Judges 19: The Worst Chapter Ever

Happy birthday America. To celebrate the state of our country, let's talk about the worst chapter in this book, which is saying something because it had some serious competition. This chapter gave me a lot of feelings and when I have a lot of feelings I put in a lot of GIFS because expressing the emotions this chapter forced upon me with words is beyond my vocabulary. 

The chapter ominously starts with "In those days Israel had no king." i.e. shit's about to get real you guys. 

We're off to our usual not so female friendly start when a man's "concubine" is "unfaithful" to him and runs away back to her family.

I looked some stuff up. "Concubine" is another word for wife. Not the best pet name. 

The book is vague about what exactly "unfaithful" means and why she runs away in the first place. After reading this chapter, my theory isn't that she's a bored housewife. 

The Levite husband who has no name (which in no way makes up for all the nameless women in this book) chases after his nameless concubine wife. Eventually the husband takes his wife back and they head out on a road trip. The husband and concubine stop in Gibeah. They sit in the city square until an old man finds them and offers them a place to stay, but not before creeping them out with ominous warnings of doom as every old person in a horror story must do, "don't spend the night in the square." Why old man?! What's wrong with the square?!

We're about to get deja vu either because this book is trying to metaphor something or it's a hot mess. Remember Lot and his guests? Remember how the whole town wanted to rape his guests and Lot was all "Hey you guys, you can't rape my guests but go ahead and take my virgin daughters"? But horrific gang rape was averted by an act of God? Well, God's not in this book anymore. He's with Gendry out in a canoe. 

The town surrounds the old man's home and demands that they give up the Levite husband so that they can reenact Deliverance. 

Then, the owner of the house says some stuff that I'm just going to quote directly because there's nothing I can say to make it any more ridiculous than it actually is. Satire is holding a mirror to society and if you try to satirize what already feels like a satire of reality, you're just holding a mirror to a mirror and then we're just in a terrifying funhouse of mirrors with no escape. Welcome to 2017. Anyway, this is what the old man says word for fucking word:

"No, my friends; don't be so vile. Since this man is my guest, don't do this outrageous thing. Look, here is my virgin daughter, and his concubine. I will bring them out to you now, and you can use them and do to them whatever you wish. But as for this man, don't do such an outrageous thing." 

Let's break this down. 

Firstly, "my friends"? you think a "Hey, buddy, let's think this through?" works on a group of rapists?  

Secondly, "Since this man is my guest" because it'd be totes fine to rape someone so long as he's not a guest right? 

Thirdly, "Look, here is my virgin daughter" go fuck yourself.

Fourthly, "and his concubine" and she's not your guest? Go fuck yourself with a Saguaro Cactus. 

Fifthly, "You can use them and do to them whatever you wish." They only said sex.They didn't have the imagination to think of more things until you suggested it you sick sick bastard.

Sixthly, "But as for this man, don't do such an outrageous thing." BECAUSE IT'S ONLY OUTRAGEOUS IF IT'S MAN ON MAN RAPE RIGHT?!

There aren't enough table in the world to soothe my lady rage. 

But the men weren't into that, so the Levite husband gets into hero mode and takes things into his own hands, sacrificing himself for the safety of everyone. JK he sends his "concubine" out there. 

"and they raped and abused her throughout the night, and at dawn they let her go." 

At dawn, the concubine lays motionless on the doorstep. Her loving husband steps outside and takes her up in his arms, screaming to God "Why oh why did you take her from me?!" Just kidding:

"He said to her 'Get up. Let's Go." 

When there was no answer, he threw her on his donkey and went on his way. When he returns home with her, he chops her up into twelve pieces and sends her body parts into all the areas of Israel. 

Let's take a moment and remember that the book did not actually specify if she was already dead or not and NO I don't think that the Levite husband is above thinking she's now useless since she was used up by rapists and decides the best thing to do is to put her out of her misery like a horse with a broken leg. 

The people of Israel who receive the Levite's gift baskets react with way more enthusiasm than I am comfortable with: "Such a thing has never been seen or done, not since the day the Israelites came up out of Egypt. Just imagine! We must do something! So speak up!"

There are better ways to get woke people. 

Judges 17-18

It's been a long time. I've missed you. Let's suffer through this book together. 

Chapter 17 Micah's Idols: 

I couldn't bring myself to read for awhile because I knew once Samson died that this book couldn't be that good again, at least not for another thousand pages and I was right. What's this exciting chapter about? Micah the thief. The chapter starts out assuming we already know these characters. I checked to see if some pages were missing but no, all the numbers are there, it's just poorly written. I can tell Jesus and James have the ambition of George R. R. Martin for world building with about a thousand characters but the difference is George can actually develop his characters, give them dialogue, and the women have names. Jesus and James should really just focus on a handful of characters, and they should name the women. Seriously guys. 

