Jeremy Duncan: The violence of the ancient world was real, and it was horrific. And wars that were fought came at great human cost. But the language of these hyperbolic annihilation narratives that we find in archaeology and in the Bible, they are by the testimony of scripture itself, not objective historical accountings. Today, we start a new series. And that means last week we finished up our previous one.
It was about joy, and maybe now we need to be reminded of the significance of those conversations more than ever. That said, we have already covered a lot of ground today, so I'm not going to recap this morning. But you can find that full series available in our archives if you want to catch up. That does mean, though, that we are shifting gears into a new series that's called The Last of Them. And in this series, we want to focus in on the specific period of history in the Hebrew people, the transition from the era of the judges to the period of the kings.
In particular, though, we want to make our way toward the story of Samuel who was the last of the judges in Israel. And today is going to be sort of an overview of the whole period, an attempt to help us situate what is honestly a pretty violent set of stories within our Christian faith and perspective. And so to do that, we'll take a historical snapshot. We'll talk about our why, three approaches, and then looking back with new eyes on the whole story. But already, that brings up some important questions for us.
What exactly were the judges? And when were the judges running the show? And what does any of that have to do with following the way of Jesus? And of those, it's the third that's probably the most difficult and certainly the most important. So we'll leave that to the end.
But let's start with who the judges were. Because in the broad scope of Hebrew history, things start with Abraham, and we'll have a series about him and his family in our archives that you can check out. But Abraham is called to leave his home in the land of Ur and travel to the land of Canaan. And this is sort of the first time that the story develops a forward trajectory and direction. Abraham is called to go somewhere.
And he's told that through his faithfulness in going the entire world will be blessed. Good news is for everyone. That's the foundation of scripture. Eventually, though, Abraham's story transitions through his son, Isaac, to his grandson, Jacob. Jacob who wrestles with God and is renamed Israel.
And we have a series about him in our archives as well. From Jacob, we move to his son, Joseph, who's initially sold into slavery, but ends up in Egypt. And Joseph, over time, becomes a powerful political figure in his own right within Pharaoh's court. Eventually though, through Joseph, Abraham's family is brought to Egypt during this massive famine that rips through the land. And they are saved from starving.
And we have a series about Joseph in our archives as well. Unfortunately, that story does not go well from there at all. And the new pharaoh to whom Joseph meant nothing comes to power. And the story takes a dark turn as the Hebrew people are ostracized first and then eventually enslaved in Egypt, where they remain until Moses emerges to stand up to pharaoh and lead his people out to the Red Sea to freedom. And we just did a series on Moses and the Exodus last year.
You can find that in the archives as well. But from there, the people move into the desert, and they develop a lot of the ritual and tradition that we know from the Hebrew Bible. Eventually, they make their way back to the land of Canaan, where Abraham was originally called to go in the beginning. And in doing this, they find themselves in conflict with the many Canaanite nations that surround them, which leads to a period known as the conquest of Canaan. Now, this is an incredibly violent period full of a lot of war propaganda.
It's the period where we get the Israelite nation, and equally, many of the Canaanite nations all claiming complete and utter victory over each other at the same time. Clearly, though, one side does not wipe out the other. The Canaanites are not gone, because out of that period come the judges. And the judges are essentially ad hoc leadership that emerge in times of crisis, largely in response to ongoing conflict with Canaanite nations that surround Israel. See, at this point in the story, having just escaped Egypt, the different tribes of Israel are sort of operating as their own little city states.
And they're figuring things out on their own, but they're largely kind of staying to themselves, except when a big enough threat comes up, someone would step up to unite them, lead them in battle, and also turn the people back toward their God. And so in the book of Judges, this happens 12 different times. The theme of the book, if you wanted to pick 1, is probably something like, we are constantly forgetting our own past, and we are constantly making the same mistakes over and over again. Because throughout the period of Israel, it's led by the judges. They find themselves oppressed by the Edomites, the Moamites, the Canaanites, the Midianites, the Ammonites, and the Philistines.
So, again, clearly those claims of Israeli victory in Joshua are well, let's just say a little bit embellished. But the key here is that in the book of Judges different leaders emerge to help them ward off these threats until eventually the Israelite people begin to look around, and they say to themselves, maybe what we need is just someone to tell us what to do. Maybe what we need is a king like all the other nations. And they demand for themselves a permanent monarchy, just like all the other nations that they keep finding themselves in conflict with. And so, there's a lot to explore in that in this series.
