Judges 9

Chap. IX. Ver. 1—33. Abimelech assumes the kingdom, and murders his brethren.—Though Gideon had many sons by his various wives, it was the son only of his concubine and slave who aspired to reign. This probably originated in the folly of the kingdom, which his father had refused both for himself and his family. Ambition is bounded by no ties of justice or humanity. When a throne is in view, the power to attain it will never be restrained by scruples of right or equity; and when attained by violence, it will be secured, if possible, by the same means as here: the murder of all his father’s other sons, though threescore and ten, was not thought too dear a price for the security of the usurper. The instruments of his cruelty were “vain and light persons”—“worthless and dissolute,”

says Dr. Clarke, assassins “hired” for the occasion. Thus his throne was founded in artifice and blood; how it protested we shall see in the sequel, for “there is a God in heaven that judgeth righteously.” With all the art, and with all the cruelty of Abimelech, Jotham, one of his father’s sons, far more worthy, and a man evidently of superior intelligence, providentially escapes by concealment; and probably lived to see the reward of his brother’s cruelty and baseness. Jotham, however, particularly claims our notice as author of the oldest, and one of the most beautiful parables in existence, independent of its inspired authority. It is the nature of a parable, or fable, to give “tongues to trees,”

and here we find them in conversation. The trees resolve to choose a king, and apply successively to the olive, the fig-tree, and the vine, to reign over them; but they each plead excuses, and decline the intended honour, excusing themselves in a manner which might directly bring to the recollection of the hearers, the conduct of Gideon in refusing to take the office; and intimating that he who aspired to it was not likely to prove a blessing, like the olive, the fig-tree, or the vine; but would prove a mere bramble, and eventually destroy them. What is here figuratively said of wine, that it “cheereth the heart of God and man,” has been cavilled at as false and improper; but admits of an easy and beautiful explanation.

Libations of wine formed a part of the sacrifices offered to Jehovah, and being of his appointment, must be acceptable to him, who is therefore poetically represented as gratified thereby. So, in a preceding verse, the olive is said to “honour God,” as well as man, because of the oil burnt before his presence in the sacred chandelier of the tabernacle. Some critics, however, considering that Jotham was addressing idolaters, choose to render the word Elohim plural, gods, and apply it to their idols, to whom it certainly may easily be accommodated, as they offered a similar tribute of oil and wine to the objects of their worship. Ver. 34—57. Strife breaks out between Abimelech and the Shechemites.—Jotham had imprecated, or at least predicted the discord and hatred between Abimelech and his besotted subjects, and that they should devour each other.

Accordingly, after three years’ reign, which seem to have produced nothing worth recording, the fire begins to break out; and that we may not refer the circumstance to the mere natural course of events, we are expressly informed that the hand of Providence was in it. That God, who has all the affairs of the universe under his control, has equal command over good and bad men, and pure and fallen spirits, and often employs the worst of them to fulfil his will, and makes them the instruments of punishment to each other. So in this instance, “God sent an evil spirit between Abimelech and the men of Shechem,” and that with the express design, “that the cruelty done to the sons of Jerubbaal (Gideon) might come”

home to them; and their blood be laid on Abimelech their murderer, and the men of Shechem who “aided” and assisted him. This evil spirit created mutual jealousies between them; on one part suspicion, and on the other treachery and treason. The men of Shechem, we are told, set liers in wait for their king in the top of the mountains, doubtless to assassinate him, and in the meantime they robbed all that came that way. The very men who had so lately raised Abimelech to power, were now no less ready to pull him down. A party of the disaffected meeting to keep their vintage festival, one Gaal, a factious demagogue of the same unprincipled character as Abimelech, conspires against him, and endeavours to supplant him.

But Zebul, faithful to his unworthy master, sends him secret intelligence, whereby he comes upon the city by surprise, and Gaal, who had vaunted himself against him, is constrained to go out and fight with him. He is however discomfited. Abimelech takes the city, and the people flying for shelter to an idol temple, the temple and all whom it contained, being above 1000 persons, are consumed to ashes. Abimelech now flushed with victory, besieges Thebez, and the people, as in the other instance, take refuge in the tower of the city, which he attempts to burn also; but while in the act of holding a firebrand against the door, a woman on the top cast down part of a mill-stone upon his head, and fractured his skull: on which, finding his case hopeless, and still anxious to avoid the supposed disgrace of dying by the hands of a woman, he directs his armour-bearer to thrust him through, and dies.

Thus God (says the inspired writer) rendered the wickedness of Abimelech and of the men of Shechem, upon their own heads: and “upon them came the curse of Jotham the son of Jerubbaal.” And thus we see, that though crimes of the most atrocious nature may succeed for a time, yet the sins of wicked men will sooner or later “find them out;” and there is no escape from the righteous vengeance of the God of all the earth.

Notes on the verses

Chap. IX. Ver. 4, Vain and light persons.—[“Worthless and dissolute men;” persons who were living on the public, and had nothing to lose. Such was the foundation of his Babel government. By a cunning management of such unprincipled men most revolutions are brought about.]—Bagster. Ver. 5. On one stone.—On the great sacrificial stone belonging to the idol temple of Mexico, which is now exhibited by Bullock, at the Egyptian Hall, Piccadilly, London, 30,000 human beings are said to have been sacrificed at the Coronation of their last emperor. See Cullen’s Mexico. Ver. 8. Olive tree.—[The zayith, or olive tree, in the Linnean system, is a genus of the diandra monogynia class of plants. It is of a moderate height, and grows best in sunny places.

