Read Judges 21 here (text coming …) or at Bible Gateway.
The Hebrew paragraphs:
21:1-4 {p} The oath against Benjamin/ Israel inquired of YHVH concerning Benjamin
21:5-12 {p} Israel destroys Jabesh Gilead and captures the virgin daughters for Benjamin
21:13-18 {s} Peace made with the survivors of Benjamin/ Israel mourns for their brother
21:19-22 {s} The plan to capture the virgin daughters of Shiloh for the remainder of Benjamin
21:23-24 {p} Benjamin did so/ returned to their cities and rebuilt them/ Israel returned to his cities
21:25 {p} No king in Israel, every man did what was right in his own eyes
Judges 17:1-21:25 Chiastic Structure:
When we were learning about Samson, I had said that I thought the Greeks’ myth of Hercules was based on him (Judges 16). Then, there is a story from Roman mythology or early history during the reign of Romulus, of the Romans facing a similar lack of wives, and ambushing the virgin girls from a neighboring city and carrying them off. It is likely that this part of the Romulus myth was borrowed from the true history of Israel.
The Timeline of the Judges, according to Ussher:
1443 Death of Joshua
1413 Because of apostasy, Israel subjugated by Cushan king of Mesopotamia
1405 Othniel, nephew of Caleb, called by God to deliver and judge Israel
1343 Because of apostasy, Israel subjugated by Moab and Amalek
1325 Ehud called by God to deliver and judge Israel
1305 Because of apostasy, Israel subjugated by the Canaanites
1285 Deborah called by God to deliver and judge Israel; Sisera killed
1252 Because of apostasy, Israel subjugated by Amalek and Midian
1245 Gideon called by God to deliver and judge Israel
1236 Death of Gideon; his son Abimelech kills his brothers but one and tries to make himself king
1233 Abimelech slain by a woman; end of civil war
1206 Because of apostasy, Israel subjugated by Ammon and Philistia
1188 Jephthah called by God to deliver and judge Israel
1155 Birth of Samson, dedicated as a Nazirite
1137 Samson slays many Philistines in a dispute over his Philistine bride
1136 Samson slays 1000 Philistines with a donkey’s jawbone, and is made judge of Israel
1117 Delilah cuts Samson’s hair; he is captured by the Philistines; but destroys them in their temple
Ussher places the civil war with Benjamin some time during the Israelites’ subjugation by Moab and Amalek, which lasted from 1343-1325 BC. Ehud was a survivor of Benjamin. How did Ussher come up with his dates? All the information needed to construct a complete and accurate chronology of the Hebrew Testament is present within the Hebrew Testament. Ussher studied meticulously collecting every scrap of chronological information, arranging it until no thing was out of harmony with any other thing, also using the histories of the ancient world in Greek and Latin which he had. His history was so accurate, that his dates appeared in the margins of the King James Bible for hundreds of years, until the rise of darwinian evolutionary theory caused the publishers to abandon them.
If there are questions, this is a good resource:
The Annals of the World by James Ussher, translated by Larry Pierce
The Chronology of the Old Testament – Dr. Floyd Nolen Jones
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