圣经-旧约(天主教思高圣经)
不认识圣经,就是不认识基督,不认识基督,就是不认识基督所建立的天主教会。
旧约·民长纪
共21章:
引论各支派分占许地与宗教概况(1-3)
第一章(36)
犹大与西默盎出征
1:1 若苏厄死后,以色列子民询问上主说:「我们中谁应首先上去攻打客纳罕人﹖」
1:2 上主说﹕「犹大先上去。看,我已将那地交在他手中。」
1:3 犹大遂对自己的兄弟西默盎说﹕「请你同我到我拈阄所得的地方去,与客纳罕人作战,日后我也同你到你拈阄所得的地方去。」西默盎就同他去了。
1:4 犹大上去,上主把客纳罕人和培黎齐人交在他们手中,他们在贝则克击杀了一万人。
1:5 他们在贝则克又遇上了阿多尼贝则克,与他交战,击败了客纳罕人和培黎齐人。
1:6 阿多尼贝则克逃走,他们在后面追赶,捉住他,割去了他手脚的姆指。
1:7 阿多尼贝则克说:「七十位王子被割去了手脚的姆指,在我桌下拾取零碎食物;天主照我所行的报复了我。」他们将他带到耶路撒冷,他就死在那里。
1:8 犹大子孙攻打了耶路撒冷,将城占领,用利剑杀了城中的居民,放火烧了城。
1:9 此后,犹大子孙下去与住在山地、南方和平原的客纳罕人作战。
1:10 犹大又去攻打住在赫贝龙的客纳罕人,──赫贝龙以前名叫克黎雅特阿尔巴,──击败了舍瑟、阿希曼和塔耳买。
1:11 他们从那里又去攻打住在德彼尔的居民,──德彼尔以前名叫克黎雅特色费尔。
1:12 那时加肋布说:「谁能攻打克黎雅特色费尔,将城拿下,我就将我的女儿阿革撒嫁给他为妻。」
1:13 加肋布的弟弟刻纳次的儿子敖特尼耳夺取了那城,加肋布遂把自己的女儿阿革撒嫁给他为妻。
1:14 当她过门的时候,丈夫劝她向父亲要一块田地,她一下驴,加肋布便问她说:「你要什么﹖」
1:15 她答说:「请你给我一件礼物,因为你既把我安置于南方旱地,求你也将水泉给我!」加肋布遂把上泉和下泉给了她。
1:16 梅瑟的姻亲刻尼的子孙从棕树城上来,同犹大子孙一同往阿辣得南方的犹大旷野去,与那里的百姓住在一起。
1:17 以后犹大和他兄弟西默盎又起程,击败了住在责法特的客纳罕人,将城完全毁灭,故称这城为曷尔玛。
1:18 犹大却未能夺取迦萨及其四境;阿市刻隆及其四境;厄刻龙及其四境。
1:19 上主与犹大同在,因此,他占据了山地,但不能赶走平原的居民,因为他们有铁甲车。
1:20 按照梅瑟吩咐的,他们把赫贝龙给了加肋布,因为他由那里铲除了阿纳克的三支后裔。
其余各支派占领基业
1:21 本雅明子孙没有逐出住在耶路撒冷的耶步斯人,因此耶步斯人与本雅明子孙,直到今日同住在耶路撒冷。
1:22 若瑟家族也上去攻打贝特耳,上主与他们同在。
1:23 当若瑟家族差人去侦探贝特耳时,──这城昔名叫路次,──
1:24 侦探看见一个人从城里出来,就向他说:「请指给我们进城的路,我们必要恩待你。」
1:25 那人就指给了他们进城的路;他们用刀屠杀了全城的居民,但把那人和他全家放走了。
1:26 那人到了赫特人的地方,建了一座城,起名叫路次,直到今日仍叫此名。
1:27 默纳协没有赶走贝特商及其属境的居民,塔纳客及其属境的居民,多尔及其属境的居民,依贝肋罕及其属境的居民,默基多及其属境的居民,客纳罕人依旧住在这些地方。
1:28 等到以色列强盛了,只能使客纳罕人服役,终未能把他们全部逐出。
1:29 厄弗辣因也没有逐出住在革则尔的客纳罕人,所以客纳罕人仍在革则尔住在他们中间。
1:30 则步隆也没有逐出克特龙的居民及纳哈罗耳的居民,客纳罕人仍住在他们中间,但应为他们服役。
1:31 阿协尔也没有把阿苛、漆冬、阿赫拉布、阿革齐布、赫耳巴、阿费克和勒曷布的居民逐出,
1:32 所以阿协尔人住在当地的居民客纳罕人中间,因为他们没有把他们逐出去。
1:33 纳斐塔里也没有把贝特舍默士的居民和贝特阿纳特的居民逐出,于是他们就住在当地的居民客纳罕人中间;但是贝特舍默士和贝特阿纳特的居民应为他们服役。
1:34 阿摩黎人强迫丹的子孙住在山上,不让他们下到平原。
1:35 阿摩黎人依旧住在哈尔赫勒斯、阿雅隆和沙耳宾;但在若瑟家族势力强大之后,他们就成了服役的人。
1:36 厄东人的境界,是从阿刻辣宾山坡直到色拉以上地带。
第二章(23)
上主的神谕
2:1 上主的使者从基耳加耳上到波津说:「我使你们由埃及上来,领你们进入了我向你们祖先所誓许的地方;我曾说过:我永不废弃我与你们所立的盟约,
2:2 你们也不可与这地方的居民结约,且要拆毁他们的祭坛。但你们没有听从我的声音;你们这是作的什么事﹖
2:3 为此我现在说:我必不把他们从你们面前赶走,他们为你们将是陷阱,他们的神要成为你们的罗网。」
2:4 当上主的使者对全以色列子民说这话时,百姓便放声大哭,
2:5 因此给那地方起名叫波津。他们在那里给上主奉献了祭献。
民长时代的史论
2:6 若苏厄遣散了百姓,以色列子民就各到自己应得的产业去,为占领那地方。
2:7 当若苏厄在世时,和他去世后,那些见过上主为以色列所行的大事的长老们还在的时日,百姓都事奉上主。
2:8 上主的仆人,农的儿子若苏厄一百一十岁时去了世。
2:9 人们把他埋在他地业的境内,即在厄弗辣因山地,加阿士山北面的提默纳赫勒斯。
2:10 当那一代人都归于他们的祖先以后,在他们之后,兴起了另一代,他们不认识上主,也不知道上主为以色列所行的事迹。
2:11 以色列子民行了上主视为恶的事,事奉了巴耳诸神。
2:12 他们离弃了上主他们祖先的天主,即领他们出离埃及地的天主,而随从了别的神,叩拜他们四周各民族的神,因此触怒了上主。
2:13 他们背离了上主,而事奉巴耳和阿市托勒特。
2:14 于是上主对以色列大发忿怒,把他们交在强盗手中,叫强盗抢掠他们;将他们卖给四周的敌人,使他们不能抵抗他们的敌人;
2:15 他们无论去那里,上主的手总是加害他们,犹如上主所说的,犹如上主向他们所起的誓,使他们受极大的痛苦。
2:16 上主虽兴起民长,拯救他们脱离强盗的手;
2:17 但他们仍不肯听从他们的民长,反而与外邦的神行淫,顶礼叩拜,迅速地离开了他们祖先所走的服从上主命令的路,没有照样行事。
2:18 当上主给他们兴起民长时,上主与民长同在,在民长一生的岁月中,救他们脱离仇敌的手,因为上主听见了他们受压迫欺凌发出的叹息,而怜悯了他们;
2:19 可是民长一去世,他们又转而行恶,行为比他们的祖先更坏,去追随外神,事奉叩拜他们,总不放弃他们祖先的恶行和顽抗的行为。
2:20 因此上主对以色列大发忿怒说:「因为这百姓违犯了我与他们祖先缔结的盟约,没有听从我的声音;
2:21 为此,若苏厄死后所剩下的民族,我也不再由他们面前,驱逐任何一个,
2:22 为试验以色列是否谨守遵行上主的道路,有如他们的祖先所遵行的一样。」
2:23 因此,上主保留了那些民族,没有迅速驱逐他们,也没有把他们交在以色列人手中。
第三章(31)
上主保留的民族
3:1 这是上主为考验那些不晓得客纳罕一切战事的以色列人,所留下来的民族,
3:2 叫以色列子民的后代,至少那些以前不晓得这些战事的人,知道和学习作战。
3:3 这些民族就是培勒舍特人的五个酋长,一切客纳罕人、漆冬人和住在黎巴嫩山上,即从巴耳赫尔孟山直到哈玛特关口的希威人。
3:4 他们留在那里是为考验以色列人,看他们是否听从上主藉梅瑟吩咐他们祖先的那些诫命。
3:5 以色列子民就住在客纳罕人、赫特人、阿摩黎人、培黎齐人、希威人和耶步斯人中间,
3:6 竟然娶了他们的女子为妻,也把自己的女儿嫁给他们的儿子,事奉了他们的神。
十二民长的事迹(3-16)
敖特尼耳民长
3:7 以色列子民行了上主视为恶的事,忘却了上主他们的天主,而事奉了巴耳诸神和阿舍辣诸女神;
3:8 因此上主对以色列大发忿怒,将他们交在厄东王雇商黎沙塔殷手中,以色列子民遂服事了雇商黎沙塔殷八年。
3:9 当以色列子民向上主呼吁时,上主给以色列子民兴起了一个拯救他们的救星,即加肋布的弟弟刻纳次的儿子敖特尼耳。
3:10 上主的神降在他身上,他作了以色列的民长,出去作战;上主把厄东王雇商黎沙塔殷交在他手中,他的能力胜过了雇商黎沙塔殷。
3:11 于是四境平安了四十年。
厄胡得民长
刻纳次的儿子敖特尼耳去世后,
3:12 以色列子民又行了上主视为恶的事,上主就强化摩阿布王厄革隆去打以色列,因为他们行了上主视为恶的事。
3:13 他联合了阿孟子民和阿玛肋克人,前来击败以色列,占据了棕树城;
3:14 以色列遂服事了摩阿布王厄革隆十八年。
3:15 当以色列子民向上主呼吁时,上主给他们兴起了一位拯救者,就是本雅明人革辣的儿子厄胡得,他是左右手能兼用的人;以色列子民便派他给摩阿布王厄革隆献贡物。
3:16 厄胡得预备了一把一肘长的双刃刀,插在右腿衣服底下,
3:17 来到摩阿布王厄革隆前献贡物──厄革隆原是极肥胖的人。
3:18 献完贡物以后,就把抬贡物的人打发走,
3:19 自己却由基耳加耳柱像那里退回,说:「王呀!我有机密事要对你说。」王说:「退下!」于是侍立左右的人都退去。
3:20 厄胡得来到他跟前,他正独自坐在凉台上的房子里;厄胡得说:「我有神谕告诉你!」王就从自己的座位上起立;
3:21 厄胡得遂伸左手从右腿上拔出刀来,刺入他的腹部,
3:22 柄和刀都刺了进去,脂肪遂包住了刀子,他没有从肚子里把刀抽出来;
3:23 厄胡得出来到了走廊,把凉台上的门关上,上了锁。
3:24 他出去之后,王臣前来,看见凉台的房门关着,就说:「他一定在凉台上的内室里便溺。」
3:25 待他们等烦了,看见没有人来开凉台上的门,他们就拿钥匙把门开了,见他们的主子躺在地上死了。
3:26 在他们犹豫的时候,厄胡得已经逃走,绕过柱像,而逃往色依辣。
3:27 他到了那里,就在厄弗辣因山地吹号角,以色列子民就同他由山地下来,他在他们前面,
3:28 对他们说:「你们紧跟着我,因为上主把你们的仇敌摩阿布人已交于你们手中!」他们遂跟他下去,占据了摩阿布对面的约旦河渡口,不许一人渡过。
3:29 就在那个时候,他们击杀了摩阿布人约有一万,都是壮丁和兵士,没有一个人逃脱。
3:30 从那天起,摩阿布驱服于以色列手下;境内平安了八十年。
沙默加尔民长
3:31 在他以后,有阿纳特的儿子沙默加尔,他以赶牛棒击杀了六百培肋舍人,拯救了以色列。
十二民长的事迹(3-16)
第四章(24)
德波辣民长
4:1 厄胡得死后,以色列子民又行了上主视为恶的事。
4:2 因此上主将他们交在客纳罕王雅宾手中,他当时在哈祚尔为王,他的军长息色辣驻扎在哈洛舍特哥因。
4:3 因为雅宾王有九百辆铁甲车,极力压迫以色列子民已有二十年之久,以色列子民遂呼吁上主。
4:4 当时有一位女先知德波辣是拉丕多特的妻子,作以色列的民长。
4:5 她常坐在厄弗辣因山地、辣玛和贝特耳中间那棵德波辣棕树下,以色列子民都到她那里去听判断。
4:6 她打发人从纳斐塔里刻德士把阿彼诺罕的儿子巴辣克叫来,对他说:「这是上主以色列的天主的命令:你要从纳斐塔里和则步隆子孙中,率领一万人向大博尔山进发:
4:7 我要引领雅宾的将军息色辣和他的车辆军队到克雄河畔,到你跟前来,把他交在你手中。」
4:8 巴辣克对她说:「你若同我去,我就去;你若不同我去,我就不去。」
4:9 她回答说:「我一定同你去,但是你此行并无光荣,因为上主要把息色辣交在一个女子手中。」于是德波辣起身同巴辣克往刻德士去了。
4:10 巴辣克召集则步隆和纳斐塔里的子孙到刻德士去,跟他上去的有一万人,德波辣也同他上去了。
息色辣败北
4:11 那时刻尼人赫贝尔离开别的刻尼人,离开梅瑟的姻亲曷巴布的子孙,在刻德士附近的匝阿纳宁橡树旁支搭了帐幕。
4:12 有人报告息色辣;阿彼诺罕的儿子巴辣克已上了大博尔山。
4:13 息色辣遂召集了他所有的车辆,即那九百辆铁甲车,和随从他的全军,从哈洛舍特哥因出来。到了克雄河畔。
4:14 德波辣对巴辣克说:「起来!因为今天上主已把息色辣交在你手中。上主不是走在你前面吗﹖」于是巴辣克从大博尔山下来,那一万人跟在他后面。
4:15 当时上主用利剑在巴辣克前面扰乱了息色辣和他的车辆以及他的军队,息色辣下车,徒步逃跑了。
4:16 巴辣克就追赶车辆和军队,直追到哈洛舍特哥因;息色辣的全军都丧身刀下,一个也没有剩下。
息色辣死
4:17 息色辣徒步逃到刻尼人赫贝尔的妻子雅厄耳的帐幕那里,因为哈祚尔王雅宾和刻尼人赫贝尔的家族相安无事。
4:18 雅厄耳出来迎接息色辣,向他说:「我主!请你躲起来,躲在我这里,不必害怕!」他就躲在她的帐幕里;雅厄耳就用毯子盖住他。
4:19 息色辣对她说:「请给我一点水喝!因为我渴了。」她就打开皮囊给他奶喝,然后又盖住他。
4:20 息色辣又向她说:「你站在帐幕门口,若有人来问你说:这里有人吗﹖你就回答说:没有。」
4:21 那时赫贝尔的妻子雅厄耳取了一根帐棚上的木橛,手里拿着锤子,悄悄走到息色辣前,把木橛钉在他的太阳穴里,一直钉到地上;那时他正疲乏熟睡,就这样死去。
4:22 那时巴辣克正在追赶息色辣,雅厄耳出来迎接他,对他说:「来!我给你看看你所追寻的人。」他来到她那里,看,息色辣已躺在那里死了!木橛在他的太阳穴中。
4:23 这样,那一天天主在以色列子民面前制伏了客纳罕王雅宾。
4:24 以色列子民的力量日渐强大,超过了客纳罕王雅宾,直到将他消灭。
第五章(31)
德波辣的凯旋歌
5:1 那一天德波辣和阿彼诺罕的儿子巴辣客作歌说:
5:2 「为了以色列中间有指挥的元帅,为了百姓自愿从军,你们应祝颂上主!
5:3 诸民,请听!君王,请听!诸侯,侧耳!对上主我要歌唱,要赞颂上主以色列的天主!
5:4 上主,当你由色依尔出征时,当你由厄东地前进时,天摇地动,密云滴雨。
5:5 山岳摇摇欲坠,在上主前,在上主以色列的天主前。
以色列受压迫
5:6 阿纳特之子沙默加尔年间,在为奴的当时,商队敛迹,行人转向弯曲的陌径。
5:7 威力在以色列消逝了,消逝了!直到我德波辣崛起,直到以色列的母亲兴起。
5:8 以色列选择了新神,战争即临门下。四万以色列人中,不见一面盾牌,一支长矛。
胜利的庆祝
5:9 我的心灵向往以色列的首领,向往百姓中自愿从军者。请你们祝颂上主!
5:10 骑白驴的,坐华毯的,和过路行人,你们都要歌唱,
5:11 加入水泉间缭绕的歌声!那里正在歌颂上主的胜利,歌颂他统治以色列的胜利。上主的百姓,速下到城门口!
5:12 奋发呀!奋发,德波辣!奋发呀!奋发,请歌唱!奋勇,起来,巴辣克!阿彼诺罕的儿子!擒住你的俘虏!
战友
5:13 英雄的后裔,请出征!上主的百姓,请随勇士为我出征!
5:14 厄弗辣因盘据在山谷中,本雅明随你加入了行列;领袖由玛基尔进军,手执权仗的由则步隆出发。
5:15 依撒加尔的首领与德波辣和巴辣克相偕;巴辣克在山谷中率领自己的步兵袭敌。勒乌本境内,大有运筹帷幄之士!
5:16 为什么你坐在羊圈内,静听牧童的笛声﹖勒乌本境内,都是犹豫满怀的人。
5:17 基肋阿得在约旦河东安居;丹人为什么寄居船上﹖阿协尔在海岸静坐,在港口悠闲;
5:18 则步隆是好冒死舍命的子民,纳斐塔里在高原上奋不顾身。
交战
5:19 君王齐来战斗,客纳罕众王鏖战,在默基多水傍──塔纳客,未曾掠去一个银钱。
5:20 星辰由天上参战,自其轨道与息色辣交锋。
5:21 克雄河的急流将仇敌冲没。我的心灵,勇敢践踏罢!
5:22 勇士急奔飞腾,马蹄挞挞作响。
雅厄耳计杀息色辣
5:23 诅咒默洛次,诅咒其中的居民,因他未率领勇士来协助上主!
5:24 雅厄耳,在女子中是可赞美的!在居于帐棚的女子中是可赞美的!
5:25 他求水,她给了奶,以珍贵的杯盘呈上了乳酪。
5:26 她左手拿着橛子,右手拿着匠人的锤子,打击了息色辣,打穿了他的头颅,击穿了他的太阳穴。
5:27 在她脚前屈身仆倒,深深入睡,昏迷至死;在她脚前屈身仆倒,蜷伏在那里,僵卧在那里。
5:28 息色辣的母亲自窗口探望,在铁棂中长叹:战车为什么迟迟不来﹖车轮为什么缓缓而行﹖
5:29 聪明的宫女作了回答,自己心中亦反复思想:
5:30 或者获得掠物而在分赃,每人分得一二少女;息色辣取得彩衣为掠物,为我的颈项,获得锦绣彩衣。
结论
5:31 上主!愿你的敌人如此灭亡,愿爱你的人像兴起的旭日。」境内于是平安了四十年。
第六章(40)
米德杨的迫害
6:1 以色列的子民又行了上主视为恶的事,上主把他们交于米德杨人手中七年之久。
6:2 米德杨人的势力胜过了以色列,以色列子民为了防御米德杨人,修筑了山洞、地洞和山寨。
6:3 每逢以色列人撒种之后,米德杨人、阿玛肋克人和东方子民就上来攻打他们;
6:4 对着他们扎营,毁坏地产直到迦萨一带,没有给以色列留下一点食粮,连羊、牛、驴也没有留下;
6:5 因为他们总是带着家畜和帐棚上来,多如蝗虫;他们来的人和骆驼多得无数,踏入境内,毁坏田地。
6:6 以色列为了米德杨人的原故,很是穷困,因此以色列子民呼吁了上主。
6:7 当以色列子民为了米德杨的原故,呼吁上主时,
6:8 上主就派了一位先知到以色列子民那里,对他们说:「上主以色列的天主这样说:是我使你们由埃及上来,领你们离开了为奴之家;
6:9 是我从埃及人的手中,从一切压迫你们的人手中救出你们来;是我从你们面前把他们赶走,把他们的地赐给你们。
6:10 我曾对你们说过:我是上主你们的天主,你们在阿摩黎地方,切不可敬畏他们的神!但是你们没有听从我的话。」
基德红被召
6:11 上主的使者来到,坐在敖弗辣的一棵属于阿彼厄则尔人约阿士的笃耨树下,当时他的儿子基德红正在酿酒池里打麦子,躲避米德杨人。
6:12 上主的使者显现给他,对他说:「英勇的壮士,愿上主与你同在!」
6:13 基德红回答他说:「我主,请原谅!如果上主与我们同在,我们怎会遭遇这些困难﹖我祖先给我们所讲过的那一切奇事,如今在那里?他们曾向我们说过:看,是上主领我们出离埃及,但是现在上主拋弃了我们,将我们交在米德杨人的掌握中。」
6:14 上主注视他说:「凭你这种力量,你去拯救以色列脱离米德杨人的掌握。看,是我派遣你。」
6:15 他回答说:「我主,请原谅!我凭什么拯救以色列﹖看,我家在默纳协支派中是最卑微的,我在我父亲家中又是最小的一个。」
6:16 上主对他说:「有我与你同在,你必击败米德杨人,如击一个人一样。」
6:17 基德红又向他说:「我若在你面前蒙恩,请你给我一个记号,证明与我说话的是你。
6:18 请你不要离开此地,等我回到你这里,带来礼物,摆在你前。」他答应说:「我等你回来。」
6:19 基德红就去预备了一只小公山羊,又用一「厄法」麦粉作了无酵饼,把肉放在筐里,把汤盛在罐里,带到笃耨树下献给他。
6:20 天主的使者对他说:「拿出肉和无酵饼来,放在这盘石上,把汤倒出来!」他就照样作了。
6:21 上主的使者遂伸出手中的棍杖,杖头一触及肉和无酵饼,盘石便起火,把肉和无酵饼吞噬了;上主的使者便从他眼前隐没了。
6:22 基德红遂知道他是上主的使者说:「哎呀!我主上主,我竟然面对面地看见上主的使者!」
6:23 但上主对他说:「你放心!不必害怕,你不会死!
