Judges 2:1-10

Israel’s Disobedience

1 Now the angel of the Lord went up from Gilgal to ¹Bochim. And he said, “I brought you up from Egypt and brought you into the land that I swore to give to your fathers. I said, ²‘I will never break my covenant with you,

2 ³and you shall make no covenant with the inhabitants of this land; ⁴you shall break down their altars. ’ But you have not obeyed my voice. What is this you have done?

3 So now I say, ⁵I will not drive them out before you, but they shall become ⁶thorns in your sides, and their gods shall be a snare to you. ”

4 As soon as the angel of the Lord spoke these words to all the people of Israel, the people lifted up their voices and wept.

5 And they called the name of that place Bochim. ^[a] And they sacrificed there to the Lord.

The Death of Joshua

6 When Joshua dismissed the people, the people of Israel went each to his inheritance to take possession of the land.

7 ⁷And the people served the Lord all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great work that the Lord had done for Israel.

8 And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died at the age of 110 years.

9 And they buried him within the boundaries of ⁸his inheritance in Timnath-heres, ⁹in the hill country of Ephraim, north of the mountain of Gaash.

10 And all that generation also were gathered to their fathers. And there arose another generation after them who did not know the Lord or the work that he had done for Israel.

Judges 2:1-10 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO JUDGES 2

This chapter gives an account of an angel of the Lord appearing and rebuking the children of Israel for their present misconduct, Jud 2:1-5; of their good behaviour under Joshua, and the elders that outlived him, Jud 2:6-10; and of their idolatries they fell into afterwards, which greatly provoked the Lord to anger, Jud 2:11-15; and of the goodness of God to them nevertheless, in raising up judges to deliver them out of the hands of their enemies, of which there are many instances in the following chapter, Jud 2:16-18; and yet that how, upon the demise of such persons, they relapsed into idolatry which caused the anger of God to be hot against them, and to determine not to drive out the Canaanites utterly from them, but to leave them among them to try them, Jud 2:19-23.

Cross References

• 1. 2:1 ver. 5
• 2. 2:1 Gen. 17:7; Ex. 6:4; Deut. 31:16
• 3. 2:2 Deut. 7:2
• 4. 2:2 Deut. 12:3
• 5. 2:3 ver. 21
• 6. 2:3 Num. 33:55; Josh. 23:13
• 7. 2:7 For ver. 7-9, see Josh. 24:29-31
• 8. 2:9 Josh. 19:50
• 9. 2:9 Josh. 24:33

Footnotes

• [a] 2:5 'Bochim' means 'weepers'