OET-RV by section HERO Intro:15

⌂ ← HERO Intro:15–Intro:27 → ‴ ║ ═ ©

This OET Readers’ Version was designed to be used with the Literal Version alongside, so you won’t get the best understanding from this single viewpoint. This is still an early look into the drafted text of the Open English Translation of the Bible. Please double-check the text in advance before using in public.

Introduction

This document commonly called ‘Judges’, contains a collection of accounts of ‘Various Heroes and Guides/Leaders’ who helped to rescue the Israeli people from their oppressors. It covers the times from their invasion of Kena’an through to just before their first king. Most of these heroes or guides were actually warriors. Shimshon (commonly called ‘Samson’) is the best-known of all of them, and his story can be read in chapters 13–16.

From this document we can learn that Yisrael (‘Israel’ in older English translations) prospered when they obeyed Yahweh’s instructions, but when they disobeyed, then God allowed other peoples and nations to oppress them. However, God is always ready and prepared to save his people whenever they turn away from their disobedience and return again to obeying the instructions that he’d given them.

The previous book was named after the main character Yehoshua (Joshua) and the following books (Ruth and 1 Shmuel/Samuel) are named after their main characters, but this document with somewhere around a dozen important characters, has no single prominent character that it could be named after. Instead it’s traditionally named ‘Judges’ in English because of around twenty uses of the Hebrew root ‘שָׁפַט’ (shafat) often in roots normally translated as ‘judged’. Despite that, there’s not a single account in this document of these leaders judging the cases and conflicts of the common people. This dilemma offers two possible interpretations: 1/ that these leaders (often military leaders) did judge cases for the common people, but those details aren’t recorded, or 2/ (which we’ve leaned more towards) that this Hebrew word has a wider range of meaning, and so we’ve leaned towards the English word ‘guided’ or ‘led’ in these contexts.

Main components of this account

The events up until Yehoshua’s death 1:1-2:10

The various heroes/guides of Yisrael 2:11-16:31

Various other events 17:1-21:25

This is still an early look into the unpolished text of the Open English Translation of the Bible. Please double-check the text in advance before using in public.

OET-RV HERO C1 C2 C3 C4 C5 C6 C7 C8 C9 C10 C11 C12 C13 C14 C15 C16 C17 C18 C19 C20 C21