6:24 基德红就在那里给上主立了一座祭坛,称为雅威沙隆;至今还在阿彼厄则耳人的敖弗辣那里。
基德红拆毁巴耳祭坛
6:25 当夜上主对他说:「取你父亲的一只牛,即那只七岁的肥牛,以后拆毁你父亲的巴耳祭坛,打碎旁边的阿舍辣;
6:26 给上主你的天主在这盘石顶上建一座祭坛,准备妥当,将那只肥牛献为全燔祭,用打碎的阿舍辣作木柴。」
6:27 基德红就从仆人中选出十个人,照上主吩咐他的作了;但因为害怕父亲的家人和城里的人,不敢在白天行事,就在黑夜作了。
6:28 城里的人早晨起来,看见巴耳的祭坛已毁,旁边所有的阿舍辣也被打碎,那只肥牛也献于新筑的祭坛上,
6:29 就彼此询问说:「谁作了这事﹖」经过考察追问之后,断定说:「必是约阿士的儿子基德红作了这事。」
6:30 因此本城的人对约阿士说:「将你的儿子交出来,将他处死!因为他拆毁了巴耳的祭坛,打碎了旁边的阿舍辣。」
6:31 约阿士回答所有反对他的人说:「你们要为巴耳辩护么﹖或者你们要救助他吗﹖谁为他辩护,明天早晨便该处以死刑!他如果是神,让他为自己辩护罢!因为有人拆毁了他的祭坛。」
6:32 因此当天人就称基德红为「耶鲁巴耳,」好象说:「让巴耳与他争辩,因为基德红拆毁了他的祭坛。」
基德红求证
6:33 那时,米德杨、阿玛肋克和东方子民都聚集起来,过了河,在依次勒耳平原安了营。
6:34 上主的神充满了基德红,他一吹号角,阿彼厄则尔人便应召前来跟随他;
6:35 他又打发使者走遍默纳协,默纳协人也应召前来跟随他;他又打发使者往阿协尔、则步隆和纳斐塔里去,他们也都上来与他们会合。
6:36 基德红就对天主说:「如果你按你所说的,真要借着我的手拯救以色列,
6:37 看我将剪下的一把羊毛放在禾场上,若露水单单落在羊毛上,而遍地都是干的,那么我便晓得,如你所说的,你真要藉我的手拯救以色列。」
6:38 次日清早起来,果然如此,基德红把羊毛一拧,从羊毛里拧出一碗露水。
6:39 基德红又向天主说:「如果我再说一次,求你别对我发怒!请让我用这羊毛再试一次:单单羊毛是干的,而遍地都是露水。」
6:40 那一夜天主果然这样作了,单单羊毛是干的,而遍地都是露水。
第七章(25)
选拔三百战士
7:1 耶鲁巴耳即基德红和所有跟随他的民众一早起身,在哈洛得泉安营;米德杨的营幕就在他们北面,在摩勒山脚的平原里。
7:2 上主对基德红说:「跟随你的民众太多,我不能把米德杨交在他们手中,免得以色列对我自夸说:是自己的能力救了自己。
7:3 现在你要向民众宣告说:凡害怕恐惧的可以回去,急速离开这里。」于是民众中有二万二千回去,只剩下一万人。
7:4 上主又对基德红说:「民众还是太多;领他们下到水边去,我要在那里为你检验他们。凡我告诉你说:这人可同你去,他就与你同去;凡我告诉你说:这人不可同你去,他就不可去。」
7:5 他就引民众下到水边;上主向基德红说:「凡用舌头舔水像狗舔水似的,将他们安置在一处;同样,凡屈膝跪下饮水的,将他们安置在一处。」
7:6 用手捧到嘴边舔水的共有三百人;其余民众都是屈膝跪下喝水。
7:7 上主对基德红说:「我要用这三百舔水的人拯救你们,把米德杨交于你手中。让其余的民众各回本地去。」
7:8 基德红便留下民众的罐子和号角,打发众以色列人各回自己的帐幕,只留下三百人。米德杨的营幕就在他们下面的平原里。
基德红巧取米德杨营
7:9 当夜上主对他说:「起来,下去攻营!我已将敌营交在你的手中了。
7:10 如果你一人害怕下去,可带你的随从普辣一起下到营幕,
7:11 听他们说什么;以后你的手就会坚强,敢下去攻营了。」于是他和他的随从普辣便下去,来到营中驻军的前哨。
7:12 那时米德杨、阿玛肋克和东方的子民都散布在平原里,多如蝗虫;他们的骆驼不可胜数,多如海边的沙粒。
7:13 基德红来到时,正有一个人给他的同伴讲梦说:「我作了一个梦:有一个大麦面饼滚入米德杨营内,直滚向帐幕,将帐幕撞倒:翻转朝上。」
7:14 他的同伴回答说:「这不是别的,这是以色列人约阿士的儿子基德红的刀剑;天主已把米德杨及其全营交于他手中。」
7:15 基德红一听见这梦的叙述和解释,就朝拜天主;然后回到以色列营中说:「起来!因为上主已将米德杨的营幕交在你们手中了。」
7:16 他于是把三百人分作三队,把号角和空罐子交在每人手中,把火把放在罐子里;
7:17 然后吩咐他们说:「你们看我怎样行,你们便怎样行;一到营幕边上,我怎样作,你们也要怎样作。
7:18 当我与跟随我的人吹号角时,你们也应该在营幕四周吹号角,并且喊叫;为上主,为基德红!」
7:19 在三更之初,当哨兵换防的时候,基德红领着他那一百人来到营幕边上,吹起号角来,打破手中的罐子。
7:20 同时三队一齐吹号角,打破罐子,左手拿着火把,右手拿着号角吹,并喊叫说:「刀剑为上主,为基德红!」
7:21 众人都在营幕四周,各站在自己的地方。那时敌营惊醒,乱喊乱窜。
7:22 当那三百人吹号角的时候,上主使敌营互相撕杀。以后朝着责勒达逃往贝特史大,直到面对塔巴特的阿贝耳默曷拉。
米德杨惨败
7:23 那时以色列人从纳斐塔里、阿协尔和默纳协全地集合,追赶米德杨。
7:24 基德红又打发使者到全厄弗辣因山地说:「请下来攻打米德杨人,在他们前占据约旦河的渡口,直到贝特巴辣。」全厄弗辣因人就集合,占据了约旦河的渡口,一直到贝特巴辣。
7:25 他们捉住了米德杨的两个领袖,即敖勒布和则厄布,在敖勒布石上把敖勒布杀死,在则厄布醡酒池里把则厄布杀死;以后继续追赶米德杨人,并把敖勒布和则厄布的头送到约但对岸基德红跟前。
第八章(35)
基德红平息厄弗辣因的忿怒
8:1 那时厄弗辣因人对基德红说:「你去攻打米德杨时,没有召叫我们,你为什么这样对待我们﹖」他们激烈的与他争吵。
8:2 他回答他们说:「我所行的怎能比得上你们呢﹖厄弗辣因所拾的不比阿彼厄则尔所收的葡萄更好吗﹖
8:3 天主将米德杨的首领敖勒布和则厄布交在你们手中,我所能行的怎能与你们相比﹖」为了他这番话,他们对他的怒气,就平息了。
基德红乘胜追赶米德杨王
8:4 基德红来到约旦河,就渡过河;他与跟随他的三百人,虽然都疲倦,仍继续追赶。
8:5 他向稣苛特人说:「请你们给跟随我的人几个饼吃,因为他们疲倦了,我还愿意追赶米德杨的两个王子则巴黑和匝耳慕纳。」
8:6 稣苛特人的头目回答说:「难道则巴黑和匝耳慕纳的手已在你的掌握中,我们就该把饼送给你的军队吗﹖」
8:7 基德红说:「好罢!几时上主把则巴黑和匝耳慕纳交在我手中,我必要用茨条和荆棘鞭挞你们的身体。」
8:8 以后由那里上去,到了培奴耳,也向他们说了同样的话;培奴耳人回答他也像稣苛特人一样。
8:9 他也对培奴耳人说:「当我平安回来时,我必拆毁这座碉堡。」
8:10 那时则巴黑和匝耳慕纳正在卡尔科尔,他们的军队约有一万五千人,这是全部东方子民所剩下的军队,因为已有十二万持刀的被击毙了。
8:11 基德红从诺巴黑和约革波哈东面,顺着住帐棚人的路上去,当敌人自以为安全的时候,袭击了军营,
8:12 则巴黑和匝耳慕纳落荒而逃,基德红在后面追赶,捉住了那两个米德杨王子则巴黑和匝耳慕纳,并使全军覆没。
8:13 约阿士的儿子基德红,从战场沿赫勒斯斜坡回来,
8:14 捉住了稣苛特的少年人,查问他。这少年人就给他写下稣苛特的首领和长老的名字,共七十七人。
8:15 基德红遂往稣苛特人那里去说:「看!这是则巴黑和匝耳慕纳,你们为了他们曾讥笑我说:难道则巴黑和匝耳慕纳的手已在你掌握中,我们就该把饼送给你疲倦的人吗﹖」
8:16 他于是捉住那城的长老,用旷野里的茨条和荆棘惩罚了稣苛特居民。
8:17 以后又把培奴耳的碉堡拆毁,杀戮了城内的居民。
8:18 然后询问则巴黑和匝耳慕纳说:「你们在大博尔山上杀戮的那些人是怎样的人呢﹖」他们答说:「他们像你们一样,个个都像君王的儿子。」
8:19 基德红说:「他们是我的兄弟,是我母亲的儿子:上主永在:如果你保留了他们不死,我也就不杀你们。」
8:20 他遂对自己的长子耶特尔说:「起来,杀死他们!」但是这孩童害怕,拔不出刀来,因为年纪还小。
8:21 因此,则巴黑和匝耳慕纳说:「你亲自起来杀死我们罢!因为人怎样,他的力量也怎样。」基德红就起来杀了则巴黑和匝耳慕纳,拿去他们骆驼颈上的月牙环。
基德红辞王位及其末年
8:22 事后,以色列人便对基德红说:「你既然从米德杨手中拯救了我们,请你和你的子孙作我们的君王!」
8:23 基德红回答他们说:「我不作你的君王,我的子孙也不作你们的君王,唯有上主是你们的君王。」
8:24 基德红又向他们说:「我只向你们要求一件事:请将每人掠夺的金环给我。」原来依市玛耳人都有金环。
8:25 他们答说:「我们情愿给你。」于是铺开一件外衣,每人把所掠夺的金环掷在上面。
8:26 他所要的金环共有一千七百「协刻耳」重;此外尚有月牙环、耳环和米德杨王所穿的紫红衣,及他们骆驼颈上的项链。
8:27 基德红用这些金子造了一个「厄弗得」安置在他本城敖弗辣。以色列众人都到那里行邪淫,因此这个「厄弗得」便成了基德红及其家族的罗网。
8:28 米德杨在以色列子民前面屈服,再没有抬起头来。基德红在世时,境内平安了四十年。
8:29 约阿士的儿子耶鲁巴耳回去,安居在自己家中。
8:30 基德红有七十个儿子,都是他亲生的,因为他有很多妻子。
8:31 他在舍根的妾也给他生了一个儿子,给他起名叫阿彼默肋客。
8:32 约阿士的儿子基德红寿终正寝,埋在阿彼厄则尔的敖弗辣,他父亲约阿士的坟墓里。
8:33 基德红死后,以色列子民又去跟从巴耳诸神行邪淫,立巴耳贝黎特当做他们的天主。
8:34 以色列子民忘记了上主他们的天主,曾从四周所有的敌人手中救了他们,
8:35 也没有恩待耶鲁巴耳即基德红的家,以报答他施于以色列的恩惠。
第九章(57)
阿彼默肋客称王
9:1 耶鲁巴耳的儿子阿彼默肋客到舍根去见他的母舅们,对他们和他母家的人说:
9:2 「请你们问一问舍根所有的公民:是耶鲁巴耳的儿子七十人治理你们好呢﹖还是一个人治理你们好呢﹖你们还要记得:我是你们的骨肉。」
9:3 他的母舅们就替他把这些话传给舍根所有的公民;他们的心都倾向阿彼默肋客,因为他们说:「他确是我们的兄弟!」
9:4 他们遂从巴耳贝黎特庙里拿了七十块银钱给他,阿彼默肋客就用这些钱雇了一些放荡无赖之徒跟随他。
9:5 他回到敖弗辣他父亲家里,在一块石头上把自己的兄弟,即耶鲁巴耳的儿子七十人都杀了,只剩下耶鲁巴耳的幼子约堂,因为他藏了起来。
9:6 于是舍根所有的公民和贝特米罗人都集合起来,在舍根的纪念碑前那棵橡树下,立阿彼默肋客为王。
约堂讲寓言
9:7 有人将此事告诉了约堂,约堂就上了革黎斤山顶,站在那里,高声向他们喊说:「舍根公民,请你们听我,望天主也听你们!
9:8 有一次,众树要去立一树为他们的君王,就对橄榄树说:请你作我们的君王!
9:9 橄榄树回答说:人用我的油来敬礼神,尊崇人,难道要我放弃出油,而去摇摇在众树之上吗﹖
9:10 众树又对无花果树说:请你来作我们的君王!
9:11 无花果树回答说:难道要我舍掉我的甘甜和美果,而去摇摇在众树之上吗﹖
9:12 众树又对葡萄树说:请你来作我们的君王!
9:13 葡萄树就回答说:我的新酒悦乐神人,难道要我放弃出产,而去摇摇在众树之上吗﹖
9:14 于是众树对荆棘说:请你来作我们的君王!
9:15 荆棘对树木答道:若你们真愿立我作你们的君王,来罢!躲在我的荫下;否则,火必从荆棘冒出,吞灭黎巴嫩的香柏木。
9:16 现在,你们立阿彼默肋客为王,如果你们认为作的真诚正直,如果你们认为是善待了耶鲁巴耳和他的家族,如果你们认为你们这样行事,对得起他一手所立的功勋,──
9:17 因为原是我父亲为你们作战而舍生,把你们由米德杨手中救出来。
9:18 然而你们今日却来反对我父亲的家族,在一块石头上杀了他的儿子七十人,立他婢女的儿子阿彼默肋客为舍根公民的君王,因为他是你们的弟兄?ぉ?
19 今天如果你们认为以真诚正直对待了耶鲁巴耳和他的家族,那么,你们就因阿彼默肋客而喜乐罢!希望他也因你们而喜乐!
9:20 不然,愿火从阿彼默肋客发出,吞灭舍根的公民和贝特米罗!也愿火从舍根的公民和贝特米罗发出,吞灭阿彼默肋客!」
9:21 以后约堂出走,逃到贝尔去了,住在那里,远避他的哥哥阿彼默肋客。
舍根叛变
9:22 阿彼默肋客治理以色列三年。
9:23 天主使恶神降在阿彼默肋客和舍根公民中间,舍根的公民便背叛了阿彼默肋客,
9:24 要报复对耶鲁巴耳七十个儿子的罪行,将他们的血归于他们的兄弟阿彼默肋客,因为是他杀害了他们;也归于舍根的公民,因为他们曾鼓励他杀害自己的兄弟。
9:25 舍根公民为反抗他,就在山顶上设下伏兵,抢掠所有路过他们那里的人:有人将这事报告给阿彼默肋客。
9:26 那时厄贝得的儿子加阿耳和他同族的人迁徙到舍根,舍根的居民竟信任了他;
9:27 他们便到田间收葡萄,榨酒,开庆祝会,到他们的神庙里又吃又喝,也咒骂了阿彼默肋客。
9:28 厄贝得的儿子加阿耳说:「阿彼默肋客是谁,我们舍根人是谁,我们竟该服侍他﹖岂不是耶鲁巴耳的儿子和官员则步耳,该服侍舍根的始祖哈摩尔的后人吗﹖我们为什么要服侍阿彼默肋客﹖
9:29 恨不得这百姓交于我手中,好把阿彼默肋客除掉。我要对阿彼默肋客说:增派你的军队出征罢!」
9:30 则步耳城尉听到厄贝得的儿子加阿耳的话,大发忿怒,
9:31 遂打发使者去见在阿鲁玛的阿彼默肋客说:「看,厄贝得的儿子加阿耳和他的同族人,来到舍根,挑唆全城反叛你。
9:32 所以现在你和跟随你的人夜里要起来,埋伏在田野间,
9:33 明天早晨太阳一出来,就攻城。当他和随从他的人出来抵抗你时,你看看怎样好,就怎样对付他。」
9:34 阿彼默肋客遂同所有跟随他的人夜间起身,分作四队,对着舍根设下埋伏。
9:35 当厄贝得的儿子加阿耳出来,站在城门口时,阿彼默肋客便与随从他的人从埋伏的地方出来,
9:36 加阿耳一见这些人就对则步耳说:「看,有人从山顶下来!」则步耳回答他说:「你看见山影,误以为是人!」
9:37 加阿耳接着又说:「看,有人从高地出来,又有一队沿巫士橡树道上前来。」
9:38 则步耳对他说:「现在你的口在那里﹖不是你曾说过:阿彼默肋客是谁,要我们服侍他﹖这不是你所轻视的人吗﹖现在请你出去攻打他罢!」
9:39 加阿耳就在舍根公民之前出去,攻打阿彼默肋客;
9:40 可是阿彼默肋客一追击他,他就在他面前逃跑了;直到城门有许多伤亡的人。
9:41 以后阿彼默肋客回到阿鲁玛;则步耳将加阿耳和他的同族人赶走,禁止他们住在舍根。
舍根灭亡
9:42 第二天早晨,人民到田野里去,有人告诉了阿彼默肋客,
9:43 他于是把自己的人分作三队,叫他们埋伏在田间;他自己窥望,当他看见百姓从城里出来,就冲过去,击杀了他们;
9:44 当时阿彼默肋客与跟随他的军队冲过去,把住城门口,而另两队冲向田间的众人,杀了他们。
9:45 那一天,阿彼默肋客整天攻打那城,把城攻下,杀了城中的居民,把城拆毁,撒上盐。
9:46 舍根碉堡里的人听见此事,就躲到巴耳贝黎特庙里的地穴里。
9:47 有人告诉阿彼默肋客,人民都聚集在舍根碉堡内。
9:48 阿彼默肋客和跟随他的人就上了匝耳孟山;阿彼默肋客手里拿着一把斧头,砍了一根树枝,拿起来放在肩上,然后向跟随他的人说:「你们看我作什么,你们也赶快照样去作!」
9:49 于是众人都各砍了根树枝,随着阿彼默肋客把树枝堆在地穴上,在地穴上点了火,于是舍根碉堡里所有的人都死了,男女约有一千人。
阿彼默肋客的结局
9:50 此后阿彼默肋客往特贝兹去,安营攻打特贝兹,也占据了那城。
9:51 在那城中有一座坚固的碉堡,该城所有的公民,男男女女都跑到那里躲避,关上门,上到碉堡顶上。
9:52 阿彼默肋客来到碉堡前攻打;当他走近碉堡门口,要放火焚烧时,
9:53 有一个妇人拋下了一块磨石,正落在阿彼默肋客头上,打碎了他的头盖骨。
9:54 他急忙喊叫替他执戟的少年,向他说:「拔出你的刀杀了我罢!免得人讲论我说:一个女子杀了他!」那少年就用刀刺死了他。
9:55 以色列人一见阿彼默肋客死了,各回了本家。
9:56 于是天主报复了阿彼默肋客对他父亲所行的恶事,因为他杀了自己的七十个兄弟;
9:57 并且天主也把舍根人的一切恶行归在他们自己的头上:这样耶鲁巴耳的儿子约堂的诅咒,也应验在他们身上。
第十章(18)
托拉民长
10:1 阿彼默肋客之后,有依撒加尔人多多的孙子,普阿的儿子托拉起来整救以色列。他住在厄弗辣因山地的沙米尔,
10:2 做以色列民长有二十三年之久,死后葬在纱米尔。
雅依尔民长
10:3 在他以后,有基肋阿得人雅依尔兴起,作以色列民长二十二年之久。
10:4 他有三十个儿子,骑着三十匹驴驹;他们有三十座城,这些城称作哈沃特雅依尔,直到今日,都在基肋阿得地。
10:5 雅依尔死后埋葬在卡孟。
以民犯罪受罚
10:6 那时以色列子民又行了上主视为恶的事,事奉巴耳和阿市托勒特众神,以及阿兰的神,漆冬的神,摩阿布的神,阿孟子民的神,培肋舍特人的神;他们背弃上主,不事奉他。
10:7 上主向以色列发怒,把他们交在培肋舍特人和阿孟子民手中。
10:8 从那一年起,他们迫害压制以色列子民,即所有住在约旦河对岸,在阿摩黎人境内基肋阿得地方的以色列子民,一连十八年。
10:9 阿孟子民也过约旦河来攻击犹大、本雅明和厄弗辣因家族;因此以色列人很是困苦。
10:10 以色列子民遂向上主呼吁说:「我们得罪了你,因为我们背弃了我们的天主,事奉了巴耳诸神!」
10:11 上主对以色列子民说:「当埃及人、阿摩黎人、阿孟子民、培肋舍特人、
10:12 漆冬人、阿玛肋人、米德杨人难为你们的时候,你们向我哀号,我岂没有从他们手中拯救了你们﹖
10:13 但是你们背弃了我,事奉了别的神,因此我不再拯救你们,
10:14 去呼吁你们所选择的神罢!让他们在你们遭难时来拯救你们!」
10:15 以色列子民对上主说:「我们犯了罪,你任意对待我们,只求你今日援救我们!」
10:16 以色列子民遂从他们中间除去外邦的神,而事奉上主;上主再不能容忍以色列受苦。
10:17 那时阿孟子民集合在基肋阿得扎营,以色列子民也集合在米兹帕安营。
10:18 基肋阿得人民的首领彼此说:「谁开始攻打阿孟子民,谁就作全基肋阿得居民的首领。」
第十一章(40)
依弗大民长
11:1 基肋阿得人依弗大是一个英勇的壮士,是妓女的儿子;父亲名基肋阿得。
11:2 基肋阿得的妻子也给他生了几个儿子,正妻的儿子长大之后,把依弗大逐出,他说:「你在我们父家不能承受产业,因为你是外妇的儿子。」
11:3 依弗大就从他兄弟面前逃走,定居于托布地方;有些流氓聚在他那里,同他来往。
11:4 过了一些时候,阿孟子民与以色列交战。
11:5 当阿孟子民同以色列交战的时候,基肋阿得的长老到托布地方去请依弗大回来。
11:6 他们向依弗大说:「请你来作我们的统帅,攻打阿孟子民。」
11:7 依弗大回答基肋阿得的长老说:「你们不是恨我,将我逐出我的父家﹖现在你们遭难,为什么来找我﹖」
11:8 基肋阿得的长老对依弗大说:「我们现在来找你正是为此。请你和我们一同回去,攻打阿孟子民,作我们,作基肋阿得所有居民的首领。」
11:9 依弗大对基肋阿得的长老说:「你们领我回去,同阿孟子民作战,如果上主将他们交给我,那么我就作你们的首领!」
11:10 基肋阿得的长老对依弗大说:「上主在我们中间作证:我们必照你的话实行。」
11:11 依弗大就与基肋阿得的长老一同回去,百姓立他做他们的首领和统帅;依弗大在米兹帕,在上主面前,又把他这一切话陈述了一遍。
依弗大与阿孟交涉
11:12 依弗大就派使者到阿孟子民王那里说:「你与我何干﹖竟来我这里攻打我的土地﹖」
11:13 阿孟子民的君王对依弗大的使者说:「因为以色列从埃及上来的时候,侵占了我的领土,从阿尔农河到雅波克河,直到约旦河;现在你应和平交还!」
11:14 依弗大再打发使者去见阿孟子民的君王,
11:15 对他说:「依弗大这样说:以色列并没有侵占摩阿布的土地和阿孟子民的土地,
11:16 因为以色列从埃及上来的时候,是经过旷野,到了红海,而来到卡德士。
11:17 以色列曾派使者对厄东王说:请让我们经过你的领土!但是厄东王不肯答应;又打发使者到摩阿布王那里,但是他也不肯;于是以色列便逗留在卡德士。
