What Militates Against a Thirst for Glory?

I'm going through the Book of Judges for my daily quiet time.  In this post, I'll focus on Judges 4:8-9.  Deborah is a prophetess, and she wants for Barak to wage war against the Canaanite king Jabin, who has been afflicting Israel.  In Judges 4:8-9, we read the following exchange (in the King James Version):

"And Barak said unto her, If thou wilt go with me, then I will go: but if thou wilt not go with me, then I will not go.  And she said, I will surely go with thee: notwithstanding the journey that thou takest shall not be for thine honour; for the LORD shall sell Sisera into the hand of a woman. And Deborah arose, and went with Barak to Kedesh."

Deborah tells Barak that he would not get the glory for Israel's victory over Jabin, for God would deliver Sisera (the captain of Jabin's army) into the hands of a woman.  How would I feel if I were Barak?  Part of me would probably be upset, for I'm the sort of person who likes to be credited and applauded for my work.

And yet, on the other hand, I think that two things would militate against me being overly upset.  First of all, there's the importance of my work: I'd be helping to deliver Israel from oppression, which is good for my fellow Israelites and also for myself.  And, second, I would not be alone, for Deborah would be going with me.  When I feel isolated, that especially is when I desire glory in the eyes of others and feel resentful when I do not have it, for I am looking for some way to feel good about myself.  But when I feel loved and supported by others, then my hunger for glory is not as obsessive.

At church several years ago, the Sabbath school teacher asked how many servants of God there are whose names we do not know.  Someone in the congregation replied, "Most", meaning that we don't know most of the names of God's servants!  I think that it's good to acknowledge people and their contribution.  Yet, hopefully, even those who serve God anonymously can feel good by remembering that their work is important----that it's making the lives of other people better.  And it's even better if those who serve God anonymously do so with the support of people who accept them.

God Loving Everyone

At church this morning, my pastor's sermon was about attitude.  He referred to the Philippians 2 passage about letting the same mind be in us that was also in Christ Jesus, and he described the mind that was in Christ Jesus: loving towards everyone.  The pastor said that Jesus' message of love for all is controversial because a number of people would like to think that God dislikes the same people whom they dislike.  According to the pastor, the way to get the right attitude is to focus on Christ.  Yet, the pastor also stated that there are mean people who know the Bible backward and forward.

I don't have problems with the message that Christ loves everyone.  But I do struggle to bring that realization into my own life by myself loving everyone.  And my pastor's right: just knowing what's in the Bible is not enough.  That doesn't necessarily change a person.  Reading and even remembering are not the same as truly absorbing.  I do believe that I need to remind myself continually of God's love for me and everyone else, replacing my bitter thoughts with reminders of God's love.

Some would say that I need to depend on God to change me.  Why is it hard for me to depend on God to change me?  Because, if God were to change me, I'd expect perfection.  I'd expect for God to make me more of an extrovert, or to enable me to interact well with people I do not like, and who do not like me.  When that perfection does not come, however, I feel that God has let me down, and I wonder how reliable he is.  Maybe there are other ways to conceptualize dependence on God, however. 

Another thought: I'm reading the Book of Judges right now.  Actually, my posts on Judges will appear months from now, for I write ahead.  But I have a thought to share right now.  The latest story that I am reading in Judges is about the strife between Abimelech and the lords of Shechem in Judges 9, which was incited by God as punishment for their sin of killing the sons of Gideon (except for Abimelech).  While I was reading this story, I had a question: Did God love Abimelech and the lords of Shechem?  It doesn't seem that God did.  God was not giving Abimelech a chance to repent, I don't think.  And Jotham's reprimand to the lords of Shechem seemed to be more of a curse on them than a plea for them to repent.

I think that, in the Book of Judges, God has a fair-minded respect for the dignity of human beings, which provides God with a moral sense, if you will.  (People may question this by pointing to Judges' treatment of foreigners and women, but I guess that my point is that God in Judges in not amoral.)  Yet, God in Judges does not appear to love gross sinners.  The exception to this, however, would be the entire nation of Israel, which God continues to forgive and to rescue.  But I doubt that we can get the notion that God loves everybody from the Book of Judges.  Such a theme is arguably in certain other parts of the Hebrew Bible, such as some of the Psalms and Second Isaiah, and it also appears to be in the New Testament, such as Paul and the Gospels, at least when the Gospels are not as Israel-centric (or such is my impression, and there are others who may feel differently).  In a big-picture sense, in terms of the Bible, God does love everyone.  But the trees are sometimes (or maybe more often than sometimes) different from the forest.

Anyway, those are my ramblings for today.

Why Does Gideon Misquote?

For my write-up today of Meir Sternberg's Poetics of Biblical Narrative, I will quote something that Sternberg says on page 420, then I will elaborate on the biblical passage to which Sternberg is referring.

"For a more intricate example of betraying motive by misquotation, consider the charge leveled by Gideon at the people of Succoth after his victory over Midian" 'Behold Zebah and Zalmunah [the kings of Midian], concerning whom you taunted me, saying, Is the fist of Zebah and Zalmunah now in thy hand, that we should give bread to thy weary men?' (Judg 8:15). However villainous the quoted people of Succoth, they could hardly go so far as to load the dice against themselves by referring to the army they refuse to feed as 'weary men.' Indeed, checking the quotation against their actual words given earlier, we find that they did nothing so foolish. Gideon has simply effected a montage between his original appeal ('Give, pray, loaves of bread to the people that follow me, for they are weary') and their original response ('Is the fist of Zebah and Zalmunah now in thy hand, that we should give bread to thy army?'), so as to blacken the accused before destroying them."

I talked about the Scriptural passage a while back in my post here. Here was my summary of this particular story:

"In Judges 8, when the people of Succoth and Penuel refuse to feed Gideon's exhausted army because he has not yet captured the Midianite kings, Gideon promises to trample their flesh on thorns and briers, which is a horribly painful way to die. And, after he catches the kings, that's exactly what he does. According to my trusty E-Sword commentaries, the people of Succoth and Penuel were afraid to support Gideon because they feared Midianite retaliation. They weren't sure Gideon would win! What would happen to them if they supported Gideon and he lost?"

Sternberg's point is that Gideon misquotes the people of Succoth, who refused to support his weary army. Gideon said to them, "Give, pray, loaves of bread to the people that follow me, for they are weary." The people of Succoth refuse, responding, "Is the fist of Zebah and Zalmunah now in thy hand, that we should give bread to thy army?" And, after Gideon captures the two Midianite kings, he quotes the people of Succoth as saying, "Is the fist of Zebah and Zalmunah now in thy hand, that we should give bread to thy weary men?" But Gideon is misquoting the people of Succoth, for they themselves said nothing about Gideon's army being weary. Gideon was the one who told them that his men were weary.

So why is Gideon misquoting the people of Succoth? According to Sternberg, his aim was to "blacken the accused before destroying them." Gideon may have been castigating the people of Succoth for refusing to support his men when they were weary, or for denigrating his men as weak, which Gideon and his army proved to be wrong when they captured the Midianite kings.

What Really Needs Emending, According to Sternberg!

For my write-up today of Meir Sternberg's Poetics of Biblical Narrative, I will start with something that Sternberg says on page 312. I'll give more information about the topic of the quote in the course of this post.

"Hence the surprise now occasioned by the surfacing of the familial motive for the pursuit---the slaughter of Gideon's brothers, who have so far played no role in the narrative. Gideon, it turns out, has not even entertained any hope of rescuing these brothers. "Where are the men you slew at Tabor?" he asks his royal captive, an inquiry whose apparent senselessness has elicited from scholarship the usual crop of textual emendations. But what really needs emending is the scholar's sensitivity to the expressiveness of biblical dialogue. For the question is not intended to make sense as a demand for information: indeed, the addressees themselves (to dispose of another scholarly pseudo-crux) show their perfect understanding of its rhetorical drift in making no attempt to meet it. The very incoherence of the question betrays the questioner's raging pain and indicates vengeance as the mainspring of his actions all along."

I chose to write about this quote because I loved Sternberg's line of "But what really needs emending is the scholar's sensitivity to the expressiveness of biblical dialogue"! At this point, however, I'll try to understand the context of Sternberg's discussion. Sternberg is talking about Judges 8. I actually wrote about this chapter a while back (see here), and I said the following in summarizing Gideon's question about the men of Tabor:

"When he captured the Midianite kings, Zebah and Zalmunnah, he boldly confronted them about an atrocity at Tabor, in which they had slaughtered Gideon's brothers. Gideon tells them, 'They were my brothers, the sons of my mother; as the LORD lives, if you had saved them alive, I would not kill you' (Judges [8]:19). If not for their atrocity, Gideon would have shown mercy to the Midianite kings."

Gideon asked the Midianite kings, "Where are the men whom you slew at Tabor?" And the Midianite kings respond, "Like you, like them, one according to form, sons of a king." English translations render this passage to convey that Gideon was asking the Midianite kings what the men whom they had slain at Tabor were like, and the kings respond that the men looked like Gideon and had a royal appearance. I do not know why there would be emendations, unless scholars' problem is with the word eiphoh, which usually means "where?", not "what kind?" I notice that Sternberg italicizes the word "slew", so perhaps the problem is that the question appears senseless: Where are the men who were killed at Tahor? Well, still in Tahor, I suppose! I doubt that the Midianite kings would take the corpses with them! But Sternberg's point seems to be that the question is rhetorical---that Gideon is not asking for information, but instead is confronting the Midianite kings with their atrocity. And the Midianite kings do not answer the question, but rather talk about the type of men Gideon's brothers were.

