Judges 19-21 ?
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The literal reading of the last three words of Ps 22:17 is indeed ׳כָּאֲרִׄי יָדַי֥ וָרַֽגְלי׃ like a lion my hands and my feet.
However that doesn't make any more sense in Hebrew than in English. Idiom requires that 'like a lion' be rendered:
[teeth (they)] have pierced. I can understand why the Jewish Publication Society prefers to render it literally since they obviously don't like the obvious reference to Jesus.
However that doesn't make any more sense in Hebrew than in English. Idiom requires that 'like a lion' be rendered:
[teeth (they)] have pierced. I can understand why the Jewish Publication Society prefers to render it literally since they obviously don't like the obvious reference to Jesus.
reminds me of Hosea & Gomer -- which is a picture of the Father, the Husband of Israel, the adulterous wife - to whom, as Jesus Christ, He goes to, to speak to her heart and redeem her.
what does that make the girl's father, in type? these are pictures of the love and mercy and judgement of the Lord, in shadow, revealed as the Messiah, aren't they?
what does that make the girl's father, in type? these are pictures of the love and mercy and judgement of the Lord, in shadow, revealed as the Messiah, aren't they?
as i understand Psalm 22 is double reference. much of it is speaking about Israel, and some of Christ - she is "the hind of the morning" ((the name/title of the psalm)) - perhaps they don't like the reference to themselves, either 
it is not Christ, the Lord God become flesh, who is forsaken, in v. 1 - how can He forsake Himself? - He is singing this psalm on the cross because it is being fulfilled as He recites it, in the hearts of those around Him.
it is not Christ, the Lord God become flesh, who is forsaken, in v. 1 - how can He forsake Himself? - He is singing this psalm on the cross because it is being fulfilled as He recites it, in the hearts of those around Him.
Actually when you study the history of Israel, they were given warning after warning by the prophets that if they would not repent of their idolatry and disobedience, they would suffer terrible Divine judgments. So that was already prophesied by Moses and it came to pass.
What we do see in the book of Judges is an illustration of this Divine principle: Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
Israel had absolutely no excuse to go into the debauchery and evil deeds that are described in Judges (having been brought out of Egypt and taught directly by Moses and led by Joshua), and for which God sent their enemies against them over and over again.
So if you want to see Christ in Judges, what you see is Him applying the principle that when people sow the wind, they reap the whirlwind.
What we do see in the book of Judges is an illustration of this Divine principle: Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened.
Israel had absolutely no excuse to go into the debauchery and evil deeds that are described in Judges (having been brought out of Egypt and taught directly by Moses and led by Joshua), and for which God sent their enemies against them over and over again.
So if you want to see Christ in Judges, what you see is Him applying the principle that when people sow the wind, they reap the whirlwind.
yes, we know. God judges sin. sin is bad. it only takes 6 words to say that, but the Bible has a whole lot more words than that. why?
11 of the tribes - and who knows how much of the 12th tribe, apart from the sons of Belial in Gibeah - quite obviously know and agree with this, and were so fervently determined to rid the land of this wickedness that after inquiring of the Lord what to do, they almost exterminated an entire tribe, who stood up to defend the evil men that did this. i'm not sure if there's a good reason for you to lump all those hundreds of thousands of men who assembled before the LORD together and assume that they were all into debauchery and evil deeds; they seem to have been clearly opposed to that sort of thing - judging from the text.
which is to say i believe there's evidence that there is a lot more to this Biblical narrative, and the reason it is written for us, than "sin bad, fear God, not sin, or else"
but you didn't answer her question, and i'm curious to know too - do you see a correlation in this between the priest and his wife, and Israel and the Father? and what happened to the wife?
11 of the tribes - and who knows how much of the 12th tribe, apart from the sons of Belial in Gibeah - quite obviously know and agree with this, and were so fervently determined to rid the land of this wickedness that after inquiring of the Lord what to do, they almost exterminated an entire tribe, who stood up to defend the evil men that did this. i'm not sure if there's a good reason for you to lump all those hundreds of thousands of men who assembled before the LORD together and assume that they were all into debauchery and evil deeds; they seem to have been clearly opposed to that sort of thing - judging from the text.
which is to say i believe there's evidence that there is a lot more to this Biblical narrative, and the reason it is written for us, than "sin bad, fear God, not sin, or else"
but you didn't answer her question, and i'm curious to know too - do you see a correlation in this between the priest and his wife, and Israel and the Father? and what happened to the wife?
