"And when he was come into his house, he took a knife, and laid hold on his concubine, and
divided her, together with her bones, into twelve pieces, and sent her into
all the coasts of Israel." -- Judges 19:29
Judges for Skeptics
Judges is a violent book even by biblical standards. It begins by chopping off the thumbs and big toes of
a captured king and ends by chopping up a dead concubine's body and sending the pieces in the mail parcel post. Along
the way it describes, with apparent relish and approval, a gruesome "message from God" (a knife blade stuck deeply into
a fat man's belly); a tent stake driven through a sleeping man's skull; a couple of severed heads delivered to Gideon; the
killing of 69 brothers upon a single stone; a daughter killed by her father as a sacrifice to God; 300 foxes tied
together by their tails and lit on fire; 1000 men killed with a jawbone of an ass; and, in what is probably the most disgusting
story in all literature, the rape, death and mutilation of the Levite's concubine. And I've left a lot out. Read it yourself,
if you have a strong enough stomach, that is. And be sure to check out:
- Cutting off the thumbs and big toes of a captured king. 1:6-7
- God couldn't drive out the valley people because they had chariots of iron. 1:19
- Ehud's message from God. 3:20-22
- God sells the Israelites into slavery. 3:8, 4:2,
10:7
- Shamgar kills 600 Philistines with an ox goad. 3:31
- Jael drives a tent stake through her guest's head. For this she is "blessed above women."
4:17-23, 5:24-26
- "Have they not divided the prey, to every man a damsel or two?" 5:30
- God takes Gideon's fleece/dew test. 6:36-40
- God finds a few good men with a dog-lapping test. 7:4-7
- "The Lord set every man's sword against his fellow." 7:21
- Two princes killed and their heads delivered to Gideon 7:25
- Gideon tears the flesh of the elders of Succoth and kills the men of the city. 8:7,
16-17
- Gideon's many wives" 8:30
- Abimelech kills 69 brothers "upon one stone." 9:5
- God sends an evil spirit. 9:23
- Jephthah sacrifices his daughter to God. 11:29-39
- The spirit of God comes mightily upon Samson (and he kills things). 14:6,
14:19, 14-16
- Samson catches 300 foxes, ties their tails together, and sets them on fire. 15:4-5
- Samson kills 1000 men with the jawbone of an ass. 15:14-16
- Samson goes in unto a harlot. 16:1
- The Levite and his concubine. 19:22-30