Judges 16:23-24: Plural God, Singular Verb

Many Christians like to make a big deal about the word Elohim in Genesis 1. Elohim is the plural for "god," yet, in Genesis 1, it occurs with singular verbs. For a lot of Christians, this means the Old Testament views "God" as a collective.

A lot of Christians believe this is evidence for the trinity. "When a Jewish person or a Jehovah's Witness disputes the trinity, you should point him to Genesis 1," Christian apologists boldly claim. "Elohim is plural, yet the verb is singular. God is three persons, but he is still one God."

Armstrongites, however, do not see God as a trinity, since they don't think that the Holy Spirit is God. So how do they approach the verse? They say that Elohim can mean a binity: two persons (the Father and Jesus) in one God family (which will expand to include more members once believers become divine). After all, Elohim is plural, and all you need is more than one person to have a plural, right? So Elohim can mean that God is a binity, as far as Armstrongites are concerned.

"Not so fast," respond trinitarians. On Felix's post a while back, Guess What I found on Youtube.com???, there is a debate between John Ankerberg and the late Garner Ted Armstrong over the trinity. Someone from Ankerberg's audience attempts to discredit Armstrong's binitarian interpretation of Genesis 1 through an appeal to Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar. Essentially, he argues that the Hebrew uses the dual whenever it discusses two of something, but it employs the plural for more than two. According to this reasoning, had Genesis 1 wanted to convey that the Godhead has two members, it would have used the dual Elohayim, not the plural Elohim. But it uses the plural Elohim, so it must be saying that God is more than two persons. Therefore, the trinity wins, right?

In my humble opinion, they're all wrong. If one reads the Hebrew Bible on its own terms rather than forcing it into the mold of orthodox or Amrstongite Christianity, one will see that it also uses the plural for "god" with a singular verb when it discusses non-Israelite deities. But it's only talking about one deity when it does so. For example, take Judges 16:23-24, noting in particular the parts in red:

The lords of the Philistines assembled to offer a great sacrifice to their god Dagon and to make merry. They said, "Our god has delivered into our power Samson our enemy." When the people saw him, they praised their god. For they said, "Our god has delivered into our power our enemy, the ravager of our land, the one who has multiplied our slain." Then they stationed him between the columns. (NRSV, emphasis mine)

The word for "our god" is "elohenu," which is plural. And the word for "has delivered" is "natan," which is singular. Grammatically speaking, Judges 16:23-24 refers to Dagon the same way that Genesis 1 speaks of the Israelite God: plural subject, singular verb. Yet, Judges 16:23-24 is not saying that Dagon is a trinity, or a binity, or a family, or even collective. There's only one Dagon! So the use of the plural for "God" in Genesis 1 is fully consistent with strict Israelite monotheism.

So why does the Hebrew do this for gods? A professor at DePauw once told me that the Israelites couldn't conceive of putting "God" in the singular, since they thought he was so glorious and majestic. So maybe we see the plural of majesty here. I don't know.

But I will say this: Even if the trinity is true, appealing to the use of Elohim in Genesis 1 to support it is problematic.

Aggadic Stories Soothing the Soul

Source: H. Graetz, History of the Jews, volume II (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1893) 623.

"The reigning distress offered no scope for the profundities of the Halacha, but furthered the study of the cheerful Agada, which, diving deep into the joyful and gloomy situations of past ages, poured the balm of consolation on fretted and desperate spirits, and lulled them with the magic of hope."

I identify with this quote because entertainment is something that has gotten me through a lot. It makes me cry. It makes me laugh. I almost feel like I'm spending time with the characters when I watch TV. I'm becoming like Lieutenant Barclay on Star Trek: The Next Generation, with his holodeck addiction. There I go again--talking like these characters are real people!

I believe it was Mark Brettler of Brandeis who argued that some of the stories in the Bible served as comic relief. As the Israelites struggled with Moabite oppression, they could laugh when they heard the story of Eglon the "cowman," which made its way into the Book of Judges (Judges 3). Comedy helped them through some real-life difficulties. That's why I don't feel guilty when my mind turns to funny stuff during my daily quiet time. Laughter is the best medicine!

Does TV offer me hope? Yes and no. A lot of television characters have lives that are far better than mine is. How many girlfriends has John-Boy Walton had? How many have I had? Do you see what I mean? In terms of family life, I'd say mine is more like TV sitcom families than are a lot of families out there, for my family is supporting, loving, and sometimes annoying, but in a caring way.

So TV can be idealistic. But many characters experience some of the same problems that I do, and I can identify with them. And they somehow make it to the other side. Does that give me hope? Perhaps it shows me what's possible. I mean, stories must have some kernel of truth in them, right, considering someone from the real world wrote them?

I can understand how Agada could be soothing. I've taken rabbinic classes, and there's something cozy about a nice rabbinic story. It has the same feel as sitting around the campfire and telling stories, which is something like what I get from my AA meetings, or even at my family gatherings.

But I wonder if the hope the Jews got from their stories was the belief that they may be true, historically speaking. In their minds, maybe Hillel (or Akiba--I don't remember) actually did sit on the roof of the rabbinic academy for decades, before he was finally let inside and went on to become one of the most respected sages of all time. Historians would probably dismiss this story as legend, designed to teach a moral lesson. But did the ancients who heard it see it that way? Maybe they got hope because they thought something good indeed happened to a humble person in the past, and so it could happen to them in the present, provided they imitated such humility.

(Note: See Izgad's comment.)

I don't know.

King Moses

Source: George W.E. Nickelsburg, "The Bible Rewritten and Expanded," Jewish Writings of the Second Temple Period, ed. Michael E. Stone (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984) 126-127.

"In his dream Moses is conveyed to Sinai's peak, where he sees a gigantic throne and upon it, God himself in human semblence. God bids him approach the throne, gives him the sceptre, seats him on the throne and crowns him. From the throne, Moses beholds the whole universe. According to the interpretation, Moses 'will cause a great throne to arise,' (line 95), and he himself will rule over mortals. His vision of the universe is interpreted not cosmologically, but historically; he will see all things present, past, and future...Moses' enthronement draws on the idea that the prophet was also king, an idea attested in Philo of Alexandria and the Rabbis and based on Deuteronomy 33:5[--'There arose a king in Jeshurun, when the leaders of the people assembled-- the united tribes of Israel.' NRSV]. His being seated upon God's throne may reflect Exodus 7:1 ('See I make you as God to Pharaoh')."

Nicklesburg is talking about a composition of Ezekiel the Tragedian, who could have written anytime between the third-first centuries B.C.E. (Nobody knows.) The above quote reminds me of things I've heard in the course of my education:

1. In my evangelical Bible study group at DePauw, the leader loved to poke fun at the biblical heroes' foibles, since they clearly demonstrated that God saves people by grace, not on account of their personal merit. "And so you're not supposed to worship the Bible heroes, as the Jews do," he said.

He's partially right about Judaism. No, it didn't "worship" the biblical heroes, but it did tend to hold them in high regard. In The Bible As It Was, James Kugel points out that Jewish exegesis attempted to explain away the faults of the biblical heroes, since it expected godly people to behave in a righteous manner. In the Prayer of Manasseh, Manasseh boldly affirms that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob did not need repentance. Try to say that at an evangelical Bible study group! "Of course they need repentance, for all have sinned," a bunch of evangelicals would say at once.

At the same time, Judaism can also be pretty hard on biblical heroes. The Aggadah is not that nice to Deborah and Jephthah, for example.

But Moses was a high-ranking biblical hero, so I'm not surprised that Ezekiel the Tragedian elevates him to such a high rank. As far as the Bible goes, we can't deny that it makes a big deal about Moses' faults, to the point that Moses doesn't even get to enter the Promised Land. At the moment, though, I'm not sure how Jewish exegesis handles Moses' errors.

2. If memory serves me correctly, Stephen Geller at Jewish Theological Seminary said something to the effect that Moses was a king-like figure. And that makes sense, considering that kings in the ancient Near East were often the source of law. Case in point: Hammurabi. So why does the Torah have Moses giving the law rather than a real king? A professor of mine here at Hebrew Union College says it's because the Torah is exilic and post-exilic--times when the monarchy was irrelevant.

Another professor at JTS, Stephen Garfinkel, has done research on Moses as a divine figure. The Bible can be interpreted to imply something like that, since Moses had horns when he came down from Sinai, and horns are a sign of divinity. I never had Dr. Garfinkel, so I don't know what his argument is. But Ezekiel the Tragedian does lean in the direction of treating Moses as a divine figure.

Judith on Faith and Wisdom

For a rough summary of the Book of Judith's plot, see Faith and FAITH.