The chapter starts out thusly: 

"Now a man named Micah from the hill country of Ephraim said to his mother, 'The eleven hundred shekels of silver that were taken from you and about which I heard you utter a curse-I have that silver with me; I took it.' "

Just look at that shit sentence. That sentence would be covered in red marks in a middle school English class. What is that? Who let this get published? Intro sentence: There's this guy and his nameless mother and he says "You know how you were swearing about stolen money, I stole that money." 

Were the authors just racing each other? This book is thousands of pages long and you couldn't take like a paragraph to set up a scene? Why couldn't this whole book just be about lion carcass honey eating, donkey jawbone wielding, compulsive lady liar loving, harry Samson? You were taken too soon from us. 

I found this on a website titled "Bible Fun for Kids"

Back to boring Micah who probably isn't man enough to fight a lion. Micah stole money from his nameless mother and instead of giving him a beating, she asks that the Lord bless him and not in a passive aggressive way a mother might pray for a child before punishing them severely. 

She's just so excited that her son admitted to it. Dear Micah's nameless mother, this enabling behavior creates criminals. I'm naming Micah's mother Cersei. That's a Game of Thrones reference and if you were hoping I was going to stop making those and find yourself frustrated with me, just keep in mind that I was hoping this book would start naming women. I guess we're both just going to have to keep being disappointed aren't we? 

So Cersei takes her enabling a few steps further. When Micah returns the stolen money, she turns the silver into an idol for him to worship. Micah grows up and adds to his idols, creating a stay at home temple. He turns one of his sons into a priest. The book foreshadows that worshipping Lord in your pajamas is a no no: 

"In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as they saw fit." 

A Levite passed through looking for a place to stay. Micah's thirsty for a Levite priest and asks him to stay. The Levite agrees and is treated like a son. Dear authors, just because you didn't name the male Levite doesn't make up for not naming women. That's like saying it's cool to objectify women because we now demand that celebrity males have abs. Two wrongs don't make a right. Name your ladies or I will and they will all be Game of Thrones references. All of them.

Chapter 18 The Danites Settle in Laish: 

The book emphasizes that Israel has no king during these times so people did whatever tf they wanted. Things are about to get real. The Danites, which are a tribe of people I can't remember if I'm supposed to remember or not, are in search of land. They send out five men in search of land. They spend the night at Micah's and recognize the Levite and ask what he's doing there. The Levite explains he is a live-in priest. The Danites ask him to ask God if their journey will be successful. Levite priests are Lord Translators now. The Levite immediately says they have Lord's approval. Lord doesn't get direct quotes anymore. 

Since the Danites get Lord's approval, are they the good guys? Because the next section does not make it seem like they are the good guys. 

"So the five men left and came to Laish, where they saw that the people were living in safety, like the Sidonioans, at peace and secure. And since their land lacked nothing, they were prosperous. Also, they lived a long way from the Sidonians and had no relationship with anyone else."

Once upon a time a sleepy little village lived in peace and prosperity...until a group of people chosen by Lord decided to fuck their shit up. 

The five men return to the Danites and let them know about the peaceful innocent Laish and about the man who let them stay as guests: 

"Do you know that one of these houses has an ephod, some household gods and an image overlaid with silver? Now you know what to do." 

Our heroes proceed with their plans to murder a town of innocent people and steal from the man who showed them hospitality. These are the protagonists stamped with Lord approval. 

600 men go to Micah's to steal all his idols and silver. They ask the Levite, who is like a son to Micah, to betray his father figure. They have to spend a lot of time convincing him:

"'Be quiet! Don't say a word. Come with us, and be our father and priest. Isn't it better that you serve a tribe and clan in Israel as priest rather than just one man's household?' The priest was very pleased. He took the ephod, the household gods and the idol and went along with the people." 

Our heroes set off with the loot. Micah and his men pursue them and the Danites are really offended:

"What's the matter with you that you called out your men to fight?"

I'm not making this up. The men who just stole everything from Micah ask "Hey, what's your problem? Why can't you just let us get away with this?"

Micah's response:

"You took the gods I made, and my priest, and went away. What else do I have? How can you ask, 'what's the matter with you?'"

Dinate's response:

"'Don't argue with us, or some of the men may get angry and attack you, and you and your family will lose your lives.'"

The Danites are Marvel fans and probably children. 

