Judges 2:19

19 And it came to pass when the judge died, that they went back, and again corrupted worse than their fathers to go after other gods to serve them an to worship them: they abandoned not their devices nor their stubborn ways.

Judges 2:19 Meaning and Commentary

Judges 2:19

And it came to pass, when the judge was dead
Any one of them, the first and so all succeeding ones:

[that] they returned;
to their evil ways and idolatrous practices, from which they reformed, and for which they showed outward repentance during the life of the judge; but he dying, they returned again to them:

and corrupted [themselves] more than their fathers;
in Egypt and in the wilderness; or rather than their fathers that lived in the generation after the death of Joshua; and so in every generation that lived before a judge was raised up to deliver them out of the evils brought upon them; the children of those in every age successively grew worse than their fathers:

in following other gods to serve them, and to bow down unto them;
not content with the idols their fathers served, they sought after and found out others, and were more constant and frequent in their worship and service of them, and increased their sacrifices and acts of devotion to them:

they ceased not from their own doings;
or, "did not let them fall" ^F2; but retained them, and continued in the practice of them, being what they were naturally inclined unto and delighted in:

nor from their stubborn way;
which they were bent upon, and determined to continue in: or "their hard way" ^F3; which their hard hearts had chosen, and they obstinately persisted in, being obdurate and stiffnecked; and which, in the issue, they would find hard, troublesome, and distressing to them, though at present soft and agreeable, and in which they went on smoothly; but in time would find it rough and rugged, offensive, stumbling, and ruinous; or it may signify a hard beaten path, a broad road which multitudes trod in, as is the way of sin.

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FOOTNOTES:

F2 (wlyph al) "non Cadere faciebant", Pagninus, Montanus, Vatablus, Drusius.
F3 (hvqh Mkrdm) "de via sua dura", Pagninus, Montanus, Tigurine version, Drusius.

Judges 2:19 In-Context

17 for they went a whoring after other gods, and worshipped them; and they turned quickly out of the way in which their fathers walked to hearken to the words of the Lord; they did not so.

18 And because the Lord raised them up judges, so the Lord was with the judge, and saved them out of the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge; for the Lord was moved at their groaning by reason of them that besieged them and afflicted them.

19 And it came to pass when the judge died, that they went back, and again corrupted worse than their fathers to go after other gods to serve them an to worship them: they abandoned not their devices nor their stubborn ways.

20 And the Lord was very angry with Israel, and said, Forasmuch as this nation has forsaken my covenant which I commanded their fathers, and has not hearkened to my voice,

21 therefore I will not any more cast out a man of the nations before their face, which Joshua the son of Naue left in the land. And left ,