estates with intentions promising a constant fidelity. But the love of this world seduced them: they soon thought only of their private interest, how to extend and aggrandize themselves; and, speedily losing sight of the public good, shamefully neglected the sacred duties of religion. To make this more clear, it would be better to read the beginning of the 6th verse thus: Now when Joshua had let, &c.
Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke
An extract from the Book of Joshua showing when and through what occasion the religious apostasy of Israel began
Jdg 2:6-10
6And when [omit: when] Joshua had [omit: had] let the people go, [and] the children [sons] of Israel went every man unto his inheritance, to possess [to take possession of] the land. 7And the people served the Lord [Jehovah] all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that outlived9 Joshua, who had seen all 8the great works of the Lord [Jehovah], that he did for Israel. And Joshua, the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord [Jehovah], died, being an hundred and ten years old. 9And they buried him in the border [district] of his inheritance in Timnath-heres, in the mount [mountains] of Ephraim, on the north side of the hill [north of Mount] Gaash. 10And also all that generation were gathered unto their fathers:10 and there arose another generation after them, which knew not the Lord [Jehovah], nor yet the works11 which he had done for Israel.
TEXTUAL AND GRAMMATICAL
[1 Jdg 2:7. , to prolong ones days, usually means, to live long; but here the addition after Joshua shows that the expression is not to be taken in this ordinary acceptation, but according to the proper sense of the words: they prolonged days (life) after Joshua, i. e. they survived him: not, they lived long after Joshua, cf. the remarks of Bachmann quoted on p. 15.Tr.]
[2 Jdg 2:10.The sing. suf. in , although the verb is plural, arises from the fact that the expression , and others of like import, are generally used of individuals. Habit gets the better of strict grammatical propriety.Tr.]
[3 Jdg 2:10.Dr. Cassel: die Gott nicht kannten, und [also] auch seine That nicht; i. e. who knew not God (Jehovah), nor [consequently], the works. The explanation of this rendering is that he takes knew in the sense of acknowledge, see below; so that the clause gives him the following sense: they acknowledged not what God had done for them, and of course did not rightly value his works. But, as Bachmann observes, conveys no reproach, but only states the cause of the ensuing apostasy. The new generation did not know the Lord and his work, sc. as eye witnesses (cf. Jdg 2:7; Jdg 3:2); they only knew from hearsay.Tr.]
EXEGETICAL AND DOCTRINAL
Jdg 2:6-8. The penitence of the people at Bochim had shown that it had not yet fallen from its obedience to God, that it was still conscious of the blessings which had been bestowed upon it. The promise made to Joshua (Jos 24:24) had as yet been kept. They still served the Lord. Their position in this respect was the same as when he dismissed the tribes to take possession of their several inheritances. This dismission introduced Israel to the new epoch, in which it was no longer guided by Moses or Joshua. Hence, the insertion of these sentences, which are also found in Joshua 24, is entirely appropriate. They describe the whole period in which the people was submissive to the Word of God, although removed from under the direct guidance of Joshua. The people was faithful when left to itself by Joshua, faithful after his death, faithful still in the days of the elders who outlived Joshua. That whole generation, which had seen the mighty deeds that attended the conquest of Canaan, stood firm. Our passage says, for they had seen, whereas Jos 24:31 says, they had known. To see is more definite than to know. The facts of history may be known as the acts of God, without being witnessed and experienced. But this generation had stood in the midst of the events; the movements of the conflict and its results were still present in their memories Whoever has felt the enthusiasm inspired by such victories and conquests, can never forget them. The Scripture narrators are accustomed, like the chroniclers of the Middle Ages, to repeat literally what has already been said elsewhere, in cases where modern writers content themselves with a mere reference. While we should have deemed it sufficient to appeal to earlier histories for an account of the death of Joshua, the narrative before us takes the more accurate method of literal repetition. Hence, the interruption of the course of thought commenced Jdg 2:1-5, is only apparent. Jdg 2:6-10 explain the pious weeping of the people which Jdg 2:4-5 recorded. Joshuas death, age, and burial are mentioned, because the writer wishes to indicate that Israel served God, not only after its dismission by the still living leader, but also after his decease. The less necessity there was for the statements of Jdg 2:8-9, the more evident it is that they are borrowed from Joshua 24. And we may congratulate ourselves that by this means the name of the place where Joshua was buried, has been handed down to us in a second form.
