Judges 3:1-7

1 And these are the nations that Jehovah left, to prove Israel by them, all that had not known all the wars of Canaan;

2 only that the generations of the children of Israel might know war by learning it, at the least those who before had known nothing thereof:

3 five lord ships of the Philistines, and all the Canaanites, and the Sidonians, and the Hivites that dwell on mount Lebanon; from mount Baal-Hermon unto the entering into Hamath.

4 And they were to prove Israel by them, to know whether they would obey the commandments of Jehovah, which he commanded their fathers by the hand of Moses.

5 And the children of Israel dwelt among the Canaanites: Hittites and Amorites and Perizzites and Hivites and Jebusites;

6 and they took their daughters as wives, and gave their daughters to their sons, and served their gods.

7 And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of Jehovah, and forgot Jehovah their God, and served the Baals and the Asherahs.

Judges 3:1-7 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO JUDGES 3

This chapter gives an account of the nations left in Canaan to prove Israel, and who became a snare unto them, Jud 3:1-7; and of the servitude of Israel under the king of Mesopotamia for their sins, from which they were delivered by Othniel, Jud 3:8-11; and of their subjection to the Moabites, from which they were freed by Ehud, who privately assassinated the king of Moab, and then made his escape, Jud 3:12-30; and of the destruction of a large number of Philistines by Shamgar, with an ox goad, Jud 3:31.

Footnotes

• [a]. See Note, Josh. 13.3.
• [b]. See Note a, ch. 2, vers. 11-13 and Ex. 34.13.