Old Testament Lesson 19: "The Reign of the Judges"

Years ago, my wife accompanied me to a speaking assignment in the Mesa, Arizona, area. We stayed at a motel near the Superstition Mall. On Saturday morning, we decided to take a walk. A sidewalk encircled the buildings and the parking lot of the Mall. We had only walked a few steps when I realized that I was looking at something unusual. Landscapers had planted some kind of deciduous tree at close intervals just next to the sidewalk nearly all the way around the mall. And every one of the trees was leaning—not just inclining — leaning at a precipitous angle toward the west. I could feel the wind on my face as we walked eastward on the south side of the Mall. It was not strong that morning, but it was constant. I wondered how many hours and days it had blown against those trees to push them so consistently and completely out of shape.

I watched the same process with fruit trees in my own yard in Orem as the constant canyon winds pushed them away from their normal upright position. I soon learned that when I planted trees, I needed a stake and an anchor to keep my trees growing straight.

Those trees are an effective metaphor for Israel in the Promised Land. There were forces working against her in that environment. She needed anchors to grow up in perfection. Five of those anchors are suggested by the stories in Judges. Four of these stories are given in the lesson. I will add a fifth and try to offer some new insights into those anchors mentioned in the Gospel Doctrine manual.

Righteous parents have a duty to their children to create an environment in which those children can grow up in Christ without unreasonable pressure from the world. These Israelite parents seem to have been righteous for a time:

But the Israelites made a calamitous mistake. What do the following phrases and verses tell you about the dangers in which Israel placed her children?

Why would it matter if a few groups of idolaters were left in the midst of Israel? How much influence could so few have on so many? Why was the Lord so concerned?

The Lord responded to this disobedience with a rebuke and a prophecy:

You will not need to read much of Judges to learn just how devastating these pockets of heathen worship, these snares and thorns, were to Israel.

What snares do Latter-day Saint parents place in the environment in which their children are raised? Could an unsupervised TV be such a snare? What about an un-reviewed collection of videos? Could the application of situational ethics or occasional dishonesty become a snare? How about speaking evil of leaders? Shopping on the Sabbath?

Have we embraced the counsel of the Lord and his leaders sufficiently to drive out all the enemies of righteousness from our homes? A safe environment is a powerful anchor to the young and growing soul.

There is a second side to this equation. Children must be willing to follow the righteous example of their parents. Apparently, many of the Israelite children who were born in the Promised Land were not.

Israel’s children forsook the God, the way, the covenant, and the walk of their fathers. All of those can be anchors in the storms of life. What do the following verses suggest about the influence of righteous parents? (See Genesis 18:19; 1 Nephi 2:16; Enos 1:3; Mosiah 27:14; Alma 36:17.) Even if our earthly parents are unwilling or unable to do this, we must remember that we have another Father who will.

The book of Judges shows us a continuing cycle of apostasy, periods of righteousness followed by wickedness and bondage and repentance. To whom were the Israelites in bondage in Judges 4:1–3? Who was the judge in Israel? (SeeJudges 4:4.) 

Through his judge, the Lord called a deliverer:

Barak was willing to go. In fact, he had only one condition that needed to be met for him to take his army against the 900 iron chariots of Canaan and all the Canaanite army. He needed Deborah to go with him (see Judges 4:8). Have you ever been encouraged to do something difficult or dangerous because you had a great friend at your side?  

My first six-week experience in the army was miserable. I had only been married a few weeks and was suddenly thrust into the company of several thousand young men in an environment that fell several lightyears short of the environment I had enjoyed at home. I was not long off my mission and my loneliness for my new wife was compounded by the filthy language and undisciplined behavior of those soldiers. Only one thing saved me. By the grace of God, I ended up in the same platoon and the same squad and the even the same set of bunk beds with a former missionary companion and dear friend. I cannot tell you how much strength I drew from him in those awful weeks of basic training. When it was time to kneel in prayer, we knelt together. When it was time to go to church, we went together. When language and discussions became unbearable, we stood together in an appeal for some restraint. Even then it was difficult, but without him, it might well have been impossible.

There is this thing that Barak is supposed to do, and he wants someone beside him who will help him do it. This is a part of the definition of true friendship.  True friends will assist you and encourage you in doing what is right. In my own life, I have learned what Barak seemed to have learned. A righteous woman is a source of great power.

Boyd K. Packer said something powerful about this:

Brigham Young spoke of an even more dramatic difference between men and women:

In the mid-eighties when I was working with a branch of missionaries at the MTC, I listened to a young missionary bear his testimony. He was from a tiny town in eastern Washington and was on his way with five others to begin the work in a brand new country, just opened for missionary work. “My town,” he told us, “has 600 people. I am going to a country of 20 million. But the Lord has called me, and I’ll get it done!”

I thought of him as I was studying the story of Gideon a few years ago. Gideon was a simple man from humble beginnings who, when he learned to trust in the Lord, accomplished unimaginable things.

Israel was in bondage again, this time to Midian. What terrible thing did the enemies of Israel do to her? (See Judges 6:3–4.) In these circumstances, we first meet Gideon. Where is he and what is he doing when his call comes? (See Judges 6:11.)

When Gideon was told, “The Lord is with thee,” (Judges 6:12) he was understandably skeptical. He asked the kind of question some of us have heard from others, or perhaps even asked ourselves in times to trouble: “Oh my Lord, if the Lord be with us, why then is all this befallen us? and where be all his miracles which our fathers told us of, saying, Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt?” (Judges 6:19). 