11:18 以后他们经过旷野,绕过厄东地和摩阿布地,从摩阿布东面而行,在阿尔农河那边安营;他们并没有进入摩阿布的境界,因为阿尔农是摩阿布的边界。
11:19 以色列又派使者到阿摩黎王息红,即赫市朋王那里;以色列向他说:请让我们经过你的领土,到我们的地方去。
11:20 然而息红不信任以色列,不准他们经过他的境界;并且息红还召集他所有的人民,在雅哈兹安营,同以色列交战。
11:21 但是上主以色列的天主将息红及他全体百姓交于以色列手中,击杀他们;于是以色列便取得住在那地的阿摩黎人所有的土地,
11:22 取得阿摩黎人,从阿尔农河到雅波克河,从旷野到约旦河所有的土地。
11:23 现今上主以色列的天主,由自己的百姓以色列面前驱逐了阿摩黎人,难道你还要占据这地吗﹖
11:24 你岂不是应占据你的神革摩士赐你占领的地,而我们应占领我们的天主上主,由我们前所驱逐之人的地吗﹖
11:25 现在,难道你比摩阿士王漆颇尔的儿子巴拉克还强么﹖他何曾与以色列争斗过,或者与他们交战过﹖
11:26 以色列住在赫市朋及其附近村镇,阿洛厄尔及其附近村镇,阿尔农河沿岸各城镇里,已有三百年之久,为什么在这期间,你们没有收回呢﹖
11:27 所以我并没有得罪你,而你竟要加害我,与我交战;愿裁判者上主今天在以色列子民与阿孟子民中间判断是非!」
11:28 但是阿孟子民的君王不肯听从依弗大向他传报的这些话。
依弗大许愿
11:29 那时上主的神降于依弗大身上,他就走遍基肋阿得和默纳协,来到基肋阿得的米兹帕,又从基肋阿得的米兹帕,到了阿孟子民那里。
11:30 依弗大向上主许愿说:「若你把阿孟子民交于我手中,
11:31 当我由阿孟子民那里平安回来时,不论谁由我家门内出来迎接我,谁就应归上主,我要把他献作全燔祭。」
11:32 于是依弗大到阿孟子民那里与他们交战,上主把他们交在他手中,
11:33 于是他从阿洛厄尔击杀他们直到米尼特,直到阿贝耳革辣明,共二十座城,实在是一场大追击战;于是阿孟子民在以色列子民前屈服了。
依弗大还愿
11:34 依弗大回到米兹帕自己家中时,看,他的女儿出来,击鼓跳舞前来迎接他。她是依弗大的独生女,除她以外,没有别的子女。
11:35 当依弗大一见了她,就撕破衣服说:「哎呀!我的女儿,你真使我苦恼,太叫我作难了!因为我对上主开过口不能收回。」
11:36 她回答他说:「我的父亲,你既然对上主开过口,就照你说出的对待我罢!因为上主已对你的敌人阿孟子民,为你报了仇。」
11:37 她又向父亲说:「请你许我一件事:给我两个月的期限,让我与我的伴侣到山上去,哀哭我的童贞。」
11:38 他答应说:「你去罢!」就让她离去两个月的时间。她就去了,与她的伴侣在山上哀哭自己的童贞。
11:39 过了两个月,她回到父亲那里,父亲就在她身上还了所许的愿;她还没有认识男子。于是在以色列成为一种风俗:
11:40 每年以色列少女要哀吊基肋阿得人依弗大的女儿,每年四天。
第十二章(15)
依弗大战败厄弗辣因
12:1 厄弗辣因人集合起来,过河到了匝丰,对依弗大说:「当你去攻打阿孟子民时,为什么没有召我们与你同去﹖我们要用火把你的房屋同你一起烧掉。」
12:2 依弗大回答他们说:「我与我的人民同阿孟子民激战的时候,我曾向你们求救,但你们没有来救我们脱离他们的手。
12:3 我见你们没人来援助,我就拼命猛攻阿孟子民,上主遂将他们交在我手中;那么,你们为什么今天上来攻击我﹖」
12:4 于是依弗大召集基肋阿得所有的人同厄弗辣因作战;基肋阿得人击溃了厄弗辣因人?z因为厄弗辣因人曾说过:你基肋阿得人是从厄弗辣因跑出来的,散居在厄弗辣因人中,在默纳协人中?{
12:5 基肋阿得人为了反击厄弗辣因人,先占据了约旦河渡口;逃跑的厄弗辣因人说:「容我过去罢!」基肋阿得人就问:「你是厄弗辣因人吗﹖」如果说:「不是。」
12:6 基肋阿得人就对他说:「你说『史波肋特!』」如果他不能照样说出,而说成「斯波肋特,」就捉住他,在约但渡口杀了;在这种情形下,厄弗辣因人就死了四万二千。
12:7 依弗大作以色列的民长共计六年;以后基肋阿得人依弗大死了,埋葬在基肋阿得本城。
依贝赞民长
12:8 在他以后,有贝特肋恒人依贝赞作以色列民长。
12:9 他有三十个儿子,三十个女儿;女儿们都嫁到外乡;为自己的三十个儿子,从外乡娶了三十房媳妇。他作以色列民长七年。
12:10 依贝赞死后,葬在贝特肋恒。
厄隆民长
12:11 在他以后,有则步隆人厄隆作以色列民长,他作以色列民长十年。
12:12 则步隆人厄隆死后,埋葬在则步隆的阿雅隆。
阿贝冬民长
12:13 在他以后,有丕辣通人希肋耳的儿子阿贝冬作以色列民长。
12:14 他有四十个儿子,三十个孙子,骑着七十匹驴驹。他作以色列民长八年。
12:15 丕辣通人希肋耳的儿子阿贝冬死后,埋葬在厄弗辣因的丕辣通,即在阿玛肋克山地内。
第十三章(25)
三松诞生
13:1 以色列子民又行了上主视为恶的事,因此上主把他们交于培肋舍特人手中四十年之久。
13:2 那时,在祚辣有一个人,属于丹支派,名叫玛诺亚,他的妻子是个石女,从未生育。
13:3 上主的使者显现给那妇人,对她说:「看,你原是个石女,从未生育,但是你要怀孕生子。
13:4 今后要留心:清酒浓酒都不可喝,各种不洁的东西也不可吃!
13:5 看,你将怀孕生子,剃刀不可触及他的头,因为这孩子从母胎就是献于上主的;他要开始从培肋舍特人手中拯救以色列。」
13:6 那妇人遂去告诉自己的丈夫说:「有一个天主的人来到我这里,他的容貌好象天主的使者,极其威严;我没有问他从那里来;他也没有告诉我他的名字。
13:7 他对我说:看,你将怀孕生子,从今以后清酒浓酒都不可喝,各种不洁的东西都不可吃,因为这孩子从母胎一直到死,是献于天主的。」
13:8 玛诺亚就向上主恳求说:「我主!求你叫你所派的那位天主的人再到我们这里来!指教我们对于将生的婴孩应该作什么﹖」
13:9 天主听了玛诺亚的话;天主的使者又来到那妇人跟前;那时她正坐在田间,她的丈夫没有同她在一起。
13:10 那妇人就急速跑去告诉丈夫说:「看,那天来我跟前的那个人,又显现给我了。」
13:11 玛诺亚就起来,跟着妻子来到那人跟前,对他说:「你就是向这妇人说话的那人吗﹖」他回答说:「我就是。」
13:12 玛诺亚向他说:「当你的话应验的时候,我们应该怎样管教这孩子﹖要怎样待他﹖」
13:13 上主的使者对玛诺亚说:「我给这妇人所说的一切,她都当留神:
13:14 凡葡萄树所结的,她不能吃;清酒浓酒她不能喝,各种不洁的东西她不能吃;凡我所吩咐她的,她都该遵守。」
13:15 玛诺亚对上主的使者说:「请容许我款留你,为你预备一只小山羊。」
13:16 上主的使者对玛诺亚说:「你虽然款留我,我却不吃你的食物;假使你要献一全燔祭,就当献于上主。」因玛诺亚当时还不知道他是上主的使者。
13:17 玛诺亚问上主的使者说:「你叫什么名字﹖当你的话应验的时候,我们好恭敬你。」
13:18 上主的使者回答说:「你为什么问我的名字﹖它是奥妙的。」
13:19 玛诺亚取了一只小山羊和素祭,在一块盘石上献于行奇事的上主。
13:20 当火焰从祭坛上向天升起时,上主的使者也在祭坛的火焰中上升了。玛诺亚和他的妻子看见这事,就俯伏在地上。
13:21 上主的使者没有再显现给玛诺亚和他的妻子,那时玛诺亚才知道他是上主的使者。
13:22 玛诺亚对自己的妻子说:「我们必定要死,因为我们看见了天主。」
13:23 但他妻子对他说:「如果上主有意叫我们死,必定不会悦纳我们的手所献的全燔祭和素祭,必不会使我们看见这些事,也不会使我们听到像现在这样的话。」
13:24 后来那妇人生了一个儿子,给他起名叫三松;孩子渐渐长大,上主祝福了他。
13:25 在玛哈乃丹,即在祚辣与厄市陶耳之间,上主的神开始感动他。
第十四章(20)
三松求婚
14:1 那时三松下到提默纳;在那里见了一个女子,她是培肋舍特人的女儿。
14:2 三松上去禀告他的父母说:「我在提默纳见了一个女子,她是培肋舍特人的女儿,愿你们现今把她给我娶来为妻!」
14:3 他的父母对他说:「难道在你兄弟的女儿中,在我们民族间没有女子吗﹖为什么你要去从那些未受割损的培肋舍特人中间娶妻呢﹖」三松向他的父亲说:「请给我娶了她!
因为我实在喜欢她。」
14:4 他的父母原不知道这事是出于上主,使他找机会攻击培肋舍特,因为那时培肋舍特正统治以色列。
14:5 三松往提默纳去,来到提默纳的葡萄园时,看,有一只小狮子向他咆哮;
14:6 上主的神突然降在他身上,他当时虽赤手空拳,竟将那狮子撕裂,好象撕裂小山羊;他没有把所作的这事告诉他的父母。
14:7 此后他下去向那女子谈情,三松很喜爱她。
14:8 过了不久,回去娶她,绕路去看那只死狮子。看,在狮子尸体内有一窝蜜蜂作了蜜。
14:9 他取了些蜜放在手中,继续前行,一面走一面吃;来到他父母那里,也给他们一些,他们也吃了,但他没有告诉他们这蜜是从狮子尸体内取来的。
14:10 三松又来到那女子那里,有人为他设了婚筵,因为青年人们惯常这样做。
14:11 但有人害怕他,便请来三十个同伴陪伴他。
14:12 三松对他们说:「让我给你们说个谜语,如果你们能在这七天婚筵期内,给我猜出来,我就给你们三十件衬衫和三十套礼服。
14:13 若是你们不能给我解说,你们就得给我三十件衬衫和三十套礼服。」他们对他说:「请你把谜语讲给我们听。」
14:14 他向他们说:「食者生出食品,强者生出甘甜。」他们三天之久不能解这谜语。
14:15 到了第四天,他们对三松的妻子说:「请引诱你的丈夫,把谜语说给你,以免我们放火烧你和你的父家。难道你请了我们来,是为了夺取我们的东西吗﹖」
14:16 三松的妻子就在他眼前哭哭啼啼说:「你是恨我,而不是爱我!你给我的同胞说谜语,都不解给我听。」三松对她说:「你看,我都没有告诉我的父母,怎能告诉你﹖」
14:17 那七天婚筵期内,她常在他跟前哭哭啼啼;到了第七天,由于她不断的催逼,三松便将谜底告诉了她;她就把谜底告诉自己的同胞。
14:18 到了第七天,在他进洞房之前,本城的人给他说:「有什么比蜜还甜﹖有什么比狮子还强﹖」他向他们说:「你们若不是用我的小母牛耕田,你们决不会猜出我的谜底。」
14:19 上主的神又突然降在他身上,他就下到阿市刻隆,击杀了三十个人,拿了所劫夺的东西,把三十套礼服送给猜中谜语的人;以后愤怒的回到父亲家里。
14:20 三松的妻子以后却跟了作他伴郎的一个同伴。
第十五章(20)
三松火烧庄田
15:1 过了一些日子,正是收割麦子的时期,三松带了一只小山羊去看他的妻子;他说:「我要到内室去亲近我的妻子。」但是妻子的父亲不让他进去,
15:2 且说:「我以为你一定厌恶了她,所以我将她嫁给你的一个同伴;她的妹妹不是比她更美丽吗﹖你可娶而代之。」
15:3 三松对他们说:「我若加害培肋舍特人,这一次我可不负责任。」
15:4 于是三松去捉了三百只狐狸,又拿火把来,把狐狸的尾和尾结在一起,将火把插在两尾中间,
15:5 点着火把,将狐狸放入培肋舍特人的庄田内,把堆集的麦捆,立着的庄稼,葡萄园和橄榄园都烧了。
15:6 培肋舍特人问说:「是谁作了这事﹖」有人说:「是提默纳人的女婿三松,因为他的岳父把他的妻子嫁给了他的一个同伴。」培肋舍特人就上去,放火烧了那女子和她的父家。
15:7 三松向他们说:「你们既然这样作,我必向你们报复,然后纔罢休。」
15:8 三松遂打击他们,腿腰乱砍,大杀一阵;然后下去住在厄坦的一个石穴内。
以驴骨击杀千人
15:9 培肋舍特人上去,在犹大扎营,进袭肋希。
15:10 犹大问说:「你们为什么上来攻打我们﹖」他们答说:「我们上来是为拘捕三松,要报复他对我们所行的。」
15:11 于是有三千犹大人到厄坦石穴那里,对三松说:「难道你不知道培肋舍特人统治我们吗﹖你为什么作连累我们的事﹖」他回答说:「他们怎样待我,我也怎样待他们。」
15:12 他们就向他说:「我们下来是为拘捕你,把你交在培肋舍特人手中。」三松向他们说:「你们要对我发誓,不杀害我!」
15:13 他们回答说:「一定不;我们只把你绑好,交在他们手中,决不杀你。」他们于是用两条新绳把他捆起,从石穴里把他拉上来。
15:14 他来到肋希,培肋舍特人吶喊着出来迎他;那时上主的神突然降在他身上,他手臂上的绳索,好象着火的细麻一样,绑他的绳子从他的手上落下。
15:15 他找到一块鲜驴腮骨,伸手拿起来,击杀了一千人。
15:16 然后三松喊说:「用驴腮骨杀的一堆一堆,用驴腮骨杀了一千。」
15:17 当他说完这话,就顺手把腮骨拋弃了;因此那地名叫辣玛肋希。
15:18 此后,他非常口渴,呼吁上主说:「你藉你仆人的手得了这次大胜利;如今我却要渴死,陷于这些没有割损的人手中。」
15:19 天主遂在肋希使一洼地裂开,涌出水来;他喝了水,精神恢复,无异再生;因此那泉称作「呼吁泉,」至今还在肋希。
15:20 他在培肋舍特人统治以色列的时日内,作以色列民长二十年。
第十六章(31)
三松在迦萨
16:1 三松往迦萨去,在那里看见一个妓女,便去走近了她。
16:2 有人告诉迦萨人说:「三松到这里来了。」他们就把他围住,终夜派人埋伏在城门口,整夜静悄悄地等待他,说:「等到早晨天亮,我们纔杀他。」
16:3 三松睡到半夜,半夜醒来,抓紧城门,连两个门框带门闩,一起拔起,放在肩上,背到赫贝龙对面的山顶上。
三松与德里拉
16:4 此后,他在芍勒克平原又爱上一个女人,名叫德里拉。
16:5 培肋舍特的酋长上到她那里,对她说:「请你引诱他,看看他这样大的力量是从那里来的,我们怎样能制胜他,将他捆起,而制伏他;我们每人给你一千一百银子。」
16:6 德里拉问三松说:「请你告诉我,你这样大的力量是从那里来的﹖人怎样纔能将你捆起,而制伏你﹖」
16:7 三松回答说:「人若用七根未干的新牛筋绳将我捆起,我就像别人一样软弱。」
16:8 培肋舍特人的酋长就给她送来七根未干的新牛筋绳,她便用这些绳子将他捆起。
16:9 当时有埋伏的人暗藏在她的内室里;德里拉向他喊说:「三松,培肋舍特人来捉你哩!」他就挣断牛筋绳,如同麻线被火烧断一样;于是人们仍不知他力量的所在。
16:10 德里拉遂对三松说:「看,你戏弄我,对我说谎。如今请你告诉我,怎样纔能捆绑你﹖」
16:11 他回答她说:「人若用从未用过的新绳将我捆起,我就像别人一样软弱。」
16:12 德里拉就拿新绳将他捆起,对他喊说:「三松,培肋舍特人来捉你哩!」当时仍有埋伏的人暗藏在内室里;但他挣断手臂上的绳子,好象一根丝线一样。
16:13 德里拉对三松说:「到现在你仍戏弄我,对我说谎;你告诉我,人怎样纔能捆绑你﹖」他回答她说:「你若把我头上的七条发辫与织布的经线编在一起,然后用木橛钉住,我就像别人一样软弱。」
16:14 德里拉使他睡了,然后把他头上的七条发辫与织布的经线编在一起,再用木橛钉住,向他喊说:「三松,培肋舍特人来捉你哩!」他从梦中醒来,把织布机的木橛连织布的经线都拔了出来。
16:15 德里拉就对他说:「你心里既没有我,你怎能说:我爱你呢﹖你已三次戏弄我,还没有告诉我你这样大的力量是从那里来的!」
16:16 因为她天天用话来逼他,催他,致使他的精神苦恼的要死。
16:17 三松遂把心中的一切全透露给她,对她说:「剃刀从未接触过我的头,因为我在母胎时就是献于天主的;人若剃去我的头发,我的力量就离开了我,我就像众人一样软弱。」
16:18 德里拉一见他把心中的一切全给她透露了,便打发人召培肋舍特的酋长来说:「这一次你们上来罢!因为他把心中的一切全透露给我。」于是培肋舍特人的酋长手中带着银子,来到德里拉那里。
16:19 德里拉使三松睡在自己的膝上,又叫来一个人,剃去他头上的七条发辫,他就开始软弱无力,他的力量全离开了他。
16:20 她于是喊说:「三松,培肋舍特人来捉你哩!」他由梦中醒来,心想:「这一次和前几次一样,我一挣扎,必能脱身。」他却不知道上主已离弃了他。
16:21 培肋舍特人便把他捉住,剜去他的眼睛,带他下到迦萨,用铜链锁了他,叫他在监狱里推磨。
16:22 但是他的头发在剃了以后,又渐渐长起来。
三松殉身复仇
16:23 培肋舍特人的酋长聚集起来,为给他们的神达贡举行祭献大典,表示庆祝;他们说:「我们的神把我们的仇人三松交在我们手中。」
16:24 民众一见三松,就赞颂他们的神说:「我们的神把破坏过我们的田地,杀害过我们多人的仇人,交在我们的手中了。」
16:25 当他们兴高采烈的时候,就喊说:「让三松给我们表演把戏。」他们就从监狱里叫出三松来,在他们面前耍把戏;以后把他放在两根柱子中间。
16:26 三松对牵他手的僮仆说:「让我摸摸支殿的柱子,好能靠一靠。」
16:27 那时殿内满了男女,培肋舍特人的酋长也在里面,在天台上约有三千男女,都在看三松表演把戏。
16:28 三松呼求上主说:「吾主上主,求你眷念我!天主,求你再赐我力量,只要这一次!以报培肋舍特人剜我双眼的仇。」
16:29 三松就抱住正中支殿的两根柱子,右手抱一根,左手抱一根;
16:30 然后三松说:「让我的性命和培肋舍特人同归于尽!」于是他奋力屈身,大殿随之倒塌,压在酋长和里面所有的民众身上;这样他在临死时所杀死的人,比一生所杀死的人还多。
16:31 此后,他的兄弟和父亲的全家下来,把他抬上去,葬在祚辣和厄市陶耳之间,他父亲玛诺亚的坟墓里。他作以色列民长二十年。
附录一米加的神像与丹族的迁移(17-18)
第十七章(13)
米加的母亲制造神像
17:1 厄弗辣因山地有一个人,名叫米加,
17:2 他、
17:3 对自己的母亲说:「有人拿去你那一千一百银钱,对这事你曾起过誓,我也亲自听见你说:我要亲手把这项银钱奉献给上主,为我儿做一尊神像。看,银钱在这里,是我拿了;如今还给你!」他的母亲就说:「愿我儿蒙上主祝福!」于是米加就把一千一百银钱还给他的母亲。
17:4 当他把银钱还给他的母亲以后,她的母亲便拿出两百银子给了银匠,请他制造一尊神像,安放在米加的家里。
17:5 于是米加为这尊神像盖了一座神庙。又做了「厄弗得」和「忒辣芬,」委派自己的一个儿子充任司祭。
17:6 当时在以色列没有君王,各人任意行事。
米加收肋未为司祭
17:7 当时有一个少年,他是个肋未人,从猷大白冷,即从猷大支派来到那里作客。
17:8 这人离开猷大白冷,想找一个可寄居的地方;当他旅行的时候,来到厄弗辣因山地,米加的家旁,
17:9 米加问他说:「你从那里来﹖」他回答说:「我是个肋未人,由猷大白冷来,想找一个可寄居的地方。」
17:10 米加就对他说:「你住在我这里罢!作我的师傅和司祭,我每年给你十块银钱,还照管你的吃穿。」米加挽留那肋未人,
17:11 他遂同意住在米加那里,他看待这少年好似自己的儿子。
17:12 米加又委任了这肋未人,这人遂作了他的司祭,住在米加家中。
17:13 于是米加说:「如今我知道上主必施恩于我,因为有位肋未人作了我的司祭。」
第十八章(31)
丹人侦探新地
18:1 那时在以色列没有君王,同时丹支派仍在寻找居住的基地,因为直到那一天在以色列支派中,丹支派尚未得到基地。
18:2 于是丹子孙从祚辣和厄市陶耳,由全家族中,派了五个勇敢的人去窥探侦察那地方,对他们说:「你们去侦察那地方!」他们到了厄弗辣因山地,来到米加的住宅,就在那里过夜。
18:3 他们在米加家附近,认出那少年肋末的声音,就过去向他说:「谁领你来到这里﹖你在这里作甚么﹖你在这里有甚么职务﹖」
18:4 他回答说:「米加待我如此如此!他聘了我作他的司祭。」
18:5 他们对他说:「你求问天主,使我们知道,我们将走的路顺利吗﹖」
18:6 司祭回答他们说:「你们平安去罢!上主必使你们所走的路顺遂。」
18:7 于是那五个人就去了,来到拉依士,在那里看见城中的人民安居乐业,一如漆冬人一样,平安无虑,地产丰富,一无所缺;并且他们离漆冬又远,与阿兰也没有往来。
18:8 当他们回到祚辣和厄市陶耳自己弟兄那里时,弟兄们问他们说:「你们带来什么消息﹖」
18:9 他们回答说:「起来,让我们上到拉依士去,因为我们已察看过,那地真肥美,你们还等什么﹖不要再迟延,赶快去占领!