I got a few thoughts about faith and wisdom in my Judith quiet time, which I finished last night:

1. The Ammonite Achior tells the Assyrian general Holofernes that God will fight for the Israelites if they're good. Holofernes then exiles Achior to the besieged Israelites, angry that Achior doesn't recognize the only god to be King Nebuchadnezzar. The beautiful and pious Jewess, Judith, then decks herself out and goes to Holofernes' camp. Her goal is to find Holofernes in a state of vulnerability and to kill him.

Judith tells Holofernes that God is angry with the Israelites, since they have eaten from the tithe in their hungry desperation. (Remember that Holofernes has cut off Israel's water supply!) Judith then says that, with God's help, Holofernes can defeat the Israelites, and she will assist him in that endeavor. She just needs to seek God's guidance on what to do.

What's interesting here is that Holofernes seems to believe in Israel's God. He shipped off Achior with the claim that there is no god but Nebuchadnezzar, but that may not be how he feels deep-down. He wonders if God truly will help the Israelites. He's probably relieved to learn that Israel has sinned and that God will help him defeat her.

Of course, there's a possibility that he really does believe that Nebuchadnezzar is the only god, and he's only playing along with Judith because he wants to get her in bed. But let's assume that he actually did believe in the power of Israel's God. Do atheists think deep-down that there might be a God? I've heard evangelicals claim that homosexuals are defensive about their lifestyle because they feel that God condemns it, regardless of what they may say out loud.

Who knows? I can't read the thoughts of non-believers. I do know that one thing that hampers my own faith life is my belief that certain parts of the Bible may in fact be true. For example, Jesus says in Matthew 6:14-15: "For if you forgive others their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you; but if you do not forgive others, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses." That verse really troubles me, since I have a hard time letting go of grudges. Often, I don't feel as if I'm holding on to them, but rather that they're holding on to me. I can blow off the passage and focus on the "God is love" texts. But there's a question that haunts me deep-down: Maybe God will ditch me if I don't forgive others.

2. On a more positive note, Judith is an example of someone whose relationship with God leads her to have wisdom. Judith fasted throughout her widowhood, except on Sabbaths and other holy occasions. Judith 9 indicates that she was familiar with Israel's religious history, as are Christians who regularly study the Bible. Her devotion enabled her to be a fountain of wisdom to her people as well as come up with a plan to defeat Holofernes.

The people of Israel are giving God an ultimatum: they will surrender to Assyria if God does not help them in five days. But Judith tells them not to put God to the test. She states:

"Who are you to put God to the test today, and to set yourselves up in the place of God in human affairs?...You cannot plumb the depths of the human heart or understand the workings of the human mind; how do you expect to search out God, who made all these things, and find out his mind or comprehend his thought?...For if he does not choose to help us within these five days, he has power to protect us within any time he pleases, or even to destroy us in the presence of our enemies...Therefore, while we wait for his deliverance, let us call upon him to help us, and he will hear our voice, if it pleases him...But we know no other god but him, and so we hope that he will not disdain us or any of our nation. For if we are captured, all Judea will be captured and our sanctuary will be plundered; and he will make us pay for its desecration with our blood. The slaughter of our kindred and the captivity of the land and the desolation of our inheritance--all this he will bring on our heads among the Gentiles, wherever we serve as slaves; and we shall be an offense and a disgrace in the eyes of those who acquire us" (Judith 8:13-22 NRSV).

Like me (and many people with Asperger's), the Israelites see the situation as a binary: either God helps them in five days, or their only option is to surrender to the Assyrians. But Judith gives them other things to think about: God can help them at the last minute, God loves them as his people, slavery to the Assyrians is not very pleasant, surrender can make things worse, etc.

Judith's words are wise. She had something to offer the Israelites because she gained wisdom through her relationship with God (Proverbs 10:11). Testing God is a sign that we do not truly entrust ourselves to his love. And God can act at the last minute any time he wishes. I often wonder why God hasn't blessed me with a job or a woman thus far. Well, the Israelites could easily ask the same sort of question: "Why hasn't God helped us so far? We might as well not even wait for him. Where's it gotten us up to now? Let's give him five days, and, if he doesn't help us, we're doing it our way." But God could help them at the last minute, within whatever time-frame he chose. Why he didn't help them until that point is a mystery known only to him.

But Judith doesn't just believe: she also acts. And she gets her plan on how to act from the Bible. In Judges 4, Jael kills the evil Canaanite general, Sisera, in her tent, after lulling him to sleep. And that's pretty much what Judith does to Holofernes! The Bible gave her a game-plan on how to help her people.

That reminds me of the movie Signs. Mel Gibson plays an Episcopal priest whose wife dies in a car accident. Her last words seem so random: "Tell your brother to swing away." Mel's brother, played by Joaquin Phoenix, is an ex-baseball player who lost out on a promising career. Well, at the end of the movie, an alien is in Mel's house and is about to hurt his family. Mel then looks at a wall, sees a baseball bat, remember's his late wife's words, and tells his brother to swing away. Joaquin then slams the bat at the alien!

A lot of ideas don't come to us automatically. They need to be prompted by something, and Mel got his strategy for how to deal with the alien from his wife's last words. Similarly, Judith gained wisdom on how to confront her situation from the word of God. She may have immersed herself in Israel's tradition, so she had an idea of what to do.

This happens for so many Christians. God can use the Bible to provide us with general guidance on how to live a righteous life. But there are also times when he uses it to give specific instructions. I'm not saying that we should see the Bible as an oracle for every situation, since that can be disastrous. But God has guided his people with his word on many occasions, and things have worked out. That's one reason I believe in God: because he has worked in other people's lives. But, in any case, whether God speaks to us or not, the Bible is still a source of ideas on what to do.

No King in Israel

I finished my weekly quiet time on the Book of Judges yesterday, and I'll be going on to Ruth this coming Saturday.

One line that intrigues me is the final verse of Judges: "In those days there was no king in Israel; all the people did what was right in their own eyes" (Judges 21:25 NRSV).

This line also appears in Judges 17:6; 18:1; and 19:1.

In a lot of sermons, I hear about how wrong it is for us to do what's right in our own eyes, as opposed to obeying God. But the passage mentions the absence of a king for some reason. Why? Is this a pro-monarchical passage?

And how would the existence of a king in Israel ensure that people stopped doing what's right in their own eyes? Israel had some pretty bad kings, who led Israel down the wrong path. Israel having a king wouldn't make her more godly, would it?

Yet, Israel having a good king can make her more godly. In Judges 17-21, we see a lot of chaos. A man has his own private shrine and Levite, which is then stolen by Danite marauders. A group from Gibeah gang-rapes and kills a man's concubine, reminiscent of the men of Sodom (Genesis 19). Israel then fights Benjamin, which is protecting the guilty party, and comes close to exterminating the tribe. When Israel decides that she wants to accept Benjamin back into the Israelite body, she remembers that the Israelites swore not to give their daughters to the Benjamites. The Israelites then have to find some way to get the Benjamites some wives, and they ask God for guidance. But they do not wait for God's answer, for they decide to slaughter the men of Jabesh-Gilead, taking its virgin women. And when there are not enough women for the Benjamites, Israel sends them out to kidnap dancing women at Shiloh.

Everything appears so ad hoc. Would things be better under a king, in the eyes of the author of Judges? It would under a godly king. One function of the Israelite king was to uphold the worship of God in the central sanctuary (Jerusalem). I-II Kings critiques kings on whether or not they extirpate idolatry from Israel, and it praises those who tear down alternative sanctuaries (e.g., II Kings 21-23). Under a righteous king, a man would not have his own private Levite. God wouldn't be a cheap commodity.

A king was also to execute justice (e.g., II Samuel 8:15). He'd have a system of justice in place (II Chronicles 19:5), so Israel wouldn't be making up how to punish evildoers as they went along. The king would hopefully execute justice with wisdom and divine guidance (see I Samuel 29:9; II Samuel 2:1; 5:19; 21; I Kings 3:28), rather than "seeking" God's will and then doing his own thing.

For the author of Judges, a lot of problems could have been avoided if Israel had a righteous man at the helm--a king who was powerful enough to uphold the worship of God and punish evildoers.

Lost: Season 2

I finished the second season of Lost last night, and it got me thinking about pride, relationships, faith, and true virtue.

1. Let's first talk about pride. Charlie Pace loves Claire, who has a baby boy named Aaron. Well, Charlie made Claire mad when she discovered he was using heroin. Add to that Charlie's abduction of Aaron and his attempt to baptize him, and you can see that Charlie's lucky if Claire ever speaks to him again!

Enter John Locke, a philosopher-type who seems to know everything about everything (he must have done a lot of reading during his period of paralysis). He keeps hanging around Claire, even going so far as to sleep near her tent to protect her and the baby. When Charlie abducts Aaron, returns him, and tearfully apologizes, Locke punches him. As Sawyer tells Charlie, "That's like Gandhi hitting his kids." Charlie is humiliated by the macho pillar of the island community, John Locke.

And so Charlie participates in a con that Sawyer sets up. Sawyer's goal is to get all the guns for himself. Charlie's motivation, however, is to make Locke look stupid. Both are successful.

I can sympathize with Charlie. I don't like to look foolish, especially in front of a girl I happen to like. And when there's an admired person who totally humiliates me, I want revenge. It's only natural.