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if you study the history of Israel, you will find that they were given picture after picture after picture of Jesus Christ the Messiah, through prophets, through angels, through great signs, through the lives of men and women, through dreams, through judgement, through blessing, through captivity, through peace; they were they were given the express image of God Himself, dwelling among them, and they will continue to see the testifying of Him, and He will come again and then they will all know.
when studying the scripture i am looking for these images. the history of Israel is that they were given the scripture -- including the book of Judges chapters 19-21 -- scriptures which the Lord tells us to search, informing us that they testify of Him. if they had understood them they would have known Him - but they did not. they certainly understood that God judges sin. that is why hundreds of thousands of them rose up before YHWH. that is why they wept all night before Him.
all judgement is given to the Son by the Father: where then is the One who judges in this story? He's telling Judah to go up first, and He's omniscient and omnipotent. He's sending Judah to their death two days in a row. why???
what is this judgement from God? it is infinitely perfect, and absolutely holy!
how?
when studying the scripture i am looking for these images. the history of Israel is that they were given the scripture -- including the book of Judges chapters 19-21 -- scriptures which the Lord tells us to search, informing us that they testify of Him. if they had understood them they would have known Him - but they did not. they certainly understood that God judges sin. that is why hundreds of thousands of them rose up before YHWH. that is why they wept all night before Him.
all judgement is given to the Son by the Father: where then is the One who judges in this story? He's telling Judah to go up first, and He's omniscient and omnipotent. He's sending Judah to their death two days in a row. why???
what is this judgement from God? it is infinitely perfect, and absolutely holy!
how?
Stunnedbygrace,
I wanted to compliment you on your posts because in reading the thread it seemed like you were only trying to share your ideas on the matter, and did not fall into any kind of argument. (which is what I took the OP to be requesting). I wondered what portion of your comments to quote, but the "Great thread!" part kind of summed up the honest heart you showed throughout. Plus, the last part of this particular quote allows a chance to bless you with the reference to the scripture you were partially quoting.
Pro_25:2 It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter.
Love in Jesus
Kelby
I wanted to compliment you on your posts because in reading the thread it seemed like you were only trying to share your ideas on the matter, and did not fall into any kind of argument. (which is what I took the OP to be requesting). I wondered what portion of your comments to quote, but the "Great thread!" part kind of summed up the honest heart you showed throughout. Plus, the last part of this particular quote allows a chance to bless you with the reference to the scripture you were partially quoting.
Pro_25:2 It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter.
Love in Jesus
Kelby
My take on this: Judges 19-21 (Part 1) For me, these chapters are some of the hardest to read in the whole bible. Partly because of the savagery involved, and that the bible doesn't just mention it quickly and move on.. it kind of walks us through it. (Thank God he didn't give a play-by-play of that concubine's experience).
I'd also wondered whether these particular chapters even belonged in the bible because they have such a generally harsh/dark feel to them. They just seem so different from the surrounding texts and the bible in general. I'm not saying they shouldn't be in there. I'm just saying that's how they struck me...and I would have preferred they weren't in there. But they are. So I try not to avoid them.
Having said that...Here's how I currently see it:
I'd never taken the story to be an allegory to Christ, or to assign who represents who concerning the man, concubine, father-in-law, old man etc. Although I now believe we can see a bit of ourselves in ANY of the roles mentioned in the story.
I just took the Levite as simply "a guy" (in the church, obviously)...and the pre-story to be a simple explanation as to why he was traveling..and perhaps to give some humanity to the concubine...lest we think of her as a label instead of someone we can relate to… or even BE.
While traveling home, the Levite thought it best to avoid "the world" and wickedness therein (prudent, faithful thinking). So he makes the extra effort to find a place in Israel (the church)...only to find debauchery and wickedness there, too.
Everyone in town knows what is likely to happen and doesn't want to watch it happen again or get involved for fear of repercussions.. The old man being the one person who risks helping this clueless, naive traveler.
Then the bad stuff happens. Hidden under darkness, of course…(the church doesn’t want to do this stuff openly like the world...because we want to see ourselves as so much better than... them.)
The old man tries to help but, of course, he can’t.
So the Levite, now realizing the gravity of the situation, panics. And instead of facing the danger himself, sacrifices the one he loves. <--that’s worth some thought.
When it’s all over, the Levite, still in a state of shock (having no clue how to deal with what just happened) tries to go on like nothing happened. But he has the whole way home to think about it. I’m guessing his shock eventually turns to rage and he realizes he MUST tell others in order to fix it. So he cuts up his concubine to send as evidence too gruesome to ignore.
When the rest of Israel comes and asks what happened, notice that the Levite STILL can’t admit what REALLY happened...Jdg 20:5 And the men of Gibeah rose against me, and beset the house round about upon me by night, and thought to have slain me: and my concubine have they forced, that she is dead. <--they weren’t going to kill him. They were going to rape him.
(End of Part 1)...
I'd also wondered whether these particular chapters even belonged in the bible because they have such a generally harsh/dark feel to them. They just seem so different from the surrounding texts and the bible in general. I'm not saying they shouldn't be in there. I'm just saying that's how they struck me...and I would have preferred they weren't in there. But they are. So I try not to avoid them.