18:10 到那里去,是到一个不设防的人民那里去,地面宽广辽阔;天主已把那地交在你们手中;那地方物产丰富,一无所缺。」
18:11 于是有六百丹支派的人,带着武器,从祚辣和厄市陶耳出发,
18:12 经过山路,在犹大克黎雅特耶阿陵安营;因此,那地方直到今日叫作「丹营;」这地是在克黎雅特耶阿陵西面。
18:13 他们又从那里经过厄弗辣因山地,来到米加的住处。
丹人抢去米加的神像
18:14 当时先去窥探那地的五个人,告诉弟兄们说:「你们知不知道,在此家内有「厄弗得、」「忒辣芬」和一尊神像﹖现在你们要决定该作什么。」
18:15 于是他们转入米加的住宅,来到少年肋末人的屋里,向他请安问好。
18:16 同时那六百丹人带着兵器站在门口,
18:17 先去探地的那五个人就上去,进到里面,要拿那尊神像并「厄弗得」和「忒辣芬,」此时司祭和那六百个带武器的人站在门口。
18:18 当那些人进入米加家里,拿那尊神像、「厄弗得」和「忒辣芬」时,司祭问他们说:「你们做什么﹖」
18:19 他们回答说:「不要作声,用手掩住你的口,跟我们去,作我们的师傅和司祭;你作一个人家的司祭好呢﹖还是在以色列中间作一个支派,一个家族的司祭好呢﹖」
18:20 司祭满怀高兴,遂带了「厄弗得、」「忑辣芬」和神像,到了那些人中间。
18:21 他们遂转身回去,把妇孺、牲口以及辎重放在前方。
18:22 当他们离开米加的住宅相当远的时候,米加和米加家附近的人,都聚集起来,去追赶丹的子孙。
18:23 他们向丹的子孙呼喊,丹的子孙回过脸来对米加说:「你叫喊什么﹖」
18:24 米加回答说:「你们把我所制的神像和司祭都带走,我还有什么呢﹖」怎么你们还向我说:你作什么﹖」
18:25 丹的子孙对他说:「不要再让我们听见你的声音,免得我们中间有暴燥的人打击你们,使你和你全家都丧失性命!」
18:26 此后,丹的子孙继续前行,米加见他们比自己强大,就转身回了家。
丹族占据拉依士
18:27 丹的子孙带着米加所做的神像和他私有的司祭,来到拉依士,到了一个平安无虑的人民那里,用刀剑杀戮了他们,放火烧了那城,
18:28 没有人来援救,因为拉依士离漆冬很远,与阿兰又没有往来。这城位于贝特勒曷布山谷中;丹的子孙重建这城,住在那里,
18:29 按他们的祖宗,以色列所生的儿子丹的名字,给这城起名叫丹;其实这城原先名叫拉依士。
18:30 丹的子孙把那尊神像立起来,梅瑟的后裔,革尔雄的子孙约纳堂和他的子孙作丹支派的司祭,直到该地被掳掠的时日。
18:31 天主的殿在史罗多少时日,米加所作的神像在丹支派中也立了多少时日。
附录二基贝亚的恶行及所受之罚(19-21)
第十九章(30)
肋未人讨回己妾
19:1 当以色列人尚没有君王时,有一个肋未人寄居在厄弗辣因山地边境;他由犹大白冷娶了一个女子为妾。
19:2 那妾对他发怒,就离开他回了犹大白冷的父家,在那里住了四个月。
19:3 她的丈夫起来,带着一个仆人,牵了两匹驴去找她,想去慰问她,劝她回来;当他来到那女子的父家时,那少女的父亲一望见他,就喜喜欢欢地来迎接他。
19:4 他的岳父,即那少女的父亲,留他在家住了三日,他们在那里一齐吃喝居住。
19:5 第四天他们一早起来,肋未人起身要走,那少女的父亲就对女婿说:「你们先用些饼,吃点点心,然后再走。」
19:6 于是他们二人坐下一起吃喝;少女的父亲对那人说:「请你赏面,再住一夜,再高兴高兴!」
19:7 那人起身要走,但他的岳父挽留了他,他又在那里过了一夜。
19:8 第五天他一早起来要走,但那少女的父亲又说:「请先吃些点心!」于是二人又一同吃东西,直到日已西斜;
19:9 那人和他的妾连他的仆人起身要走,他的岳父,即那少女的父亲,对他说:「你看,天已晚了,今天在这里再过一夜,再高兴高兴,明天清早起来,上路回家去罢!」
19:10 但是,那人不愿再过一夜,就带着他的妾和仆人,以及备好的两匹驴起身走了,来到耶步斯,即耶路撒冷的对面。
到基贝亚过夜
19:11 当他们临近耶步斯时,日已西垂,仆人就对主人说:「来,让我们转去,到这座耶步斯人城里去投宿!」
19:12 主人回答他说:「我们不可进入这座不属以色列子民的外方人的城,我们往基贝亚去罢!
19:13 他又对仆人说:「来!我们到一个地方去投宿,或在基贝亚,或在辣玛。」
19:14 于是他们又上路前行,当来近本雅明的基贝亚时,太阳已经落了。
19:15 他们遂进了基贝亚,在那里投宿;他们进城后,就坐在城内街市上,因为没有人收留他们在家中过宿。
19:16 有一个老人晚上由田间工作回来,他原是厄弗辣因山地的人,寄居在基贝亚;本地人却是本雅明人。
19:17 那老人举目,看见在城中街市上有个过路的人,就问说:「你往那里去﹖从那里来﹖」
19:18 肋未人回答他说:「我们是从犹大白冷来,往厄弗辣因山地的边境去。我本是那地方的人,我去过犹大白冷,现在要回家去,但没有人收留我到自己家里去。
19:19 其实我有粮草喂驴,为我和你的婢女以及跟随你仆人的这个青年人,都有食粮和酒,一无所缺。」
19:20 那老人对他说:「你放心罢!你所需要的都由我供给,只不可在街上过夜。」
19:21 他遂领他到自己家里,喂上驴,他们洗了脚,以后就吃喝起来。
基贝亚的恶行
19:22 他们正满怀高兴的时候,看,本城的一些无赖之徒,围住房屋敲门,对作家主的老人说:「把刚才到你家的那个人领出来,我们要认识他。」
19:23 家主出来见他们,对他们说:「兄弟们,不要如此!请你不要行这样的恶事!这人既进了我的家,你们决不能行这丑事!
19:24 这里有我的女儿还是处女,我领她出来,你们可任意污辱她,任凭你们待她;但是对于这人,你们决不可作这种丑事!」
19:25 但是那些人不愿听他;客人就抓住自己的妾,把她交给了他们,他们就认识了她,整夜污辱她,直到早晨,在破晓的时候纔放了她。
19:26 天快亮的时候,那女子回到留他主人住宿的那人屋前,跌倒在那里,直到天亮。
19:27 早晨,当她的主人起来开门,出去要动身起程时,看见那女人,即他的妾,伏在门口,她的手扶在门限上,
19:28 就对她说:「起来!我们走罢!」然而没有人回答他;那人便把她驮在驴上,起身回了本地。
19:29 到了家里,拿起刀来,握住自己的妾,把她的肢体切成十二块,送到以色列全境,
19:30 吩咐他所派遣的人说:「你们要对以色列人这样说:自从以色列子民由埃及地上来那一日,直到今日,是否发生过这样的事﹖大家想一想,决定之后,请说出来。」凡看见的都说:「自从以色列子民由埃及地上来那一日,直到今日,从未发生过,也未见过这样的事。」
第二十章(48)
声讨基贝亚
20:1 于是以色列全体子民出动,从丹到贝尔舍巴,以及基肋阿得地,全会众集合起来好象一个人一样,来到米兹帕上主面前。
20:2 全民众,即以色列各支派的首领,都参与天主百姓的集会;拿刀的步兵,共有四十万。
20:3 本雅明子孙也听说以色列子民上到了米兹帕。以色列子民说:「这件恶事是怎样发生的,请你们述说一遍!」
20:4 那被杀的女子的丈夫肋末人就回答说:「我与我的妾来到属本雅明的基贝亚,要在那里过夜,
20:5 基贝亚的公民起来攻击我,夜间包围我过夜的住宅,企图杀害我,并把我的妾强奸致死。
20:6 因为他们在以色列中间行了这穷凶极恶的丑事,我遂将我的妾切成碎块,遍送以色列基业各地。
20:7 以色列子孙,请你们大家说出你们的意见和对策。」
20:8 那时全体民众好象一个人一样都起来说:「我们中谁也不要返回自己的帐幕,谁也不要回自己的家,
20:9 现在我们就要这样对付基贝亚,抽签进攻,
20:10 由以色列各支派中,每百人抽十人,每千人抽百人,每万人抽千人,给民众运送军粮;待众人到达本雅明的基贝亚后,按照那城在以色列中间所行丑事报复它。」
20:11 于是以色列人联合起来攻击那城,彼此合作有如一人。
本雅明备战
20:12 以色列众支派差人往本雅明支派的各家说:「你们中间怎么发生了这样的恶事﹖
20:13 现在你们把那些人,即基贝亚的无赖之徒,交出来,我们好处死他们,从以色列中铲除这邪恶。」本雅明子孙却不肯听从他兄弟们以色列子民的呼声;
20:14 本雅明子孙反而从各城聚集起来,来到基贝亚,要与以色列子民交战。
20:15 那一天,本雅明人从各城来的共计两万六千拿刀的,基贝亚的居民尚未计算在内。
20:16 在这些人中,还有特选的七百精兵,左右开弓,个个能用机弦拋石,毫厘不爽。
20:17 本雅明人除外,以色列人共有四十万拿刀的,个个都是战士。
两次进攻失利
20:18 以色列子民起身上到贝特耳,求问天主说:「我们中谁该先上去与本雅明子孙作战﹖」上主答说:「犹大先去。」
20:19 于是以色列子民早晨起来,对着基贝亚安营。
20:20 以色列人出来要与本雅明人交战,遂在基贝亚前面摆阵等待他们。
20:21 本雅明子孙从基贝亚出来迎战,那一天杀死了两万两千以色列人。
20:22 以后,众以色列又鼓起勇气,又在前一日布阵的地方布阵。
20:23 事前,以色列子民先上到贝特耳,在上主面前哀哭,一直到晚上,然后求问上主说:「我们可否再去与我们的弟兄本雅明交战﹖」上主答说:「可上去攻打。」
20:24 于是第二天,以色列子民又去攻打本雅明子孙。
20:25 本雅明人第二天也从基贝亚出来与以色列人交战,又杀死一万八千以色列子民,都是拿刀的人。
20:26 以色列众子民,即全民众,又上到贝特耳,坐在上主面前哀哭,整日禁食到晚上;以后,在上主面前献了全燔祭与和平祭。
20:27 【那时
20:28 天主的约柜正在那里,同时有亚郎的子孙厄肋阿匝尔的儿子丕乃哈斯在约柜前供职。】以色列子民又求问上主说:「我们是否应再去与我们的弟兄本雅明人交战﹖或是休战﹖」上主答说:「你们应上去,因为我明天必将他们交在你们手中。」
末次进攻获胜
20:29 以色列人就在基贝亚四周设下伏兵。
20:30 第三天以色列子民上去攻打本雅明子孙,在基贝亚对面布阵,像前两次一样。
20:31 本雅明子孙出来迎敌,被引出城外,在两条大路上,──一条通往贝特耳,一条通往基贝红,──像前两次一样,开始杀敌,在田野就杀死了约有三十个以色列人。
20:32 本雅明子孙遂说:「他们像前次一样,在我们面前打败了。」但以色列子民却说:「我们不如后退,引他们远离城,到大路上来。」
20:33 当以色列众人从他们的地方起来,在巴耳塔玛尔布阵的时候,以色列的伏兵从革巴西边埋伏的地方冲出来;
20:34 全以色列中所选出的一万精兵齐来攻打基贝亚,战争非常激烈,但是本雅明人还不知道大祸临头。
20:35 上主在以色列前打击本雅明人,那一天以色列子民杀死本雅明人共有二万五千一百,都是拿刀的人。
20:36 这样,本雅明子孙看出自己已失败。原来以色列人依仗在基贝亚所设下的伏兵,先在本雅明人前退怯;
20:37 伏兵急速冲入基贝亚,冲进之后,用刀屠杀了全城的人。
20:38 原先以色列人与伏兵约定,在城内放火,以烟火上腾为号。
20:39 以色列人在战场上撤退的时候,本雅明动手杀死以色列人约有三十人,他们想:「的确,他们如前一仗一样,在我们前杀败了。」
20:40 当烟柱信号从城中上腾的时候,本雅明人转过身来,见全城烟火冲天;
20:41 那时以色列人也转身回来;本雅明人大为惊慌,因为看见大祸临头,
20:42 遂在以色列人面前转向旷野的路上逃去,但战士却追踪而至,从城里出来的人也夹击他们;
20:43 这样,以色列人击溃了本雅明人,追击他们,从诺哈蹂躏他们,直到革巴对面的东方之地。
20:44 本雅明人阵亡一万八千,都是勇士。
20:45 其余的人都转身向着旷野逃往黎孟岩石,以色列人在路上又扫荡了他们中五千人;以后,直追到革巴,击杀了二千人。
20:46 那一日,本雅明中阵亡的,共有二万五千人,
20:47 所剩下的六百人,转身逃往旷野,直到黎孟岩石,在黎孟岩石中住了四个月。
20:48 以色列人又回到本雅明子孙那里,把各城的人和牲畜,以及所遇见的都用刀杀尽;并将所经过的城池放火烧毁。
第二十一章(25)
战后余波
21:1 以色列人曾在米兹帕起誓说:「我们中谁也不可把自己的女儿嫁给本雅明人为妻。」
21:2 民众来到贝特耳,在天主面前,坐在那里,放声大哭,直到晚上;
21:3 然后说:「上主以色列的天主!为什么在以色列中间发生了这事,今日竟使以色列中少了一支派﹖」
21:4 次日,百姓一早起来,在那里筑了一座祭坛,献了全燔祭与和平祭。
21:5 以后,以色列子民问说:「以色列众支派中,有谁没有上到上主面前,参加集会呢﹖」因为他们先前对于那些凡不上米兹帕到上主面前来的人,曾发过严誓说:「死无赦!」
21:6 以色列子民对他们的弟兄本雅明起了怜悯之心说:「今天以色列绝了一支派。
21:7 我们曾指着上主起过誓,决不将我们的女儿给他们为妻,那么,我们怎样给所剩下的人娶妻呢﹖」
21:8 他们又问说:「以色列众支派中,有那一支派没有上米兹帕来到上主面前呢﹖」看,由基肋阿得雅贝士中没有一人入营,参加集会。
21:9 的确,检阅百姓的时候,没有一个基肋阿得雅贝士的居民在场。
21:10 因此会众打发一万二千勇士到那里去,吩咐他们说:「你们去用刀屠杀基肋阿得雅贝士的居民,连妇女孩子都在内。
21:11 你们要这样作;所以男子和与男子同过房的妇女,尽行杀掉,但要保留处女。」他们就这样作了。
21:12 他们在基肋阿得雅贝士居民之中,寻得了四百个未曾认识过男子,也未曾与男子同过房的少年处女,就把她们带到客纳罕地史罗营里。
21:13 全会众又打发人往黎孟岩石去,与住在那里的本雅明子孙谈判,与他们讲和。
21:14 本雅明子孙当时就回来了,会众就把基肋阿得雅贝士女子中所保留的少女,给他们为妻,但是数目不足。
史罗抢妻
21:15 民众仍为本雅明人伤心难过,因为上主使以色列支派中有了缺陷。
21:16 会众的长老说:「本雅明的妇女既然都消灭了,我们怎样给所剩下的人娶妻呢﹖」
21:17 又说:「本雅民的遗民该有承嗣,免得以色列中泯没一支。
21:18 但是,我们不能将自己的女儿给他们为妻,因为以色列曾起誓说:谁把女儿给本雅明人是可诅咒的!」
21:19 有人说:「看,年年在史罗举行上主的庆节。」──史罗位于贝特耳之北,贝特耳至舍根大路之东,肋波纳之南。
21:20 于是他们给本雅明子孙出主意说:「你们往葡萄园去,藏在那里。
21:21 等到你们看见史罗的童女出来列队跳舞,你们就从葡萄园中出来,从史罗的女儿中,各抢一个为妻,然后回本雅明地方去。
21:22 她们的父亲或兄弟若是出来与我们争论,我们就说:求你们看我们的情面,恩待这些人,因为他们战场上没有得到女子为妻;况且又不是你们将女儿交给他们;若是你们给的,那就有罪了。」
21:23 本雅明子孙就这样作了:按数目抢跳舞的女子,各娶一个为妻;以后他们就走了,回到自己的地业,重建城邑,住在那里。
21:24 以后以色列子民从那里各回自己的支派和家族,从那里各回自己的家乡。
21:25 那时,在以色列没有君王,各人任意行事。
BOOK ENDS. Seraphim, April 2009.
JB JUDGES Chapter 1
- FIRST INTRODUCTION[*a]
- SUMMARY ACCOUNT OF THE SETTLEMENT IN CANAAN
The settlement of Judah, Simeon, Caleb and the Kenites
1:1 After the death of Joshua the Israelites consulted Yahweh, ‘Which of us shall march up first against the Canaanites to attack them?’
1:2 And Yahweh answered, ‘Judah is to attack first; I am delivering the country straight into his hands’.
1:3 Then Judah said to Simeon his brother,[*b] ‘March with me into the territory allotted to me; we will attack the Canaanite, and then I in my turn will march with you into your allotted territory’. And Simeon marched with him.
1:4 So Judah marched up, and Yahweh delivered the Canaanites and Perizzites into their hands, and they routed ten thousand men at Bezek.
1:5 They came on Adoni-zedek at Bezek, joined battle with him and routed the Canaanites and Perizzites.
1:6 Adoni-zedek took to flight, but they followed and captured him and cut off his thumbs and big toes.
1:7 Then Adoni-zedek said, ‘Seventy kings with their thumbs and big toes cut off used to pick up the crumbs under my table. As I did to others, so God does to me.’ He was taken to Jerusalem[*c], and there he died.
1:8 (The sons of Judah attacked Jerusalem and took it: they put its people to the sword and set fire to the city.)[*d]
1:9 After this the sons of Judah went down to attack those Canaanites living in the highlands and in the Negeb and the lowlands.