It takes a great deal of self-crucifixion to let bygones be bygones. Charlie would really have to trust in God's love to forgo seeking revenge. But it's hard to do that, especially when life stinks. In Charlie's case, everyone on the island didn't like him, including Claire, the love of his life. It takes a great deal of faith to look beyond one's present surroundings--to believe in something good, even when one's external reality seems to scream the opposite.

This overlaps with my weekend quiet time, which is on Judges 15. The Philistines get their revenge on Samson, and Samson gets his revenge on the Philistines. And innocent people suffer as a result. Forgiveness or non-retaliation looks like weakness or timidity to a lot of people, which is why many seek revenge in the first place. But revenge only escalates the conflict. Again, it takes a lot of self-crucifixion to do the right thing!

What's ironic is that Locke has the same kinds of issues that Charlie has. He's not a heroin addict, mind you, but he has a lot of pride. People treated him like garbage for most of his life--his dad, his workplace, etc., etc. He didn't like others telling him what he couldn't do. And he has somewhat of a rivalry with Dr. Jack, the leader of the island community. Locke sees himself as a co-leader, so he doesn't like Jack giving him orders.

One would think that Locke's issues would lead him to sympathize with Charlie, but they don't necessarily. Maybe that's because pride tends toward isolation, not community. In general, it's not always the case that people who suffer have compassion for others who suffer. There are people who have struggled socially, as I do, but I don't necessarily connect with them, nor they with me. Shared experiences must not be the only necessary ingredient for a social connection.

2. Now onto the topic of relationships. As we saw, Claire became mad at Charlie. In one of Locke's flashbacks, we see that Locke and his girlfriend, Helen, had a falling out. Locke and Helen were going to get married, but that whole plan deteriorated when Helen discovered that Locke valued his dad's love over hers. Charlie and Locke both apologized profusely to the women they loved, but the relationship was still over.

Can relationships be healed? A few months ago, I had a conversation with a young woman on my Christian dating site. Things were going well for a couple of days, as we had some good banter. But then I said something that offended her. I didn't mean to cause her offense, mind you, for I was actually trying to make her feel better. But the damage was done. My apologies didn't appease her. We've not had contact since.

But there have also been times when my relationships have been restored. I may be estranged from someone, but then we encounter each other after a long period of absence. We start talking, and we end up bonding over a shared topic of interest. I'm not always sure if I'm ready to dive back into the relationship, since I don't want to be hurt again. But I find myself having a good time with the person.

Sometimes, giving a person space is the right thing to do. Time can be conducive to healing. Meeting a person after a long period of absence may be a way of letting a relationship start anew. That's why I don't need to walk around with grudges about the past. I can allow each social situation to be a fresh and new experience.

3. Now let's talk about faith. At the beginning of the season, Locke wants to get inside a portal, and he doesn't know how to do so. He believes that the island has a special destiny for him and the community, since it healed him of his paralysis. In despair, he cries out to the island and hits the door of the portal. Suddenly, there's a bright light, and the door opens.

Inside the portal, Locke encounters Desmond, who is part of the Dharma Initiative, a research project that encompasses the government and various universities. Desmond feels he has to type a code into a computer every 108 minutes to save the world. Dr. Jack denies that the world is in danger, for he views the whole exercise as a psychological experiment to see if Desmond will go along. But Locke is convinced that Desmond is truly saving the world every 108 minutes, and he assumes Desmond's task as his own--as if it's part of his destiny.

But Locke discovers that it was all a psychological experiment, or at least he concludes that when he watches a Dharma Initiative video in another portal. And he learns that the ominous "bright light" was actually Desmond turning on a lamp to identify who was pounding on the portal (Locke). Locke then has a crisis of faith. What he initially viewed as a mysterious sign turns out to be ordinary. And he feels that his life is meaningless, devoid of any purpose.

But, sheesh, the island took away his paralysis, didn't it? Did he forget that little detail? It's amazing how quickly we're willing to dump our faith, just because not everything turns out as we had hoped or expected. I have a whole list of expectations of things that should be true if there is a God: I'd have a pretty Christian woman, God would be blessing me left and right, someone would stumble on my blog and offer me a lucrative writing contract, people would come to Christ on a massive scale through my "brilliance." But life's not like that for me; actually, it's rather ordinary, and I often wonder if anyone's minding the store. And yet, there have been times when God has helped me, so maybe he still has a plan for my life. And perhaps God can work through the ordinary and not-so-glamorous.

4. Finally, true virtue. Michael's son, Vic, is abducted by the Others. The Others tell Michael that he'll get his son back if he brings them four people from his island community: Jack, Kate, Sawyer, and Hurley. In the process of following these instructions, Michael kills two innocent people, one of them Hurley's girlfriend (who keeps popping up in flashbacks, for some reason). He also deceives his friends. But he gets his son back in the end, and the Others show him how to get back home (off the island, that is).

I had to admire the depth that Michael was willing to go out of love for his son. He would do anything for that boy! But his situation reminded me of something I read in Jonathan Edwards' Nature of True Virtue. Edwards was trying to explain how non-Christians could do good things, since he believed in the total depravity of human beings apart from Christ. His conclusion was that the "good" that unbelievers do is not true virtue. For Edwards, true virtue is disinterested love for God and neighbor. There's a part of his book where he says that unbelievers may love their family, their friends, or their clan, without really giving a rip for the larger human community. As far as Edwards is concerned, that is not true virtue, for true virtue values the whole, not just individual parts.

And that's what I see with Michael: he was willing to do anything out of love for his son, but he ended up hurting everyone else in the process. Of course, that raises other questions, such as the whole Star Trek dilemma of "Do the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or of the one?" Would I have wanted Michael to tell the Others, "Go ahead and kill my son--I will not compromise my morality!"? How would I feel if my dad approached the issue in that way?

That reminds me of a motif that I've seen on TV and in movies, in which a parent tries to save the world and ignores his own family in the process. In an episode of Touched by an Angel, a man owns a large taffy company and tries to implement a grand vision for all kids. But his own son feels left out of his father's life. In The Third Miracle, Anne Heche plays a woman whose mother was a saint. But her mom was so busy saving the rest of the world, that her very own daughter felt neglected. The TBAA episode and the movie portray the saintly parent in a positive light, but I wonder: "Shouldn't the parents have focused more on their own children? Does God require me to care for the entire world, or only for those he has placed in my life?" But maybe there was a way they could have had their cake and eaten it too: they could've worked with their children to help others, making social justice a family activity. It's something to think about!

I'll go to the library to see if I can find Lost: Season 3. Stay tuned!

Samson: Good or Bad?

For my weekly quiet time, I studied Judges 14. In this chapter, Samson goes into a vineyard and encounters a ferocious lion, which he kills through the spirit of the LORD. When he returns to see the lion's corpse, he notices bees and honey on the lion's body. He eats the honey and gives some to his parents, but he doesn't tell them where he got it, or that he killed a lion, for that matter.

As I listened to sermons and read the Protestant E-Sword commentaries, I noticed a difference of opinion about the character of Samson: was he bad or good in Judges 14?

Most said that he was bad. Samson was a lifelong Nazirite (see Judges 13:5, 7). According to Numbers 6:3-6, Nazirites are not supposed to eat grapes or touch a corpse. Moreover, touching the carcass of an unclean animal makes an Israelite impure until the evening, meaning he must wash his clothes (Leviticus 11:27-28).

The anti-Samson crowd argues as follows: here's Samson, who's not supposed to eat grapes. But he's putting himself in the path of temptation by strolling into a vineyard! He's like a lot of Christians, who go places they're not supposed to be. Then, he eats honey that's been defiled through its contact with a corpse (and of an unclean animal, no less!). And, to make matters worse, he gives some of that impure honey to his parents, without informing them that it's defiled! He seeks to justify his own sin by dragging his parents down with him. Sin loves company, after all! And Samson doesn't even have the courtesy to give his parents a chance to purify themselves. They're unclean, and they don't even know it!

Matthew Henry, by contrast, is a lot more charitable towards Samson. For Henry, Samson didn't tell his parents that he killed the lion because he was modest. And he was a pretty nice guy to share his honey with them. He knows how to honor his father and mother! Plus, Henry denies that the honey was even defiled, for he states, "He ate himself, asking no questions for conscience' sake; for the dead bones of an unclean beast had not that ceremonial pollution in them that the bones of a man had."

I'm not sure if Henry's right about an animal carcass being unable to pollute food. According to Leviticus 11:31-38, we read that an unclean swarming thing can defile stoves, clothing, water-jars, cisterns, and wet seeds. In this case, an unclean animal can pollute things, which can in turn defile the Israelites who use them. So maybe that applied to the lion's honey.

I've not combed through all of the Mishnah's rules on animal corpses and second-grade uncleanness, so I don't know off-hand if it thinks that all carrion can defile food. But M. Tohoroth 1:1 says that the carrion of a clean bird can convey food uncleanness, provided it's an egg's bulk in quanity. And Herbert Danby notes that "if it is an egg's bulk in quanity it is like other unclean foodstuffs and conveys uncleanness to clean foodstuffs, making them suffer 'second-grade uncleanness.'" So maybe a dead lion can defile honey!

