Growing up, I remember hearing stories of Samson. As best I could tell, he was pretty much the Bible’s Hercules— a man with superhuman strength who took on the Philistines to protect God’s people, and I think I remember something about a donkey’s jawbone, right?
When I became a teenager, I heard a slightly more mature version of Samson’s story. It turns out that he was pretty lecherous (especially with that whole Delilah situation), and a lot of his “great battles” actually looked more like mass murders. Maybe he’s not the greatest role model after all, but I guess we can learn from his mistakes, right?
Then, in college, I read the book of Judges for myself, and holy crap, Samson is a sadistic monster. I’d say he’s as bad as Genghis Khan or Vlad the Impaler, but at least those guys knew how to build an army and arrange a government. Samson just roams the countryside killing and sleeping around, and even his “act of redemption” at the end of his story is another mass murder.
My entire upbringing, I had his story wrong: Samson isn’t meant to be a hero; he’s an example of what happens when God’s blessing is abused, and he’s one of many utterly despicable characters in the book of Judges.
The book of Judges represents one long downward spiral in Israel’s history. In fact, it almost reads like a propaganda piece for establishing a monarchy, but before we go dismissing Judges as the Bible’s fake news, let’s look at what this book is trying to tell us about God, life, and government.
The first section of the book of Judges follows a repeating formula:
(1) Israel does evil in the eyes of the Lord.
(2) God allows an invading force to wage war on Israel.
(3) Israel collectively says “our bad.”
(4) God appoints a judge (a military chieftain) to deliver them.
(5) Peace is restored for a time.
(repeat)
This occurs again and again through the first 16 chapters. God raises up Othniel, Ehud, Shamgar, Deborah and Barak, Gideon, Abimelek (sort of), Jephthah, and Samson with a few other leaders like Tola and Ibzan sprinkled in between. As time goes on, these leaders become progressively more flawed and immoral. Sure, things are great under Othniel and Ehud, and Deborah is one of the biggest badasses in the Bible, but then Gideon is kind of a coward. A civil war breaks out after Abimelek tries to make himself king, Jephthah makes tragic and stupid vows that cost him dearly, and then we get to the absolute bottom of the barrel: Samson. But amazingly, things still get worse.
These judge stories all involve certain repeated phrases: “Israel did evil in the eyes of the Lord, so the Lord delivered them unto the hands of [bad guy of the week]….The Israelites cried out to God, so God sent [judge] to deliver them.” But after Samson, we get a new pattern:
“In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as they saw fit.”
From here, things get worse and worse. The last five chapters of Judges are some of the bloodiest and most disturbing in the Bible. These pages overflow with idolatry, dismemberment, rape, and the massacre of an entire generation. Israel has descended into anarchy and cannot even glimpse God’s will for them, let alone obey it.
“In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as they saw fit.”
The implication is that, without law and order, we become as bad as Samson. Human beings are prone to destruction no matter what our governments look like. We habitually lose sight of God and focus on our own cravings instead. We need a king to come in and get us back on the right path, and while this message isn’t wrong (in fact, many see Jesus as being that redeeming king), the Bible has still another curveball waiting for us:
Judges ends with “everyone did as they saw fit,”
but it is immediately followed by a very different story
—a love story—
the story of Ruth, a Moabite, Israel’s enemy.
In the time of the Judges,
when Israel was at its darkest,
Ruth, a widow and a foreigner,
a complete outsider to the people of Israel,
met Boaz,
a proud son of the tribe of Ephraim,
the direct descendant of Joseph,
and they fell in love.
Ruth and Boaz had a son named Obed,
who fathered Jesse of Bethlehem,
who fathered King David,
an ancestor of Joseph,
the adopted father of Jesus of Nazareth,
the one true King.
And so Judges grants us an unexpected moral:
In the dark times, where the depravity of humanity seems abundant,
where it seems that the masses are taking God for granted,
when leaders are wielding their power rashly and aggressively,
when all you can focus on is how terrible we’re all becoming,
look for the love story;
there you will find deliverance.