The Pulpit Commentary — Judges — Section 2

The first thing one looks for in a scientific history is a careful and accurate chronology. But such is entirely wanting in the Book of Judges, for the reason that it is not a scientific history, but a collection of narratives having a moral and religious purpose ; illustrative, that is, of the evil of idolatry, of God's provi- dentiaJ government of the world, and of his special rule over the chosen race of Israel We are obliged, therefore, to .::onstruct our chronology out of the indications which every true history contains in itself of the sequence and connection of events. But these are necessarily inexact, and cannot always be made to deter- mine the time within a century or more, especially when there is no accurate contemporary history. There are also special circumstances which increase the difficulty in the case of the Judges. The date of Joshua's death, which is the terminus a quo of the book, is uncertain by about 200 years. Then the time occupied by the elders who outlived Joshua, which intervened before the action of the book commences, is indefinite ; it may mean ten years, or it may mean thirty or forty years. Again, the point of junction of the close of the book with 1 Samuel which follows it is uncertain; we do not know certainly how far the latest events in the judgeship of Samson ran into the judgeships of Eli and Samuel. But there is another element of uncertainty which largely affects the _chronology of the Book of Judges. The history is not the history of one kingdom or common- wealth, but of several almost separate and independent tribes. Except on great occasions, such as the national gathering at Mizpeh (and that was very soon after the death of Joshua), Gilead,i. e. the tribes to the east of Jordan, had little com- munication with Western Israel; and even on the west of Jordan, Ephraim and the northern tribes were divided from Judah and Simeon and Dan on the south. The great tribe of Judah is not so much as mentioned in the enumeration of the tribes which fo•1ght under Barak, nor in the victories of Gideon. Hence it is  THE BOOK 01!' JUDGES. iii ------------ ---------------------- apparent that it is at least very possible that some of the events narrated may be 11ot consecutive, but synchronous; that wars may have been going on in one part of Israel while another part was at rest; and that we may possibly be led into a.~ great a chronological blunder by adding together all the different servitudes and rests, as a reader of English history would be if he made the reigns of the Anglo- Saxon kings of the heptarchy consecutive instead of simultaneous. And there is yet another cause of uncertainty as to the chronology. Long periods of eighty and forty years are named without a single event being recorded in them. Now it is notorious that numbers are peculiarly liable to be corrupted in Hebrew manuscripts, as, e. g., in the familiar example of 1 Sam. vi. 19; so that those numbers are very uncertain, and not to be depended upon. On all these accounts an accurate and certain chronology is, in our present state of knowledge, impossible. There is, however, one source, though not in the Book of Judges itself, from which we may fairly look for some more certain help, and that is from those genealogies which span the time occupied by this history. The chief of these is the genealogy of David appended to the Book of Ruth, repeated in the First Book of Chronicles, and again reproduced in the Gospels of St. Matthew and St. Luke. This genealogy gives three generations between Salmon, who was a young man at the time of the occupation of Canaan, and David. These three are, however, about equivalent to five, when we take into account the age of Boaz at his marriage with Ruth, and the probable age of Jesse at the birth of David. They may also admit of some further extension, if Salmon, whose exact age at the entrance into Canaan we do not know, did not beget Boaz till ten or more years afterward-s, and if Jesse was a younger son of Obed. Reckoning, however, the generations as five, and allowing thirty-three years for a generation, we get 5 X 33 = 165 as the approximate length of the period from the entrance into Uanaan to the birth of David ; and, deducting thirty years for the time of Joshua and the elders, 135 years from the beginning of the times of the judges to the birth of David. But this is probably rather too short, because, if we turn to other genealogies covering the same period, we find that the generations between those who were grown men at the dntrance into Canaan and those who were David's contempomries were six or seven, as in the genealogy of the high priests given in 1 Chron. vi., where there are seven gener- ations between Phinehas and Zadok the son of Ahitub. Again, the list of Edomitish kings in Gen. xxxvi. and 1 Chron. i. 43, &c., gives eight kings as having reigned before Saul was king of Israel, the last of them being Saul's contemporary, and one of them being king at the time of the exodus. If he was the first king, that would give six between the entrance into Canaan and David. The genealogy of Zabad (1 Chron. ii. 36, &c.) gives six or seven between the ..,utrance into Canaan and David. And it may be said on the whole, that of nine 1 genealogies, eight agree in 1 The nine genealogies 1m. those of ZRdok, Heman, Ahimoth, Asaph, Eth(ln, Abiathu Sa;il, Zahad, (l!lll the Euomitcah kings. I\" lNTHODUGTION TO