THE
PULPIT COMMENTARY, EDITED BY THE
VERY REV. H. D. M. SPENCE, D.D., DEAN OF GLOUCESTER;
AND DY THE
REY. JOSEPH S. EXELL, M.A.
WITH
INTRODUCTIONS DY THE
VERY REV. F. W. FARRAR, D.D., F.R.S., DEAN OF CANTERiff'RY. RIGHT REV. H. COTTERILL, D.D., F.R.S.E. VERY REV. PRINCIPAL J. TULLOCH, D.D. REV. CANON G. RAWLINSON, M.A. REV. A. PLUMMER, M.A., D.D.
NEW EDITION.
FUNK & WAGNALLS COMP.:\.NY LONDON AND NEW YORK 1906 PRINTED BY \\'ILLlAII CLOWES ANO SONS, LJMITBD, LONDON AND BJiCCLES. THE
PULPIT COMMENTARY, EDITED BY TH1I
VERY REV. H. D. M. SPENCE, D.D., DEAN OF GLOUCESTER;
AND BY TBE
REV. JOSEPH S. EXELL, M.A.
JUDGE S. ~r~ostfion ntth Jomilefics: RIGHT REV. LORD A. C. HERVEY, D.D., llISHOP or llATH AND WELLS.
Jjomilits bn. ~arious ~uf~ors: REV. A. F. Mum, M.A.; REV. W. F. ADE~EY, M.A..
NEW EDITION!
FUNK & WAGNALLS COMPANY LONDON AND NEW YORK 1906 THE BOOK OF JUDGES. -- INTRODUCTION THE Book of Judges, called in Hebrew Cl"~::>iw,1 in the Septuagint KRITAI, aml in the Vulgate LIBER JUDICUM, or JUDICES, takes its name, like the other his- torical books,-the five Books of Moses, the Book of Joshua, the Book of Ruth, the Books of Samuel and of the Kings, the Books of Ezra and Nehemiah, and the Book of Esther,-from its contents, viz., the history of certain transactions which took place in Israel under the judges. The judges were those extraordinary civil and military rulers who governed Israel in the interval between ihe death of Joshua and the foundation of the kingdom of Israel; except only that the judge- ship of Samuel was a kind of connecting link between the two-Samuel himself being a judge, though of a different character from those that preceded him, and his government merging in the latter part of it into the kingdom of Saul ; so that the times of Samuel occupy a middle place between the Judges and the Kings, belonging partly to both, but wholly to neither. The age of the world in which the transactions recorded in the Book of Judges occurred was somewhere between the years B.c. 1500 and 1000. It was one marked by the same peculiar features in different parts of the earth It wo.a the dim twilight of history ; but, as far Ill! we can judge from those mythological accounts which precede the existence of true history, it was a time of much movement, of the birth of heroic characters, and of the incipient formation of those nations who were destined to be foremost among the nations of the earth. The mythologies of Greece tell of exploits of heroes which imply nnsettled and disturbed times, the clashing of race with race, fierce struggles for the possession of lands, terrible conflicts for dominion or existence. And as far as such mytho- logies contain, as they doubtless do, some shreds of historical truth, and reflect something of the character of the men of the period, they are in accordance with the picture contained in the Book of Judges of the times which were more or less contemporary. Instead of a comparison of the Greek mythologies leading to the 1 This is the same word as the C11rtliaginiii11 Stt.ffetes, 11s their chief magistrates are ,callod (Liv., Hist., xxvii. 37). The Tyrians lrn.d l\ similar 1mme for their 1ungistrates, trnusbfoJ by Jos,iphus (App., i. 21) 01rn<1rai. ii I~THODCCl'lON TO
concln~ion that the history in the Book of Judges is mythological olso, it rnthcr lenrls a valuable confirmat.ion of that historical character which the internal e,idence of the book so abundantly claims for it. The features which are common to the Greek mythologies and the Hebrew history, the wars of new ,ettlers "ith the old inhabitants, the recklessness of human life, the fierce cruelty under excitement, the heroic deeds and wild adventures of a few great leaders, the taste for riddles, the habit of making vows, the interfe1·ence of gods and angels in human affairs, the frequent consultations of oracles, and so on, are the products of the same general condition of human society at the same epoch of tlie world. The difference between the two is, that the Greek traditions have passed through the hands of countless poets and story-tellers, who in the course of generations altered, added, embellished, confused, distorted, and invented, accord- ing to their own fertile fancy and their own creative imaginations; while the Hebrew records, by the special providence of God, have been preserved some ~00 years and upwards uncorrupted and unchanged.
CHRONOLOGY,