But I find it interesting that there aren't a lot of Jewish sources that struggle with Samson's eating of the honey (as far as I can tell). Rashi doesn't wrestle with it. John Gill usually cites Jewish sources in his commentary, and he doesn't mention any that's troubled by Samson's deed (though he tries to force something like that out of Josephus' Antiquities 5.292). Am I missing something? I'd expect Jewish sources to be especially concerned about purity!

I'm also puzzled by Samson's status as a Nazirite. Yairah Amit in the Jewish Study Bible notes that "Samson is never depicted as a Nazirite in chs 14-15." I guess that's his answer to how a Nazirite like Samson can do seemingly un-Nazirite things: Judges 14-15 is independent of Judges 13, so it (Judges 14-15) doesn't assume that Samson was a Nazirite.

But even the chapter in which Samson is a Nazarite is puzzling to me. In Judges 13, where Samson actually is a Nazarite, the angel tells Samson's mother that her son will deliver Israel from the Philistines (v 5). Won't Samson have to kill Philistines to do that? And doesn't that mean he'll have contact with corpses, which Nazirites are not to have? I Maccabees 3:49 invites the Nazirites who had completed their vows to join the battle against the Seleucids. The implication is that Nazirites could not have gone to war during their vows, since they had to avoid corpses. Did God's command for Samson to be a Nazirite conflict with his overall purpose for Samson: that he deliver Israel from the Philistines?

There are a lot of puzzles here. I wonder if Jewish sources wrestle with them anywhere.

Manoah the Dunce

In Judges 13, Samson's father Manoah comes across as a complete dunce. His wife tells him that she saw a man of God who resembled an angel, and Manoah wants to feed him and find out his name. The angel essentially tells Manoah (in my paraphrase): "I don't eat, silly, and my name is too wonderful to share with you. Didn't you hear what your wife said? I'm an angel! Duh!"

When Manoah offers a sacrifice, the angel ascends into the flames, and Manoah gets scared. "We shall surely die, for we have seen God," he exclaims. But his wife responds (in my paraphrase): "Manoah, relax! If God had wanted to kill us, he wouldn't have accepted our sacrifice. Plus, didn't you hear the angel? God has promised us that we will have a son. We can't do that if we're not alive!"

Manoah must be the slow one of the family. And what's interesting is that Manoah didn't hear all of the information about Samson. The angel told Samson's mother that her son would be the first to deliver Israel from the Philistines. But neither Samson's mother nor the angel told Manoah that little detail. Why not? Maybe they thought Manoah was so dense that he'd blab about his son to the Philistines, or to the other Israelites in the Philistines' hearing. "What's this you're saying about a soon deliverance?" the big, tough Pharisees would then say to the helpless Israelites.

The vast majority of commentators treat Manoah as a dolt. In the Babylonian Talmud, Rabbi Nahman calls him an ignorant man because he followed his wife's advice (Berachot 61a; Eiruvin 18b). That's slightly unfair. What was he supposed to do? Act on his own thinking? His wife was the only bright bulb in the family!

Jon Courson tries his best to find something good about Manoah. When Manoah asked his wife to seek further instructions from the man of God, Courson said that's a lesson to all of us: that we should pray for God's instructions rather than being hasty in our actions. But when he got to the "We're all going to die!" scene, even Courson admitted that Manoah is pretty dense!

This whole scene got me thinking about feminist approaches to Scripture. There are at least two ways that feminists read the Bible. One is "the Bible is good because it uplifts women." The other is "the Bible is bad because it downgrades women." Carol Delaney is an example of the latter point of view, for she argues in Abraham on Trial that Genesis 22 treats Isaac as the sole property of Abraham, since Abe doesn't even tell his wife that he's about to sacrifice their son. Maybe, but Judges 13 presents the opposite scenario, for Samson's mother doesn't share everything with Manoah. Plus, she comes across as more spiritually insightful than her husband.

Why does Judges present Manoah as such a dolt? One of my professors has argued that the Book of Judges is comic, and that may be a part of it. Even the ancient Israelites needed entertainment!

But I also think that the text is saying that the apple doesn't fall too far from the tree. Manoah was dense and had to be led around by his wife (which will probably be me when I get married!). Well, Samson was much the same way. Delilah kept asking him for the secret of his strength, and she tried to weaken him on two separate occasions (with ropes and a hair loom--see Judges 15). And Samson thought she wouldn't cut off his hair once he told her his secret? How gullible can you be? Samson was dense, and he got outsmarted by a woman! He's a chip off the old block.

In one of my recovery groups, some people were talking about the fourth step, which is kind of like a personal psychological evaluation: you try to dig into why you are the way that you are. A few in the group were tracing their personalities to their fathers. "My dad was an obnoxious loudmouth, like I am." "My dad was a know-it-all, like me." "James, was your dad quiet and timid?" Well, he certainly is on the quiet side, but timid? Absolutely not! I got my timidity by stumbling around through life.

But could it be that we mirror our parents in some way, shape, or form? Maybe that should motivate us to be good examples for our kids. Of course, I don't want my kids to grow up to be timid, so I may wait before I have some!

Me on Universalism: "Forever"

Opponents of universalism often cite specific proof-texts, for the New Testament is clear that there are people who will go to hell. Jesus says in Matthew 25:46, "And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life" (NRSV). In Mark 9:43-46, Jesus repeatedly calls hell a place where the fire shall never be quenched. And Revelation 20:10 implies that hell is a place of everlasting torment, for it states, "And the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur, where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever."

The Greek word translated "eternal" and "forever" is from aion, and it indeed can mean eternity. Its Hebrew equivalent is olam, which also can carry the connotation of "forever." Olam is used when the Bible says that God's mercy endures forever, or that God's anger will not last forever, or that Israel will dwell in her land forever (and the Septuagint translation of such passages uses some form of aion). These passages are so assuring because they carry a notion of perpetuity.

But aion and olam do not imply eternity in every case.

For example, Jeremiah 18:15-16 states: "But my people have forgotten me, they burn offerings to a delusion; they have stumbled in their ways, in the ancient roads, and have gone into bypaths, not the highway, making their land a horror, a thing to be hissed at forever. All who pass by it are horrified and shake their heads."

Jeremiah 23:39-40 has: "I will surely lift you up and cast you away from my presence, you and the city that I gave to you and your ancestors. And I will bring upon you everlasting disgrace and perpetual shame, which shall not be forgotten."

Describing God's wrath upon Zion, Isaiah 33:14 states: "The sinners in Zion are afraid; trembling has seized the godless: 'Who among us can live with the devouring fire? Who among us can live with everlasting flames?'"

Or take the statement that the fires of hell will not be quenched. Jeremiah 7:20 says about Jerusalem: "Therefore thus saith the Lord; Behold, my anger and wrath shall be poured out upon this place, and upon the men, and upon the cattle, and upon every tree of their field, and upon the fruits of the land; and it shall burn, and not be quenched."

In these passages, we see the theme of eternal punishment, or of an everlasting fire, or of a fire that cannot be quenched. And these are all referring to God's punishment of Israel and/or Jerusalem. Yet, we know that the same prophets also describe God's ultimate restoration of his nation and his city. God says that they'll be destroyed forever, but that's not exactly what happens. So I guess that his eternal punishment was not eternal after all, at least not in that case.

Or take Jonah 2:6: "I went down to the land whose bars closed upon me forever; yet you brought up my life from the Pit, O LORD my God." Jonah says that the bars were around him forever (olam), yet God delivered him from them.

So what do I do with all this? The Bible says that God will punish people eternally. But what if "eternal" or "everlasting" or "forever" in such cases simply means "for a very long time"? Do those passages absolutely have to deprive us of all hope--for our unsaved loved ones who died before saying the sinner's prayer, or for those who never heard the Gospel, or for the people who heard it yet did not fully receive it (for whatever reason)?

A lot of hard-core fundamentalists and evangelicals will answer, "But the Bible says they'll burn forever and ever! It offers no hope for them after they die!" Well, God told the Israelites in Judges 10:13-16 that he would deliver the Israelites no more, but he changed his mind after they repented (or at least appeared to do so). Why should we assume that God's absolutely inflexible about his words?

At the same time, it's important to understand that this is all speculation. Maybe "eternal punishment" literally does mean "eternal punishment." One thing that gets on my nerves about universalists is that they are SO dogmatic. In many cases, universalism practically is their religion. One of my relatives bases many of his beliefs on the idea that "God will convert everybody anyhow."

That's a lot of weight to place on a doctrine that's not explicitly in the Bible! The Bible doesn't put near the amount of emphasis on post-mortem salvation that its adherents do (actually, the Bible doesn't even seem to mention it). All I'm saying is that there might be some window of hope in the Scriptures for those who die in an unsaved state, so we shouldn't completely despair if that happens to our friends or loved ones.

But we shouldn't play with God either, for the Bible talks a lot about punishment. And a huge part of our witness should be warning people to flee from the wrath to come.

Jephthah Didn't Have to Do It!

For my weekly quiet time last night, I was listening to a good sermon by Steve Mays entitled Ephraim's Obnoxious Attitude. It was on Judges 11-12, the story of Jephthah.

What was good about it was that Mays didn't try to justify Jephthah's actions--regarding his daughter or his harsh treatment of the complaining Ephraimites. Rather, he stated that Jephthah didn't handle either situation as well as he should.