Micah shrugs his shoulders and heads back home. Our heroes go onto slaughter, rape, and pillage the unsuspecting town of Laish because they wanted the land for themselves. They burn the city to the ground because the Danites and Lord are strongly against recycling. Our Lord approved heroes make a life there and continue to use the silver idols that belonged to Micah. Remember when the the Exodus Israelites were horribly punished for worshipping a golden calf? Lord doesn't talk directly in the book anymore either. Do you think the big twist in this book is that he's dead now and the humans are making up rules that are convenient for them? 

Judges 15-16

Samson is officially my favorite character in this book. Sure, he’s just as unstable and murdery as past characters have been but he just DGAF. He doesn’t pretend to be the good guy, he’s merely a strong meat vessel going around tearing up lions and goats. I love him and I never want his journey to end but I know this book can't let me love something for too long. I don’t know how you’ve been picturing Samson, but I’m picturing Khal Drogo because they both love violence and hair and my mind only has room for the 3 million or so characters from Game of Thrones.

Chapter 15: Samson comes home, grabs a goat, and attempts to go to his wife’s room. Manoa, Samson’s father, stops him concerned about the intentions might have with the goat. Manoa explains that Samson’s wife is gone because:

“ ‘I was so sure you hated her,’ he said, “that I gave her to your companion. Isn’t her younger sister more attractive? Take her instead.”

In this book, women can be casually gifted and re-gifted to people and by people I mean men, the only people considered people in this book.

Rather than rip his dad up like a goat, Samson blames the Philistines for his lost wife and prepares for his revenge.  

“So he went out and caught three hundred foxes and tied them tail to tail in pairs.”

We need to talk about Samson.

“He then fastened a torch to every pair of tails, lit the torches and let the foxes loose in the standing grain of the Philistines.”

Dear God I'm burning alive, please put me out of my misery.

In retaliation, the Philistines burn Samson’s ex-wife and her father to death. The irony is that Samson's wife started all this by trying to avoid fire danger. If only she didn’t allow herself to be forced into a marriage against her will with a psycho, all this could have been avoided. Women.  

Samson who apparently has short term memory loss when it comes to his own actions says: “ ‘Since you’ve acted like this, I swear that I won’t stop until I get my revenge on you.’ ”

I mean...you kind of already got “revenge” and it’s what got you into this mess in the first place but it’s more entertaining than the rest of this book combined so proceed.

My sweet murder boy Samson goes a slaughtering before living in a cave like the hairy bear man he is.

I think it's important to remember that this guy has never cut his hair and this book hasn't even mentioned how he wears it. In a bun? A braid? Pigtails? There's no way he can leave his hair down with all his fire shenanigans

The Philistines find out Samson is hibernating in a cave and send his own people after him. The men ask Samson why he had to get into all this in the first place:

“He answered, ‘I merely did to them what they did to me.’ ”

I don’t remember the Philistines getting too creative with wildlife, Samson.

The Israelites are pretty straight forward and tell thim they have to turn him into the enemy. Samson asks only that they don’t kill him themselves which they agree to. They bind him in ropes and bring him to the Philistines UNTIL

“The Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon him.”

The ropes burns up and fall off of Samson. AND THEN

“Finding a fresh jawbone of a donkey, he grabbed it and struck down a thousand men.”

Samson just keeps healing all the boredom wounds this book has inflicted on me:

“With a donkey’s jawbone

   I have made donkeys of them.

With a donkey’s jawbone

   I have killed a thousand men.”

This book just turned into an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie. Sociopaths love puns. Particularly murder puns.

“Because he was very thirsty, he cried out to the Lord, ‘You have given your servant this great victory. Must I now die of thirst and fall into the hands of the uncircumcised?’ ”

If any other character in this book was just saved by Lord then immediately demanded more and complained, they and generations of descendants would be plagued a thousand times over, but not this guy. This guy is hilariously reckless and ungrateful.

The chapter ends by stating Samson rules over the Israelites for 20 years which had me worried that his story was over but thankfully we are gifted with one more chapter of batshit crazy.

16: Hey There Samson and Delilah

Samson goes and hangs out with a prostitute. His enemies surround the place and wait all night, planning to get him at dawn, but Samson avoids them by leaving in the middle of the night.

Did they think he was going to have breakfast with the prostitute?

Samson makes an escape through the city by tearing up their barriers like the beast he is. The book makes the same mistake it usually does by offering no conclusions and skips ahead to the future, but I can forgive them this one time because they brought Samson into my life.  

Samson falls in love with another woman who gets a name! Her name is Delilah and she is quickly corrupted by the Philistines who tell her if she finds out his weakness they will each giver her eleven hundred shekels of silver. Samson has a thing for deceptive women.

“So Delilah said to Samson, ‘Tell me the secret of your great strength and how you can be tied up and subdued.’ ”

Real subtle Delilah.

