Editing Book of Judges (section)

== Composition ==
[[File:Maarten van Heemskerck 024.jpg|thumb|upright|"[[Adam and Eve/Gideon and the Fleece|Gideon thanks God for the miracle of the dew]]", painting by Maarten van Heemskerck (Musée des Beaux-Arts de Strasbourg)]]
{{See also|Judges 1#Composition and historicity|Textual variants in the Book of Judges}}

=== Historicity ===
[[Biblical archaeology]] in the 19th and 20th centuries supported viewing Judges as historical, but while some scholars still see echoes of early history, most critical scholars today reject its historical accuracy.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Smith |first1=Mark S. |last2=Bloch-Smith |first2=Elizabeth M. |title=Judges 1: A Commentary on Judges 1:1–10:5 |year=2021 |publisher=Fortress Press |isbn=978-0800660628 |page=18-19 |quote=[T]he nineteenth and twentieth centuries witnessed the use of ‘biblical archaeology’ to support the view that Judges represents Israel's historical reality in the premonarchic period, the era that the book purports to relate. The result was an optimistic representation of Judges' historical background, as represented by John Bright's History of Israel, in turn reflected in Robert G. Boling's Judges commentary. While a half-century has passed since the halcyon days of biblical historicism, some scholars continue to see in Judges signs of an early period. For example, Israel Finkelstein suggests that a ‘vague memory’ of a late Iron I/very early Iron II conflict can be gleaned from the story of Ehud. By contrast, most critical scholars today would claim no such early historical record in Judges.}}</ref>

Scholars hold a variety of opinions about the dating and historicity of the Book of Judges.{{sfn|Bacon|Sperling|2007|pp=563–566}}{{sfn|Alter|2013|p=105}} Some scholars doubt whether any of the people named as judges existed, while others still find truth throughout the book.<ref>{{cite book |title=Misusing Scripture: What are Evangelicals Doing with the Bible? |last=Dever |first=William G. |publisher=Taylor & Francis |year=2023 |isbn=978-1-000-85301-8 |editor-last=Elliott |editor-first=Mark |page=PT113 |chapter=Christian Fundamentalism, Faith, and Archaeology |quote=the immediately following (!) book of Judges has the ring of truth for an archaeologist on every page. |editor-last2=Atkinson |editor-first2=Kenneth |editor-last3=Rezetko |editor-first3=Robert |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=WGuwEAAAQBAJ&pg=PT113&dq=book+of+judges+has+the+ring+of+truth}}</ref> For [[Israel Finkelstein]], the historical reliability of the Book of Judges cannot be assessed by the possible inclusion of heroic tales from earlier eras because it is impossible to know to what extent those tales are based on authentic memories of local heroes and wars preserved over the centuries in the form of epic poems or popular folktales.<ref>Finkelstein, Israel (2001). ''The Bible Unearthed: Archaeology's New Vision of Ancient Israel and the Origin of Its Sacred Texts''. (New York: Free Press), p 120.</ref> [[Lester Grabbe]] generally considers the Book of Judges too problematic to use as a historical source for much the same reasons, but acknowledges that an actual historical core can be found in the Judges stories and cannot be ruled out by archeological evidence.<ref>Grabbe, Lester (2007). ''Ancient Israel: What Do We Know and How Do We Know It?'' (London & New York: T & T Clark), p 99-100.</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Knauf |first=Ernst Axel |editor-last=Grabbe |editor-first=Lester L. |title=The Hebrew Bible and History: Critical Readings |chapter=History in Judges |year=2019 |publisher=Bloomsbury |isbn=978-0567672698 |pages=213–221 |doi=10.5040/9780567672698.0019 |url=https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/encyclopedia-chapter?docid=b-9780567672698&tocid=b-9780567672698-2318 }}</ref><ref> Grabbe, Lester (2017). Ancient Israel: What Do We Know and How Do We Know It?. Bloomsbury. {{ISBN|978-0-567-67043-4}} p. 118: "The book is generally too problematic to use as a historical source." p. 117–118: "Two points relating to history, however, can be made about the book of Judges: first, the picture of a tribal society without a unified leadership engaging in uncoordinated local actions seems to fit the society of the hill country in IA I, as evidenced by the archaeology....Secondly, perhaps the one exception to the historical ambiguity of the text is the Song of Deborah in Judges 5 (cf. Knauf 2005b)."</ref>