Jdg 2:9. And they buried him in Timnath-heres, in the mountains of Ephraim, north of Gaash. In Jos 24:30, the place is called Timnath-serah ( for ). The most reverential regard for the Masoretic text will not refuse to acknowledge many variations in the names of places, arising especially from the transposition of letters (as and Jos 19:29).12 Jewish tradition, it is true, explains them as different names borne by the same place; but the name Cheres is that which, in Kefr Cheres, preserved itself in the country, as remarked by Esthor ha-Parchi (ii. 434) and other travellers (Carmoly, pp. 212, 368, 444, etc.). Eli Smith discovered the place, April 26, 1843. A short distance northwest of Bir-Zeit (already on Robinsons earlier map, cf. the later), near Wady Belat, there rose up a gentle hill, which was covered with the ruins or rather foundations of what was once a town of considerable size. The spot was still called Tibneh (for Timnah, just as the southern Timnath is at present called Tibneh). The city lay to the north of a much higher hill, on the north side of which (thus facing the city), appeared several sepulchral excavations.13 No other place than this can have been intended by the Jewish travellers, who describe several graves found there, and identify them as those of Joshua, his father, and Caleb (Carmoly, p. 387). The antiquity of the decorations of these sepulchres may indeed be questioned, but not that of the sepulchres themselves. Smith was of opinion that hitherto no graves like these had been discovered in Palestine. Tibneh lies on the eastern side of Mount Ephraim, the same side on which, farther south, Beth-horon and Srs are found. Mount Heres, which not the tribe of Dan, but only the strength of Ephraim, could render tributary, must have lain near Srs, east of Aijalon. It is evident, therefore, that the name Heres must have been borne by this whole division of the mountains of Ephraim; and that the Timnath in which Joshua was buried, was by the addition of Heres distinguished from other places of the same name. In this way, the peculiar interest which led Ephraim to administer justice on Mount Heres (cf. on Jdg 1:35) explains itself.
Jdg 2:10. And also all that generation, etc. Time vanishes. One generation goes, another comes. Joshua, who had died weary with years, was followed into the grave by his younger contemporaries. The generation that had borne arms with him, had been buried in the soil of the promised land; and another, younger generation lived. It had already grown up in the land which the fathers had won. It inherited from them only possession and enjoyment. It already felt itself at home in the life of abundance to which it was born. It could not be counted as a reproach to them that they had not seen the mighty works of God in connection with the conquest (hence it is not said ); but in the triteness of possession they utterly failed to acknowledge ( ) their indebtedness for it to God. How Israel came into the land, they must indeed have known; but to know Jehovah is something higher. They did not acknowledge that it was through God that they had come thither. Their fathers had seen and felt that victory and freedom came to them from the Lord. But they, as they did eat, built goodly houses, and dwelt in them (Deu 8:12), forgat God, and said (Deu 8:17): Our power and the might of our hands hath gotten us this wealth. Modern German history furnishes an instructive illustration. The generation which broke the yoke of servitude imposed by Napoleon, felt their God, as E. M. Arndt sang and prayed. The succeeding age enjoys the fruits and says: Our skill and arms have smitten him. The living enthusiasm of action and strength, feels that its source is in the living God. It looks upon itself as the instrument of a Spirit who gives to truth and freedom their places in history. The children want the strength which comes of faith in that Spirit who in the fathers accomplished everythingand want it the more, the less they have done. Everything foretold by Moses goes into fulfillment. The later Israel had forgotten (Deu 8:14) what God had done for their fathersin Egypt, in the desert, in Canaan. The phraseology is very suggestive; they knew not Jehovah, nor, consequently, the works which he had done for Israel. Among the people, the one is closely connected with the other, as is shown by what follows.
HOMILETICAL AND PRACTICAL
One generation goes and another comes, but the word of God abides forever. It holds good for fathers and children; it judges ancestors and descendants. The new Israel had not beheld the deeds of Joshua and Caleb; but the God in whose spirit they were accomplished, still lived. They had not witnessed the recompense which was visited upon Adoni-bezek; but the Word which promises reward and punishment, was still living. Israel apostatized not because it had forgotten, but because sin is ever forgetful. When the blind man sins, it is not because he does not see the creation which God created, but because sin is blind both in those who see and in those who see not.
