Judges 2:12 — meaning, Hebrew and Greek word study, commentary
Judges 2:12
And they forsook the LORD God of their fathers, which brought them out of the land of Egypt, and followed other gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them, and bowed themselves unto them, and provoked the LORD to anger.
to loosen · conjunction + verb, qal sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine plural
LORD
יְהוָ֣הYah.weh
H3068
Jehovah · proper noun, a title
God
אֱלֹהֵ֣י'e.lo.Hei
H430
gods in the ordinary sense · noun, common masculine plural construct
fathers
אֲבוֹתָ֗ם'a.vo.Tam
H1
father · noun, common feminine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine plural
out
הַמּוֹצִ֣יאha.mo.Tzi'
H3318
to go (causatively · definite article + verb, hiphil active participle, masculine singular absolute
land
מֵאֶ֣רֶץme.'E.retz
H776
the earth (at large · preposition + noun, common feminine singular construct
Egypt
מִצְרַיִם֒mitz.ra.Yim
H4714
Mitsrajim · proper noun, a place name
followed
יָלַךְyâlak
H3212
to walk (literally or figuratively)
other
אֲחֵרִ֗ים'a.che.Rim
H312
properly · adjective, masculine plural absolute
gods
אֱלֹהִ֣ים'E.lo.Him
H430
gods in the ordinary sense · noun, common masculine plural absolute
gods
מֵאֱלֹהֵ֤יme.'e.lo.Hei
H430
gods in the ordinary sense · preposition + noun, common masculine plural construct
people
הָֽעַמִּים֙ha.'a.Mim
H5971
a people (as a congregated unit) · definite article + noun, common masculine plural absolute
about
סְבִיב֣וֹתֵיהֶ֔םse.vi.Vo.tei.Hem
H5439
(as noun) a circle · noun, common feminine plural construct + pronominal suffix, 3rd person masculine plural
bowed
וַיִּֽשְׁתַּחֲו֖וּvai.yish.ta.cha.Vu
H7812
to depress · conjunction + verb, sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine plural
LORD
יְהוָֽהYah.weh
H3068
Jehovah · proper noun, a title
anger
וַיַּכְעִ֖סוּvai.yakh.'I.su
H3707
to trouble · conjunction + verb, hiphil sequential imperfect, 3rd person masculine plural
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Exodus 20:5 Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon…
Deuteronomy 6:14-15 Ye shall not go after other gods, of the gods of the people which are round about you;
Deuteronomy 13:5 And that prophet, or that dreamer of dreams, shall be put to death; because he hath spoken to turn you away from the LORD your God, which br…
Deuteronomy 29:25 Then men shall say, Because they have forsaken the covenant of the LORD God of their fathers, which he made with them when he brought them f…
Deuteronomy 5:9 Thou shalt not bow down thyself unto them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upo…
Deuteronomy 29:18 Lest there should be among you man, or woman, or family, or tribe, whose heart turneth away this day from the LORD our God, to go and serve…
Deuteronomy 31:16-17 And the LORD said unto Moses, Behold, thou shalt sleep with thy fathers; and this people will rise up, and go a whoring after the gods of th…
Deuteronomy 32:15 But Jeshurun waxed fat, and kicked: thou art waxen fat, thou art grown thick, thou art covered with fatness; then he forsook God which made…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Judges 2:6–end
The beginning of this paragraph is only a repetition of what account we had before of the people's good character during the government of Joshua, and of his death and burial (Jos 24:29, Jos 24:30), which comes in here again only to make way for the following account, which this chapter gives, of their degeneracy and apostasy. The angel had foretold that the Canaanites and their idols would be a snare to Israel; now the historian undertakes to show that they were so, and, that this may appear the more clear, he looks back a little, and takes notice, 1. Of their happy settlement in the land of Canaan. Joshua, having distributed this land among them, dismissed them to the quiet and comfortable…
WICKEDNESS OF THE NEW GENERATION AFTER JOSHUA. (Jdg 2:11-19)
the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord--This chapter, together with the first eight verses of the next [Jdg. 2:11-3:8], contains a brief but comprehensive summary of the principles developed in the following history. An attentive consideration of them, therefore, is of the greatest importance to a right understanding of the strange and varying phases of Israelitish history, from the death of Joshua till the establishment of the monarchy.
served Baalim--The plural is used to include all the gods of the country.
