UST JDG Chapter 2

◄ JDG 2 ► ║ ═ ©

2 An angel representing Yahweh went from Gilgal to a place that the people of Israel would soon call Bokim. He said to the Israelite people, “Your ancestors were slaves in Egypt, but I set them free, and they escaped. I promised your ancestors that I would give this land to you, and I have now brought you to it. I told them I would never break the promises I made to them. 2 But I also told them that you, their descendants, must never make any peace treaties with the people who lived in this land. You were supposed to tear down all the altars where those people made sacrifices to idols. But you have not obeyed me. You have done a wicked thing by making peace treaties with them and not destroying their altars. 3 So now, as I warned you through Joshua, I will no longer help you force the people who live here to leave. They will bother you continually, as if they were thorns in your sides. And when you worship their idols, it will be as if a hunter catches you in a trap and kills you.”

4 After the angel representing Yahweh had said these things to all the Israelites, they cried loudly. 5 So they named that place Bokim, which means “weeping.” They offered sacrifices there to Yahweh.

6 After Joshua had sent the people of Israel away from the assembly at Shechem, each group had gone to occupy the land that Joshua had assigned to them. 7 The Israelites had obeyed Yahweh for as long as Joshua was alive. After he died, there were still some older leaders alive who had seen all the miracles that Yahweh had done for Israel. For as long as those leaders were alive, the people had continued to obey Yahweh.

8 Yahweh’s servant Joshua was 110 years old when he died. Joshua’s father’s name was Nun. 9 The Israelites buried the body of Joshua within the territory that he had received from Moses. That was at Timnath Heres, north of Mount Gaash. That is in the hilly area where the descendants of Ephraim settled.

10 Finally, all the people who had lived at the same time as Joshua died. After that, more people grew up who did not know Yahweh. They had also not seen the miracles he had done for the people of Israel.11-13 11-13The Israelites then did things that Yahweh had said were very evil. They worshiped different idols that represented gods such as Baal. They stopped worshiping Yahweh, the God their ancestors had worshiped. He was the one who had brought their ancestors out of Egypt. Instead, they began to worship the various gods that the people groups around them worshiped. They bowed down to those gods in order to honor them. This caused Yahweh to be very angry. When the Israelites stopped worshiping Yahweh and started worshiping Baal, they also started worshiping female fertility goddesses such as Ashtoreth. 14 This made Yahweh very angry with the Israelites. So he allowed people from other groups to attack the Israelites and steal their crops and animals. Yahweh allowed the hostile nations around them to conquer them. The Israelites were no longer able to defeat their enemies in battle. 15 Whenever the Israelites went to fight their enemies, Yahweh always worked against them and allowed their enemies to defeat them. That was just what he had warned them he would do. So the Israelites were greatly distressed.

16 But then Yahweh brought leaders to them. These leaders rescued the Israelites from the powerful enemies who had been attacking them. 17 But the Israelites did not obey those leaders. Instead, they were unfaithful to Yahweh and worshiped false gods. They bowed down to idols that represented those gods. They were not like their ancestors. Their ancestors had obeyed what Yahweh commanded. But these younger people quickly stopped behaving as their ancestors had behaved. 18 The Israelites were groaning because their enemies were treating them badly and making them suffer. Yahweh heard them groaning and felt sorry for them. So he brought leaders to them, and he helped each leader rescue the people from their enemies. He did that for as long as the leader was alive. 19 But after that leader died, the people stopped living as God wanted. Instead, they did even more evil things than the Israelites who had lived before them. They worshiped other gods and bowed down to them and did what they thought those gods wanted them to do. They stubbornly continued to do very wicked things.

20 This made Yahweh very angry with the Israelite people. He said, “These people have disobeyed the agreement that I made with their ancestors. They have not done what I told them to do. 21 When Joshua died, there were still some other people groups living in this land. Because the Israelites are disobeying me, I will no longer help them force any of those people groups to leave. 22 Instead, I will use those people groups to create difficult situations for the Israelites. That will show whether or not they will consistently do what I want them to do, as their ancestors did.” 23 That is why Yahweh did not allow Joshua and his army to force those people groups to leave. Instead, he allowed those people groups to stay in the land for a long time after the people of Israel arrived.

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