Having said that...Here's how I currently see it:
I'd never taken the story to be an allegory to Christ, or to assign who represents who concerning the man, concubine, father-in-law, old man etc. Although I now believe we can see a bit of ourselves in ANY of the roles mentioned in the story.
I just took the Levite as simply "a guy" (in the church, obviously)...and the pre-story to be a simple explanation as to why he was traveling..and perhaps to give some humanity to the concubine...lest we think of her as a label instead of someone we can relate to… or even BE.
While traveling home, the Levite thought it best to avoid "the world" and wickedness therein (prudent, faithful thinking). So he makes the extra effort to find a place in Israel (the church)...only to find debauchery and wickedness there, too.
Everyone in town knows what is likely to happen and doesn't want to watch it happen again or get involved for fear of repercussions.. The old man being the one person who risks helping this clueless, naive traveler.
Then the bad stuff happens. Hidden under darkness, of course…(the church doesn’t want to do this stuff openly like the world...because we want to see ourselves as so much better than... them.)
The old man tries to help but, of course, he can’t.
So the Levite, now realizing the gravity of the situation, panics. And instead of facing the danger himself, sacrifices the one he loves. <--that’s worth some thought.
When it’s all over, the Levite, still in a state of shock (having no clue how to deal with what just happened) tries to go on like nothing happened. But he has the whole way home to think about it. I’m guessing his shock eventually turns to rage and he realizes he MUST tell others in order to fix it. So he cuts up his concubine to send as evidence too gruesome to ignore.
When the rest of Israel comes and asks what happened, notice that the Levite STILL can’t admit what REALLY happened...Jdg 20:5 And the men of Gibeah rose against me, and beset the house round about upon me by night, and thought to have slain me: and my concubine have they forced, that she is dead. <--they weren’t going to kill him. They were going to rape him.
(End of Part 1)...
Judges 19-21 (Part 2)
Now the rest of the church is rightly appalled, and says “That’s horrid! How could they be so wicked?! We can’t have wickedness like this in the church. We have to clean house! ”
So they make a vengeance pact and eventually take it to the Lord, asking “How should we do this?” God (in my view) says “Well, if you’re dead-set in dealing with it this way, Let Judah go first.”
Now, thinking they have God’s blessing for this “righteous” endeavor, they attack with vigor...only to suffer greatly.
So... they soften up (a little) and re-check with God…”Should we continue our mission to rid the church of wickedness?” He says “Yep, You should.” And they do. Probably with a little less ‘righteous indignation’. And likewise suffer, again, but also a little less.
At this point they know that they can’t just quit. But they also know that if they don’t get it right, it might not be BENJAMIN that dies. It might be themselves. And they don’t know exactly what’s wrong.
So this time they go to God HUMBLY...hesitantly...unsure of their own worthiness...and HONESTLY asking if they should try to remove the (still real) wickedness within their brother Benjamin. This is exactly what God was waiting for...HUMILITY in judgement. And God gives them the go-ahead, promising victory instead of personal destruction.
They go, and start dealing with the problem makers. But I’m guessing they started to forget their recent vulnerability and instead started thinking of the attrocities that started all this. So they were a little to zealous...almost killing their brother instead of cleansing him. And then have to spend extra effort healing him.
THE END (of how I read it)
If you didn’t pick up on the point already, I REALLY read it as a story of “Don’t think you’re better than those whose faults you see. Don’t be hasty to wish punishment on others, lest it come on you...because vengeance begins in the house of the Lord (before it comes on those that WE think have a problem with wickedness)”
As I wrote this, I realized how amazingly new testament this story is because it lines up with what Jesus said about “Cast the beam out of your own eye... THEN shall ye see clearly to cast the mote out of your brother’s eye.” and “Judge not, lest ye be judged”
God loves you. I love you.
-Kelby
Now the rest of the church is rightly appalled, and says “That’s horrid! How could they be so wicked?! We can’t have wickedness like this in the church. We have to clean house! ”
So they make a vengeance pact and eventually take it to the Lord, asking “How should we do this?” God (in my view) says “Well, if you’re dead-set in dealing with it this way, Let Judah go first.”
Now, thinking they have God’s blessing for this “righteous” endeavor, they attack with vigor...only to suffer greatly.
So... they soften up (a little) and re-check with God…”Should we continue our mission to rid the church of wickedness?” He says “Yep, You should.” And they do. Probably with a little less ‘righteous indignation’. And likewise suffer, again, but also a little less.
At this point they know that they can’t just quit. But they also know that if they don’t get it right, it might not be BENJAMIN that dies. It might be themselves. And they don’t know exactly what’s wrong.