Mays affirmed that, if Jephthah had known his Torah, he would have realized that he didn't need to sacrifice his daughter. Leviticus 27, after all, allows Israelites to redeem what they've vowed to the LORD. And the Torah also bans human sacrifice (Exodus 13:13; Leviticus 18:21; 20:2-5).

In a lot of the sermons and commentaries that I encountered, there was a sense that Jephthah knowingly vowed to perform a human sacrifice. Jephthah said to God, "If you will give the Ammonites into my hand, then whoever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return victorious from the Ammonites, shall be the LORD's, to be offered up by me as a burnt offering" (Judges 11:30-21 NRSV). "What could possibly come out of Jephthah's house to greet him?," commentators ask. "A cow? A sheep? No! Jephthah expected a person." The problem was that he didn't think his daughter would be that person. According to such exegetes, Jephthah was anticipating one of his slaves to come out of the door. Bummer!

Of course, I know what a lot of biblical scholars will say: "We don't know if Leviticus was written before the Jephthah story," or "the Bible speaks with different voices on human sacrifice." But, homiletically speaking, Mays does well to highlight the value of God's word in providing guidance to us. Without God's word, we are left to our own devices on how to please God. And, in the words of that hackneyed cliche from Alcoholics Anonymous, "Your own best thinking is what got you here" (in trouble, that is).

What's interesting is that, in Jewish rabbinic tradition, there are similar views that Jephthah did not have to go through with his vow. Here are some quotes from the online Jewish Encyclopedia article on JEPHTHAH:

"He is classed with the fools who do not distinguish between vows (Eccl. R. iv. 7); he was one of the three men (Ta'an. 4a), or according to other authorities one of the four men (Gen. R. lx. 3), who made imprudent vows, but he was the only one who had occasion to deplore his imprudence. According to some commentators, among whom were Kimchi and Levi b. Gershom, Jephthah only kept his daughter in seclusion. But in Targ. Yer. to Judges xi. 39 and the Midrash it is taken for granted that Jephthah immolated his daughter on the altar, which is regarded as a criminal act; for he might have applied to Phinehas to absolve him from his vow. But Jephthah was proud: 'I, a judge of Israel, will not humiliate myself to my inferior.' Neither was Phinehas, the high priest, willing to go to Jephthah. Both were punished: Jephthah died by an unnatural decaying of his body; fragments of flesh fell from his bones at intervals, and were buried where they fell, so that his body was distributed in many places (comp. Judges xii. 7, Hebr.). Phinehas was abandoned by the Holy Spirit (Gen. R. l.c.).

"The Rabbis concluded also that Jephthah was an ignorant man, else he would have known that a vow of that kind is not valid; according to R. Johanan, Jephthah had merely to pay a certain sum to the sacred treasury of the Temple in order to be freed from the vow; according to R. Simeon ben Lachish, he was free even without such a payment (Gen. R. l.c.; comp. Lev. R. xxxvii. 3). According to Tan., Behukkotai, 7, and Midrash Haggadah to Lev. xxvii. 2, even when Jephthah made the vow God was irritated against him: 'What will Jephthah do if an unclean animal comes out to meet him?' Later, when he was on the point of immolating his daughter, she inquired, 'Is it written in the Torah that human beings should be brought as burnt offerings?' He replied, 'My daughter, my vow was, 'whatsoever cometh forth of the doors of my house.' She answered, 'But Jacob, too, vowed that he would give to Yhwh the tenth part of all that Yhwh gave him (Gen. xxviii. 22); did he sacrifice any of his sons?' But Jephthah remained inflexible. His daughter then declared that she would go herself to the Sanhedrin to consult them about the vow, and for this purpose asked her father for a delay of two months (comp. Judges xi. 37). The Sanhedrin, however, could not absolve her father from the vow, for God made them forget the Law in order that Jephthah should be punished for having put to death 42,000 Ephraimites (Judges xii. 6)."

Jewish tradition is rather unfavorable to Jephthah. You see the "Jephthah didn't know his Torah" line, but, even when he was confronted with the Torah, he stubbornly refused to abandon his vow. His pride led him to disregard the Torah's nuances and its humanitarian elements. The fact that his pride was religious didn't make it any better. And, like Mays, Jewish tradition doesn't care much for Jephthah's slaughter of 42,000 Ephraimites either, even if they did threaten to burn down his house.

A lot of the Christian sermons I heard are more favorable to Jephthah. Their reason is that he makes the hall of faith in Hebrews 11:32, so he must have done something right. And so some see Jephthah as a man who kept his word--who set his mind on something and did it. In a world where many of us don't fulfill our resolutions, that's pretty admirable. But Jewish tradition highlights where it can be downright foolish in certain circumstances!

What do Christians do with Jephthah's sacrifice of his daughter? Some believe that he offered her as a burnt offering. Many contend, however, that he simply made her a lifelong virgin, since Judges 11:39 emphasizes that she had never slept with a man. In those days, a woman becoming a virgin was somewhat like death, since childbearing was a huge function of womanhood. Plus, when Hannah dedicated Samuel to the LORD, she didn't exactly offer him up on an altar (I Samuel 1), so maybe that's not what Jephthah did when he gave his daughter to God.

There are all sorts of positions. But I appreciated Mays' take on the issue: We're really stumbling in the dark without the light of God's word! Actually, we're stumbling around when we're left to our own devices, period! Because of my black and white thinking, I need others to tell me what my options are. Otherwise, I jump to conclusions, or I see my choices as limited, or I just plain act unwisely. And that's the way it was with Jephthah: he didn't know his Torah, so he was unaware of his options.

When Did These Characters Live?

The Book of Judges has a strange phenomenon: there are characters who crop up, and they share the same names with their places of residence and people from the Book of Numbers.

First of all, there's Jair. In Judges 10:3-4, we read that Jair was a judge from Gilead, whose well-off sons lived in Havvoth-Jair.

But Jair is first mentioned in Numbers 32:40-41: "so Moses gave Gilead to Machir son of Manasseh, and he settled there. Jair son of Manasseh went and captured their villages, and renamed them Havvoth-jair" (NRSV). In one tradition, Jair seems to live in the time of Moses, since he was taking the Transjordanean land that Moses permitted to the half tribe of Manasseh (Joshua 13:30).

Second, there's Gilead. Gilead is the father of Jephthah, and he lives in (you guessed it) Gilead (Judges 11:1-2). Now, with Jair, you can probably make the case that him being the "son of Manasseh" means he's just descended from Manasseh, instead of being a direct son (see I Chronicles 2:22-23). But you really can't say that about Gilead, since Judges 11:1-2 says that Gilead had Jephthah with a prostitute.

And Gilead also shows up in Numbers. According to Numbers 26:29, Gilead was Manasseh's grandson. And he too is associated with (guess where?) the land of Gilead.

The problem is that we can't assume that Jair and Gilead lived for three hundred years, the approximate time between the Israelite conquest of Canaan and the period of the Judges (see Judges 11:26). These weren't the days of Methuseleh! Moses died at age 120 (Deuteronomy 34:7), and Caleb thought he was old when he was 85 (Joshua 14:10).

One solution is to say that they're different people. And that's plausible, for there are many people who have the same name. Plus, Luke 1:61 records the Jewish custom of naming people after relatives. And so if a woman who lives in Gilead has a son, what better name is there for him than "Gilead"?

But could it be that there are different traditions about the same person? In the movie Big Fish, a man tells his son tall tales that are based on his own experiences. One story is about a witch he encountered when he was a kid. He looked in the witch's eye and saw his future death, and that gave him comfort throughout his life (since he knew how he'd go). Well, it turns out that he had some of his details mixed up, for the witch was actually a woman he met in his adulthood. And she was not a witch when he first met her--she just degenerated to that point long after he helped her (and rejected her advances). And so the man had a single character in his mind, but he placed her in the wrong time frame.

Could there have been different stories about the founders of Gilead and Havvoth-Jair? I don't know. One argument against that is there are parts of Judges that presume the Conquest stories. Jephthah mentions a few of them to the king of Ammon in Judges 11. So it would make sense that the author/compiler of Judges believes that the Israelites took the land of Canaan in the Conquest. And that would include Jair and Gilead's taking of the Transjordan.

Are God's Words Absolute?

Many fundamentalists, evangelicals, and conservative Christians act like the Bible's words are absolute, with no flexibility whatsoever. When they read that blasphemy against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, they take that to mean that it will never be forgiven (ever). They are also absolutist on hell. "The Bible is clear that non-Christians will burn in hell forever and ever," they say. "There is no wiggle room, no second chance in the afterlife, no hope for the lost after death." It's hard to believe that, especially when you're trying to comfort people who've lost unsaved loved ones.

Such a view offends many people's sensitivities about God. George MacDonald, whom C.S. Lewis called his "master," speculated that God tries to ease the sufferings of those in hell. For MacDonald, a loving God does not sit back and allow people to be hopelessly tormented. He is love, after all.

Judges 10:13-16 makes me wonder how absolute we should be in our approach to the Bible. The passages states the following:

"[God said to Israel, 'Y]ou have abandoned me and worshiped other gods; therefore I will deliver you no more. Go and cry to the gods whom you have chosen; let them deliver you in the time of your distress.' And the Israelites said to the LORD, 'We have sinned; do to us whatever seems good to you; but deliver us this day!' So they put away the foreign gods from among them and worshiped the LORD; and he could no longer bear to see Israel suffer."