1:10 Then Judah marched against the Canaanites in Hebron – in earlier times the name of Hebron was Kiriath-arba – and they overcame Sheshai and Ahiman and Talmai.
1:11 From there they marched against the inhabitants of Debir – in earlier times the name of Debir was Kiriath-sepher.
1:12 Caleb said, ‘To the man who conquers and captures Kiriath-sepher, I will give my daughter Achsah to wife’.
1:13 The man who captured it was Othniel son of Kenaz, Caleb’s younger brother; Caleb gave him his daughter of Achsah to wife.
1:14 When she came to her husband, he urged her to ask her father for a field. Then she jumped down from her donkey, and Caleb asked her, ‘What do you want?’
1:15 She answered, ‘Grant me a favour; since you have banished me to the wilderness of Negeb, at least grant me some springs of water’. So Caleb gave her the upper springs and the lower springs.
1:16 The sons of Hobab the Kenite, father-in-law of Moses, went up with the sons of Judah from the city of palms into the wilderness in the Negeb of Judah at the Ascent of Arad; they went and lived with the Amalekites.
1:17 Then Judah set out with his brother Simeon. They overcame the Canaanites who lived in Zephath and delivered it over to the ban; hence the town was given the name of Hormah.
1:18 But Judah did not take Gaza with its territory or Ashkelon with its territory or Ekron with its territory;
1:19b they could not drive out the inhabitants of the plain, because they had iron chariots.
1:19a Yahweh was with Judah, and Judah subdued the highlands.
1:20 As Moses had directed, Hebron was given to Caleb, and he drove the three sons of Anak out of it.
1:21 As regards the Jebusites living in Jerusalem, the sons of Benjamin did not drive them out, and even now the Jebusites are still living in Jerusalem with the sons of Benjamin.
The settlement of the house of Joseph
1:22 In the same way, the house of Joseph went up against Bethel, and Yahweh was with them.
1:23 The house of Joseph made a reconnaissance of Bethel. The name of the city used to be Luz.
1:24 The scouts saw a man coming out of the city, and said to him, ‘if you show us how to enter the city, we will spare you’.
1:25 He showed them a way into the city. They put the inhabitants to the sword but let the man go, and all his clan with him.
1:26 The man went off to the country of the Hittites and built a town which he called Luz; that is its name even yet.
The settlement of the northern tribes and the Edomites
1:27 Manasseh did not subdue Beth-shean and its outlying villages, or Taanach and its villages. He did not drive out the inhabitants of Dor and its outlying villages, or of Ibleam and its villages, or of Megiddo and its villages; in those parts the Canaanites held their ground.
1:28 But when the Israelites became stronger, they subjected the Canaanites to forced labour, though they did not drive them out.
1:29 Nor did Ephraim drive out the Canaanites in Gezer;[*e] thus the Canaanites went on living there among them.
1:30 Zebulun did not drive out the inhabitants of Kitron or of Nahalol. The Canaanites remained among Zebulun, but were subjected to forced labour.
1:31 Asher did not drive out the inhabitants of Acco or of Sidon or Ahlab, or Achzib . . . or Aphik or Rehob.
1:32 So the Asherites lived among the Canaanite inhabitants of the country, for they did not drive them out.
1:33 Naphtali did not drive out the inhabitants of Beth-shemesh or of Beth-anath; they settled among the Canaanite inhabitants of the country; but the inhabitants of Beth-shemesh and of Beth-anath were compelled to do forced labour for them.
1:34 The Amorites drove back the Danites into the highlands and would not allow them to enter the plain below.
1:35 The Amorites held their ground at Har-heres and Shaalbim, but when the hand of the House of Jacob grew heavier, they were subjected to forced labour.
1:36 The territory of the Edomites begins at the Ascent of Akrabbim, runs to the Rock and continues on upwards.
JB JUDGES Chapter 2
The angel of Yahweh tells Israel of ills to come
2:1 The angel of Yahweh went up from Gilgal to Bethel and came to the House of Israel; and he said,’… and I brought you out of Egypt and led you into this land which I swore to give your fathers. I said: I shall never break my covenant with you.
2:2 You for your part must make no covenant with the inhabitants of this country; you must destroy their altars. But you have not obeyed my orders. What is it that you have done?
2:3 Very well, I now say this: I am not going to drive out these nations before you. They shall become your oppressors, and their gods shall be a snare for you.’
2:4 When the angel of Yahweh had spoken these words to all the Israelites, the people began to groan and weep.
2:5 And they called the name of the place Bochim,[*a] and offered sacrifices to Yahweh there.
- SECOND INTRODUCTION
GENERAL REFLECTIONS ON THE AGE OF THE JUDGES
The end of Joshua’s life
2:6 Then Joshua told the people to go, and the Israelites went away, each to his own possession, to occupy the land.
2:7 The people served Yahweh throughout the lifetime of Joshua and the lifetime of those elders who outlived Joshua and had known all the great deeds that Yahweh had done for the sake of Israel.
2:8 Joshua son of Nun, the servant of Yahweh, died when he was a hundred and ten years old.
2:9 They buried him on the estate he had received for inheritance, at Timnath-heres in the highlands of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash.
2:10 And when that generation too had been gathered to its fathers, another generation followed it which knew neither Yahweh nor the deeds that he had done for the sake of Israel.
The unfaithfulness of succeeding generations; their punishment
2:11 Then the sons of Israel did what displeases Yahweh and served the Baals.
2:12 They deserted Yahweh, the God of their ancestors, who had brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods from the gods of the peoples round them. They bowed down to these; they provoked Yahweh;
2:13 they deserted Yahweh to serve Baal and Astarte.[*b]
2:14 Then Yahweh’s anger flamed out against Israel. He handed them over to pillagers who plundered them; he delivered them to the enemies surrounding them, and they were not able to resist them.
2:15 In every warlike venture, the hand of Yahweh was there to foil them, as Yahweh had warned, as Yahweh had sworn to them. Thus he reduced them to dire distress.
The judges. No lasting conversion
2:16 Then Yahweh appointed judges[*c] for them, and rescued the men of Israel from the hands of their plunderers.
2:17 But they would not listen to their judges. They prostituted themselves to other gods, and bowed down before these. Very quickly they left the path their ancestors had trodden in obedience to the orders of Yahweh; they did not follow their example.
2:18 When Yahweh appointed judges for them, Yahweh was with the judge and rescued them from the hands of their enemies as long as the judge lived, for Yahweh felt pity for them as they groaned under the iron grip of their oppressors.
2:19 But once the judge was dead, they relapsed and behaved even worse than their ancestors. They followed other gods; they served them and bowed before them, and would not give up the practices and stubborn ways of their ancestors at all
Why foreign nations were left in the land
2:20 Then Yahweh’s anger flamed out against Israel, and he said, ‘Since this people has broken the covenant I laid down for their ancestors, since they have not listened to my voice,
2:21 in future I will not evict any of the nations that Joshua left in the land when he died’;
2:22 this was to test them by means of these nations, to see whether Israel would or would not tread the paths of Yahweh as once their ancestors had trodden them.
2:23 So Yahweh allowed these nations to remain; he did not hurry to drive them out, and did not deliver them into the hands of Joshua.
JB JUDGES Chapter 3
The peoples who remained
3:1 These are the nations that Yahweh let remain, to use them to test all those in Israel who had never known war in Canaan
3:2 (this was only in the interest of the generations of the sons of Israel, to teach them the art of war, those at least who had never known the former wars):
3:3 the five chiefs of the Philistines, all the Canaanites, the Sidonians, and the Hittites who lived in the range of Lebanon, from the uplands of Baal-hermon to the Pass of Hamath.
3:4 They were used to put Israel to the test and see if they would keep the orders that Yahweh had given their fathers through Moses.
3:5 The Israelites lived among the Canaanites and Hittites and Amorites, the Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites;
3:6 they married the daughters of these peoples, gave their own daughters in marriage to their sons, and served their gods
III. THE STORY OF THE JUDGES TOLD IN EPISODES
- OTHNIEL
3:7 The Israelites[*a] did what displeases Yahweh. They forgot Yahweh their God and served the Baals and the Asherahs.
3:8 Then Yahweh’s anger flamed out against Israel: he handed them over to Cushan-rishathaim the king of Edom, and the Israelites were enslaved by Cushan-rishathaim for eight years.
3:9 The Israelites cried to Yahweh, and Yahweh raised up for the Israelites a deliverer who rescued them, Othniel son of Kenaz, Caleb’s younger brother.
3:10 The spirit of Yahweh came on him; he became judge in Israel and set out to fight. Yahweh delivered the king of Edom, Cushan-rishathaim, into his hands, and he overcame Cushan-rishathaim.
3:11 Then the land enjoyed rest for forty years.
- EHUD
When Othniel son of Kenaz died,
3:12 once again the men of Israel began to do what displeases Yahweh, and Yahweh gave Eglon the king of Moab power over Israel, because they had done what displeases Yahweh.
3:13 Eglon in alliance with the sons of Ammon and Amalek marched against Israel and conquered them and took possession of the city of palms.[*b]
3:14 The Israelites were enslaved by Eglon the king of Moab for eighteen years.
3:15 Then the Israelites cried to Yahweh, and Yahweh raised up a deliverer for them, Ehud the son of Gera the Benjaminite; he was left-handed. The men of Israel appointed him to take their tribute to Eglon the king of Moab.
3:16 Ehud made a dagger – it was double-edged and a cubit long – and strapped it on under his clothes, over his right thigh.
3:17 He presented the tribute to Eglon the king of Moab. This Eglon was a very fat man.
3:18 Having presented the tribute, Ehud went off again with the men who had carried it;
3:19 but he himself, on reaching the Idols of Gilgal,[*c] turned and went back and said, ‘I have a secret message for you, O king’. The king replied, ‘Silence!’ and all who were with him went out.
3:20 Then Ehud went in. The king sat in the cool retreat of his upper room; he was alone. Ehud said to him, ‘I have a message from God for you, O king’. The king immediately stood up from his seat.
3:21 Then Ehud, using his left hand, drew the dagger he was carrying on his right thigh and thrust it into the king’s belly.
3:22 The hilt too went in after the blade, and the fat closed over the blade, for Ehud left the dagger in his belly; then he went out through the window.
3:23 Ehud went out by the porch; he had shut and locked the doors of the upper room behind him.
3:24 When he had gone, the servants came back and looked; the doors of the upper room were locked. They thought, ‘He is probably covering his feet[*d] in the inner part of the cool room’.
3:25 They waited until they no longer knew what to think, for he still did not open the doors of the upper room. At length they took the key and unlocked the room; their master lay on the ground, dead.
3:26 While they were waiting, Ehud had fled. He passed the Idols and escaped to safety in Seirah.
3:27 When he reached the territory of Israel he sounded the horn in the highlands of Ephraim, and the Israelites came down with him from the hills, with him at their head.
3:28 And he said to them, ‘Follow me, because Yahweh has delivered your enemy Moab into your hands’. So they followed him, cut Moab off from crossing the fords of the Jordan and let no one across.
3:29 On that occasion they beat the Moabites, some ten thousand men, all tough and seasoned fighters, and not one escaped.
3:30 That day, Moab was humbled under the hand of Israel, and the land enjoyed rest for eighty years.
- SHAMGAR
3:31 After him came Shamgar son of Anath. He routed six hundred of the Philistines with an ox-goad; he too was a deliverer of Israel.
JB JUDGES Chapter 4
- DEBORAH AND BARAK
Israel oppressed by the Canaanites
4:1 When Ehud died, once again the Israelites began to do what displeases Yahweh,
4:2 and Yahweh handed them over to Jabin the king of Canaan who reigned at Hazor. The commander of his army was Sisera, who lived in Harosheth-ha-goum.
4:3 Then the Israelites cried to Yahweh; for Jabin had nine hundred chariots plated with iron and had cruelly oppressed the Israelites for twenty years.
Deborah
4:4 At this time Deborah was judge in Israel, a prophetess, the wife of Lappidoth.
4:5 She used to sit under Deborah’s Palm between Ramah and Bethel in the highlands of Ephraim, and the Israelites would come to her to have their disputes decided.
4:6 She sent for Barak son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali. She said to him, ‘This is the order of Yahweh, the God of Israel: “March to Mount Tabor and take with you ten thousand men from the sons of Naphtali and the sons of Zebulun.
4:7 I will entice Sisera, the commander of Jabin’s army, to encounter you at the wadi Kishon with his chariots and troops; and I will put him into your power.”‘
4:8 Barak answered her, ‘If you come with me, I will go; if you will not come, I will not go, for I do not know how to choose the day when the angel of Yahweh will grant me success’.
4:9 ‘I will go with you then,’ she said ‘but, the way you are going about it, the glory will not be yours; for Yahweh will deliver Sisera into the hands of a woman.’ Then Deborah stood up and went with Barak to Kedesh,
4:10 and there Barak summoned Zebulun and Naphtali. Ten thousand men marched behind him, and Deborah marched with him.
Heber the Kenite
4:11 Heber the Kenite had cut himself off from the tribe of Kain and the clan of the sons of Hobab, the father-in-law of Moses; he had pitched his tent near the Oak of Zaanannim, not far from Kedesh.
Sisera routed
4:12 When Sisera heard that Barak son of Abinoam was encamped on Mount Tabor,
4:13 he called for all his chariots – nine hundred chariots plated with iron – and all the troops he had. He summoned them from Harosheth-ha-goum to the wadi Kishon.
4:14 Deborah said to Barak, ‘Up! For today is the day Yahweh has put Sisera into your power. Yes, Yahweh marches at your head.’ And Barak charged down from Mount Tabor with ten thousand men behind him.
4:15 At Barak’s advance, Yahweh struck terror into Sisera, all his chariots and all his troops. Sisera leapt down from his chariot and fled on foot.
4:16 Barak pursued the chariots and the army as far as Harosheth-ha-goum. Sisera’s whole army fell by the edge of the sword; not one man escaped.
Sisera slain
4:17 Sisera meanwhile fled on foot towards the tent of Jael, the wife of Heber the Kenite. For there was peace between Jabin the king of Hazor and the family of Heber the Kenite.
4:18 Jael came out to meet Sisera and said to him, ‘My lord, stay here with me; do not be afraid!’ He stayed there in her tent, and she covered him with a rug.
4:19 He said to her, ‘Please give me a little water to drink, for I am thirsty’. She opened the skin that had milk in it, gave him some to drink and covered him up again.
4:20 Then he said to her, ‘Stand at the tent door, and if anyone comes and questions you – if he asks, “Is there a man here?”, say, “No”.’
4:21 But Jael the wife of Heber took a tent-peg, and picked up a mallet; she crept up softly to him and drove the peg into his temple right through to the ground. He was lying fast asleep, worn out; and so he died.
4:22 And now Barak came up in pursuit of Sisera. Jael went out to meet him and said, ‘Come in, and I will show you the man you are looking for’. He went into her tent; Sisera lay dead, with the tent-peg through his temple.
Israel delivered
4:23 Thus God that day humbled Jabin the king of Canaan before the Israelites.
4:24 And the Israelites bore down more and more heavily on Jabin the king of Canaan, until he was utterly destroyed.
JB JUDGES Chapter 5
THE SONG OF DEBORAH AND BARAK
5:1 They sang a song that day, Deborah and Barak son of Abinoam, and the words were:
5:2 ‘That warriors in Israel unbound their hair, that the people came forward with a will, for this, bless Yahweh!
5:3 ‘Listen, you kings! Give ear, you princes! From me, from me comes a song for Yahweh.I will glorify Yahweh, God of Israel.
5:4 ‘Yahweh, when you set out from Seir,[*a] as you trod the land of Edom, earth shook, the heavens quaked, the clouds dissolved into water.
5:5 The mountains melted before Yahweh, before Yahweh, the God of Israel.
5:6 ‘In the days of Shamgar the son of Anath, in the days of Jael, every highroad was forsaken; those who went forth on their travels through by-paths took their way.
5:7 ‘Dead, dead were Israel’s villages until you rose up, O Deborah, you rose up, a mother in Israel.
5:8 ‘Those that should stand for God were dumb. From five cities, not one shield! Not one spear from forty thousand in Israel!
5:9 ‘My heart beats fast for Israel’s chieftains, with those of the people who stood forth boldly. For this, bless Yahweh!
5:10 ‘You who ride on white she-asses, you with caparisons beneath you, and you who walk the highways, sing
5:11 to the shouts of a rejoicing people gathered about the watering places. There they extol Yahweh’s blessings, the blessings of his reign in Israel. (Yahweh’s people marched down to the gates.)
5:12 ‘Awake, awake, Deborah! Awake, awake, declaim a song! Take heart, arise Barak, capture your captors, son of Abinoam!
5:13 ‘Then Israel marched down to the gates; Yahweh’s people, like heroes, marched down to fight for him.
5:14 ‘Ephraim’s princes are in the valley. Your brother Benjamin joins your ranks. From Machir, captains have come down; from Zebulun, those with the staff of office.
5:15 The princes of Issachar are with Deborah; Naphtali in the vale with Barak has sped forward to follow him. ‘Where the streams of Reuben are, men hold their long debate.
5:16 Why did you linger among the sheepfolds listening to pipes amid the flocks? (Where the streams of Reuben are, men hold their long debate.)
5:17 ‘Gilead stayed beyond the Jordan. Why is Dan in the ships of strangers?[*b] Asher kept by the sea coast, dwelling at ease within his harbours.
5:18 ‘The tribe of Zebulun fronted death, Naphtali too, on the rising ground.
5:19 ‘The kings came, they stood in line of battle; then they fought, those kings of Canaan, at Taanach, by Megiddo’s waters, yet bore away no silver spoils.
5:20 ‘From high in heaven fought the stars, fought from their orbits against Sisera
5:21 ‘The torrent of Kishon swept them away, the sacred torrent, the torrent of Kishon. Trample, my soul, with might and main!
5:22 ‘The horses’ hoofs beat the ground; galloping, galloping go his steeds.
5:23 “Curse Meroz,” says Yahweh’s angel “curse, curse the dwellers in it; for they never came to Yahweh’s aid, to Yahweh’s aid among the warriors.”
5:24 ‘Blessed be Jael among women (the wife of Heber the Kenite); among all women that dwell in tents may she be blessed.
5:25 ‘He asked for water; she gave him milk; in a precious bowl she brought him cream.
5:26 She stretched out her hand to seize the peg, her right hand to seize the workman’s mallet. She struck Sisera, crushed his head, pierced his temple and shattered it.
5:27 At her feet he tumbled, he fell, he lay; at her feet he tumbled, he fell. Where he tumbled, there he fell dead.
5:28 ‘Through her window she leans and looks, Sisera’s mother, through the lattice: “Why is his chariot long in coming? Why are the harnessed horses slow?”
5:29 ‘Among her princesses the wisest one answers, and she to herself repeats,
5:30 “They are gathering, doubtless, sharing the spoil: a girl, two girls for each man of war; a garment, two dyed garments for Sisera; a scarf, two embroidered scarves for me!”
5:31 ‘So perish all your enemies, Yahweh! And let those who love you be like the sun when he arises in all his strength!’ And the land enjoyed rest for forty years.
JB JUDGES Chapter 6
- GIDEON AND ABIMELECH
- THE CALLING OF GIDEON
Israel oppressed by the Midlanites
6:1 The Israelites did what displeases Yahweh; Yahweh gave them over for seven years into the hands of Midian,
6:2 and Midian bore down heavily on Israel. To escape from Midian the Israelites used the mountain clefts and the caves and shelters.
6:3 Whenever Israel sowed seed, Midian would march up with Amalek and the sons of the East; they would march up against Israel
6:4 and encamp on their territory and destroy the produce of the country as far as Gaza. They left Israel nothing to live on, not a sheep or ox or donkey,
6:5 for they came up as thick as locusts with their own cattle and their tents; they and their camels were past counting, they overran and pillaged the country.
6:6 Thus Midian brought Israel to great distress, and the Israelites cried to Yahweh.
A message from a prophet
6:7 When the Israelites cried to Yahweh because of Midian,
6:8 Yahweh sent a prophet to the Israelites. This was his message, ‘Thus Yahweh speaks, the God of Israel. “It was I who brought you out of Egypt and led you out of a house of slavery.
6:9 I rescued you from the power of the Egyptians and the power of all who oppressed you. I drove them out before you and gave you their land,
6:10 and I said to you: I am Yahweh your God. Do not reverence the gods of the Amorites in whose land you now live. But you have not listened to my words.”‘
The angel of Yahweh appears to Gideon
6:11 The angel of Yahweh came and sat under the terebinth at Ophrah which belonged to Joash of Abiezer. Gideon his son was threshing wheat inside the winepress to keep it hidden from Midian,
6:12 when the angel of Yahweh appeared to him and said, ‘Yahweh is with you, valiant warrior!’
6:13 Gideon answered him, ‘Forgive me, my lord, but if Yahweh is with us, then why is it that all this is happening to us now? And where are all the wonders our ancestors tell us of when they say, “Did not Yahweh bring us out of Egypt?” But now Yahweh has deserted us; he has abandoned us to Midian.’
6:14 At this Yahweh turned to him and said, ‘Go in the strength now upholding you, and you will rescue Israel from the power of Midian. Do I not send you myself?’
6:15 Gideon answered him, ‘Forgive me, my lord, but how can I deliver Israel? My clan, you must know, is the weakest in Manasseh and I am the least important in my family.’
6:16 Yahweh answered him, ‘I will be with you and you shall crush Midian as though it were a single man’.
6:17 Gideon said to him, ‘If I have found favour in your sight, give me a sign that it is you who speak to me.
6:18 I beg you, do not go away until I come back, I will bring you my offering and set it down before you.’ And he answered, ‘I will stay until you return’.
6:19 Gideon went away and prepared a young goat and made unleavened cakes with an ephah of flour. He put the meat into a basket and the broth into a pot, then brought it all to him under the terebinth. As he came near,
6:20 The angel of Yahweh said to him, ‘Take the meat and unleavened cakes, put them on this rock and pour the broth over them’. Gideon did so.