Therefore, no one can excuse himself, when he falls away into idolatry. Creation is visible to all, all have come up out of Egypt, all enjoy the favor of their God. Inexperience, satanic arts of temptation, temperament, can explain many a fall; yet, no one falls save by his own evil lusts, and all wickedness is done before the eyes of God (Jdg 2:11).
Starke: Constantly to remember and meditate on the works of God promotes piety, causing us to fear God, to believe in Him, and to serve Him.
Lisco: As long as the remembrance of the mighty works of God continued alive, so long also did active gratitude, covenant faithfulness, endure.
Footnotes:
[9][Jdg 2:7. , to prolong ones days, usually means, to live long; but here the addition after Joshua shows that the expression is not to be taken in this ordinary acceptation, but according to the proper sense of the words: they prolonged days (life) after Joshua, i. e. they survived him: not, they lived long after Joshua, cf. the remarks of Bachmann quoted on p. 15.Tr.]
[10][Jdg 2:10.The sing. suf. in , although the verb is plural, arises from the fact that the expression , and others of like import, are generally used of individuals. Habit gets the better of strict grammatical propriety.Tr.]
[11][Jdg 2:10.Dr. Cassel: die Gott nicht kannten, und [also] auch seine That nicht; i. e. who knew not God (Jehovah), nor [consequently], the works. The explanation of this rendering is that he takes knew in the sense of acknowledge, see below; so that the clause gives him the following sense: they acknowledged not what God had done for them, and of course did not rightly value his works. But, as Bachmann observes, conveys no reproach, but only states the cause of the ensuing apostasy. The new generation did not know the Lord and his work, sc. as eye witnesses (cf. Jdg 2:7; Jdg 3:2); they only knew from hearsay.Tr.]
[12]As and , and and . Cf. Bochart, Hierozoicon, lib. 1. cap. 20. tom. 2, p. 137.
[13]Ritter 16:562, Gages Transl. 4:246; [Smiths Visit to Antipatris, in Bibliotheca Sacra for 1843 (published at New York) p. 484.Tr.] On the desire of the Bedouins to be buried on mountains, cf. Wetzstein, Hauran, p. 26.
Fuente: A Commentary on the Holy Scriptures, Critical, Doctrinal, and Homiletical by Lange
These verses have a retrospective view to the history of Joshua, as before related. And perhaps the subject is here again introduced, by way of contrasting the sad apostasy of Israel, to what their conduct had been during the life of Joshua, and that generation. Alas! when good men perish from the earth, what a melancholy thought is it, if an evil generation succeed them. The prophet makes a woeful lamentation of this, but forms a sweet resolution therefrom, that he will cease from man, and look unto the Lord. Mic 7:2-7 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Jdg 2:6 And when Joshua had let the people go, the children of Israel went every man unto his inheritance to possess the land.
Ver. 6. And when Joshua had let the people go. ] See Jos 2:1 ; but Vatablus’s note here is, that these things are here spoken by way of recapitulation; that the sum and argument of the whole book may be in this place set down together.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
let the People go. Compare Jos 24:28-31.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
a Generation that Knew not Jehovah
Jdg 2:6-15
What a thrilling experience it must have been to hear Joshua and Caleb talk of Egypt, the Red Sea, and Sinai! The younger men would stand awestruck as the veterans narrated their experiences of God. Open your diaries of the past, ye older saints, and tell what the Lord hath done for you. It will hearten us for the fight, Mal 3:16.
Joshua was carried to his last resting-place in his inheritance-the portion of the sun-amid the respect and affection of the entire people. Like Moses, he had deserved to be known as the servant of the Lord. The elders, who had witnessed the conquest of Canaan, took up his testimony and told of Jericho and the valley of Ajalon. But these also were gathered unto their fathers, which implies more than burial. They joined the great throng of holy ones who are gathering around our Lord, awaiting the hour when, as a radiant throng, they shall issue forth with Him to take up the kingdom of the world. What a gathering that will be! Whatever else we miss, let us see to it that we stand in our lot, at the end of the days, Gen 49:33; Gen 50:14; Dan 12:13.