God said he would deliver Israel no more. Yet, he changed his mind after Israel repented, and he spared her out of his love for her: he couldn't bear to see her suffer.

But God said he would deliver Israel no more! Where's the flexibility in those words? Can you find any hope in what God says? It looks pretty bleak! But God turns out to be more flexible in his actions.

Similarly, the biblical passages about blasphemy against the Holy Spirit and hell also seem hopeless and bleak. But should we see them as absolute? Should we allow them to deprive us of hope?

At the same time, do we want to say that God doesn't say what he means, and mean what he says? Do we want to rob God's warnings of any teeth, giving sinners an excuse not to take them seriously?

Another View on Judges 8

I often submit my blog posts to Helium, a web site for wannabe writers (like yours truly). You can write an article under a topic that's already on the Helium site, and that will get it published immediately.

Well, I was searching to see if anyone had started a topic on Gideon, the subject of my last post. I noticed that someone wrote an article entitled, Bible study: Judges 8:4-17. And so I cut and pasted my Gideon post under that article.

The person who started the topic was Mary Walker, and her article is beautiful. She begins by greeting her readers warmly, and then she launches into her Scripture lesson:

"When God had delivered Midian into Gideon's hand, Gideon and his three hundred men were faint, but still pursuing them when they came to the Jordan and passed over. And, also the men of Succoth and Penuel were unhospitable when Gideon and his men asked for bread. (JUDGES 8:4-17)

"What can we learn as Christians today from Gideon's example? Well, Just like Gideon in the battle against Midian, We all get faint on our quest to pursue our spirituality, but we must keep pursuing. And like the men of Succoth and Penuel, The devil will throw unhospitable agents your way to upbraid you, but you must be strong like Gideon and his three hundred men, and with God's help win the battle. (JUDGES 8:4-17)"

Finally, she tells us that she enjoyed writing her article, and she wishes her readers love and peace.

Many things intrigue me: the humility that I see in her article, my sense that she is communicating a message of encouragement that she received from the Lord, etc., etc. But what catches my eye is that she applies the text in a way that's totally different from my application, and yet we're both right.

She portrays Gideon as the good guy--as someone who keeps pursuing even though he is hungry and encounters inhospitable people along the way. By contrast, I said that Gideon was on the path to the dark side in that particular episode. He forgot where he came from, and he failed to show mercy to people with flaws that he once had (i.e., fear, lack of faith).

Yet, despite our differences, our messages are both valid. I can understand why she sees what she sees in the chapter, even though I organize its details in a different way. And both of our interpretations encourage faith, hope, and love, and that's what's truly important.

Isn't the Bible awesome? You can have two different interpretations, each of which contains an edifying truth.

Gideon, Dr. Dobson, and Darth Vader

Gideon's name means "hacker." And that's what Gideon did--he hacked at idolatry in Israel. Maybe he got that name after he tore down the altar of Baal (Judges 6:25-27). Or perhaps his name is a literary device, in that the author names him according to what he does in the story.

I'd like to think that Gideon's father had a sense of his son's destiny. It's kind of like this one scene in Dale Buss' Family Man: The Biography of Dr. James Dobson, in which James Dobson, Sr. predicted on his death bed in 1977 that his son would reach millions. And sure enough, his son did, for Focus on the Family has touched multitudes throughout the world, from all sorts of cultures.

There is one obvious difference between James Dobson, Sr. and Gideon's father, Joash: Jim, Sr. was a devout Nazarene preacher, whereas Joash was not exactly the most committed Yahwist. Joash may have believed in the God of Israel on some level, for, in a time of rampant Baalism, Gideon was familiar with God's activity at the Exodus (Judges 6:13). Gideon possibly heard the Exodus story from his father. But Joash owned a big altar that was specifically for Baal worship. Did he truly believe in Baalism, or was he just trying to fit in? He didn't display a zealous desire to kill Gideon after his son had torn down his altar, for he simply said that Baal would work it out. The townspeople cared more about Joash's altar than Joash did! Was Joash trying to save his son? Or did he actually feel that piety towards Baal meant letting Baal fight his own battles? I don't know. Maybe he wasn't sure what he believed.

Even if Joash had a sense that his son would do something big, Gideon didn't feel that way. When God promised to defeat the Midianites, Gideon responded in disbelief: "But sir, how can I deliver Israel? My clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my family" (Judges 6:15, NRSV). But Gideon's clan was not the weakest. His father had bulls and servants (Judges 6:25, 27), so his family was obviously quite well-off! In Judges 8, the Midianite kings say that Gideon and his brothers look like sons of a king (v 18). But, for some reason, Gideon viewed himself as insignificant.

Gideon was very timid and fearful, for he needed God's constant reassurance. He gave God test after test to make absolutely sure that God wanted him to fight the Midianites, and God was patient with him through his lack of faith. When Gideon was especially fearful about attacking the enemy, God allowed him to hear a Midianite's dream about his (Gideon's) impending victory (Judges 7:10-11). That gave Gideon confidence! God was compassionate to Gideon in the midst of his weaknesses.

The problems occurred after his victory, as Gideon struggled with certain temptations. Gideon displays a few contradictions in Judges 8. On the one hand, Gideon demonstrates humility and love. In vv 1-3, we see that Gideon could use the art of diplomacy when he needed to do so. When the Ephraimites were whining that Gideon hadn't invited them to the battle, Gideon put on an "aw shucks" demeanor and appealed to the tribe's vanity (Judges 8:1-3). Maybe he sincerely valued the Ephraimites' contribution to the war effort, for they had captured Oreb and Zeeb, the Midianite captains. Or perhaps he'd say anything to get the Ephraimites off his case and prevent a civil war. Either way, he valued Israelite unity, and he humbled himself to achieve it.

When he captured the Midianite kings, Zebah and Zalmunnah, he boldly confronted them about an atrocity at Tabor, in which they had slaughtered Gideon's brothers. Gideon tells them, "They were my brothers, the sons of my mother; as the LORD lives, if you had saved them alive, I would not kill you" (Judges 7:19). If not for their atrocity, Gideon would have shown mercy to the Midianite kings.

On the other hand, Gideon could be quite brutal and merciless. In Judges 8, when the people of Succoth and Penuel refuse to feed Gideon's exhausted army because he has not yet captured the Midianite kings, Gideon promises to trample their flesh on thorns and briers, which is a horribly painful way to die. And, after he catches the kings, that's exactly what he does. According to my trusty E-Sword commentaries, the people of Succoth and Penuel were afraid to support Gideon because they feared Midianite retaliation. They weren't sure Gideon would win! What would happen to them if they supported Gideon and he lost?

Sure, their character was flawed. It's better to stand with God than to base one's position on which way the winds happen to be blowing. Plus, maybe they should've known that God was on their side, especially after Gideon had beaten numerous Midianites with only 300 men. But they were timid! And Gideon was timid before he won those battles. He could've shown mercy to the people of Succoth and Penuel, for David didn't kill Nabal when he rudely refused to provide for his men (I Samuel 25). In the course of the story, Gideon grew from a timid man who lacked faith, into a bold and resolute leader. But he started to forget where he came from, and he didn't cut people slack when they had similar faults to what he once had.

At the end of the story, the Israelites offer to make Gideon king, but he politely refuses. At the same time, he requests that they give him gold from their plunder, which he uses to make an ephod. An ephod was an article of clothing that was used to seek God's will (I Samuel 23:9-12; 30:7-8), but it could also be a sign of civil power (I Chronicles 15:27). Either Gideon is setting up an alternative to God's appointed sanctuary (in Shechem), or he is claiming that he possesses authority as a leader. And, strangely enough, he names one of his sons "Abimelech," which means "My father, the king." But I thought you didn't want to be king, Gideon! As one preacher I heard commented, Gideon was starting to believe his own PR.

Gideon reminds me somewhat of Darth Vader. Anakin Skywalker had a special destiny, which he knew about from his childhood. But as he became more and more aware of his talents, he started to display a certain arrogance. Sure, he (like Gideon) had a sense of morality and justice. He was angry when Count Dooku had killed all those jedis, and his descent into the dark side came from an attempt to prevent his wife's death. But his vanity led him to become evil, and he soon destroyed anyone who got in his way.

Obviously, there are differences between Gideon and Darth Vader. Anakin Skywalker was always rather confident, even as a child. Gideon, however, was timid and had low self-esteem. And that may have led to Gideon's moral descent. He went through most of his life feeling like a nothing, and so when he finally became a something, he wanted to keep on feeling special. He liked the money and the power and the women that could come with success. (Some have argued that Bill Clinton fits this profile). He relished being God's right hand man, carrying out God's vengeance against anyone who would not support him. He still held on to some sense of morality, but it got to the point where his "morality" became all talk, as when he said that he didn't want to be king, but proceeded to set himself up on a pedestal anyway. And mercy was rapidly becoming a distant memory for him.

