The text reports to us that there was no king in Israel in those days (Judges 17:6, 18:1, 19:1, 21:25). This wording provides a good example of the difference between ‘the time of writing’ and ‘the time written about.’ That is, the book of Judges describes the 300 years before the establishing of the monarchy in Israel – roughly, 1300 BC to 1000 BC: that’s the time written about. But the history was composed from a perspective that looked back at those three centuries after they were over, during an era when there was a king, during the monarchy: that’s the time of writing.

And, indeed, in those days when there was no king, all the people did what was right in their own eyes (17:6, 21:25). That suggests that the document was written down during the time of David or Solomon, when the monarchy did its (imperfect) best to stand for justice. If the book were written later than that, there would be plenty of examples of how the king could lead the people astray into wickedness; after the reigns of Jeroboam or Abijam, for example, you would hardly propose that if they’d only had a king back then, they would have lived in righteousness.

So far in Judges we have seen a pattern of failure, oppression, repentance, and deliverance: but in the final five chapters we see just one kind of evil after another – theft, idolatry, abuse, rape, and murder – with no repentance and no deliverance. The tacit lesson is this: if God does not raise up a deliverer, our own wisdom will not be sufficient to keep us out of trouble.

That does not sit well with us, of course. We tend to be quite confident in our own opinions – doing whatever is right in our own eyes – yet it would be wiser for us to be self-critical about our own motives. As a later generation would point out, our hearts are devious and perverse and beyond comprehension (Jeremiah 17:9).

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We are so good at justifying whatever is right in our own eyes, O God: yet for all our self-justifications we keep doing what we know is wrong, again and again. If you do not rescue us, we are lost forever. Let your grace amend our hearts: we have no other Savior but you, O Lord.

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