Fuente: F.B. Meyer’s Through the Bible Commentary
Joshua: Jos 22:6, Jos 24:28-31
Reciprocal: Pro 14:34 – Righteousness
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
Subdivision 2. (Jdg 2:6-23; Jdg 3:1-4.)
The Breach with Jehovah.
1. Idolatry had evidently never really been quite rooted out from among the children of Israel. Long afterward God reminds them by Amos how in the wilderness they had borne the tabernacle of Moloch, and Chinn their images, the star of their god which they had made for themselves (Amo 5:26); and Joshua’s exhortation at the close of his life to “put away the strange gods that were among” them, shows that even when they entered into the land, they had not fully cleansed themselves, nor turned to God with a perfect heart. True, externally no foreign worship was tolerated in Joshua’s time, and in his days and those of the elders that outlived him, Israel generally served the Lord. But with the next generation decline became manifest. They had not seen the great works of the Lord, and the brief space that had elapsed was ample for forgetfulness. “Out of sight” was speedily “out of mind.”
The Christian Church, in the same way, scarcely stood in any integrity during the lifetime of the apostles. Early in Paul’s day he told the Thessalonians, “the mystery of iniquity doth already work;” and this, when John wrote his first epistle, had ripened into “many antichrists.” The Church of uninspired history already retains but little semblance of its first condition. “As in water face answereth to face, so does the heart of man to man.” And so in its general features does the Israelite history to that of the present dispensation. This is what makes the book of Judges so exceedingly important for us. We have here as in a glass, our own faces spiritually: a photograph of divine light that will not flatter.
There is a significant change in this connection of the name of Joshua’s inheritance, from Timnath-serah to Timnath-heres. The one word is simply the reversal of the letters of the other, but the change of meaning is striking, if with Fuerst and others we take the latter to mean, not “sun,” but “clay.” An “abundant portion” becomes thus a “portion of Clay.” How striking if we think of the spiritual meaning! How indeed thus does the abundant heavenly portion into which Christ has entered vanish from sight, leaving Him only a portion of clay” -an earthly one, expressed in its grossest form! And has not the Church in its decline lost sight of the heavenly portion and changed it, as it were, into mere earthliness? Or in its loss of the Lord as the Heavenly Man at the right hand of God, has it not, so to speak, left Him in the grave? All the more does this meaning come out in the position of this portion as given both in Joshua and here, on the north of the hill Gaash,” the mystery side of the “quaking” earth out of which the Lord rose! It is as we realize or not that of which this speaks, that we shall give our answer here. That quaking of the earth has its significance: that which is shaken can be removed. The “yet once more I shake, not the earth only, but also heaven,” signifies, according to the apostle (Heb 12:26-27), the “removal of those things that are shaken.” For faith this was now taking place, and out of a judged world there was already beginning the call of a heavenly people.
2. Man must worship something. He has a religious instinct, an apprehension of some Power or Powers to which he is related, out of which he may perhaps reason himself, but which requires reason, however perverted, to accomplish this. Hence atheism is a disease of cultivation, and where it exists has still in general to do homage to what it denies, as in the Comtean worship of humanity itself. Hence fulfilling the well-known saying that if there were no God, it would be still necessary to invent one.
The Comtean worship reveals more than this (for in truth it is humanity that man, fallen away from God, everywhere worships. He may invest this with more or less of the attributes of deity: because he is not a being groping his way out of native darkness, as so many would persuade us; the inspired version of heathenism is more honoring to God, if more condemnatory of the creature, that “when they knew God, they glorified Him not as God, but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.” They had not to invent God, but rather to invent the god that they desired; and the god that they desired was one like themselves, a being who could sympathize with the lusts and passions of a corrupt nature. Hence “professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the image of the incorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man.”
Higher they could not go; but they could go lower. In the creatures below man they could find represented the lower instincts, cravings, appetites of man, with no check of conscience or morality. In the beast there is an unmoral nature, which may appear to sanction what in man is immoral. Thus came in the bestial gods of Egypt and elsewhere: “birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things” (Rom 1:23), became to them the images of the divine glory; and the infinite degradation degraded more and more the worshipers: they were assimilated to what they worshiped, and received back in divine government “that recompense of their error that was meet.” The imagination of man was employed to throw a halo around what was utterly abominable. Taught by the sacred lips of parents, maintained by law, becoming more venerable continually with the passing of generations, conscience itself lost almost the power of protest against whatever enormities, and even came to confirm and enforce the putting of good for evil and evil for good, of darkness for light and of light for darkness.