Why do we sometimes want to be told what to do? Why do we sometimes want someone to rule over us? Why do we so often turn to these strongman figures when we find ourselves in crisis? But all of that will lead us to Samuel as the last of the judges who is this really interesting character, because honestly, he's just this really good guy who finds himself replaced by this desire for something else. But that brief history answers our first two questions today.
Who were the judges? They were situational leaders that emerged in times of crisis. And when were the judges? They were around in the period immediately after the Israelite people left Egypt, but before the Kingdom of Israel was established in the Promised Land. That still leaves us with our last question, the important question.
What does any of this, what does that have to do with following the way of Jesus? And you may have noticed that as I situated the book of Judges within the larger history of Israel, at each point along the way, from Abraham to Jacob to Joseph to Moses, I was able to point you to a series in our archives here at commons. And that's because, even though we firmly believe that Jesus is the best lens through which to make sense of the biblical story, In order to make sense of the biblical story, we have to wrestle with all of that biblical story, including at times the very difficult parts of the story. And so one of the things that we do to discipline ourselves here at commons is that we make sure that every year in your journal, we have a series that is rooted directly in the words of Jesus. This year, that was the gospel of Mark in 2 parts.
We have one that engages a New Testament letter that was Beautiful Body in the letter of 1st Corinthians. And every year, we have a series that walks us through an Old Testament narrative, just like the book of Judges where we find ourselves today. And that still leaves us lots of time throughout the year to engage in series like we just finished about joy, or to dive into disciples us to fully engage the story through the lens of Jesus. And that's important Because while we believe that the entire text of the Bible is inspired by God, that this is the story through which God reveals God's self to us, we also trust that it is only in Jesus that we finally fully see God clearly. Now, a lot of what we see in Jesus reinforces our best imaginations of God.
Right? Like, all the grace that is beautifully present and woven throughout all of the Hebrew Scriptures. Some of what we see in Jesus helps us to let go and move past practices and patterns that aren't actually necessary to experience God. Things like sacrifice and burnt offerings, which we also see all throughout the Hebrew Scriptures. But importantly, part of what we see in Jesus also serves to overrule or perhaps we could say reinterpret some of the ways that we have imparted our perspective.
And of particular note, our violence onto God all throughout the Hebrew Scriptures. Jesus will, when He arrives on the scene, say famously, you have heard it said, love your neighbor and hate your enemy. Or you have heard it said, an eye for an eye. But I tell you, there is a better way back to God. And my argument is that in wrestling with all of these stories in community, particularly the ones that make us feel a little uncomfortable at times.
It can first help us to better understand the story that leads to Jesus. It can some can help us to grasp the perspectives that Jesus eventually offers us alternatives to. But in many ways, and perhaps most importantly, I think it can also help us to become more of the ways in which we are still very fond of attributing our agendas to God. And in that, I think we actually have the opportunity to come to see the endless grace of God, how that is at work within our limited and our sometimes very flawed perspectives of God. There's an old saying that comes from the Talmud.
The Hebrew commentary on scripture, it says, we see things not as they are, but as we are. And the actual quote, where that comes from, is more literally translated. A man sees only what is suggested by his thoughts. But the intent is still the same. Even within the Jewish tradition, there was this recognition that their own stories, sacred and holy, pointed them to God.
But those stories were never able to capture the full extent of God. Sometimes I liken God to a parent who has this end goal in mind. God knows where God wants to take us in Jesus. But God invites us step by step, timid and cautious, to take our stumbling movements toward truth. And every one of those steps along the way is vitally important.
They're what get you there, even though we eventually find ourselves at the foot of Jesus looking back on everything with completely new eyes. Example, I talk to my 4 year old daughter differently than I talk to my 10 year old son. Right? I'll speak to them both differently when they're 18 or when they're 28, at least I hope I will. Yes.
But I'll always be their dad. My love for them will never change. That's not at stake. And the fact that our concepts of the divine become more clear as we read the story, as we watch it unfold, that's not a bug. It's a feature.
In fact, it's a grace that God allows us to slowly shape our understanding throughout history as the story unfolds on its way to Jesus. And that's why it's actually really important that we ask a different set of questions of these ancient texts than perhaps the original authors even thought to. It's important now that we interrogate them in the light of everything Jesus has shown us about who God is. For example, I have a friend who posted this on Twitter a while ago, but it really struck me. He was explaining the story of David and Goliath to his young daughter, and she turned to him and she said, dad, I understand why David did it, but God was sad when Goliath died.
