Judges 3:9

It calls the savior "Othniel," which means "the time of God for me." Through this first Othniel, then, the people were delivered from their humiliating servility and were restored to peace rather than having their longstanding pride and various deeds removed. But because we already said that a certain spiritual identity can be found in King Chusarsaton as one of the adversaries and a prince of the "powers of the air," it seems to me fitting to say that Othniel likewise, who was raised up to deliver the people, is a member of the "host of heaven" and of the throng of archangels who "are sent to support those who receive the inheritance of salvation." These angels are saviors, moreover, designated under the form of Othniel or Ehud, for, as we have often shown, we do not fight alone against the powers of the enemy, but good forces and powers are also sent to our aid by the Lord.

And the Lord raised a savior for Israel and saved them. And then, as if he were asked who the savior was, he adds: To Gotoniel, son of Cenez. Gotoniel is here in accusative, as if he had said: Gothonielem (to Gotoniel). For the rest, we must pay attention to the fact that God calls a man a savior through whom he will save them. The text reads as follows: The children of Israel cried out to the Lord, and the Lord raised a savior for Israel, and he saved them: to Gothoniel son of Cenez, Caleb's younger brother, and he heard them. Among the different kinds of hyperbaton, what is here is rare, because it also participates in what the Greeks call hysterology. If the words that are put at the end: And he listened to them, put them before, the phrase would be clearer. For the order is this: And the children of Israel cried to the Lord, and he heard them, and the Lord raised up a savior for Israel. Then comes what has interposed here: And saved them. And then it is said: To Gotoniel -as if he were in accusative Gothonielem-, son of Cenez. If the passage were read this way, it would be clearer: And the Lord raised a savior for Israel, Gotoniel son of Cenez, and saved them.

We frequently find this calling from need in Scripture as well, when we read that on account of their sins, the children of Israel were delivered over by the Lord to their enemies and that, having changed their course because of their domination and savage cruelty, they cried out to the Lord. "And the Lord sent them," it says, "a deliverer named Ehud, the son of Gera, the son of Jemini, who used either hand as if it were his right hand." And again it says, "They cried out to the Lord, who raised up a deliverer for them, Othniel, the son of Kenaz, the younger brother of Caleb, and he freed them." And it said of them in a psalm: "When he killed them, then they sought him, and they turned and at dawn they came to God, and they remembered that God was their helper." And again: "They cried out to the Lord when they were troubled, and he freed them from their distress."Of these three kinds [of calling from need], then, although the first two seem to be supported by better beginnings, nonetheless we find that even on the third level [recorded by the psalmist], which seems inferior and lukewarm, there have been people who are perfect and very fervent in spirit, similar to those who have made an excellent beginning in the Lord's service and have passed the rest of their lives in praiseworthy intensity of spirit. Likewise there are many who have become tepid and have fallen from a higher level and very frequently ended up in tragedy. [Thus], just as it was no drawback to the former that they seem to have been converted not by their own will but by force of necessity, inasmuch as the Lord's kindness furnished the occasion whereby they might feel compunction, likewise their having been converted in some sublime fashion profited the latter nothing whatsoever, because they did not strive to live out the rest of their days accordingly.