Such was the devilish system to which Israel, with their back on God, now turned. “The children of Israel did the evil thing” -what was emphatically that -“in Jehovah’s eyes, and served the Baals.” “They forsook Jehovah, and served Baal and the Ashtoreths.”
Their gods, being the product of their own minds, were necessarily many as their minds were. The plural in both cases, it is allowed, stands not for the multiplicity of images, but for different modifications of the deity himself. Baal was in no wise one, as Jehovah was; nor was even Ashtoreth the same goddess everywhere, although the general idea was one. Baal means “husband” and “lord,” with the primary idea of ownership. A bird even is a “baal of wing”; and a hairy man a “baal of hair.” It does not stand so much for the idea of one who rules therefore, which is rather adon, from din, to “discern,” to “judge.” Yet it has no necessary bad sense either: in that of “husband,” God uses it of His own relation to the people: “thy Maker is thy baal;” “though I was a baal unto them.” (Isa 54:5; Jer 31:32.) Nevertheless, God finally repudiates the word. By Hosea He says, “Thou shalt call me Ishi [my husband], and thou shalt no more call me Baali: for I will take away the names of the Baals out of her mouth, and they shall no more be remembered by their name.” (Hos 2:16-17.)
The difference here is not hard to be made out. Ishi is, literally, “my man”; woman being Ishah, as “taken out of man.” (Gen 2:23.) Ishi speaks, therefore, of one who fills the due place implied by the relationship, man being divinely fitted to woman, and woman to man. The baal might be in the relationship, and not rightly fill it. When God says, “I was a baal to them,” or “Thy Maker is thy baal,” it is the fact of who it is that is in this relation which assures us of the blessing implied. But baal thus being at the best indifferent, it is at last disclaimed, with all the abhorrence due to the false gods that had usurped Jehovah’s place.
Baal stands thus for the power implied in possession, apart from any thought of how it may be used, as Ashtoreth speaks (comp. Jos 21:27) of fruitfulness here in the nature-sense. Both might be used (and were) in the vilest applications and unitedly they reveal the mystery of iniquity that is native in the heart of man. Power he seeks, -to have things in his hand: that, without question of how he will use it, -irresponsible power; while, underneath, the lusts that war in his members” hold him as a poor slave to their will. Baal and Ashtoreth are twin worships, the natural complements of each other: both meaning independence of God, and together self-bondage; in which is found the awful tyranny of a more malignant despotism, that of the adversary of God and man alike, the “spirit that worketh in the children of disobedience.” (Eph 2:2.)
Satan is thus the “prince of this world,” and, spite of Christianity, -man, alas, not accepting the deliverance, -“the god” also “of this age.” (2Co 4:4, Greek.) This he will be until the Lord comes, and he is cast into the “bottomless pit.” (Rev 20:2.) This makes the effort at world-reform so hopeless, and is the only thing that can account for the history of Christendom. The Baals and the Ashtoreths have no more been kept out of the Christian than out of the Jewish enclosure: “while men slept, the enemy came” has repeated itself in the history of every spiritual movement. And as surely as in Israel’s history here the Lord’s chastening hand has had to be upon His people. Spoilers had spoiled them, and they could no longer stand before their enemies; and this for us also is, “as Jehovah has said -yea, as Jehovah has sworn”: nor is He “man, that He should lie; nor the son of man, that He should repent.”
3. The means of deliverance was by the Lord’s raising up judges -a remedy as plain as can be, though effectual only to a limited extent, the obstinate return to the old sins being consequent upon the passing away of the judge, if not before. Yet the remedy showed plainly the disease: deliverance could be only by revival, and this would be in self-judgment as to their condition, and return to Him from whom they had departed. The “judge” plainly was not merely such between man and man, but above all was the leader in the people’s repentance and return to God -the representative of Jehovah’s law and sway in Israel.
