Judges 3:9

3:9 When the Israelites cried out for help to the Lord, he ¹  raised up a deliverer for the Israelites who rescued ²  them. His name was Othniel son of Kenaz, Caleb’s younger brother. ³ 

Judges 3:12

Deceit, Assassination, and Deliverance

3:12 The Israelites again did evil in the Lord’s sight. ⁴  The Lord gave King Eglon of Moab control over Israel ⁵  because they had done evil in the Lord’s sight.

Judges 3:15

3:15 When the Israelites cried out for help to the Lord, he ⁶  raised up a deliverer for them. His name was Ehud son of Gera the Benjaminite, a left-handed man. ⁷  The Israelites sent him to King Eglon of Moab with their tribute payment. ⁸ 

Judges 4:3

4:3 The Israelites cried out for help to the Lord, because Sisera ⁹  had nine hundred chariots with iron-rimmed wheels, ¹⁰  and he cruelly ¹¹  oppressed the Israelites for twenty years.

Judges 6:2

6:2 The Midianites ¹²  overwhelmed Israel. ¹³  Because of Midian the Israelites made shelters ¹⁴  for themselves in the hills, as well as caves and strongholds.

Judges 6:8

6:8 he ¹⁵  sent a prophet ¹⁶  to the Israelites. He said to them, “This is what the Lord God of Israel says: ‘I brought you up from Egypt ¹⁷  and took you out of that place of slavery. ¹⁸ 

Judges 10:8

10:8 They ruthlessly oppressed ¹⁹  the Israelites that eighteenth year ²⁰  – that is, all the Israelites living east of the Jordan in Amorite country in Gilead.

Judges 11:17

11:17 Israel sent messengers to the king of Edom, saying, “Please allow us ²¹  to pass through your land.” But the king of Edom rejected the request. ²²  Israel sent the same request to the king of Moab, but he was unwilling to cooperate. ²³  So Israel stayed at Kadesh.

Judges 20:35

20:35 The Lord annihilated Benjamin before Israel; the Israelites struck down that day 25,100 sword-wielding Benjaminites. ²⁴ 

Judges 20:39

20:39 the Israelites counterattacked. ²⁵  Benjamin had begun to strike down the Israelites; ²⁶  they struck down ²⁷  about thirty men. They said, “There’s no doubt about it! They are totally defeated as in the earlier battle.”

Judges 21:5

21:5 The Israelites asked, “Who from all the Israelite tribes has not assembled before the Lord?” They had made a solemn oath that whoever did not assemble before the Lord at Mizpah must certainly be executed. ²⁸ 

¹ tn Heb “the Lord.”

² tn Or “delivered.”

³ tn “Caleb’s younger brother” may refer to Othniel or to Kenaz (in which case Othniel is Caleb’s nephew).

⁴ tn Heb “in the eyes of the Lord” (also later in this verse).

⁵ tn Heb “strengthened Eglon…against Israel.”

⁷ tn Heb “the Lord.” This has been replaced by the pronoun (“he”) in the translation for stylistic reasons.

⁸ tn The phrase, which refers to Ehud, literally reads “bound/restricted in the right hand,” apparently a Hebrew idiom for a left-handed person. See Judg 20:16, where 700 Benjaminites are described in this way. Perhaps the Benjaminites purposely trained several of their young men to be left-handed warriors by restricting the use of the right hand from an early age so the left hand would become dominant. Left-handed men would have a distinct military advantage, especially when attacking city gates. See B. Halpern, “The Assassination of Eglon: The First Locked-Room Murder Mystery,” BRev 4 (1988): 35.

⁹ tn Heb “The Israelites sent by his hand an offering to Eglon, king of Moab.”

¹⁰ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Sisera) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

¹¹ tn Regarding the translation “chariots with iron-rimmed wheels,” see Y. Yadin, The Art of Warfare in Biblical Lands, 255, and the article by R. Drews, “The ‘Chariots of Iron’ of Joshua and Judges,” JSOT 45 (1989): 15-23.

¹² tn Heb “with strength.”

¹³ tn Heb “the hand of Midian.”

¹⁴ tn Heb “The hand of Midian was strong against Israel.”

¹⁵ tn Or possibly “secret storage places.” The Hebrew word occurs only here in the Hebrew Bible.

¹⁶ tn Heb “the Lord”; the proper name has been replaced by the pronoun (“he”) in the translation for stylistic reasons.

¹⁷ tn Heb “a man, a prophet.” Hebrew idiom sometimes puts a generic term before a more specific designation.

¹⁸ tc Some ancient witnesses read “from the land of Egypt.” מֵאֶרֶץ (me’erets, “from the land [of]”) could have been accidentally omitted by homoioarcton (note the following מִמִּצְרַיִם [mimmitsrayim, “from Egypt”]).

¹⁹ tn Heb “of the house of slavery.”

¹⁹ tn Heb “shattered and crushed.” The repetition of similar sounding synonyms (רָעַץ [ra’ats] and רָצַץ [ratsats]) is for emphasis; רָצַץ appears in the Polel, adding further emphasis to the affirmation.

²⁰ tn The phrase שְׁמֹנֶה עֶשְׂרֵה שָׁנָה (shemoneh ’esreh shanah) could be translated “eighteen years,” but this would be difficult after the reference to “that year.” It is possible that v. 8b is parenthetical, referring to an eighteen year long period of oppression east of the Jordan which culminated in hostilities against all Israel (including Judah, see v. 9) in the eighteenth year. It is simpler to translate the phrase as an ordinal number, though the context does not provide the point of reference. (See Gen 14:4-5 and R. G. Boling, Judges [AB], 191-92.) In this case, the following statement specifies which “Israelites” are in view.

²² tn Heb “me.” (Collective Israel is the speaker.)

²³ tn Heb “did not listen.”

²⁴ tn Heb “Also to the king of Moab he sent, but he was unwilling.”

²⁵ tn Heb “And the sons of Israel struck down in Benjamin that day 25,100 men, all of these wielding the sword.”

²⁸ tn Heb “turned in the battle.”

²⁹ tn Heb “And Benjamin began to strike down wounded ones among the men of Israel.”

³⁰ tn The words “they struck down” are supplied in the translation for clarification.

³¹ tn Heb “A great oath there was concerning the one who did not go up before the Lord at Mizpah, saying, ‘He must surely be put to death.’”