Judges2

Judges chapter two begins with an angel of the LORD rebuking Israel at Bochim for failing to obey His covenant by not driving out the land's inhabitants and throwing down their altars. The people wept and sacrificed, but after Joshua and his generation died, a new generation arose that knew not the LORD. This led to widespread idolatry, provoking God's anger and His delivering them into the hands of their enemies. Though God raised up judges to deliver them, Israel repeatedly returned to their corrupt ways after each judge's death.

The Angel's Rebuke at Bochim

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And a messenger of Jehovah goeth up from Gilgal unto Bochim,
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and saith, `I cause you to come up out of Egypt, and bring you in unto the land which I have sworn to your fathers, and say, I do not break My covenant with you to the age; and ye--ye make no covenant with the inhabitants of this land--their altars ye break down; and ye have not hearkened to My voice--what is this ye have done?
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And I also have said, I do not cast them out from your presence, and they have been to you for adversaries, and their gods are to you for a snare.'
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And it cometh to pass, when the messenger of Jehovah speaketh these words unto all the sons of Israel, that the people lift up their voice and weep,
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and they call the name of that place Bochim, and sacrifice there to Jehovah.

Death of Joshua and a Faithful Generation

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And Joshua sendeth the people away, and the sons of Israel go, each to his inheritance, to possess the land;
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and the people serve Jehovah all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who prolonged days after Joshua, who saw all the great work of Jehovah which He did to Israel.
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And Joshua son of Nun, servant of Jehovah, dieth, a son of a hundred and ten years,
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and they bury him in the border of his inheritance, in Timnath-Heres, in the hill-country of Ephraim, on the north of mount Gaash;
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and also all that generation have been gathered unto their fathers, and another generation riseth after them who have not known Jehovah, and even the work which He hath done to Israel.

Israel's Apostasy and Divine Punishment

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And the sons of Israel do the evil thing in the eyes of Jehovah, and serve the Baalim,
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and forsake Jehovah, God of their fathers, who bringeth them out from the land of Egypt, and go after other gods (of the gods of the peoples who are round about them), and bow themselves to them, and provoke Jehovah,
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yea, they forsake Jehovah, and do service to Baal and to Ashtaroth.
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And the anger of Jehovah burneth against Israel, and He giveth them into the hand of spoilers, and they spoil them, and He selleth them into the hand of their enemies round about, and they have not been able any more to stand before their enemies;
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in every place where they have gone out, the hand of Jehovah hath been against them for evil, as Jehovah hath spoken, and as Jehovah hath sworn to them, and they are distressed--greatly.

The Cycle of Oppression and Deliverance

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And Jehovah raiseth up judges, and they save them from the hand of their spoilers;
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and also unto their judges they have not hearkened, but have gone a-whoring after other gods, and bow themselves to them; they have turned aside with haste out of the way in which their fathers walked to obey the commands of Jehovah--they have not done so.
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And when Jehovah raised up to them judges--then was Jehovah with the judge, and saved them out of the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge; for it repenteth Jehovah, because of their groaning from the presence of their oppressors, and of those thrusting them away.
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And it hath come to pass, at the death of the judge--they turn back and have done corruptly above their fathers, to go after other gods, to serve them, and to bow themselves to them; they have not fallen from their doings, and from their stiff way.

Remaining Nations Become a Test

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And the anger of Jehovah doth burn against Israel, and He saith, `Because that this nation have transgressed My covenant which I commanded their fathers, and have not hearkened to My voice--
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I also continue not to dispossess any from before them of the nations which Joshua hath left when he dieth,
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in order to try Israel by them, whether they are keeping the way of Jehovah, to go in it, as their fathers kept it or not.'
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And Jehovah leaveth these nations, so as not to dispossess them hastily, and did not give them into the hand of Joshua.
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