Judges 1:7

1:7 Adoni-Bezek said, “Seventy kings, with thumbs and big toes cut off, used to lick up ¹  food scraps ²  under my table. God has repaid me for what I did to them.” ³  They brought him to Jerusalem, ⁴  where he died.

Judges 4:14

4:14 Deborah said to Barak, “Spring into action, ⁵  for this is the day the Lord is handing Sisera over to you! ⁶  Has the Lord not taken the lead?” ⁷  Barak quickly went down from Mount Tabor with ten thousand men following him.

Judges 11:24

11:24 You have the right to take what Chemosh your god gives you, but we will take the land of all whom the Lord our God has driven out before us. ⁸ 

Judges 11:26

11:26 Israel has been living in Heshbon and its nearby towns, in Aroer and its nearby towns, and in all the cities along the Arnon for three hundred years! Why did you not reclaim them during that time?

Judges 15:10

15:10 The men of Judah said, “Why are you attacking ⁹  us?” The Philistines ¹⁰  said, “We have come up to take Samson prisoner so we can do to him what he has done to us.”

Judges 16:23-24

Samson’s Death and Burial

16:23 The rulers of the Philistines gathered to offer a great sacrifice to Dagon their god and to celebrate. They said, “Our god has handed Samson, our enemy, over to us.” 16:24 When the people saw him, ¹¹  they praised their god, saying, “Our god has handed our enemy over to us, the one who ruined our land and killed so many of us!” ¹² 

Judges 19:30

19:30 Everyone who saw the sight ¹³  said, “Nothing like this has happened or been witnessed during the entire time since ¹⁴  the Israelites left the land of Egypt! ¹⁵  Take careful note of it! Discuss it and speak!”

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. ¹⁶ 

Judges 21:11

21:11 Do this: ¹⁷  exterminate every male, as well as every woman who has had sexual relations with a male. ¹⁸  But spare the lives of any virgins.” So they did as instructed. ¹⁹ 

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¹ tn Elsewhere this verb usually carries the sense of “to gather; to pick up; to glean,” but “lick up” seems best here in light of the peculiar circumstances described by Adoni-Bezek.

² tn The words “food scraps” are not in the Hebrew text, but are implied.

³ tn Heb “Just as I did, so God has repaid me.” Note that the phrase “to them” has been supplied in the translation to clarify what is meant.

⁴ map For location see Map5-B1; Map6-F3; Map7-E2; Map8-F2; Map10-B3; JP1-F4; JP2-F4; JP3-F4; JP4-F4.

⁵ tn Heb “Arise!”

⁶ tn The verb form (a Hebrew perfect, indicating completed action from the standpoint of the speaker) emphasizes the certainty of the event. Though it had not yet taken place, the Lord speaks of it as a “done deal.”

⁷ tn Heb “Has the Lord not gone out before you?”

⁸ tn Heb “Is it not so that what Chemosh your god causes you to possess, you possess, and all whom the Lord our God dispossesses before us we will possess?” Jephthah speaks of Chemosh as if he is on a par with the Lord God of Israel. This does not necessarily mean that Jephthah is polytheistic or that he recognizes the Lord as only a local deity. He may simply be assuming the Ammonite king’s perspective for the sake of argument. Other texts, as well as the extrabiblical Mesha inscription, associate Chemosh with Moab, while Milcom is identified as the god of the Ammonites. Why then does Jephthah refer to Chemosh as the Ammonite god? Ammon had likely conquered Moab and the Ammonite king probably regarded himself as heir of all territory formerly held by Moab. Originally Moab had owned the disputed territory (cf. Num 21:26-29), meaning that Chemosh was regarded as the god of the region (see R. G. Boling, Judges [AB], 203-4). Jephthah argues that Chemosh had long ago relinquished claim to the area (by allowing Sihon to conquer it), while the Lord had long ago established jurisdiction over it (by taking it from Sihon and giving it to Israel). Both sides should abide by the decisions of the gods which had stood firm for three hundred years.

⁹ tn Or “come up against.”

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

¹¹ tn Most interpret this as a reference to Samson, but this seems premature, since v. 25 suggests he was not yet standing before them. Consequently some prefer to see this statement as displaced and move it to v. 25 (see C. F. Burney, Judges, 387). It seems more likely that the pronoun refers to an image of Dagon.

¹² tn Heb “multiplied our dead.”

¹³ tn The words “the sight” are supplied in the translation for clarification.

¹⁴ tn Heb “from the day.”

¹⁵ tc Codex Alexandrinus (A) of the (original) LXX has the following additional words: “And he instructed the men whom he sent out, ‘Thus you will say to every male Israelite: “There has never been anything like this from the day the Israelites left Egypt till the present day.”’”

¹⁶ 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.’”

¹⁷ tn Heb “And this is the thing that you will do.”

¹⁸ tn Heb “every woman who is familiar with the bed of a male.”

¹⁹ tc Some Greek witnesses (notably Codex Vaticanus [B]) add the words, “‘But the virgins you should keep alive.’ And they did so.” These additional words, which probably represent the original Hebrew text, can be retroverted: וְאֶת־הַבְּתוּלוֹת תְּחַיּוּ וַיַּעֲשׂוּ כֵן (ve’et-habbÿtulot tÿkhayyu vayya’asu khen). It is likely that a scribe’s eye jumped from the vav (ו) on וְאֶת (vÿ’et) to the initial vav of v. 11, accidentally leaving out the intervening letters. The present translation is based on this reconstruction.