Right? That is a very Jesus centered question to ask of the text. And it's very much part of what we intend to wrestle with in this series as we make our way through. But before that, let's talk about situating this violence in the Hebrew Scriptures, in particular, the conquest of Canaan that is the backdrop for this series. Because this is not actually just detached theological conversation.
There are very real implications to the ways that we make sense of these tales. In particular, Robert Allen Warrior, in his paper, Canaanites, Cowboys, and Indians makes a very compelling argument that these conquest stories were a key feature of the ideology that was appealed to in an attempt to authorize the attempted extinction of Indigenous peoples here in North America. And pathology has horrible consequences. And there's basically three ways that these stories have been understood within Christianity. The first is to posit that God uses violence to get to God's ultimate ends.
And the argument is that God is God. And so God can do whatever God wants. In fact, if God does it, it's automatically okay. And hold on to that. I happen to believe that's true.
We're going to come back to it toward the end. But I don't think it helps us here particularly, Because that approach has to assume that God wants to use violence to get to God's ends, and that runs counter to, I would argue, everything we see in Jesus. For example, in Luke 22, Jesus is speaking to His disciples, and He says, if you don't have a sword, sell your cloak and go and buy 1. Now, that sounds a little strange, especially considering that I'm trying to make the argument that Jesus is nonviolent. But if we keep reading here, Jesus follows this up immediately by saying, as it is written, he was numbered with the rebels that this must be fulfilled.
What is written about me is now reaching its fulfillment. And what's happening here is that Jesus knows He will be seen. His message will be seen as criminal. And He wants to look the part specifically so that He can refuse to play the part. This is a theatrical, a rhetorical move to undermine all of the assumptions about Him.
And we know that because, just as soon as one of His disciples actually tries to use the sword to defend Jesus, Peter, Jesus immediately shuts him back down. Or as Joel Green writes in his commentary on Luke, the apostles manifest their dullness when they suppose that Jesus now opposes His own extensive and emphatic nonviolent teaching by encouraging them to actually use weaponry. So, no. I don't think Jesus wanted his disciples to use swords. He tells them as much.
And no, I don't think God wanted to kill Canaanites. That makes no sense to me in the light of a Jesus who was willing to die for his enemies. 2nd major approach is to blame the Canaanites. Well, they must have deserved it. Right?
And the argument here is that the Canaanites were so uniquely wicked that God was justified. Maybe God was even merciful in just wiping them out. Maybe God didn't want to do this, but maybe God had to do this. They got what they deserved. Again, I'm not sure that makes sense in the light of the Jesus who ensures that no one gets what they deserve.
In fact, that's precisely the message of Jesus on the cross, at the climax of the story, while He is being executed. Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do. And if that is my ultimate final image of the divine, the God who forgives even the sins we can't see for ourselves, And that doesn't sound like the God who would wipe out a people group just because we think, well, maybe they might have deserved it. Destruction may be what our actions lead to. Jesus says, the wide road leads there, Matthew 714.
But all of that is what God is desperately trying to save us from, not condemn us to. So, no. I don't think they deserved it. I don't think that justification holds weight either. So the final approach then is to do the work to understand these texts in their historical archaeological context.
And that might not sound all that interesting, but I assure you it is, at least for some of us. The rest of you, just hang in with me. But what we find is that when we look at the archaeological record, these types of bombastic speeches and language that we read in the book of Judges are not particularly unique at all. In fact, we have a number of ancient examples. For example, we have something called the Mesha inscription that came from a Moabite King who wrote, Israel has gone to ruin.
Yes, it is gone forever. Omri was the King of Israel, and he oppressed Moab for many days because Chemosh, the Moabite god was angry with us. But I looked down on him and on his house, and Israel was sent to ruin. Yes. It is gone to ruin forever.
Sounds pretty definitive. Right? Until that is that we read Judges 3, the Lord has given Moab your enemy into your hands, Israel. We struck them down. Not one escaped.
In another passage, in Deuteronomy, we read, the Lord your God has commanded, you shall not leave alive anything that breathes, but you shall utterly destroy them, the Hittite and the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Perizzite, the Hivite and the Jebusite. But then in Judges, chapter 1, we read that, to this day, the Jebusites live in Jerusalem with the Benjamites. And later in the same chapter, we run into Caleb the Kenizzite from the book of Joshua, whose daughter now marries the judge, Othniel. In other words, the violence of the ancient world was real, and it was horrific. And I'm not trying to downplay any of it at all.