Its trunk is knotty; bark smooth, of an ash colour; wood solid and yellowish; leaves oblong, almost like those of the willow, of a dark green colour on the upper side, and whitish below. In June it puts forth white flowers, growing in conchae each of one piece, widening towards the top, and dividing into four parts. After this succeeds the fruit, which is oblong and plump; first green, then pale, and when quite ripe, black. Within it is enclosed a hard stone, filled with oblong seeds. It was the most sep [surely] of all the trees in the field or forest; as the bramble was the meanest and most worthless.]—Bagster. Ver. 9. Go to be promoted over the trees, &c.—See Margin; intimating that the office of a king was to watch over, and care for all his subjects.

Ver. 15. The bramble.—[Margin, “Thistle;” a kind of thorn-bush, of which the particular species is uncertain, and of no consequence. See Harris’s Natural History, in Brazndle and in Thorn, and compare (Psalms 58:9).] Ver. 17. Adventured (Heb. “cast”) his life.—Namely, in the war with the Midianites, (Judges 8)p. Ver. 20. The house of Millo.—This is supposed to have been a sort of town-hall, where all the principal persons were accustomed to assemble. Ver. 21. Beer.—[Probably the Beer mentioned by Maundrell, three hours and a half, or about ten miles, north of Jerusalem, towards Shechem. It is situated toward the south, on an easy declivity; and has a fountain of excellent water, at the bottom of the hill, from which it has taken its name.

Close to the well are the mouldering walls of a ruined khan; and on the summit of the hill two large arches still remain of a ruined convent. Dr. Richardson says, that it seems to have been once a place of considerable consequence.]—Bagster. Ver. 27. Trode the grapes and made merry.—(Margin, “songs.”) This festival, xvi. 10. [probably a reference], was usually accompanied with singing and shouting. (See [verse] 27, when he boasted he would challenge him.)—Bagster. [That is, boasted behind his back, for he was absent: perhaps he sent, or pretended to send, a challenge to that effect to Abimelech.] Ver. 31. Fortify the city.—[Under passage of repairing the walls and towers, they were actually putting the place in a state of defence, intending to seize on the government as soon as they found Abimelech coming against them.]—Bagster. Ver. 35. Gaal.—[Of this person we know no more than is here recorded. He was probably one of the descendants of the Canaanites, who hoped, from the state of the public mind, and their disaffection to Abimelech, to cause a revolution, and thus to restore the ancient government as it was under Hamor, the father of Shechem. Josephus says he was a man of authority, who sojourned with them, with his armed men and kinsmen: and that the Shechemites desired that he would allow them a guard during the vintage.]—Bagster. Ver. 36. Shadow of the mountains.—Harmer quotes a traveller in the Holy [Land]. Ver. 38. By the plain of Meonenim.—Some translate this, “By the way of the oaks,” or oaken groves; others, “By the way of the magicians,”

or “regarders of times,” as in our own margin. “Probably (says Dr. Clarke) it was a place in which augurs and soothsayers dwelt;” and it is not improbable that they dwelt, like the Druids, among the oaks. Ver. 45. And sowed it with salt,—[Salt in small quantities renders land extremely fertile; but too much of it destroys vegetation. Every place, says Pliny, in which salt is found, is barren, and produces nothing. Hence the sowing of a place with salt was a custom in different nations to express permanent desolation. Adrian, (A. D. 113,) resolving to level Jerusalem with the ground, not to be rebuilt, strewed salt on the foundations. Sigonius observes, that when Milan was taken, A. D. 1162, the walls were razed, and it was sown with salt.

And Brantome informs us, that it was an ancient custom in France, to sow the house of a man with salt, who had been declared a traitor to his king. Charles IX. king of France, the most base and perfidious of human beings, caused the house of Admiral Coligni (whom he and the Duke of Guise caused to be murdered, with thousands more of Protestants, on the eve of St. Bartholomew, 1572,) to be sown with salt!]—Bagster. Ver. 50. Thebez.—According to Eusebius, 13 miles from Shechem, towards [Jerusalem]. Ver. 53. And all to break his skull.—[An antiquated expression, meaning “full intention” to complete an object. “All to,” observes Dr. Johnson, “is a particle of mere enforcement.” The original is wattaritz eth waito, which is simply, as the LXX render, ‘and she brake his skull.” Plutarch relates, that Pyrrhus was killed at the siege of Thebes, by a piece of a tile, which a woman threw upon his head.]—Bagster. Ver. 56. God rendered.—[Both the fratricide Abimelech and the unprincipled men of Shechem had the iniquity visited upon them of which they had been guilty. Man’s judgment may be avoided; but there is no escape from that of God. How many houses have been sown with salt in France, by the judgment of God, for the massacre of the Protestants on the eve of St. Bartholomew. See note on ver. 45.]—Bagster.