Among anthropologists, few believe in a leap from independent tribes to monarchy. Most accept an intermediate stage of chiefdom as described in the Book of Judges. These chiefdoms were inter-tribal confederacies temporarily formed for the purpose of war and led by military chief, called Judge.<ref>[[Robert D. Miller|Miller, Robert D]]. (2005). ''Chieftains of the Highland Clans: A History of Israel in the 12th and 11th Centuries''. (Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co), p XV, 6-8.</ref><ref>Portugali, Yuval (1994). ''From Nomadism to Monarchy: Archaeological and Historical Aspects of Early Israel''. (Eds. Finkelstein, Israel & Naaman, Nadav, Washington: Biblical Archeology Society), p 214, https://archive.org/details/fromnomadismtomo0000unse/page/214/mode/2up</ref> Historian Max Ostrovsky finds the [[Ban (law)|law of bun]] ([[Herem (war or property)|herem]]) a characteristic element of chiefdom-level warfare worldwide, wherever culture reached the level of chiefdom. Similar buns were practiced before the introduction of slavery and empire which are more characteristic of monarchies. Hence the accounts of the Book of Judges probably reflect historical reality.<ref>Ostrovsky, Max (2006). ''The Hyperbola of the World Order''. (Lanham: University Press of America), p 299-300.</ref>

=== Sources ===
The basic source for Judges was a collection of loosely connected stories about tribal heroes who saved the people in battle.{{sfn|Knight|1995|p=67}} This original "book of saviours" made up of the stories of [[Ehud]], [[Jael]] and parts of [[Gideon]], had already been enlarged and transformed into "wars of Yahweh" before being given the final Deuteronomistic revision.{{sfn|Soggin|1981|pp=5–6}} In the 20th century, the first part of the prologue (chapters 1:1–2:5) and the two parts of the epilogue (17–21) were commonly seen as miscellaneous collections of fragments tacked onto the main text, and the second part of the prologue (2:6–3:6) as an introduction composed expressly for the book.{{sfn|Guest|2003|pp=201–02}}

More recently, this view has been challenged, and there is an increasing willingness to see Judges as the work of a single individual, working by carefully selecting, reworking and positioning the source material to introduce and conclude his themes.{{sfn|Guest|2003|pp=201–02}} Archaeologist [[Israel Finkelstein]] proposed that the author(s) of the "book of saviours" collected these folk tales in the time of King [[Jeroboam II]] to argue that the king's [[Nimshi]]de origins, which appear to originate in the eastern [[Jezreel Valley]], were part of the "core" territory of Israel.<ref>{{cite AV media |people=[[Matthew J. Adams]], [[Israel Finkelstein]] |date=24 June 2021 |title=Episode Twenty-One: Heroic Stories in the Book of Judges |language=en |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gmSMAuH7sA |access-date=26 September 2023 |archive-url= |archive-date= |format=video |time=31:33 |location=Jerusalem |publisher=W. F. Albright Institute of Archaeological Research}}</ref>

=== The Deuteronomistic History ===
A statement repeated throughout the epilogue, "In those days there was no king in Israel"<ref>{{bibleverse||Judges|17:6|HE}}, {{bibleverse-nb||Judges|18:1|HE}}, {{bibleverse-nb||Judges|19:1|HE}}, and {{bibleverse-nb||Judges|21:25|HE}}</ref> implies a date in the monarchic period for the redaction (editing) of Judges.{{sfn|Malamat|1971|p=132}} Twice, this statement is accompanied with the statement "every man did that which was right in his own eyes", implying that the redactor is pro-monarchy,<ref>{{bibleverse||Judges|17:6|HE}} and {{bibleverse-nb||Judges|21:25|HE}}</ref> and the epilogue, in which the [[tribe of Judah]] is assigned a leadership role, implies that this redaction took place in Judah.{{sfn|Davis|Wolf|2002|p=328}}

Since the second half of the 20th century most scholars have agreed with [[Martin Noth]]'s thesis that the books of [[Book of Deuteronomy|Deuteronomy]], [[Book of Joshua|Joshua]], Judges, [[Books of Samuel|Samuel]] and [[Books of Kings|Kings]] form parts of a single work.{{sfn|Knoppers|2000a|p=1}} Noth maintained that the history was written in the early [[Babylonian captivity|Exilic period]] (6th century BCE) in order to demonstrate how Israel's history was worked out in accordance with the theology expressed in the book of Deuteronomy (which thus provides the name "Deuteronomistic").{{sfn|Walton|2009|pp=169–70}} Noth believed that this history was the work of a single author, living in the mid-6th century BCE, selecting, editing and composing from his sources to produce a coherent work.{{sfn|Knoppers|2000b|p=119}} [[Frank Moore Cross]] later proposed that an early version of the history was composed in Jerusalem in [[Josiah]]'s time (late 7th century BCE); this first version, Dtr1, was then revised and expanded to create a second edition, that identified by Noth, and which Cross labelled Dtr2.{{sfn|Eynikel|1996|p=14}}

Scholars agree that the Deuteronomists' hand can be seen in Judges through the book's cyclical nature: the Israelites fall into idolatry, God punishes them for their sins with oppression by foreign peoples, the Israelites cry out to God for help, and God sends a judge to deliver them from the foreign oppression. After a period of peace, the cycle recurs. Scholars also suggest that the Deuteronomists also included the humorous and sometimes disparaging commentary found in the book such as the story of the [[tribe of Ephraim]] who could not pronounce the word "''[[shibboleth]]''" correctly (12:5–6).{{sfn|Bacon|Sperling|2007|p=562}}