6:21 Then the angel of Yahweh reached out the tip of the staff in his hand and touched the meat and unleavened cakes. Fire sprang from the rock and consumed the meat and unleavened cakes, and the angel of Yahweh vanished before his eyes.
6:22 Then Gideon knew this was the angel of Yahweh, and he said, ‘Alas, my Lord Yahweh! I have seen the angel of Yahweh face to face!’
6:23 Yahweh answered him, ‘Peace be with you; have no fear; you will not die’.
6:24 Gideon built an altar there to Yahweh and called it Yahweh-Peace. This altar still stands at Ophrah of Abiezer.
Gideon and Baal[*a]
6:25 Now that night Yahweh said to Gideon, ‘Take your father’s fattened calf, and pull down the altar to Baal belonging to your father and cut down the sacred post at the side of it.
6:26 Then, on the top of this bluff, build a carefully constructed altar to Yahweh your God. Then take the fattened calf and burn it as a holocaust on the wood of the sacred post you have cut down.’
6:27 Then Gideon chose ten of his servants and did as Yahweh had ordered him. But since he stood too much in fear of his family and the townspeople to do this by day, he did it by night.
6:28 Next morning, when the townspeople got up, the altar to Baal had been destroyed, the sacred post that had stood beside it was now cut down, and the fattened calf had been burnt as a holocaust on the newly-built altar.
6:29 Then they said to each other, ‘Who has done this?’ They searched, made enquiries and declared, ‘Gideon son of Joash has done it’.
6:30 Then the townspeople said to Joash, ‘Bring out your son for he must die, since he has destroyed the altar to Baal and cut down the sacred post that stood beside it’.
6:31 Joash answered all those mustered round him, ‘Would you plead for Baal? Would you champion his cause? (Let anyone who pleads for Baal be put to death before dawn.) If he is a god, let him plead for himself, now that Gideon has destroyed his altar.’
6:32 That day Gideon was given the name of Jerubbaal,[*b] because, they said, ‘Baal must plead against him, seeing that he has destroyed his altar’.
The call to arms
6:33 Then all Midian and Amalek and the sons of the East joined forces, crossed the Jordan and encamped in the plain of Jezreel.
6:34 And the spirit of Yahweh came on Gideon; he sounded the horn and Abiezer rallied behind him.
6:35 He sent messengers throughout Manasseh, and Manasseh too rallied behind him; he sent messengers to Asher, Zebulun and Naphtali, and they too marched out to meet him.
The trial with the fleece
6:36 Gideon said to God, ‘If you really mean to deliver Israel by my hand, as you have declared,
6:37 see now, I spread out a fleece on the threshing-floor; if there is dew only on the fleece and all the ground is left dry, then I shall know that you will deliver Israel by my hand, as you have declared’.
6:38 And so it happened. Gideon rose the next morning, squeezed the fleece and wrung enough dew out of the fleece to fill a drinking cup.
6:39 Then Gideon spoke to God again, ‘Do not be angry with me if I speak once again. Let me make trial with the fleece just once more. Let the fleece alone be dry, and let there be dew on the ground all round it.’
6:40 And God did so that night. The fleece alone stayed dry, and there was dew on the ground all round it.
JB JUDGES Chapter 7
- GIDEON MAKES WAR WEST OF THE JORDAN
Yahweh cuts down the numbers of Gideon’s army
7:1 Jerubbaal (that is, Gideon) got up very early, as did all the people with him; he pitched camp at En-harod; the camp of Midian was north of his, under the Hill of Moreh in the valley.
7:2 Then Yahweh said to Gideon, ‘There are too many people with you for me to put Midian into their power; Israel might claim the credit for themselves at my expense: they might say, “My own hand has rescued me”.
7:3 Therefore, make this proclamation now to the people: “Let anyone who is frightened or fearful go home!” ‘ Gideon put them to the test. Twenty-two thousand men went home, and ten thousand were left.
7:4 Yahweh said to Gideon, ‘There are still too many people. Take them down to the waterside and I will sift them there. If I say of a man: He is to go with you, that man is to go with you. And if I say of a man: He is not to go with you, that man is not to go.’
7:5 So Gideon took the people down to the waterside, and Yahweh said to him, ‘All those who lap the water with their tongues, as a dog laps, place these on one side. And all those who kneel down to drink, place these on the other side.’
7:6 The number of those who lapped with their tongues was three hundred; all the rest of the people had knelt to drink.
7:7 Then Yahweh said to Gideon, ‘With the three hundred who lapped the water I will rescue you and put Midian into your power. Let all the others go back, every man to his own home.’
7:8 Gideon made the people give him what pitchers and horns they had, then sent away all the Israelites, each to his own tent, keeping only the three hundred with him. The camp of Midian was below his own in the valley.
An omen of victory
7:9 Now it came about that in the night Yahweh said to him, ‘Get up and go down to the camp. I am putting it into your power.
7:10 However, if you are afraid to make the assault, go down first to the camp with your servant Purah;
7:11 listen to what they are saying; you will be encouraged by it and then you will march against the camp.’ So with his servant Purah he went down to the outposts of the camp.
7:12 Midian and Amalek and all the sons of the East stretched through the valley as thick as locusts; their camels were innumerable like the sand on the seashore.
7:13 Gideon came up just as a man was telling his comrade a dream; he was saying, ‘I had a dream: a cake made of barley bread came rolling through the camp of Midian; it reached the tent, struck against it and turned it upside down’.
7:14 His comrade answered, ‘This can be nothing else than the sword of Gideon son of Joash the Israelite. God has put Midian and all the camp into his power.’
7:15 When Gideon heard the dream thus told and interpreted, he fell to his knees; then he returned to the camp of Israel and said, ‘On your feet, for Yahweh has put the camp of Midian into your power!’
The surprise attack
7:16 Gideon then divided his three hundred men into three companies. To each man he gave a horn and an empty pitcher, with a torch inside each pitcher.
7:17 He said to them, ‘Watch me, and do as I do. When I reach the edge of the camp, whatever I do, you do too.
7:18 When I sound the horn, I and those with me, then you too must sound your horns all round the camp and shout, “For Yahweh and for Gideon!”‘
7:19 Gideon and his hundred companions reached the edge of the camp at the beginning of the middle watch, when the new sentries had just been posted; they sounded their horns and smashed the pitchers in their hands.
7:20 The three companies sounded their horns and smashed their pitchers; with their left hands they grasped the torches, with their right hands the horns ready to blow; and they shouted, ‘For Yahweh and for Gideon!’
7:21 And they stood still, spaced out all round the camp. Then the whole camp woke and the Midianites fled, shouting.
7:22 While the three hundred kept sounding their horns, Yahweh made every man in the camp turn his sword against his comrade. They all fled as far as Beth-shittah towards Zarethan, as far as the bank of Abel-meholah opposite Tabbath.
The pursuit
7:23 The men of Israel mustered from Naphtali, Asher and all Manasseh, and pursued Midian.
7:24 Gideon sent messengers throughout the highiands of Ephraim to say, ‘Come down and fight Midian, seize the water-points as far as Beth-barah and the Jordan before they reach them’. All the men of Ephraim mustered and seized the water-points as far as Beth-barah and the Jordan.
7:25 They captured the two Midianite chieftains, Oreb and Zeeb; they killed Oreb at Oreb’s Rock and Zeeb at Zeeb’s Winepress. They pursued Midian; and they brought Gideon the heads of Oreb and of Zeeb beyond the Jordan.
JB JUDGES Chapter 8
The Ephraimites take offence
8:1 Now, the men of Ephraim said to Gideon, ‘What do you mean by treating us like this, not summoning us when you went to fight with Midian?’ And they reproached him bitterly.
8:2 He answered, ‘What have I done when compared to you? Is not the gleaning of Ephraim’s grapes better than the vintage of Abiezer?
8:3 Into your power Yahweh has given the chieftains of Midian, Oreb and Zeeb. Can what I managed to do compare with what you have done?’ And at these words their anger left them.
- GIDEON MAKES WAR BEYOND THE JORDAN. GIDEON’S END
Gideon pursues the enemy beyond the Jordan
8:4 Gideon reached the Jordan and crossed it, but he and his three hundred companions were tired out and famished.
8:5 So he said to the men of Succoth, ‘Please give my followers a few loaves of bread, because they are tired out, and I am pursuing Zebah and Zalmunna,[*a] the kings of Midian’.
8:6 The chieftains of Succoth answered, ‘Give bread to your army? Are the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna already in your grasp?’
8:7 And Gideon answered, ‘Very well! When Yahweh has put Zebah and Zalmunna into my power, I will tear your flesh with desert thorn and briar.’
8:8 From there he went up to Penuel and asked the men of Penuel the same thing; they answered as those of Succoth had done.
8:9 And to those of Penuel he made a similar reply, ‘When I return victorious, I will destroy this tower’.
The defeat of Zebah and Zalmuma
8:10 Zebah and Zalmunna were in Karkor with their army, about fifteen thousand men, all who remained of the army of the sons of the east. Those who had fallen were a hundred and twenty thousand fighting men.
8:11 Gideon went up the nomads’ way, eastwards of Nobah and Jogbehah, and routed the army when it thought itself in safety.
8:12 Zebah and Zalmunna fled. He pursued them; he took the kings of Midian prisoner, both Zebah and Zalmunna. And he utterly destroyed the army.
Gideon’s acts of vengeance
8:13 After the battle, Gideon returned by the Ascent of Heres.
8:14 He seized a young man, one of the people of Succoth, and questioned him, and the young man wrote down the names of the chieftains and elders of Succoth for him – seventy seven men.
8:15 Then Gideon came to the people of Succoth and said, ‘Here you see Zebah and Zalmunna, about whom you taunted me and said, “Are the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna already in your grasp, for us to give bread to your tired troops?”‘
8:16 Then he seized the elders of the city, and took desert thorn and briar and tore the men of Succoth with them.
8:17 He destroyed the tower of Penuel and slaughtered the townsmen.
8:18 Then he said to Zebah and Zalmunna, ‘The men you killed at Tabor-what were they like?’ They answered, ‘They looked like you. Every one of them carried himself like the son of a king.’
8:19 Gideon replied, ‘They were my brothers, the sons of my own mother; as Yahweh lives, if you had spared their lives I would not kill you’.
8:20 Then he ordered Jether his eldest son: ‘Stand up and kill them’. But the boy did not draw his sword; he dared not; he was still only a lad.
8:21 Then Zebah and Zalmunna said, ‘Stand up yourself, and strike us down; for as a man is, so is his strength’. Then Gideon stood up and killed Zebah and Zalmunna; and he took the crescents from round their camels’ necks.
Gideon triumphant. His end
8:22 The men of Israel said to Gideon, ‘Rule over us, you and your sons and your grandson,[*b] because you have rescued us from the power of Midian’.
8:23 But Gideon answered them, ‘It is not I who shall rule over you, nor my son; Yahweh must be your lord’.
8:24 But Gideon went on, ‘Let me make one request of you. Let every man of you give me one of the rings out of his spoils’ – for the vanquished army had golden rings, because they were Ishmaelites.
8:25 They answered, ‘Gladly’. So he spread out his cloak, and on it they threw, every man
of them, a ring taken from their spoils.
8:26 The weight of the golden rings be had asked for reached seventeen hundred shekels of gold, besides the crescents and the earrings and purple garments worn by the kings of Midian, and besides the collars round their camels’ necks, too.
8:27 Of all this, Gideon made an ephod[*c] and put it in his own city of Ophrah. After him, all Israel prostituted themselves to it, and it was a snare for Gideon and his family.
8:28 Thus Midian was humbled before the Israelites. They did not lift up their heads again, and the land enjoyed rest for forty years, as long as Gideon lived.
8:29 So Jerubbaal son of Joash withdrew and lived in his own house.
8:30 Gideon had seventy sons begotten by him, for he had many wives.
8:31 His concubine, who lived in Shechem, bore him a son too, whom he called Abimelech.
8:32 Gideon son of Joash was blessed in his old age; he died, and was buried in the tomb of Joash his father, at Ophrah of Abiezer.
Israel relapses into idolatry
8:33 After Gideon’s death, the people of Israel again began to prostitute themselves to the Baals, and took Baal-berith for their god.
8:34 The Israelites no longer remembered Yahweh their God, who had rescued them from all the enemies round them.
8:35 And towards the family of Jerubbaal-Gideon-they remained ungrateful for all its good deeds to Israel.
JB JUDGES Chapter 9
- THE REIGN OF ABIMELECH
Abimelech becomes king
9:1 Abimelech son of Jerubbaal came to his mother’s brothers at Shechem and said to them and the whole clan of his mother’s family,
9:2 ‘Please put this question to the leading men of Shechem: Which is better for you, to be ruled by seventy-I mean all the sons of Jerubbaal-or to be ruled by one? Remind yourselves also that I am your own flesh and blood.’
9:3 His mother’s brothers spoke of him to all the leading men of Shechem in these terms, and their hearts inclined towards Abimelech, for they told themselves, ‘He is our brother’.
9:4 So they gave him seventy shekels of silver from the temple of Baal-berith, and with this Abimelech paid worthless scoundrels to follow him.
9:5 Then he went to his father’s house at Ophrah and murdered his brothers, the seventy sons of Jerubbaal, on the selfsame stone. Only the youngest son of Jerubbaal escaped, for he had gone into hiding; this was Jotham.
9:6 Then all the leading men of Shechem and all Beth-millo gathered, and proclaimed Abimelech king by the terebinth of the pillar at Shechem.
Jotham’s fable
9:7 News of this was brought to Jotham. He came and stood on the top of Mount Gerizim and shouted aloud for them to hear: ‘Hear me, leaders of Shechem, that God may also hear you!
9:8 ‘One day the trees went out to anoint a king to rule over them. They said to the olive tree, “Be our king!”
9:9 ‘The olive tree answered them, “Must I forego my oil which gives honour to gods and men, to stand swaying above the trees?”
9:10 ‘Then the trees said to the fig tree, “Come now, you be our king!”
9:11 ‘The fig tree answered them, “Must I forego my sweetness, forego my excellent fruit, to stand swaying above the trees?”
9:12 ‘Then the trees said to the vine, “Come now, you be our king!”
9:13 ‘The vine answered them, “Must I forego my wine which cheers the heart of gods and men, to stand swaying above the trees?”
9:14 Then all the trees said to the thorn bush, “Come now, you be our king!”
9:15 ‘And the thorn bush answered the trees, “If in all good faith you anoint me king to reign over you,
then come and shelter in my shade. If not, fire will come from the thorn bush and devour the cedars of Lebanon.”
9:16 ‘In the same way, therefore, if you have acted in sincerity and good faith in making Abimelech king, if you have dealt honourably with Jerubbaal and his family, and have acted towards him as his own deeds deserve. . .[*a]
9:17 My father on his side fought for you, risked his life, rescued you from the power of Midian;
9:18 you on your side have risen today against my father’s family, you have murdered his seventy sons on the selfsame stone; and to rule the leading men of Shechem you have set up Abimelech, the son of his slave-girl, because he is your brother.
9:19 If, I say, you have acted in sincerity and good faith towards Jerubbaal and his family, then may Abimelech be your joy and may you be his.
9:20 If not, may fire come out of Abimelech and devour the leading men of Shechem and Beth-millo, and fire come out of the leading men of Shechem and Beth-millo to devour Abimelech.’
9:21 Then Jotham took flight; he escaped and made his way to Beer; and there he remained, to be out of the reach of his brother Abimelech.
The men of Shechem revolt against Abimelech
9:22 Abimelech ruled over Israel for three years.[*b]
9:23 Then God sent a spirit of discord between Abimelech and the leaders of Shechem, and the leaders of Shechem rebelled against Abimelech.
9:24 And this was so that the crime committed against Jerubbaal’s seventy sons should be avenged, and their blood recoil on their brother Abimelech who had murdered them and on those leaders of Shechem who had helped him to murder his brothers.
9:25 To spite him, the leaders of Shechem put men in ambush on the mountain tops, and these robbed anyone travelling their way. Abimelech was told of this.
9:26 Gaal son of Ebed, with his brothers, happened to pass through Shechem and won the confidence of the leaders of Shechem.
9:27 They went out into the countryside to harvest their vineyards; they trod the grapes and held rejoicings and went into the temple of their god. They ate and drank there and cursed Abimelech.
9:28 Then Gaal son of Ebed exclaimed, ‘Who is Abimelech, and what is Shechem, that we should be his slaves? Would it not be more fitting for the son of Jerubbaal and Zebul his delegate to serve the men of Hamor, the father of Shechem? Why should we be his slaves?
9:29 Who will put this people under my command? Then I would drive Abimelech out and say to him: Reinforce your army and come and fight:’
9:30 Zebul the governor of the city was told what Gaal son of Ebed had said, and he was furious.
9:31 He sent messengers to Abimelech at Arumah, bidding them tell him, ‘Listen! Gaal son of Ebed has come to Shechem with his brothers, and they are stirring up the town against you.
9:32 Move, therefore, under cover of dark, you and the men you have with you, and take up concealed positions in the countryside;
9:33 then in the morning at sunrise leave them quickly and advance against the town. When Gaal and his men come out to meet you, do with him as occasion serves.’
9:34 So Abimelech set off under cover of dark with all the men he had and took up concealed positions opposite Shechem, in four companies.
9:35 And as Gaal son of Ebed came out and paused at the entrance to the gate of the town, Abimelech and the men with him rose from their ambush.
9:36 Gaal saw these men and said to Zebul, ‘Look, there are men coming down from the tops of the mountains!’ Zebul answered, ‘You mistake the shadow of the mountains for men’.
9:37 But Gaal said again, ‘Look, there are men coming down from the Navel of the Land, and another band is on its way from Diviners’ Oak’.
9:38 Then Zebul said to him, ‘What has become of your boasting now, you who said, “Who is Abimelech that we should be his slaves?” Are not these the men you made light of? Sally out now, then, and fight them.’
9:39 So Gaal sallied out at the head of the leaders of Shechem and fought with Abimelech.
9:40 But Abimelech drove Gaal before him; Abimelech went in pursuit of Gaal who fled before him, and many of his men fell dead before they reached the town gate.
9:41 Then Abimelech went back to Arumah, and Zebul drove out Gaal and his brothers and prevented them from living in Shechem.
Shechem destroyed and Migdal-shechem taken
9:42 Next day the people went out into the country, and Abimelech was told of this.
9:43 He took his men, divided them into three companies and lay in wait in the fields. When he saw the people leaving the town, he bore down on them and cut them to pieces.
9:44 While Abimelech and the company with him advanced and took up their post at the entrance to the town gate, the two other companies fell on everyone in the fields and slaughtered them.
9:45 All that day Abimelech attacked the town. He stormed it and slaughtered the people inside, razed the town and sowed it with salt.
9:46 On hearing this, the leading men of Migdal-shechem took refuge in the crypt of the temple of EI-berith.
9:47 As soon as Abimelech heard that all the leaders of Migdal-shechem had gathered there,
9:48 went up to Mount Zalmon with all his men. Then taking an axe in his hands, he cut off the branch of a tree, picked it up and put it on his shoulder, and said to the men with him, ‘Do what you have seen me do, and do it quickly’.
9:49 all his men set to work cutting down branches, one each; then they followed Abimelech and heaped the branches on the crypt, and set it on fire over those inside[*c] All the inhabitants of Migdal-shechem perished too, about a thousand men and women.
The siege of Thehez: the death of Abimelech
9:50 Then Abimelech marched against Thebez, besieged it and stormed it.
9:51 In the middle of the town there was a fortified tower in which all the men and women and all the leading men of the town took refuge. They locked the door behind them and climbed up to the roof of the tower.
9:52 Abimelech reached the tower and attacked it. As he was approaching the door of the tower to set it on fire,
9:53 a woman threw down a millstone on his head and crushed his skull.
9:54 He called his armour-bearer at once and said to him, ‘Draw your sword and kill me, that no one may say of me, “A woman killed him”‘. His armour-bearer ran him through, and he died.
9:55 When the men of Israel saw that Abimelech was dead, they withdrew, each to his own home.
9:56 Thus God made the evil recoil on Abimelech that he had done to his father by murdering his seventy brothers,
9:57 as God made all the wickedness of the people of Shechem recoil on their own heads too. And so the curse of Jotham son of Jerubbaal came true for them.
JB JUDGES Chapter 10
JEPHTHAH AND THE LESSER JUDGES
- TOLA
10:1 After Abimelech, Tola son of Puah, son of Dodo, rose to deliver Israel. He belonged to Issachar and lived at Shamir in the mountain country of Ephraim.
10:2 He was judge in Israel for twenty-three years; then he died and was buried at Shamir.
- JAIR
10:3 After him rose Jair of Gilead, who judged Israel for twenty-two years.
10:4 He had thirty sons who rode on thirty donkeys’ colts; and they possessed thirty towns, which are still called the Encampments of Jair, in the land of Gilead.
10:5 Then Jair died and was buried at Kamon.
- JEPHTHAH
Oppression by the Ammonites
10:6 Again the Israelites began to do what displeases Yahweh. They served the Baals and the Astartes, and the gods of Aram and Sidon, the gods of Moab and those of the Ammonites and Philistines. They deserted Yahweh and served him no more.
10:7 Then Yahweh’s anger flamed out against Israel and he gave them over into the power of the Philistines and the power of the Ammonites,
10:8 who from that year onward crushed and oppressed the men of Israel for eighteen years – all the Israelites who lived beyond the Jordan, in the Amorite country in Gilead.
10:9 The Ammonites also crossed the Jordan to fight Judah, Benjamin and the House of Ephraim, and Israel’s distress was very great.
10:10 Then the Israelites cried to Yahweh and said, ‘We have sinned against you, because we have turned from Yahweh our God to serve the Baals’.
10:11 And Yahweh said to the Israelites, ‘When the Egyptians and the Amorites, the Ammonites and the Philistines,
10:12 the Sidonians and Amalek and Midian oppressed you and you cried to me, did I not rescue you from their power?
10:13 But you on your part have turned from me and served other gods; and so I shall rescue you no more.
10:14 Go and cry to the gods you have chosen. Let them rescue you in your time of trouble.’
10:15 The Israelites answered Yahweh, ‘We have sinned. Do with us as you think fit; only do rescue us today.’
