Judges, Chapters 2 & 3

Chapter 2

An angel comes down (okay, it's Jesus, at least according to Jerry), and tells the Israelites that they haven't been obeying god fully. Apparently, they haven't destroyed all their altars, so he's going to stop massacring all of them and leave the Israelites to their fate.

The Israelites start serving Baal, a fertility goddess known across the Middle East. This angers god, who causes their enemies to attack. He also appoints a series of judges, or high priests/warrior kings, to maintain the faith.

Chapter 3

The story of the left-handed assassin that kills a king on the toilet, then escapes through the drop-pit! Hey, at least it isn't another 20 massacres. Just a couple.

Anyway, when the chapter has begun, god has left some tribes in Israel because he can't defeat their more sophisticated weaponry to test their faith. The Israelites start to intermarry with the locals and they worship their gods, which pisses off the "real" god, so he sells them to Chushanrishathaim, king of Mesopotamia, who enslaves them for 8 years.

But then Othniel is filled with the spirit of the lord. Not the happy-clappy kind you see in charismatic churches, where people put their hands in the air and dance around and speak in tongues. That's much scarier than what happens here. Othniel just goes to war and frees them. They're peaceful for the ensuing 40 years, until Othniel dies and they revert to sinning again.

This time, god sends the Moabite king Eglon to defeat them and enslave them for 18 years. This time their deliverer is Ehud the lefty. He goes to Eglon, whom the bible judgementally informs us is fat, and says he has a gift. In fact, he has a daggar strapped to his thigh. I'll bet he has to strap it down. Eglon refuses to see him at first, but eventually he finagles his way into the king's summer parlor (v. 20), which according to my Uncensored Bible, is a mistranslation of toilet by telling him he has a secret message. The king sends away his attendants, who were probably happy to go. Ehud stabs the king, who, as often happens when the body is subjected to sudden trauma, shits himself (yes, like a Freudian 5 year old in his anal stage, the bible makes a point of giving us the scatological details). Either because of disgust or because it's too far into the fat, Ehud leaves the knife in the king and makes his escape. But the door is locked from the inside! How does he escape? Well, according to my Uncensored Bible, he goes down the hatch, modern plumbing being a distant dream. He leaves unnoticed, because who wants to look in a king's pit? and the king's servants think he's just in there for an extra long session. Much like when the other king, Elvis met a similar fate, they wait quite a while before searching out a key, only to discover the regicide.

Ehud is long gone by then, and rallies his army to attack in the confusion. They kill 10 000 Moabites, and have peace for 80 years.

The next judge is Shamgar, who kills 600 Philistines with an ox-goad, a stick used to drive oxen when ploughing.

Judges, Chapter 1

Umpteen massacres and a wedding. So romantic.

Judah and Simeon decide to try and rid Canaan of its pesky inhabitants. They kill 10 000 Perizzites and Canaanites at Bezek. Someone named Adonibezek flees and has his thumbs and big toes cut off as a result. This apparently is a revenge strategy, because he once cut the thumbs and toes off 70 kings and made them eat scraps from under his table. He is sent to Jerusalem, where he dies.

Next, the fighting force goes to Jerusalem, where they kill everybody and burn the city. Judah then goes and fights the peoples of the valleys around Hebron and turns to the city of Debir. Yes, we already heard this story. Caleb offers his daughter Achsah to anyone who can defeat the city of Karjathsepher and Othniel succeeds. She asks her father for a field and spring of water and he gives it to her. It seems like at least one of those passages could have been cut without losing any narrative clarity. In fact, it would have made the whole thing clearer.

In a weird interlude, Moses' heretofore unknown Kenite father in law head out into the wilderness. Judah's people then go kill more Canaanites. They take over three more cities, but are unable to conquer a tribe that has iron chariots. So in this little game of rock-paper-scissors we've got going here, iron chariots beat god, god beats unicorns. I'm hoping unicorns will eventually turn out to beat iron chariots. And also wondering why we don't worship chariots, since they're clearly the superior beings here.

Then, even though we've been told just a few verses ago that Jerusalem has been defeated and burnt to the ground, we find out the Benjaminites can't take it.

Joseph's people go to Bethel and a man comes to meet them. He agrees to show them the entrance to the city in exchange for his life.

There are a bunch of other failed conquests in all the other areas as well but it doesn't seem interesting enough to list them here.

Joshua, Chapters 13-19

The division of land in Canaan, according to tribe. Much better than reading this blog entry would be to mosey on over to The Brick Testament and visualize it. Trust me, you are not missing much.

Chapter 13

Joshua is getting old, which god rudely points out, then tells him to divide up the land by lot. The Reubenites and Gadites have already got their share in Jordan, and only half of Massaneh is here, the rest having also opted for Jordan. The rest of the chapter is the delineation of their territories.

Chapter 14

85 year old Caleb, the only other survivor of those 40 years in the desert, asks for, and receives, Hebron.

Chapter 15

The borders of Judah's territory are named. Caleb goes to Hebron and discovers a group of pesky Anakim, the giants that apparently did not die along with everything else in Noah's flood, though you'd never know it if you read Jerry Falwell's bible, living in the town of Debir. He offers his daughter as a reward to anyone who can conquer them. Othniel, one of his nephews, does it. As the girl is leaving, she asks for, and is granted, a field and some springs. We then get a 42-verse long list of the villages in Judah's territory that not even I am masochistic enough to read. In the last verse, we find out the Jebusites are still living in their territory, despite god's promise.

Chapter 16

The borders of Joseph's territory. We find out in the last verse that a tribe of Canaanites still lives in Gezer.

Chapter 17

The tribe of Manasseh gets its due. The daughters of Zelophehad, who wanted inheritance rights in Numbers, come back to ask for their fair share and get it. The children of Joseph complain about only getting one share, despite being a great people (v. 14), so Joshua tells them to conquer the Perizzites who are still on one of their mountains, and to cut down the trees, and promises they'll drive out the Canaanites, despite their iron chariots.

Chapter 18

The seven remaining tribes are told to go out and survey the land, which will be divided among them by lots. The draw is held in Shiloh. Then we get a description of Benjamin's territory. Joshua gets a city.

Chapter 19

The other tribes get their booty. The tribe of Dan doesn't get a big enough share, so they fight the people of Lesham for their territory and win.