4. Spite of all this, the course of things all through -apart from such interruptions -is ever downward: “when the judge died they returned and corrupted themselves beyond their fathers.” Correspondingly, even the deliverances become less and less full, and the character of the deliverers deteriorates (although this not continuously), until they reach together their lowest point in Samson, whose death still leaves the people in captivity. In view of this God declares that He will not drive out the nations that remain, but will leave them for a trial to Israel, and that they may know war by experience, the war of conquest not having had its due effect. The very trial thus which comes in through sin, He makes a means of practising faith, for those who have faith. Since by the history of their fathers they had not learnt the need of obedience and reliance upon the living God, they should learn these by practically meeting these enemies that their fathers met. Their discipline should be a school of faith. This, it is evident, applies to many more than Israel in the book of Judges, or than to such wars as these of Canaan. All the long series of evils that have afflicted the Church as the result of multiplied departure from God and from His word, have furnished for faith the exercise by which it is made to overcome. The history in all alike becomes, however, thus largely individual. The people disappear as a whole from sight, or furnish a background in the front of which a few figures walk apart. There are men of God, indeed, but where are the people of God? Yet divine love cannot forget these, nor can the hearts therefore of those in whom this love has stirred.
Judges
F. W. Grant.
Fuente: Grant’s Numerical Bible Notes and Commentary
Jdg 2:6. And when Joshua It should rather be rendered, Now when Joshua, &c. For it does not relate to the preceding story, but is a repetition of what was declared Jos 24:28-31, and is here recorded by way of introduction to the following account of the peoples defection and punishment, contained in the subsequent parts of the book. Let the people go When he had distributed their inheritances, and dismissed them severally to take possession of them. The sacred writer, says Dr. Dodd, having just related the reproaches delivered by the angel of the Lord against the Israelites, would now show his readers how and when the nation had incurred those reproaches. To this end he carries the matter as far back as possible; and, first, he ascends to that happy period when, Joshua having finished the division of the conquered country of the Canaanites, the Israelites went each to his inheritance, and possessed it, and dwelt in the portion of the land which had fallen to his lot. This division was in fact the immediate work of Providence. Lots were cast before the Lord: he had presided over them, and without doubt Joshua, who had used such fine exhortations to the two tribes and a half beyond Jordan, when they set out to take possession of their territories, failed not strongly to recommend religion and obedience to the other tribes, in settling them in the lands that had been assigned to them; which he repeated before his death in the most affecting manner. See on Joshua 24. All of them, therefore, equally instructed, and impressed with gratitude, had entered upon their estates with intentions promising a constant fidelity. But the love of this world seduced them. They soon thought only of their private interest, how to extend and aggrandize themselves; and speedily losing sight of the public good, shamefully neglected the sacred duties of religion.
Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
Jdg 2:6 to Jdg 3:6. The Deuteronomists Introduction to the Book of Judges proper (Jdg 3:5 to Jdg 16:31).In the view of this interpreter of sacred history, the whole era of the Judges falls into longer or shorter times of national prosperity, in which Yahweh protects and blesses His faithful people, alternating with times of national calamity, in which He withdraws His favour and blessing from apostates. On the beneficent strength of the Judge the pillars of state rest secure for a whole generation, and his decease is like the removal of the key-stone of an arch. The writers general principlehis philosophy of historyis based on sound prophetic teaching, but his application of it to the period of the Judges involves a tour de force, for the traditions deal for the most part not with national but with local heroes whose exploits affect, in the first instance, only their own tribe or group of tribes.
Jdg 2:6-9 is almost identical with Jos 24:28-30. The influence of Joshua and the elders that outlived hima phrase of frequent occurrence in Dt. (Deu 4:26; Deu 4:40; Deu 5:33, etc.)kept all Israel true to Yahweh during their lifetime.
Jdg 2:7. The great work of the Lord was the miracles of the Exodus, the Wanderings, and the Conquest.
Jdg 2:9. Timnath-heres, where Joshua was buried, may be the modern Tibneh, about 10 m. NW. of Bethel. Gaash is unknown
Jdg 2:11. The Baalim (p. 87), whom the Israelites of the generation after Joshua began to serve, were the local gods of Canaan, the lords of different cities and districts, who were distinguished from one another by the addition of place-names, e.g. Baal of Hermon (Jdg 3:3), Baal of Tamar (Jdg 20:33). For centuries after the Conquest it was legitimate to call Yahweh himself the Baal of the country, and Hosea (Jdg 2:16 f.) was apparently the first to denounce this practice. Thereafter it became the custom to change such names as Ish-baal (man of Baal) into Ish-bosheth (man of shame), Jerubbaal into Jerubbesheth (2Sa 11:21). See p. 280.