There are lessons here for many of us. I was thinking to myself today (on the way to church, no less), "Man, if I get into a position of power, and such-and-such a person comes to me for help, I'll tell him to go jump in a lake!" That's somewhat like Gideon: he was hurt by the people of Succoth and Penuel, and he chose to retaliate against them once he became a success. We should always remember where we came from, yet that should inspire us to show mercy to people, not hurt them back. God cut Gideon some slack when he was afraid, and Gideon should have done the same for Succoth and Penuel.

Pentecost 2008

Today is the day of Pentecost, at least for a lot of Armstrongites. Most Jews celebrate it on another day.

Here's the deal: Leviticus 23:11-16 tells the Israelites to present a wave sheaf offering to God on the day after the Sabbath. According to the passage, Pentecost occurs fifty days after that.

The debate within first century Judaism was, "Which Sabbath is Leviticus 23:11-16 talking about? Exactly when should we start counting to fifty?"

The Pharisees interpreted the Sabbath to be the first day of unleavened bread, which was a day of rest (Leviticus 23:7). Consequently, they placed Pentecost fifty days after Nisan 16, meaning it could fall on any day of the week, depending on the year. The Sadducees, by contrast, took the Sabbath to mean the weekly Sabbath during the Days of Unleavened Bread, so their Pentecost fell fifty days after the following day, Sunday. For them, therefore, Pentecost always fell on a Sunday. And the Qumran community started counting the Sunday after the Days of Unleavened Bread.

And so most observant Jews today follow the Pharisaic method of counting Pentecost. Armstrongites do it the Sadduccean way. And I don't know if anyone observes the Qumran approach. At Catholic mass this morning, I learned that Catholics consider today to be the fourth Sunday after Pentecost, meaning that their Pentecost was four weeks ago. But, to be honest, I don't know on what basis their Pentecost occurs when it does.

I once learned about the Pharisaic method of counting Pentecost the hard way. I had to return all these books to the Hebrew Union College library, and I put them in a movable bag, the type you haul around at airports. I didn't have a car, so I had to drag that heavy bag of library books up a hill. When I finally arrived at Hebrew Union College, I saw a sign that said the HUC library was closed for Shavuot (Pentecost). I was mad!

One advantage to observing the Sadduccean Pentecost is that I get to tie certain Old Testament rituals to Christ. According to Sadduccean reckoning, the wave sheaf offering occurred on the Sunday during the Days of Unleavened Bread. Well, guess when Christ rose from the dead? Christ was crucified on the Passover, and he rose on the Sunday during the festival (or, for Armstrongites, he ascended to the Father on that day, only to come back down and appear to his disciples). So Christ is not only the Passover lamb. He is the wave sheaf offering as well.

Personally, there's a lot that I don't understand about Pentecost. How is the wave sheaf offering thematically connected to the festival that occurs fifty days later? I always assumed that the wave sheaf offering was the first fruit of a harvest that would occur in fifty days. But that doesn't exactly work. For one, the wave sheaf offering was of barley, whereas the offering fifty days later was of wheat (or so I've read). And so the barley harvest didn't occur fifty days after the wave sheaf offering. And, second, the offering that occurred on Pentecost was also an offering of first fruits. That may be why there's a connection between the day of the wave sheaf offering and Pentecost: both were days to offer the first fruits of a later harvest (barley and wheat, respectively).

In Old Testament Israel, offering the first fruits was a way to honor God as provider. In a Mishnah class, I learned that the rationale of the biblical author was that, if the Israelites presented God with their first fruits, God would then bless them with a bountiful harvest. That kind of sounds like the prosperity Gospel to me, but that very well may have been how they saw it.

Interestingly, I encountered the wave sheaf offering in my weekly quiet time on the Book of Judges. Yesterday, I read Judges 7, in which Gideon overhears the Midianites recounting a dream. In it, a barley cake rolls down a hill and strikes a tent, causing it to collapse. The dream means that Gideon will overthrow the Midianites, but why's it have a barley cake? According to Rashi, the cake symbolizes "the merit of the Omer sacrificed on Passover."

For Rashi, God blesses the Israelites because they offered the wave sheaf. In his mind, God may have done so because he was pleased that the idolatrous Israelites were finally making some effort to turn to him. But the ritual by itself related to Israel's acceptance before God, for Leviticus 23:11 states, "He shall raise the sheaf before the LORD, that you may find acceptance."

So what can I as a Christian learn from all this? I think that the New Testament tries to interpret the wave sheaf and the feast of Pentecost in a Christian sense. Paul calls Christ the first fruits because Jesus was the first to rise from the dead (I Corinthians 15:20, 23). Because Jesus rose, those who believe in him will also rise and receive immortality. And Jesus as the wave sheaf offering has brought about our acceptance before God, for our justification depends not only on his death, but on his resurrection as well (Romans 4:25; I Corinthians 15:17). Our blessings and our spiritual victory as Christians depend on the merit of our wave sheaf offering, Jesus Christ.

But, fifty days after Christ's resurrection, another batch of first fruits was offered to God. The church was born on Pentecost, as God baptized his disciples with the Holy Spirit and enabled his church to expand (Acts 2). And the New Testament is clear that Christians are first fruits (II Thessalonians 2:13; James 1:18; Revelation 14:4).

What's this mean, exactly? Christians are the first fruits of what? Armstrongites will probably bring in their second chance doctrine, the belief that God will offer all people a chance to receive Christ after their resurrection (unless they're hopelessly wicked). In that scenario, Christians are the first batch of believers, but there will be another batch in the second resurrection. I don't see much explicit evidence for this in the Bible, but I won't object if God does it this way.

How else could Christians be the first fruits? Maybe they're first fruits in the sense that God will bring others to Christ on this side of the second coming. Or perhaps they are the first fruits of God's new creation, which will one day entail the transformation of the entire cosmos (see Romans 8:19-23). Christians are the first stage of something remarkable that God is doing.

And so I wish you all a happy Pentecost, if you are celebrating today. I actually learned a lot from writing this post. I hope that you too are edified.

Shamgar vs. Deborah

Shamgar is a Samson-like character who appears in the Book of Judges. In Judges 3:31, we read that he "killed six hundred of the Philistines with an oxgoad [and] delivered Israel" (NRSV). Because Shamgar is not a Hebrew name, he was possibly a foreigner. So God may have used a non-Israelite to beat up on the Philistines and liberate his people.

But the Shamgar Administration was far from perfect. In her famous song, Deborah sings:

"In the days of Shamgar son of Anath, in the days of Jael, caravans ceased and travelers kept to the byways. The peasantry prospered in Israel, they grew fat on plunder, because you arose, Deborah, arose as a mother in Israel" (Judges 5:6-7).

According to Deborah, the streets were not safe in the days of Shamgar, but peace and prosperity arose when Deborah came to power.

I see at least two issues here:

1. Shamgar was an outsider who got his kicks out of beating up on the Philistines. But did he care about Israel as much as an Israelite would? Could he be as concerned about the hard work of governing Israel and maintaining peace within her borders? Maybe not.

This reminds me of what Paul talks about in I Corinthians 6:1-8. There, Paul criticizes the Corinthian Christians for taking one another to secular courts. As far as Paul was concerned, the church should settle disputes among Christians, not the non-Christian authorities. Paul wanted to keep Christian governance within the church family.

On the one hand, this makes sense. The church leadership would hopefully care for each party of a dispute, so it would arrive at a resolution that is loving for everyone. It wouldn't let a Christian rot in jail, unless it deems that the loving thing to do.

Moreover, an outsider may look at injustice within the church, but would he care enough to really do anything about it? There's a possibility that he'd be a detached observer, not someone with genuine concern.

On the other hand, when disputes are kept within the family, things can easily get swept under the rug. There are families that try to ignore child molestation within its ranks, so it's a good thing that we have outside institutions, such as child services. The same can also occur with churches, which can sweep injustice under the rug rather than actually dealing with it.

And so it's a good thing for families to settle issues as families, and yet that approach can also have a dark side.

2. Most of the evangelical sermons I've heard on Deborah have a similar theme: the men didn't step forward as leaders, so God used a woman (gasp!). After all, wasn't Barak a wimp when he asked Deborah to accompany him to battle? Male leadership must have been lacking at the time, or so the argument runs.

And there may be a point in such reasoning. When Isaiah 3:12 says, "My people--children are their oppressors, and women rule over them," I don't think the author is presenting an ideal situation, as far as he's concerned. So I can picture the author of Judges having a male chauvinist view on Deborah.

And, yet, the Shamgar vs. Deborah theme of Judges 5:6-7 serves as a counter-weight to such a proposition. Shamgar was about as alpha male as you could get, but his leadership was still deficient. Israel needed the nurturing, motherly hand of Deborah to give her order.

Yet, ironically, Deborah does male things. She fights battles, after all. She restores peace to Israel, making her a law-and-order sort of politician. Pundits often call the Republicans the "Daddy Party," and the Democrats the "Mommy Party." The "Daddy Party" protects the country from enemies and gets tough on criminals, whereas the "Mommy Party" is compassionate towards the poor, the needy, and everyone else. Some may call Deborah a Democrat because she is a mother to Israel. Yet, she does some "Daddy Party" things.

God can use outsiders to help his people, yet there is something special about insiders assisting his body in love. And God can go beyond a male patriarchal system, in a way that is not condescending to females.