10:16 They got rid of the foreign gods that they had, and served Yahweh, and he could bear Israel’s suffering no longer.
10:17 The Ammonites mustered and pitched their camp in Gilead. The Israelites rallied and camped at Mizpah.
10:18 Then the people, the chieftains of Gilead, said to each other, ‘Who will volunteer to fight the sons of Ammon? He shall be made leader of all the inhabitants of Gilead.’
JB JUDGES Chapter 11
Jephthah lays down his terms
11:1 Jephthah the Gileadite was a valiant warrior. He was the son of a harlot. Gilead was Jephthah’s father,
11:2 but Gilead’s wife also bore him sons, and the sons of this wife, when they grew up, drove Jephthah out, saying, ‘You are to have no share in our father’s inheritance, because you are the son of an alien woman’.
11:3 Jephthah fled from his brothers and made his home in the land of Tob.Worthless followers gathered round him and used to go raiding with him.
11:4 Some time after this, the Ammonites took up arms against Israel.
11:5 And when the Ammonites had attacked Israel, the elders of Gilead went to fetch Jephthah from the land of Tob.
11:6 ‘Come’ they said ‘and be our commander, and we can fight the Ammonites.’
11:7 But Jephthah answered the elders of Gilead, ‘Was it not you who hated me and drove me out of my father’s house? Why come to me when you are in trouble?’
11:8 The elders of Gilead answered Jephthah, ‘That is exactly why we have come back to you. Come with us; fight the Ammonites and be our leader, leader of all the inhabitants of Gilead.’
11:9 Jephthah answered the elders of Gilead, ‘If you take me home to fight the Ammonites and Yahweh puts them at my mercy, I am to be your leader?’
11:10 The elders of Gilead answered Jephthah, ‘Yahweh be witness between us. May we be accursed if we do not do as you have said!’
11:11 So Jephthah set off with the elders of Gilead. The people set him at their head as leader and commander; and Jephthah repeated all his conditions at Mizpah in Yahweh’s presence.
Jephthah negotiates with the Ammonites
11:12 Jephthah sent messengers to the king of the Ammonites to say to him, ‘What is the trouble between us, for you to come and make war on my country?’
11:13 The king of the Ammonites answered Jephthah’s messengers, ‘The reason is that when Israel came up from Egypt, they seized my land from the Arnon to the Jabbok and the Jordan. Give it back peaceably now.’
11:14 Jephthah sent messengers to the king of the Ammonites
11:15 with this answer, Jephthah says this: “Israel seized neither the land of Moab nor the land of the Ammonites.
11:16 When Israel came out of Egypt, they passed through the wilderness to the Sea of Reeds and reached Kadesh.
11:17 Then Israel sent messengers to the king of Edom to say to him: Please let us pass through your country, but the king of Edom would not listen. They sent similarly to the king of Moab, but he refused, and Israel remained at Kadesh;
11:18 later they made their way through the wilderness, going round the countries of Edom and Moab until they were to the east of Moab territory. The people encamped beyond the Arnon but did not cross the border of Moab, for the Arnon itself is the boundary there.
11:19 Then Israel sent messengers to Sihon the king of the Amorites, who ruled at Heshbon. Israel’s message was: Please let us pass through your country to our destination.
11:20 But Sihon would not let Israel pass through his territory; he mustered his whole army; they encamped at Jahaz, and he then joined battle with Israel.
11:21 Yahweh the God of Israel delivered Sihon and his whole army into the power of Israel; Israel defeated them and took possession of the whole country of the Amorites who lived in that region.
11:22 Thus they came to occupy the whole country of the Amorites, from the Arnon to the Jabbok and from the wilderness to the Jordan.
11:23 And now that Yahweh the God of Israel has driven the Amorites out before his people Israel, will one such as you dispossess us?
11:24 Do you not possess all that Chemosh your god took from its owners?[*a] In the same fashion, whatever Yahweh our God took from its owners, that we possess too.
11:25 Are you a better man than Balak son of Zippor, the king of Moab? Did he challenge Israel? Did he make war against them?
11:26 When Israel settled in Heshbon and its outlying villages, or in Jazer and its villages, or in any of the towns on the banks of the Jordan (three hundred years), why did you not recover those places then?
11:27 I for my part have committed no sin against you, rather, you for your part are wronging me by making war on me. Let Yahweh the Judge givejudgement today between the sons of Israel and the king of the Ammonites.”‘
11:28 But the king of the Ammonites took no notice of the message Jephthah had sent him.
Jephthah’s vow and his victory
11:29 The spirit of Yahweh came on Jephthah, who crossed Gilead and Manasseh, passed through to Mizpah in Gilead, and from Mizpah in Gilead made his way to the rear of the Ammonites.
11:30 And Jephthah made a vow to Yahweh, ‘If you deliver the Ammonites into my hands,
11:31 then the first person to meet me from the door of my house when I return in triumph from fighting the Ammonites shall belong to Yahweh, and I will offer him up as a holocaust’.[*b]
11:32 Jephthah marched against the Ammonites to attack them, and Yahweh delivered them into his power.
11:33 He harassed them from Aroer almost to Minnith (twenty towns) and to Abel-keramim. It was a very severe defeat, and the Ammonites were humbled before the Israelites.
11:34 As Jephthah returned to his house at Mizpah, his daughter came out from it to meet him; she was dancing to the sound of timbrels. This was his only child; apart from her he had neither son nor daughter.
11:35 When he saw her, he tore his clothes and exclaimed, ‘Oh my daughter, what sorrow you are bringing me! Must it be you, the cause of my ill-fortune! I have given a promise to Yahweh,and I cannot unsay what I have said.’
11:36 She answered him, ‘My father, you have given a promise to Yahweh; treat me as the vow you took binds you to, since Yahweh has given you vengeance on your enemies the Ammonites.’
11:37 Then she said to her father, ‘Grant me one request. Let me be free for two months. I shall go and wander in the mountains, and with my companions bewail my virginity.’
11:38 He answered, ‘Go’, and let her depart for two months. So she went away with her companions and bewailed her virginity in the mountains.
11:39 When the two months were over, she returned to her father, and he treated her as the vow that he had uttered bound him. She had never known a man. From this comes this custom in Israel
11:40 for the daughters of Israel to leave home every year and to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite for four days every year.
JB JUDGES Chapter 12
War between Ephraim and Gilead. The death of Jephthah
12:1 The men of Ephraim mobilised; they crossed the Jordan, making for Zaphon, and said to Jephthah, ‘Why did you go to fight the Ammonites without asking us to go with you? We shall burn you and your house.’
12:2 Jephthah answered them, ‘My people and I were hard put to it, the Ammonites pressed us hard. I summoned you to help me, but you did not rescue me from their hands.
12:3 When I saw that no one came to my help, I took my life in my hands and marched against the Ammonites, and Yahweh handed them over to me. Why then today come up against me to make war on me?’
12:4 Then Jephthah mustered all the men of Gilead and joined battle with Ephraim, and the men of Gilead routed Ephraim, because these kept saying, ‘You are no more than deserters from Ephraim, you Gileadites in the heart of Ephraim and Manasseh’.
12:5 Then Gilead cut Ephraim off from the fords of the Jordan, and whenever an Ephraimite fugitive said, ‘Let me cross’, the men of Gilead asked him, ‘Are you an Ephraimite?’ If he answered ‘No’,
12:6 they said, ‘Then say Shibboleth’. He would say ‘Sibboleth’, since he could not pronounce the word correctly. Thereupon they seized and slaughtered him by the fords of the Jordan. There perished in this way forty-two thousand men of Ephraim.
12:7 Jephthah was judge in Israel for six years. Then Jephthah the Gileadite died, and was buried in his own town, Mizpah in Gilead.
- IBZAN
12:8 After him, Ibzan of Bethlehem[*a] was judge in Israel.
12:9 He had thirty sons and thirty daughters. He gave his daughters in marriage outside his clan, and brought in thirty brides from outside for his sons. He was judge in Israel for seven years.
12:10 Then Ibzan died and was buried in Bethlehem.
- ELON
12:11 After him, Elon of Zebulun was judge in Israel. He was judge in Israel for ten years.
12:12 Then Elon of Zebulun died and was buried at Elon in the land of Zebulun.
- ABDON
12:13 After him, Abdon son of Hillel of Pirathon was judge in Israel.
12:14 He had forty sons and thirty grandsons who rode on seventy donkeys’ colts. He was judge in Israel for eight years.
12:15 Then Abdon son of Hillel of Pirathon died, and he was buried at Pirathon in the mountain country of Ephraim, in the land of Shaalim.
JB JUDGES Chapter 13
- SAMSON
Samson’s birth foretold
13:1 Again the Israelites began to do what displeases Yahweh, and Yahweh delivered them into the hands of the Philistines for forty years.
13:2 There was a man of Zorah of the tribe of Dan, called Manoah. His wife was barren, she had borne no children.
13:3 The angel of Yahweh appeared to this woman and said to her, ‘You are barren and have had no child.
13:4 But from now on take great care. Take no wine or strong drink, and eat nothing unclean.
13:5 For you will conceive and bear a son. No razor is to touch his head, for the boy shall be God’s nazirite from his mother’s womb. It is he who will begin to rescue Israel from the power of the Philistines.’
13:6 Then the woman went and told her husband, ‘A man of God has just come to me; his presence was like the presence of the angel of God, he was so majestic. I did not ask him where he came from, and he did not reveal his name to me.
13:7 But he said to me, “You will conceive and bear a son. From now on, take no wine or strong drink, and eat nothing unclean. For the boy shail be God’s nazirite from his mother’s womb to his dying day.”‘
The angel appears a second time
13:8 Then Manoah pleaded with Yahweh and said, ‘I beg you, Lord, let the man of God that you sent come to us once again and instruct us in what we must do with the boy when he is born’.
13:9 Yahweh heard Manoah’s prayer for favour, and the angel of Yahweh visited the woman again as she was sitting in the field; her husband Manoah was not with her.
13:10 The woman ran quickly and told her husband: ‘Look,’ she said ‘the man who came to me the other day has appeared to me again’.
13:11 Manoah rose and followed his wife, and he came to the man and said to him, ‘Are you the man who spoke to this woman?’ He answered, ‘I am’.
13:12 Manoah went on, ‘When your words are fuffilled, what is to be the boy’s rule of life? How must he behave?’
13:13 And the angel of Yahweh answered Manoah, ‘The things that I forbade this woman, let him refrain from too.
13:14 Let him taste nothing that comes from the vine, let him take no wine or strong drink, let him eat nothing unclean, let him obey all the orders I gave this woman.’
13:15 Manoah is then said to the angel of Yahweh, ‘Do us the honour of staying with us while we prepare a kid for you’.
13:16b For Manoah did not know this was the angel of Yahweh.
13:16a The angel of Yahweh said to Manoah, ‘Even if I did stay with you, I would not eat your food; but if you wish to prepare a holocaust, offer it to Yahweh’.
13:17 Manoah then said to the angel of Yahweh, ‘What is your name, so that we may honour you when your words are fulfilled?’
13:18 The angel of Yahweh replied, ‘Why ask my name? It is a mystery.’
13:19 Then Manoah took the kid and the oblation and offered it as a holocaust on the rock to Yahweh who works mysteries.
13:20 As the flame went up heavenwards from the altar, the angel of Yahweh ascended in the flame in the sight of Manoah and his wife,and they fell face downwards on the ground.
13:21 After this, the angel of Yahweh did not appear any more to Manoah and his wife, by which Manoah understood that this had been the angel of Yahweh.
13:22 And Manoah said to his wife, ‘We are certain to die, because we have seen God’.
13:23 His wife answered him, ‘If Yahweh had meant to kill us, he would not have accepted a holocaust and oblation from our hands; he would not have told us all these things.’
13:24 The woman gave birth to a son and called him Samson. The child grew, and Yahweh blessed him;
13:25 and the spirit of Yahweh began to move him in the Camp of Dan, between Zorah and Eshtaol.
JB JUDGES Chapter 14
Samson marries
14:1 Samson went down to Timnah, and there he noticed one of the daughters of the Philistines.
14:2 He came up again and told his father and mother this. ‘At Timnah’ he said ‘I noticed one of the daughters of the Philistines. Get her for me, then, to be my wife.’
14:3 His father and mother said to him, ‘Is there no woman among those of your own clan or among your whole nation, for you to seek a wife among these uncircumcised Philistines?’ But Samson answered his father, ‘Get this one for me; get her, because I like her’.
14:4 His father and mother did not know that all this came from Yahweh, who was seeking an occasion for quarrelling with the Philistines; since at this time the Philistines had Israel in their power.
14:5 Samson went down to Timnah, and as he reached the vineyards of Timnah he saw a young lion coming roaring towards him.
14:6 The spirit of Yahweh seized on him, and though he had no weapon in his hand he tore the lion in pieces as a man tears a kid; but he did not tell his father or mother what he had done.
14:7 He went down and talked to the woman, and he liked her.
14:8 Not long after this, Samson came back to marry her. He went out of his way to look at the carcase of the lion, and there was a swarm of bees in the lion’s body, and honey.
14:9 He took up some honey in his hand and ate it as he went along. On returning to his father and mother, he gave some to them, which they ate too, but he did not tell them he had taken it from the lion’s carcase.
14:10 Then he went down to the woman, and they made a feast for Samson for seven days there, for such is the custom of young men.
14:11 But because they were frightened of him, they chose thirty companions to stay with him.
Samson’s riddle
14:12 Then Samson said to them, ‘Let me ask you a riddle. If you find the answer within the seven days of the feast, I will give you thirty pieces of fine linen and thirty festal robes.
14:13 But if you cannot find the answer, then you in your turn must give me thirty pieces of fine linen and thirty festal robes.’ ‘Ask your riddle,’ they replied ‘we are listening.’
14:14 So he said to them: ‘Out of the eater came what is eaten, and out of the strong came what is sweet’.
But three days went by and they could not solve the riddle.
14:15 On the fourth day they said to Samson’s wife. ‘Cajole your husband into telling you the answer to the riddle, or we will burn you and your father’s house together. Did you invite us here to rob us?’
14:16 Then Samson’s wife fell on his neck in tears and said, ‘You only hate me, you do not love me. You have asked my fellow countrymen a riddle and not even told me the answer.’ He said to her, ‘I have not even told my father or mother, why should I tell you?’
14:17 She wept on his neck for the seven days their feast lasted. She was so persistent that on the seventh day he told her the answer, and she in turn told her fellow countrymen what the answer to the riddle was.
14:18 So on the seventh day, before Samson entered the bridal room, the men of the town said to him: ‘What is sweeter than honey, and what stronger than a lion?’ He retorted: ‘If you had not ploughed with my heifer, you would never have guessed my riddle’.
14:19 Then the spirit of Yahweh seized on him. He went down to Ashkelon, killed thirty men there, took what they wore and gave the festal robes to those who had answered the riddle, then burning with rage returned to his father’s house.
14:20 Then Samson’s wife was given to the companion who had been his best man.
JB JUDGES Chapter 15
Samson sets fire to the crops of the Philistines
15:1 Not long after this, at the time of the wheat harvest, Samson went back to see his wife; he had brought a kid for her; he said, ‘I wish to go to my wife in her room’. But her father would not let him enter.
15:2 ‘I felt sure’ he said ‘that you had taken a real dislike to her, so I gave her to your companion. But would not her younger sister suit you better? Have her instead of the other.’
15:3 Samson answered them, ‘I can only get my own back on the Philistines now by doing them some damage’.
15:4 So Samson went off and caught three hundred foxes, then took torches and turning the foxes tail to tail put a torch between each pair of tails.
15:5 He lit the torches and set the foxes free in the Philistines’ cornfields. In this way he burned both sheaves and standing corn, and the vines and olive trees as well.
15:6 The Philistines asked, ‘Who has done this?’ and received the answer, ‘Samson, who married the Timnite’s daughter; his father-in-law took the wife back again and gave her to his companion instead’. Then the Philistines went up and burned the woman and her family to death.
15:7 Samson said to them, ‘Since this is how you behave, I swear I will not rest till I have had my revenge on you’.
15:8 And he fell on them for all he was worth and caused great havoc. Then he went down to the cave in the Rock of Etam, and stayed there.
The donkey’s jawbone
15:9 The Philistines came up and encamped in Judah and made a foray against Lehi.
15:10 The men of Judah said to them, ‘Why are you attacking us?’ They answered, ‘We have come to seize Samson and to do to him what he did to us’.
15:11 Then three thousand of the men of Judah went down to the cave in the Rock of Etam and said to him, ‘Do you not know that the Philistines have us in their power? Now what have you done to us?’ He answered, ‘What they did to me I did to them’.
15:12 Then they said to him, ‘We have come down to take you, to hand you over to the Philistines’. He said to them, ‘Swear to me not to kill me yourselves’.
15:13 They answered, ‘No; we only want to bind you and hand you over to them; we certainly do not want to kill you’. Then they bound him with two new ropes and brought him up from the Rock.
15:14 As he approached Lehi, and the Philistines came running towards him with triumphant shouts, the spirit of Yahweh seized on Samson; the ropes on his arms beeame like burnt strands of flax and the bonds melted off his hands.
15:15 Catching sight of the fresh jawbone of a donkey, he reached out and snatched it up; then with it he struck down a thousand men.
15:16 And Samson said: ‘With the jawbone of a donkey I have thrashed them;[*a] with the jawbone of a donkey I have struck down a thousand men’.
15:17 And with this, he hurled the jawbone from him; and that is why the place was called Ramath-lehi.
15:18 And as he was thirsty, he called on Yahweh and said, ‘You yourself have worked this great victory by the hand of your servant; and now must I die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised?’
15:19 Then God opened a hollow in the ground, the hollow there is at Lehi, and water gushed out of it. Samson drank; his vigour returned and he revived. And therefore this spring was called En-hakkore; it is still at Lehi today.
15:20 Samson was judge in Israel in the days of the Philistines for twenty years.
JB JUDGES Chapter 16
The gates of Gaza
16:1 From here Samson went on to Gaza, and seeing a harlot there he went into her house.
16:2 The news was told to the men of Gaza, ‘Samson has arrived’. They surrounded the place and kept watch for him at the gate of the town. All that night they made no move, thinking, ‘We will wait till daybreak; then we will kill him’.
16:3 Samson however stayed in bed till midnight, and rising at midnight, he seized the doors of the town gate and the two posts as well; he tore them up, bar and all, hoisted them on to his shoulders and carried them to the top of the hill facing Hebron and there he left them.
Samson is betrayed by Delilah
16:4 After this, Samson fell in love with a woman in the Vale of Sorek; she was called Delilah.
16:5 The chiefs of the Philistines visited her and said to her, ‘Cajole him and find out where his great strength comes from, and how we can master him and bind him and reduce him to helplessness. In return we will each give you eleven hundred silver shekels.’
16:6 Delilah said to Samson, ‘Please tell me where your great strength comes from, and what would be needed to bind you and tame you’.
16:7 Samson answered, ‘If I were bound with seven new bowstrings that had not yet been dried, I should lose my strength and become like any other man’.
16:8 The chiefs of the Philistines brought Delilah seven new bowstrings that had not yet been dried and she took them and bound him with them.
16:9 She had men concealed in her room, and she shouted, ‘The Philistines are on you, Samson!’ Then he snapped the bowstrings as a strand of tow snaps at a touch of the fire. So the secret of his strength remained unknown.
16:10 Then Delilah said to Samson, ‘You have been laughing at me and telling me lies. But now please tell me what would be needed to bind you.’
16:11 He answered, ‘If I were bound tightly with new ropes that have never been used, I should lose my strength and become like any other man’.
16:12 Then Delilah took new ropes and bound him with them, and she shouted, ‘The Philistines are on you, Samson!’ She had men concealed in her room, but he snapped the ropes round his arms like thread.
16:13 Then Delilah said to Samson, ‘Up to now you have been laughing at me and telling me lies. Tell me what would be needed to bind you.’ He answered, ‘If you wove the seven locks of my hair into the warp of the web and fixed the peg firlnly, I should lose my strength and become like any other man.’
16:14 She lulled him to sleep, then wove the seven locks of his hair into the warp, fixed the peg and shouted, ‘The Philistines are on you, Samson!’ He woke from his sleep and pulled out both stuff and peg. So the secret of his strength remained unknown.
16:15 Delilah said to him, ‘How can you say you love me when you do not trust me? Three times now you have laughed at me and have not told me where your great strength comes from.’
16:16 And day after day she persisted with her questions, and allowed him no rest, till he grew tired to death of it.
16:17 At last he told her his whole secret; he said to her, ‘A razor has never touched my head, because I have been God’s nazirite from my mother’s womb. If my head were shorn, then my power would leave me and I should lose my strength and become like any other man.’
16:18 Then Delilah realised he had told his whole secret to her; she had the chiefs of the Philistines summoned and given this message, ‘Come just once more: he has told his whole secret to me’. And the chiefs of the Philistines came to her with the money in their hands.
16:19 She lulled Samson to sleep in her lap, and summoned a man who sheared the seven locks off his head. Then he began to lose his strength, and his power left him.
16:20 She cried, ‘The Philistines are on you, Samson!’ He awoke from sleep, thinking, ‘I shall break free as I did before and shake myself clear’. But he did not know that Yahweh had turned away from him.
16:21 The Philistines seized him, put out his eyes and took him down to Gaza. They fettered him with a double chain of bronze, and he spent his time turning the mill in the prison.
16:22 But the hair that had been shorn off began to grow again.
Samson’s revenge and death
16:23 The chiefs of the Philistines assembled to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god and to rejoice. They said: ‘Into our hands our god has delivered Samson our enemy.
16:24 And as soon as the people saw their god, they acclaimed him, shouting his praises: ‘Into our hands our god has delivered Samson our enemy, the man who laid our country waste and killed so many of us’.
16:25 And as their hearts were full of joy, they shouted, ‘Send Samson out to amuse us’. So Samson was brought out of prison, and he performed feats for them; then he was put to stand between the pillars.
16:26 But Samson said to the boy who was leading him by the hand, ‘Lead me where I can touch the pillars supporting the building, so that I can lean against them’.
