March 22, 2022: Day 62 – Judges 16-21

I’m not sure that there is any more disturbing set of chapters in the Bible than these that we just read.  Remember, throughout this entire book we have the theme that “everyone did as he saw fit.”  Samson is the last judge that we find who was actually put in place to judge and rule Israel by God.  He reigns for 20 years, and he is actually not someone after whom we ought to mold our actions.  

We then get a story of Micah and his idols and his hiring a Levite whose role it is to play the priest and to serve out those functions.  The Danites come and take this priest and make him their own, and surprisingly it seems as if the Lord does speak through this priest even though we read about the presence of idols and an ephod and other items that we consider to be used by pagans and idol worshipers.  There is a whole mishmash of theologies coming to a head when the people do as they see fit and there is no clear direction.

You then have this terrible story of the tribe of Benjamin raping the wife of a man (who was offered by that man by the way) and the rest of Israel going to war against Benjamin as a result.  We finish the chapter with the Benjamites being defeated and a creative solution found on how to supply the remaining men from that tribe with wives.  Let’s just allow them to go and kidnap young women from another tribe within our family that way we were not actually helping them.  All very strange.  I’ll be glad when they finally get a king to put things back in order.