A Journey through the Bible with Tiglath

34. Book of Judges Chapter 1 to Chapter 4.

Sometimes when one is travelling the journey becomes very difficult.

One may have to traverse a desert or a range of mountains. It is the same

with our Biblical journey as we attempt to pass through the Book of

Judges. This book covers less than 200 years and is full of conflict and

very often cruelty.

The main feature is the loyalty of the Israelites to God. When they are

loyal God supports and helps them. When they forget the true God and

worship pagan gods things go terribly wrong. You must read the Book

for yourselves. preferably with a commentary.

There are, of course, interesting episodes on the way. In Chapter 1 there

is mention of chariots of iron. The Philistines who had invaded Palestine

from across the Mediterranean had brought with them the knowledge of

how to use iron to make chariots and weapons. They guarded closely the

secret of how they did this. This knowledge ensured that the Philistines

were superior in battle to the Israelites for very many years.

I have always been

intrigued when the Bible

mentions visitations to the

earth by the ‘Angel of the

Lord’. Recently we have

been thinking about his

visit to the Virgin Mary in

the New Testament. See if

you can discover how many

visits he makes in the Book

of Judges. When we think

of Judges we think of people well versed in the law. The Judges in the book we are

traversing were men with leadership qualities often quite capable of going into battle at the head of the Israelite troops.

Chapter 4 is very exciting as it shows how much influence women could

have in those far-off days. The two heroines of the story are Deborah and

Jael. Deborah was a prophetess and she rallied Barak, the leader of the

Israelite army, so he went into battle against the Philistines. She promised

that he would be victorious, even though the Philistines had nine-hundred

chariots. Chapter 5 verse 21 tells us that ‘The river of Kishon swept them

away’.

The leader of the Philistines, named Sisera,

fled the scene of battle on foot and took

refuge in the tent of a friendly tribe named

the Kenites. The wife of the leader of this

tribe was Jael and she invited Sisera to go

into the tent to rest. She even gave him a

drink of milk and covered him up. When

Sisera was fast asleep JaeI took a tent nail

and hammer, went softly in, and drove the

nail into his temples and fastened him to the ground (Chapter 4 verse 21).

When Barak the leader of the Israelites arrived Jael was able to show him

the dead body of the man he was chasing nailed to the ground!