John Gill on Judges 2:12
And they forsook the Lord God of their fathers,.... The covenant God of their fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and of their more immediate ancestors; his worship they forsook, neglected his tabernacle, and the service of it:
which brought them out of the land of Egypt; out of wretched misery and bondage there, with an high hand, and outstretched arm; and led them through the wilderness, and provided for them there, and brought them into the land of Canaan, a land flowing with milk and honey; but all these mercies were forgotten by them:
and followed other gods, of the gods of the people that were round about them: the gods of the Canaanites and Phoenicians, of the Egyptians, and of the…
After the death of Joshua the son of Nave [Nun] they forsook the God of their fathers and served idols, Baalim and Ashtaroth; and the Lord in anger delivered them up to the hands of plunderers, and they continued to be plundered by them and to be sold to their adversaries, and [they] could not at all stand before their enemies. Wherever they went forth, his hand was upon them for evil, and they were greatly distressed. And after this God sets judges, the same as our censors, over them. But not even these did they continue steadfastly to obey. So soon as one of the judges died, they proceeded to transgress more than their fathers had done by going after the gods of others and serving and worshiping them. Therefore the Lord was angry. "Since, indeed," he says, "this nation has transgressed my covenant which I established with their fathers and has not hearkened to my voice, I will not remove from them any of the nations which Joshua left at his death." And thus, throughout almost all the annals of the judges and of the kings who succeeded them, while the strength of the surrounding nations was preserved, he meted wrath out to Israel by war and captivity and a foreign yoke, as often as they turned aside from him, especially to idolatry.
As long as a people serves God, they are not "delivered into the hands of plunderers." But when they "abandon the Lord" and begin to serve their own passions, then it is said of them that "God gave them over to shameful passions" and, again, "He gave them over to a reprobate mind, that they would do unsuitable things." Why? Because, he says, "they were filled with every iniquity, wickedness, fornication, greed" and all other evils. It was because "they served and worshiped Baal and Ashtaroth" that "God delivered them into the hands of plunderers and handed them over to their enemies." This, as I have often said before, the Jews read as though it were merely a record of past events. We, however, "for whose sake this was written," it is said, ought to know that if we sin against the Lord and against our own souls by indulging the desires of the flesh as though we were worshiping our God, we also betray ourselves and concede our apostolic authority into the hands of Zebulun. Listen, then, to [Paul] speaking about one who sins: "I delivered this man to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that his spirit might be saved." You can see, therefore, that it was not only through his apostles that God "delivered" sinners "over to their enemies," but even now, through those who govern the church and have the power not only of releasing but also of binding, sinners "are delivered for the destruction of the flesh" when they are separated from the body of Christ for their crimes.
Dictionary and topics
Fast — The sole fast required by the law of Moses was that of the great Day of Atonement (q.v.), Lev. 23:26-32. It is called “the fast” (Acts 27:9). The only other mention of a periodical fast in the Old…
Idolatry — Image-worship or divine honour paid to any created object. Paul describes the origin of idolatry in Rom. 1:21-25: men forsook God, and sank into ignorance and moral corruption (1:28). The forms of…
Baal · .The Israelites wickedly worshiped in the time of the — .The Israelites wickedly worshiped in the time of the
Idolatry · Objects of described as: Other gods — Objects of described as: Other gods
Ingratitude · OF MAN TO GOD — OF MAN TO GOD
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
Keil & Delitzsch on Judges 2:11-12
Repeated Falling Away of the People from the Lord. - Jdg 2:11-13. The Israelites did what was evil in the eyes of the Lord (what was displeasing to the Lord); they served Baalim. The plural Baalim is a general term employed to denote all false deities, and is synonymous with the expression "other gods" in the clause "other gods of the gods of the nations round about them" (the Israelites). This use of the term Baalim arose from the fact that Baal was the chief male deity of the Canaanites and all the nations of Hither Asia, and was simply worshipped by the different nations with peculiar modifications, and therefore designated by various distinctive epithets. In Jdg 2:12 this apostasy is mor…
At Timnas Cheres. So entitled because a likeness of the sun11‘Timnas Serach’ is literally translated as ‘The likeness of the sun’. was placed over his grave, as if to say, "Alas, that a man who halted the sun12Yehoshua ordered the sun to stand still, and the sun obeyed. (Yehoshua, 10:12,13.) lies in the grave."