There, wars that were fought came at great human cost. But the language of these hyperbolic annihilation narratives that we find in archaeology and in the Bible, they are, by the testimony of Scripture itself, not objective historical accountings. And that means that these stories, just like they did for Moab, had a different purpose. They served as identity formation, as nation building narratives, not as historical record. In fact, what we understand from the archaeological record is that the smaller the nation was, the more of an underdog they were in the fight, the more outsized and the more hyperbolic their national language became.
It reflected how they saw themselves set against their more powerful foes. Now, think of how Canadians sometimes talk about Americans to get an idea of this. But Walter Brueggemann, who's an incredible Hebrew, text scholar, says that when we approach these texts, the theme of ancient destruction requires a class reading, because this ancient rhetoric is written on the lips of those who perceive they have no weapon. In other words, these stories became part of how they fought back against their more powerful foes. It united their people against a common enemy.
And we've talked about this many times before, this scapegoat phenomenon. Right? What a powerful tool it is to cohere a social group together when a common enemy can be singled out and pointed at. It's a very common phenomenon. We see it emerge across almost every human culture and even human society.
And yet, over time, what happens to those same stories of conquest as the Hebrew Scriptures begin to evolve? Well, the veneration of the warrior identity gives way to the care of the fatherless. And the opposition to neighboring nations gives way to the welcome of the alien and the foreigner. And there's actually myriad examples of this all throughout Hebrew Scriptures. But one example, Leviticus 1934, says, the foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native born.
Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners once in Egypt. And even this gives way to the prophets who build on that welcoming heart of Leviticus. But later they declare God desires mercy, not sacrifice. Acknowledgment, not burnt offerings. And the psalmist who sing, you delight in sacrifice?
No. Or I would bring it. You do not take pleasure in burnt offerings. Therefore, my sacrifice, oh God, is a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart. This you will never despise.
And so when we eventually get to Jesus, the climax of the story, the figure through which Christians believe that God is finally fully revealed, it should be of absolutely no surprise to us to see Jesus embrace the full history of His people and yet also call all of us toward more grace and more peace than any of us ever thought was possible. That's where the story had always been heading. Because God is love, God always has been love, but now we know that love looks like Jesus. In this series, we are not going to be searching for the middle ground between Jesus and Judges. We are looking to read the story of Judges through everything that is revealed in Jesus.
Because history is not flat, it's not static, it has meaning. And it has purpose, and that means it's going somewhere. And so to see the story evolve, to see it progress, to see humanity go from the fear of the outsider and the use of the scapegoat as our primary social glue to the care of the fatherless and the welcome of the foreigner to the inclusion of the Gentile and eventually to the welcome of all the beloved children made in the image of God. That needn't scare us away from those parts of the Bible that make us cringe a little bit when we read them. In fact, it's precisely that that allows us to go back through the grace of Jesus with new eyes to read again and see where God was there moving the story forward.
To grab hold of where God is present in Judges and in Samuel, even as we hold steadfast to who we know God to be now in Christ Jesus. But that is the movement for the rest of the series So let's pray God, for all those times that we have found ourselves stuck in the story, forgetting what's behind us and losing the ability to look ahead at where you are taking us. In those moments, we pray that our image of you revealed in the Christ and in the self giving of the cross would illuminate the path to keep moving forward toward your love, toward your grace, toward everything that helps us to make tangible Your kingdom here in this world. As we look back on, frankly, difficult stories full of violence and exclusion, would we be able, through the light of Christ, to see where you were there, present and active and moving the story forward one step at a time as a gracious Parent who knows where we need to go? And in that visibility, might we also begin then to look at our lives, our past and the mistakes that we've made, the ways that we misconstrued your grace, and the ways that those lessons can call us forward with more love toward who you call us to become.
May that translate into more grace, more welcome, more care for those of us here in this room and community who are struggling and suffering even today. And may all of the story lead us always back to you. In the strong name of the risen Christ, we pray. Amen. Hey.
Jeremy here. And thanks for listening to our podcast. If you're intrigued by the work that we're doing here at Commons, you can head to our website commons.church for more information. You can find us on all of the socials at commonschurch. You can subscribe to our YouTube channel where we are posting content regularly for the community.
You can also join our Discord server. Head to commons.church/discord for the invite and there you will find the community having all kinds of conversations about how we can encourage each other to follow the way of Jesus, we would love to hear from you. Anyway, thanks for tuning in. Have a great week. We'll talk to you soon.