16:27 Now the building was crowded with men and women. All the chiefs of the Philistines were there, while about three thousand men and women were watching Samson’s feats from the roof.
16:28 Samson called on Yahweh and cried out, ‘Lord Yahweh, I beg you, remember me; give me strength again this once, and let me be revenged on the Philistines at one blow for my two eyes’.
16:29 And Samson put his arms round the two middle pillars supporting the building, and threw all his weight against them, his right arm against one and his left arm against the other;
16:30 and he cried out, ‘May I die with the Philistines!’ He thrust now with all his might, and the building fell on the chiefs and on all the people there. Those he killed at his death outnumbered those he had killed in his life.
16:31 His brothers and his father’s whole family came down and carried him away. They took him up and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol in the tomb of Manoah his father. He had been judge in Israel for twenty years.
JB JUDGES Chapter 17
- ADDITIONS
- THE SANCTUARY OF MICAH AND THE SANCTUARY OF DAN
The household shrine of Micah
17:1 In the highlands of Ephraim there was a man called Micayehu.
17:2a He said to his mother, ‘The eleven hundred silver shekels which were taken from you and concerning which you uttered a curse, going on to say-I heard it with my own ears-
17:3b “I solemnly declare that of my own free will I consecrate this silver to Yahweh, to make a carved image (and an idol of cast metal)”
17:2b I myself have that silver; I was the one who took it,
17:3c and now I give it back to you’.
17:2c His mother answered, ‘May my son be blessed by Yahweh!’
17:3a And Micayehu gave her back the eleven hundred silver shekels.
17:4 Then his mother took two hundred silver shekels and gave them to the metal-worker. From them he made a carved image (and an idol of cast metal), and this was placed in the house of Micah,
17:5 who built a shrine for it, and then made an ephod and teraphim, and installed one of his sons to act as priest for him.
17:6 In those days there was no king in Israel, and every man did as he pleased.
17:7 There was a young man of Bethlehem in Judah, of the clan of Judah, who was a Levite and resided there as a stranger.
17:8 This man left the town of Bethlehem in Judah to look for a place where he could find a home. In his travels he came to the highlands of Ephraim and to Micah’s house.
17:9 Micah asked him, ‘Where do you come from?’ The other answered him, ‘I am a Levite from Bethlehem in Judah. I am travelling and looking for a place where I can find a home.’
17:10 Micah said to him, ‘Stay here with me; be a father and a priest for me, and I will give you ten silver shekels a year, and food and clothing’; and he urged the Levite.
17:11 The Levite agreed to remain in the man’s house, and the young man became like one of his sons to him.
17:12 Micah installed the Levite; the young man became Micah’s priest and stayed in his house.
17:13 And Micah said, ‘Now I know that Yahweh will prosper me, because I have this Levite as my priest’.
JB JUDGES Chapter 18
The Danites go in search of a territory
18:1 In those days there was no king in Israel. Now in those days the tribe of Dan was in search of a territory to live in, because up till then no territory had fallen to them among the tribes of Israel.
18:2 From their clan the Danites sent five brave men from Zorah and Eshtaol to reconnoitre the country and explore it. They said to them, ‘Go and explore the country’. The five men came to the highlands of Ephraim and to Micah’s house, and spent the night there.
18:3 When they were near Micah’s house, they recognized the voice of the young Levite, and turning that way they said to him, ‘Who brought you here? What are you doing here? What is keeping you here?’
18:4 He answered, ‘Micah has done such and such for me. He pays me a wage and I act as his priest.’
18:5 They replied, ‘Then consult God and find out for us whether the journey we are making will be successful’.
18:6 The priest replied, ‘Go in peace; the journey you are making is under the eye of Yahweh’.
18:7 So the five men set out, and came to Laish. They saw that the people there lived in security like the Sidonians, peaceful and trusting, that nothing lacked there of all that the earth yields, and that they were far from the Sidonians and had no relations with the Aramaeans.
18:8 Then they went back to their kinsfolk at Zorah and Eshtaol, and when these asked them, ‘What can you tell us?’
18:9 they answered, ‘We went and passed through the country as far as Laish. We saw that the people there live in security like the Sidonians. They are far from Sidon and have no relations with Aram. Up, and let us march against them, for we have seen the country and it is very good. But you-why stand there speechless? Set out for Laish without delay and take possession of the country.
18:10 When you reach it, you will find a defenceless people. The country is wide; God has put in your power a place where there is nothing lacking of all that man can want on earth.’
The migration of the Danites
18:11 So men of the tribe of Dan set out from Zorah and Eshtaol, six hundred of them, armed for war.
18:12 They went up and camped at Kiriath-jearim in Judah; and for this reason the place is still called the Camp of Dan today. It lies west of Kiriath-jearim.
18:13 From there they entered the highlands of Ephraim and came to Micah’s house.
18:14 Then the five men who had been to explore the country spoke to their brothers and said, ‘Do you know that there is an ephod in these houses, and teraphim and a carved image (and an idol in cast metal)? So now think what you have to do.’
18:15 They turned aside and went to the young Levite’s dwelling in Micah’s house, and greeted him.
18:16 While the six hundred men of the Danites, armed for war, stood at the threshold of the gate,
18:17 the five who had set out to explore the country went on into the house and took the carved image and ephod and teraphim (and the idol of cast metal), while the priest remained at the threshold of the gate with the six hundred men armed for war.
18:18 These men, having entered Micah’s house, took the carved image, the ephod and the teraphim (and the idol of cast metal). But the priest said, ‘What are you doing?’
18:19 They answered, ‘Hush! Put your hand over your mouth and come with us. You shall be a father and a priest for us. Is it better for you to be priest for one man’s household, or to be priest for a tribe and clan in Israel?’
18:20 The priest was overjoyed; he took the ephod and teraphim and the carved image and set off in the middle of the band of men.
18:21 They left by the way they came, putting the women, children, cattle and valuables in front of them.
18:22 They had gone some way from Micah’s home when the neighbours with houses next to his gave the alarm and set off in pursuit of the Danites.
18:23 And as they shouted after them, the Danites turned round and asked Micah, ‘What is all this shouting about?’
18:24 He answered, ‘You have taken away the god I made for myself; you have taken away the priest as well. You go on your way, and what is left for me? How can you ask me, “What is this about?”‘
18:25 The Danites answered, ‘Let us hear no more from you, or men may lose their tempers and fall on you. You may bring about your own destruction and that of your household.’
18:26 So the Danites went on their way; and since Micah saw they were the stronger, he turned and went home.
Laish taken. Dan and its sanctuary founded
18:27 So taking with them the god that Micah had made and the priest who had served him, the Danites marched against Laish, against a peaceful and trusting people. They slaughtered all the inhabitants and set the town on fire.
18:28 There was no one to help the town because it was a long way from Sidon and had no relations with the Aramaeans. It lay in the valley running towards Beth-rehob. They rebuilt the town and settled in it,
18:29 and called it Dan after Dan their father who had been born to Israel, although the town was originally called Laish. The Danites erected the carved image for their own use.
18:30 Jonathan son of Gershom, son of Moses, and his sons after him were priests for the tribe of Dan till the day when the inhabitants of the country were carried away into exile.
18:31 The carved image that Micah had made they enshrined for their own use, and there it stayed as long as the house of God remained at Shiloh.[*a]
JB JUDGES Chapter 19
- THE CRIME AT GIBEAH AND THE WAR AGAINST BENJAMIN[*a]
The Levite of Ephraim and his concubine
19:1 In those days, when there was no king in Israel, there was a man, a Levite, whose home was deep in the highlands of Ephraim. He took as concubine a woman from Bethlehem in Judah.
19:2 In a fit of anger his concubine left him and returned to her father’s house at Bethlehem in Judah, and she stayed there for some four months.
19:3 Her husband set out to visit her, to reason with her and fetch her back; he had his servant and two donkeys with him. As he approached the house of the girl’s father, the father saw him and came very joyfully to meet him.
19:4 His father-in-law, the father of the girl, made him his guest; and he stayed with him for three days; they ate and drank and spent the night there.
19:5 On the fourth day they got up early, and the Levite was preparing to leave when the girl’s father said to his son-in-law, ‘Have a bite of food to fortify yourself; you can leave later’.
19:6 So they sat down and began eating and drinking, the two of them together; then the girl’s father said to the young man, ‘Come, say you will spend tonight here too, and enjoy yourself’.
19:7 And when the man got up to leave, the father-in-law pressed him again, and he spent another night there.
19:8 On the fifth morning, the Levite got up early to leave, but the girl’s father said to him, ‘Eat something first, I beg you’. So they whiled away the time till the day began to decline, and the two of them ate together.
19:9 The husband was preparing to leave with his concubine and his servant when his father-in-law, the father of the girl, said to him, ‘Look, the day is drawing towards evening. Spend the night here and enjoy yourself. Early tomorrow you can go and return to your tent.’
19:10 But the man would not stay the night there; he got up and set off and came within sight of Jebus-that is, Jerusalem. He had with him two donkeys saddled, and his concubine and his servant.
The crime of the men of Gibeah
19:11 By the time they were near Jerusalem, the day was fast going. The servant said to his master, ‘Please let us leave the road now and enter this Jebusite town and spend the night there’.
19:12 His master answered, ‘We will not enter a town of foreigners, of people who are not Israelites; we will go on to Gibeah instead’.
19:13 He went on to say to the servant, ‘Come on, we will try to reach one or other of those places, either Gibeah or Ramah, and spend the night there’.
19:14 So they kept on, continuing their journey. As they approached Gibeah in Benjamin the sun was already setting.
19:15 So they turned that way to spend the night in Gibeah. Inside the town, the Levite sat down in the middle of the public square, but no one offered to take them into his house for the night.
19:16 But an old man came their way, who was returning at nightfall from his work in the fields. He was a man from the highlands of Ephraim, and a foreigner resident in Gibeah, the men of the place being Benjaminites.
19:17 Raising his eyes, he saw the traveller sitting in the public square of the town; the old man asked him, ‘Where have you come from? Where are you going?’
19:18 The other answered, ‘We are on our way from Bethlehem in Judah to a place deep in the highlands of Ephraim. That is where I come from. I have been to Bethlehem in Judah and now I am going home, but no one has offered to take me into his house,
19:19 although we have straw and provender for our donkeys, and I have bread and wine as well for myself and this maidservant and the young man who is travelling with your servant; we are short of nothing.’
19:20 The old man answered, ‘Welcome to you! Let me see to all your needs; you cannot spend the night in the public square.’
19:21 So he took him jnto his house and gave the donkeys provender. The travellers washed their feet, then ate and drank.
19:22 As they were at their cheerful meal, some men from the town, scoundrels, came crowding together round the house; they battered on the door and said to the old man, the master of the house, ‘Send out the man who has come into your house, so that we can abuse him’.
19:23 Then the master of the house went out to them and said, ‘No, my brothers; I implore you, do not commit this crime. This man has become my guest; do not commit such an infamy.[*b]
19:24 Here is my daughter, she is a virgin; I will give her to you. Possess her, do what you please with her, but do not commit such an infamy against this man.’
19:25 The men would not listen to him. So the Levite took his concubine and brought her out to them. They had intercourse with her and outraged her all night till morning; when dawn was breaking they let her go.
19:26 At daybreak the girl came and fell on the threshold of her husband’s host, and she stayed there till it was full day.
19:27 In the morning her husband got up and opened the door of the house; he was coming out to continue his journey when he saw the woman who had been his concubine lying at the door of the house with her hands on the threshold.
19:28 He said to her, ‘Stand up; we must go’. There was no answer. Then he laid her across his donkey and began the journey home.
19:29 Having reached his house, he picked up his knife, took hold of his concubine, and limb by limb cut her into twelve pieces; then he sent her all through the land of Israel.
19:30 He instructed his messengers as follows, ‘This is what you are to say to the Israelites, “Has any man seen such a thing from the day the Israelites came out of the land of Egypt, until this very day? Ponder on this, discuss it; then give your verdict.”‘ And all who saw it declared, ‘Never has such a thing been done or been seen since the Israelites came out of the land of Egypt’.
JB JUDGES Chapter 20
The Israelites pledge themselves to avenge the crime at Gibeah
20:1 So all the sons of Israel came out, and the whole community, from Dan to Beersheba and the land of Gilead, gathered together as one man in the presence of Yahweh at Mizpah.
20:2 The leaders of all the people and all the tribes of Israel were present at this assembly of the people of God, four hundred thousand foot soldiers who could handle the sword.
20:3 The Benjaminites heard that the sons of Israel had gone up to Mizpah…Then the sons of Israel said, ‘Tell us how this crime was committed’.
20:4 The Levite, the husband of the murdered woman, spoke in reply and said, ‘I had come with my concubine to Gibeah in Benjamin, to spend the night there.
20:5 The men of Gibeah rose against me and in the night surrounded the house where I was lodging; as for me, they wanted to kill me, and as for my concubine, they raped her to death.
20:6 Then I took my concubine, cut her in pieces and sent her throughout all the territory that Israel inherited because these men have committed an infamy in Israel.
20:7 You have all met together here, men of Israel. Discuss the matter and make your decision here and now.’
20:8 AlI the people stood up as one man and said, ‘Not one of us will return to his tent, not one of us will go back to his house.
20:9 Now, this is what we shall do to Gibeah. We will cast lots,
20:10 and select ten men from every hundred from each of the tribes of Israel, and a hundred from every thousand, and a thousand from every ten thousand; they will collect food for the army, for those who will go and punish Gibeah in Benjamin for the infamy they have committed in Israel.’
20:11 So all the men of Israel mustered against that town, united as one man.
The Benjaminites remain stubborn
20:12 The tribes of Israel sent messengers out through the whole tribe of Benjamin, saying, ‘What is this crime that has been committed among you?
20:13 Come now, give up these men, these scoundrels from Gibeah, so that we may put them to death and banish wickedness from the midst of Israel.’ But the Benjaminites would not listen to their brother Israelites.
The first encounters
20:14 The Benjaminites left their towns and mustered at Gibeah to fight the Israelites.
20:15 The Benjaminites from these various towns had counted their numbers that day, and in all there were twenty-five thousand men who could handle the sword, besides the inhabitants of Gibeah.
20:16 In this great army were seven hundred picked men who could fight with both hands; every one of these could sling a stone at a hair and not miss it.
20:17 The men of Israel also took a count. Without Benjamin, there were four hundred thousand of them who could handle the sword; all experienced fighters.
20:18 They set off and went up to Bethel to consult God. The Israelites put the question, ‘Which of us should go out first to attack the Benjaminites?’ And Yahweh answered, ‘Judah shall go first’.
20:19 In the morning the Israelites marched out and pitched their camp facing Gibeah.
20:20 Then advancing to engage Benjamin they drew up their line in front of the town.
20:21 But the Benjaminites sallied out from Gileeah and that day killed twenty-two thousand Israelites, who were left on the field.
20:23 The Israelites went and wept before Yahweh until evening; then they consulted Yahweh; they asked, ‘Shall we join battle again with the sons of our brother Benjamin?’ Yahweh answered, ‘March against him’.
20:22 Then the army of the people of Israel took heart afresh; and again they drew up their line for battle in the same place as the day before.
20:24 This second day the Israelites advanced on the Benjaminites;
20:25 but again this second day Benjamin sallied out from Gibeah against them and killed eighteen thousand Israelites, who were left on the field; they were all experienced fighters who could handle the sword.
20:26 Then all the Israelites and the whole people went up to Bethel; they wept and sat in Yahweh’s presence; they fasted all day till the evening and offered holocausts and communion sacrifices before Yahweh;
20:27 then the Israelites consulted Yahweh. The ark of the covenant of God was there in those days,
20:28 and Phinehas son of Eleazer son of Aaron was the priest who ministered at it at that time. They said, ‘Ought we to go again and fight the sons of our brother Benjamin, or should we stop?’ Yahweh answered, ‘March; for tomorrow I shall deliver him into your power.’
Benjamin is conquered and wiped out
20:29 Then Israel stationed men in ambush round Gibeah.
20:30 On the third day the Israelites marched against the Benjaminites and, just as before, they drew up their line in front of the town.
20:31 The Benjaminites made a sally against them and let themselves be drawn away from the town. As before, they began by killing those of the people who were on the road that runs up to Bethel and on the road that runs up to Gibeon; and there in the open country they killed about thirty men of Israel.
20:32 The Benjaminites thought, ‘They have had to fall back in front of us as before’; but the Israelites decided, ‘Let us take to flight and draw them away from the town along the highroads.
20:33 Then the main body of the army of Israel, leaving its position, will form up for battle at Baal-tamar, but meanwhile the Israelites in ambush will rush forward from their position west of Geba.’
20:34 Then ten thousand picked men, chosen from the whole of Israel, appeared before Gibeah. The battle was fierce. The Benjaminites did not suspect the disaster hanging over them.
20:35 Yahweh defeated Benjamin before Israel, and on that day the Israelites killed twenty-five thousand one hundred men of Benjamin, all men who could handle the sword.
20:36 The Benjaminites, seeing themselves defeated… [*a] The men of Israel had given ground to Benjamin because they relied on the ambush they had set against Gibeah.
20:37 The men in ambush quickly poured out and reached Gibeah and put the whole town to the sword.
20:38 For it had been agreed between the Israelite army and the troops in ambush that these should raise a smoke signal from the town,
20:39 whereupon the Israelites in the thick of the battle would turn about. Now Benjamin had begun by killing men of the Israelite army, about thirty of them; so they were thinking, ‘Plainly we have routed them now as we did before’.
20:40 But the signal, a column of smoke, began to rise from the town, and the Benjaminites looking back saw the whole town going up in flames to the sky.
20:41 Then the Israelites turned about, and the Benjaminites were seized with terror, for they saw that disaster was imminent.
20:42 They retreated before Israel, making for the wilderness, but the main body of Israel pressed them hard, while the others coming out of the town surprised and slaughtered them from the rear.
20:43 They hemmed the Benjaminites in, pursued them relentlessly and crushed them opposite Geba on the east
20:44 Eighteen thousand men of Benjamin fell, all of them brave men.
20:45 The survivors turned and ran, and fled into the wilderness and towards the Rock of Rimmon. On the highroads the Israelites caught five thousand men. Then they pursued the Benjaminites to Geba and killed two thousand of them.
20:46 The total number of Benjaminites who fell that day was twenty-five thousand men who could handle the sword, all of them brave men.
20:47 Six hundred men had escaped into the wilderness, to the Rock of Rimmon, and there they stayed for four months.
20:48 The men of Israel went back to the Benjaminites, and put all the males in the towns to the sword, the cattle too, and all that came their way. And they set on fire all the towns that they came to in Benjamin.
JB JUDGES Chapter 21
The Israelites relent [*a]
21:1 The men of Israel had sworn this oath at Mizpah, ‘Not one of us will give his daughter in marriage to Benjamin’.
21:2 The people went to Bethel and stayed there until evening, sitting before God with groans and bitter weeping.
21:3 They said, ‘Yahweh, God of Israel, why must this be Israel’s lot, to lose one of its tribes today?’
21:4 The next day the people got up early and built an altar there; they offered holocausts and communion sacrifices.
21:5 Then the Israelites said, ‘Which of all the tribes of Israel has not come to the assembly in Yahweh’s presence?’ For they had sworn a solemn oath threatening death to anyone who would not come into Yahweh’s presence at Mizpah.
21:6 Now the Israelites were sorry for Benjamin their brother; ‘Today,’ they said ‘one tribe has been cut off from Israel.
21:7 What shall we do to find wives for those who are left, since we have sworn by Yahweh not to give them any of our own daughters in marriage?’
The maidens of Jabesh given to the Benjaminites
21:8 Then they asked the question, ‘Which of the tribes of Israel has not come intoYahweh’s presence at Mizpah?’ It was discovered that no one from Jabesh-gilead had come to the camp for the assembly;
21:9 for the people had been counted over, and not one of the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead was there.
21:10 Then the community sent twelve thousand of their bravest men there, with these orders: ‘Go and slaughter all the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead, the women and children too.
21:11 This is what you must do. You are to put all the males and all women who have slept with a male under the ban, but you are to spare the maidens.’ They obeyed the orders.
21:12 Among the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead they found four hundred young virgins who had never slept with a man, and brought them to the camp (at Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan).
21:13 Then the whole community sent messengers to offer peace to the Benjaminites who were at the Rock of Rimmon.
21:14 Benjamin returned, and they were given those women from Jabesh-gilead who had been left alive; but there were not cnough for all.
The daughters of Shiloh are carried off
21:15 The people were sorry for Benjamin because Yahweh had made a breach in the tribes of Israel.
21:16 And the elders of the community said, ‘What shall we do to find wives for the survivors, since the women of Benjamin have been wiped out?’
21:17 They went on, ‘How can we preserve a remnant for Benjamin so that a tribe may not be blotted out from Israel?
21:18 We ourselves cannot give them our own daughters in marriage.’ For the Israelites had sworn this oath, ‘Cursed be any man who gives a wife to Benjamin!’
21:19 ‘But yet’ they said ‘there is Yahweh’s feast which is held every year at Shiloh.’ (this town lies north of Bethel, east of the highway that runs from Bethel up to Shechem, and south of Lebonah.)
21:20 So they gave this advice to the Benjaminites, ‘Place yourselves in ambush in the vineyards.
21:21 Keep watch there, and when the daughters of Shiloh come out to dance in groups together, you too come out of the vineyards: seize a wife, each one of you, from the daughters of Shiloh and make for the land of Benjamin.
21:22 If their fathers or brothers come to complain to you, we shall say to them, “Forgive them because each one of them has taken a wife for himself, as men do in war. For if you had given them brides, you would have broken your oath, and so would have sinned.”‘
21:23 The Benjaminites did this, and from the dancers they had captured, they chose as many wives as there were men; then they set off, returned to their inheritance, rebuilt their towns and settled in them.
21:24 Then the Israelites went away, each to rejoin his own tribe and clan, and returned from Shiloh each to his own inheritance.
21:25 In those days there was no king in Israel, and every man did as he pleased.
END OF JB JUDGES [21 Chapters].