Why is it that we sometimes determine only to worship a God who operates according to our standards and our timetable? 

The call came: 

Gideon asked for a sign; in fact, he asked for at least three of them before he got started on his mission. I have never felt that these signs he seeks are the kind condemned by the Savior. Rather, they are the kind asked for by the father with the possessed son:

Gideon is not saying, “Unless you show me a sign, I will not believe.” He is saying, “I want to believe. Please help me” (see Judges 6:17).

Have we not all had such feelings? When the Lord gives us a task beyond our experience and ability, we must turn to the Lord for courage and support.

Gideon saw his meal consumed like a sacrifice (see Judges 6:19–22); he saw the wet fleece and the dry fleece (see Judges 6:36–40). As he prepared to go to battle against an army of 135,000 (see Judges 8:10), he watched his army reduced from 32,000 (odds of 4 to1) to 10,000 (odds of 13.5 to 1) and then to 300 (odds of 450 to 1). But he took his fears to God and overcame them and did the thing the Lord had commanded him to do. A similar experience follows:

How many babies can you think of in all of earth’s history who had their birth announced to the parents in advance by an angel? Isaac, John the Baptist, Jesus, and . . . Samson. I cannot think of others. What was to be unique about Samson from the time of his birth? 

Numbers 6 explains what it means to be a Nazarite. The word comes from the root Nazar (it has nothing to do with Nazareth) which means, “To hold aloof; abstain from . . . impurity; spec. to set apart (to sacred purposes) i.e. devote; consecrate, separate” (Strong’s Concordance, p. 77). The three defining words in Numbers, with regard to the vow of a Nazarite, are separate (see Numbers 6:2–5), consecrate (vs. 7), and holy (vss. 5, 8). A Nazarite made a vow—he entered into a covenant with the Lord—to be separated, consecrated, and holy. We ought to note that a person under the vow of a Nazarite could not, among other things, cut his hair. Thus the length of hair was indicative of the length of the vow.  And this vow was made for Samson before he was born! 

Samson was born with a most unusual and remarkable spiritual gift. He had muscles the size of Montana. He was born in Zorah, midway between the upper lands of Israel and the lower lands of the Philistines on the Mediterranean coast. Living in such a place, Samson had two choices. He could go up to the religious centers of his people, or he could go down to the worldly pleasures of the Philistines. According to the firsts words of Judges 14:1, what did Samson do? “And Samson went down.”

In the chapters that describe this man and his accomplishments, he seems to go down almost continually, systematically shattering every covenant he had made—every part of the Nazarite vow. 

What does this man decide to do in Judges 14:1–3? Can you be separated, consecrated, and holy if you marry out of the covenant? Nazarites were not to touch any dead bodies. But in Judges 14:19, how many men does he kill to pay a gambling debt? 

What does Samson do to violate his covenants in Judges 16:1? 

These chapters are filled with accounts of the exploits of Samson. But none are more impressive than what happened at Gaza. The Philistines were anxious to capture Samson and had tried many times. When they learned that he was in Gaza, one of their own cities, they

But Samson did not wait till morning. He

Samson took the gates to the city, the posts upon which they were hung, and the bar used to secure them when they were closed and carried them to the top of a hill “before Hebron.” If “before” means “near,” Samson carried that load for about 40 miles!

Samson’s next adventure was with Delilah. How much did the lords of the Philistines offer Delilah to help them capture Samson? (Judges 16:5). The value of this payment can be appreciated by a look at Judges 17:10, where a priest was hired for 10 pieces of silver a year!

You know this story. Delilah is finally able to get Samson to tell her what he perceives to be the source of his strength. His hair is the only remaining vestige of his vow as a Nazarite and of his covenant with the Lord. He seems to know that if breaks his final covenant of separation, all traces of his spiritual gift will depart (see Judges 16:17).

Why they have not departed already, I cannot say. Certainly, they have begun to depart. For when he awakens with his locks shorn, he was so far removed from his early spirituality that “he wist [knew] not that the Lord was departed from him” (Judges 13:25). The result of a lifetime of going gradually and continuously down was that he did not know he had reached the bottom.

How would the history of Samson be different if he had kept his covenants? How would our feelings about him be different? But Samson was far removed from the attributes of a covenant people. He was more a Philistine than the Philistines. 

What happens in our own day when members of the Church turn from their covenants? Do they begin to take on the attributes of the world as Samson did?

If Samson had been anchored securely to his covenants, he might have grown into one of the greatest men the world has ever known. But the winds of temptation and self-love twisted him into a shape almost useless to the Lord.

Paul wrote to the Colossians about what would happen to them if they anchored themselves to Christ. He speaks of being “grounded and settled” so that we will “be not moved away from the hope of the gospel” (Colossians 1:23). He tells us that if we receive Christ and walk in Him, we will be “rooted and built up in him, and stablished in the faith” (Colossians 2:7). 

I have a great blue spruce in my front yard. It is grounded and settled and rooted and established. Like Israel of old, it was planted in a good spot, but unlike Israel, it grew straight and tall.

The book of Judges shows us the pattern for our own preservation. Let us tie ourselves and our children to the anchors of a good environment, righteous parents, great friends, faith in God, and our covenants. 

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