LITMIR.BIZ

Notice the interweaving of the names of deities that literarily demonstrates the Israelites’ syncretism: “Yahweh” in A, C, D, C', and A'; and “Baal(s)”/“gods”/“Ashtaroth” in B, D, B'. “Israel” is symmetrically found in A and A'. Chisholm observes that the eight wayyiqtol verbs in 2:11–13 that depict Israel’s evildoing forms a pattern: one (2:11a, summary) and seven (2:11b–13, details), suggesting a comprehensive and thoroughgoing apostasy.138 So the central element, D (2:12b), though stunning, is not surprising. It was not simply a memory lapse that the Israelites suffered, in forgetting Yahweh and his great deeds (2:10); neither was it merely an inadvertent straying from the straight and narrow. Rather, it was a deliberate going after other gods and worshiping them!139 This was treason!

Not knowing Yahweh firsthand, Yahweh is only “the God of their fathers” to the current generation (2:12)—suggesting distance. But the false gods they were running after now were “the gods of the peoples who were around them” (2:12)—suggesting greater proximity.140

The Canaanites, “the inhabitants of the land” (1:32–33), were practiced at working the land and attributed their success to the worship of these gods. The new generation of Israelites, who had known only desert life, had no such skills, but their survival now depended on adapting to their new situation as quickly as possible. What else could they do but learn from their Canaanite neighbors? It was the way of “common sense” and “necessity.” It was not the way of Yahweh, however; it was the triumph of pragmatics over principle, and a failure to trust the God who had proven himself capable of meeting their needs in the wilderness, and would surely have done so again in the land he had given them if only they had trusted him to do so. But they did not; they abandoned him . . . .141

In the chiastic scheme shown above, first, human actions are depicted (2:11–13): “did evil,” “served” (×2), “forsook” (×2), “went after,” “bowed,” and “angered.”142 Then divine actions, in response to the human ones, are described (2:14–15): “burned,” “gave,” “sold,” “was against.” “Doing evil in the sight of Yahweh” (2:11a) frequently indicates idolatrous practices in the OT: Deut 4:25; 9:18 (referring to the golden calf episode); 17:2–3; 31:29 (where “work of your hands” = idols); and Jdg 2:11; 3:7; 10:6 (though the element occurs in all the narratives in Judges, only here is evildoing specifically linked to idolatry). In several of these references, one also finds the verb “angering” with Yahweh as the subject (Jdg 2:12), also frequently linked with the idolatrous practices of his people (see Deut 4:25; 9:18; 31:29; 32:16, 21). Of course, doing “evil in the sight of Yahweh” is equivalent to each Israelite doing what is “good in his own sight” (Jdg 17:6; 21:25). And so Yahweh’s disgust and outrage at the progressively increasing Canaanization of his people is depicted in the repeated statement: “and the anger of Yahweh burned against Israel” (Jdg 2:12b, 14a; also 2:20a, and later in 3:8; 10:7), bespeaking deity’s emotional and personal involvement with his people. A direct discourse, later in 2:20–22, opens a window into Yahweh’s deep concern. Thus the whole scheme of punishment “is not caused by an automatic deed-consequence nexus.” Rather, it is a sequence of Israelites’ deed → Yahweh’s intense emotion → Israelites’ punishment. In other words, Yahweh has strong feelings towards, and an abiding personal involvement with, his people.143 His giving the Israelites—and selling them—into the “hands” of their enemies (2:14) is equated with the “hand” of Yahweh being against them for evil (2:15): the people fall from the divine “hand” into the human “hand.”144

Скачать книгу