Jdg 2:13. For the Ashtaroth read Ashtoreth, i.e. the goddess who was the Phnician Astarte and the Babylonian Ishtar (1Ki 11:5*).
Jdg 2:14-23. The Israelites having become apostate, Gods anger is kindled (Jdg 2:14); He gives them over to His enemies (Jdg 2:14); they are distressed, and groan under oppression (Jdg 2:14; Jdg 2:18); He is moved to pity and raises up a Judge (Jdg 2:16); and when the Judge dies, the people return to their evil ways (Jdg 2:19).
Jdg 2:17 breaks the connexion between Jdg 2:16 and Jdg 2:18, and is probably an editorial insertion. The figure of whoring after other godsspiritual adulteryis taken from Hosea (Hosea 1-3) (cf. Jdg 8:27-33, Exo 34:15 f., Deu 31:16).
Jdg 2:18. Instead of it repented the Lord read the Lord was moved to pity.
Fuente: Peake’s Commentary on the Bible
2:6 And when Joshua had {b} let the people go, the children of Israel went every man unto his inheritance to possess the land.
(b) After that he had divided to every man his portion by lot, Jos 24:28.
Fuente: Geneva Bible Notes
1. Review of Joshua’s era 2:6-10
This paragraph is almost identical to the one in Jos 24:28-31. Its purpose is to resume the history of Israel at this point, where the Book of Joshua ended, and to contrast the era of Joshua with the era of the judges (cf. 2Ch 36:22-23 and Ezr 1:1-3). The key issue was whom the Israelites "served" (or "worshiped" NRSV). The Hebrew verb so translated (’abad) forms an envelope structure around this passage (Jdg 2:7; Jdg 3:6), as well as appearing in its middle (Jdg 2:11; Jdg 2:13; Jdg 2:19).
"After a chapter that summarizes the incomplete wars of occupation, the reader is introduced to the threatening wars of liberation that characterize the period of the judges. To explain how Israel fell prey to powerful oppressors, the author reviews events since the death of Joshua." [Note: Wolf, p. 393.]
"Here [Jdg 2:10] we come to the heart of the second-generation syndrome. It is a lukewarmness, a complacency, an apathy about amazing biblical truths that we have heard from our childhood, or from our teachers. . . . It is a pattern which challenges churches and even nations, and nowhere does it work with more devastating effect than in Bible colleges and theological seminaries where, day after day, we come in contact with God’s truth. . . . History tells us that not even the most vivid display of the life-transforming power of the Holy Spirit will prevent this problem.
"But why? Why did it happen then, and why does it happen to us? . . . We must realize two things about this kind of complacency. The first is something Erich Fromm once pointed out when he said, ’Hate is not the opposite of love. Apathy is.’ To be complacent in the face of Calvary is the greatest possible rejection of God. The second is that complacency grows like a cancer. . . . Maybe part of the problem lay with the first [Joshua’s] generation. Interestingly, however, the book of Judges puts none of the blame there. The second generation was held responsible for their failure, and God would not allow them to shift the blame." [Note: Inrig, pp. 26-27.]
"People cannot thrive on the spiritual power of their parents; each generation must personally experience the reality of God." [Note: Wolf, p. 393.]
Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)
B. Israel’s conduct toward Yahweh and Yahweh’s treatment of Israel in the period of the Judges 2:6-3:6
This section of the book provides a theological introduction to the judges’ deeds, whereas Jdg 1:1 to Jdg 2:5 is a historical introduction. It also explains further the presence of Canaanites in the Promised Land. The first introduction (Jdg 1:1 to Jdg 2:5) is from Israel’s perspective and the second (Jdg 2:6 to Jdg 3:6) is from God’s. [Note: Lilian R. Klein, The Triumph of Irony in the Book of Judges, p. 13.] The first deals with military failure, and the second with religious failure. [Note: K. Lawson Younger, "Judges 1 in Its Near Eastern Literary Contest," in Faith, Tradition, and History, pp. 222-23.]