So this time they go to God HUMBLY...hesitantly...unsure of their own worthiness...and HONESTLY asking if they should try to remove the (still real) wickedness within their brother Benjamin. This is exactly what God was waiting for...HUMILITY in judgement. And God gives them the go-ahead, promising victory instead of personal destruction.
They go, and start dealing with the problem makers. But I’m guessing they started to forget their recent vulnerability and instead started thinking of the attrocities that started all this. So they were a little to zealous...almost killing their brother instead of cleansing him. And then have to spend extra effort healing him.
THE END (of how I read it)
If you didn’t pick up on the point already, I REALLY read it as a story of “Don’t think you’re better than those whose faults you see. Don’t be hasty to wish punishment on others, lest it come on you...because vengeance begins in the house of the Lord (before it comes on those that WE think have a problem with wickedness)”
As I wrote this, I realized how amazingly new testament this story is because it lines up with what Jesus said about “Cast the beam out of your own eye... THEN shall ye see clearly to cast the mote out of your brother’s eye.” and “Judge not, lest ye be judged”
God loves you. I love you.
-Kelby
as i understand Psalm 22 is double reference. much of it is speaking about Israel, and some of Christ - she is "the hind of the morning" ((the name/title of the psalm)) - perhaps they don't like the reference to themselves, either
it is not Christ, the Lord God become flesh, who is forsaken, in v. 1 - how can He forsake Himself? - He is singing this psalm on the cross because it is being fulfilled as He recites it, in the hearts of those around Him.
it is not Christ, the Lord God become flesh, who is forsaken, in v. 1 - how can He forsake Himself? - He is singing this psalm on the cross because it is being fulfilled as He recites it, in the hearts of those around Him.
Look at the context in which Jesus cited Ps 22:1. People were saying "He saved others, why doesn't He save Himself?"
In citing Ps 22:1 Jesus was by inference citing the entire psalm as an explanation of what was happening and an answer to the questiom on why He didn't save Himself.
i don't see any ambiguity in God when He tells them yes, go up and besiege Gibeah, and to send Judah first.
that is, the picture you're painting of God really not wanting them to do this, but telling them to anyway (("if you're dead-set on it..")) ??
does God say, yes, go and sin and do a terrible thing, and do it this way? when He really means no, this is a sin and a terrible thing, don't do it?
if what the sons of Belial were doing in Sodom was the same or the beginnings of the same things that Sodom did - which can't be simply homosexual sin or rape, because these things happened throughout history, and God didn't send fire down from heaven to destroy every city that those things were done in: He did this once, because their wickedness was so great - if these are the same things happening here, why would he just be grudgingly saying OK, this is totally wrong of you, but go ahead..?
it's not all of Benjamin doing these things, it's the sons of Belial in Gibeah. but Benjamin did not react with the same abhorrence as all Israel did, they instead defended this, the city in their territory. i really don't think the other 11 tribes were set out to destroy Benjamin, but the city of Gibeah - but because Benjamin defended them, they had to - their hatred of this wickedness, and their fear of God which compelled them, was greater than their love for their brothers - to which end, they wept bitterly ((ch. 21)) all night before the Lord seeing that Benjamin had given himself up to destruction by siding with the evil sons of Belial.
sir, i believe that you are aghast at brother fighting against brother, so much so that you suppose God cannot have approved of this. but here is another picture of Christ: who came not to bring peace, but a sword, even brother against brother ((re: Matthew 10:34)). however God's answer and direction to them is clear: go up, and send Judah first, and go up again - and go up a third time, and I, the LORD, will deliver them into your hands - and God does not direct anyone to do wrong. these are not a godless company, they are men seeking God's will for the situation, listening to Him and doing what He instructs them to do.
that is astounding is it not!?
so why Judah? God could have sent fire down from heaven and destroyed the city as He did to Sodom - as everyone said and immediately knew when they received the flesh of this woman, no one had ever committed such evil in all the land since before they came out of Egypt, and it seems like the last time it happened, God Himself destroyed the city, sending His angels. perhaps even, the same thing had happened a third time in the past - and He Himself intervened with the flood.
Kelby you gave me a start there when you said: this is how I currently see it.
I don't hear this from many people...I usually hear only fighting that ones particular current view while their mind is being renewed is the only correct view.
You keep showing true humility wherever I run into your posts. I know how it feels to have someone say that. You want to say the opposite and it embarrasses you to have someone say it because you see all you still lack in virtue. But you have had growth in this virtue!
I don't hear this from many people...I usually hear only fighting that ones particular current view while their mind is being renewed is the only correct view.
You keep showing true humility wherever I run into your posts. I know how it feels to have someone say that. You want to say the opposite and it embarrasses you to have someone say it because you see all you still lack in virtue. But you have had growth in this virtue!