What’s Samson’s secret to strength? My guess would be that his mother is the only woman who didn’t drink while pregnant but let’s see what he says.

“ ‘If anyone ties me with seven fresh bowstrings that have not been dried, I’ll become as weak as any other man.’ ”

How...how does his know this?

The Philistines bring the seven fresh bowstrings and Delilah ties him up in the night as the Philistines hide in the room. Delilah shouts to Samson “ ‘The Philistines are upon you!’ ” Then he snaps the bowstrings “as easily as a piece of string snaps when it comes close to a flame.” This is a more appropriate analogy than suggesting Samson tore a lion up as easily as a goat.

“Then Delilah said to Samson, ‘You have made a fool of me’ ”

Yes, yes he did.

“ ‘You lied to me. Come now, tell me how you can be tied.’ ”

Come oooooon just tell me how to murder you.

“He said, ‘If anyone ties me securely with new ropes that have never been used, I’ll become as weak as any other man.’ ”

I love him, I love him so much. He's fine spending time with a woman continually trying to get him killed and just toying with her. Do you think getting her to tie him up is just his kink?

So they go through the same things with the new ropes and he escapes again. Delilah gets mad again and demands that her husband be honest about his weakness because that’s what a good husband would do.

It’s true. Whenever I start dating a guy, I demand that he tell me all his humiliating, shameful secrets immediately and if he doesn’t, I know he’s not worth my time.

Samson tells Delilah another fun lie: “ ‘If you weave the seven braids of my head.’ ”

OMG so much fan service now, all the answers I wanted. Braids. I was hoping it would be braids. This really plays into my Khal Drogo fantasy.

Delilah and the Philistines fail again. Delilah guilts Samson some more.

“ ‘How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when you won’t confide in me?’ ”

How can you say you love me if you won't tell me how to murder you? I also love Delilah.

“ ‘This is the third time you have made a fool of me and haven’t told me the secret of your great strength.’ With such nagging she prodded him day after day until he was sick to death of it.”

Samson’s true weakness is nagging.

Samson finally tells her everything. That in order to weaken him, you need to shave his head.

Delilah shaves his head while he’s sleeping and this time the Philistines are able to capture him, tie him up, and GOUGE OUT HIS EYES.

They put him in prison to grind grain. His hair begins to grow again but unfortunately not his eyes.

The Philistines demand that Samson come out of prison to their temple and entertain them for a celebration. The book doesn’t specify what sort of entertainment Samson would provide but I choose to believe it’s competitive blind hair braiding.

The temple is full of all of the important Philistines expecting to be entertained by a blind man they’ve imprisoned. Samson has other more murdery plans. He prays to God to give him enough strength just once to get revenge for his two lost eyes. Again, Samson’s idea of revenge is always pretty disproportionate to what he’s actually suffered. He pulls the central pillars of the temple down,

“ ‘Let me die with the Philistines!’ Then he pushed with all his might, and down came the temple on the rulers and all the people in it. Thus he killed many more when he died than while he lived.”

I love that killing is his good deed.  In this case suicide is okay so long as you’re murdering the most amount of enemies possible.  I will miss you my hairy murder angel.

Judges 13-16

13: The book doesn't even bother to explain how the Israelites messed up this time. They are now enslaved by the Philistines. At this point, the Israelites could have a slavery montage.

Manoah has a barren wife. Names of women in this book are generally unimportant. The only information the authors deem necessary is whether or not a penis has been inside of a woman or a baby has come out of her. I shall be referring to Manoah's wife as Infertile Myrtle. Infertile Myrtle was going about her nameless, babyless life when one day an angel appeared to remind her that she’s both barren and childless because angels are redundant. The angel tells soon to be Fertile Myrtle that she will become pregnant. He then proceeds to order her around:

“ ‘Now see to it that you drink no wine or other fermented drink and that you do not eat anything unclean. You will become pregnant and have a son whose head is never to be touched by a razor because the boy is to be a Nazirite, dedicated to God from the womb. He will take the lead in delivering Israel from the hands of the Philistines.’ “

To clarify, Fertile Myrtle does not know that this man is an angel. For all she knows, some stranger tells her she’s going to get a baby in her, she better not drink and she better not ever give the kid a haircut. Only by staying sober and allowing her son to look like Sasquatch, will her people escape slavery.

Trusting Fertile Myrtle tells Manoah of her encounter.

“ ‘A man of God came to me. He looked like an angel of God, very awesome. I didn’t ask him where he came from, and he didn’t tell me his name. But he said to me, ‘You will become pregnant and have a son. Now then, drink no wine or other fermented drink and do not eat anything unclean, because the boy will be a Nazirite of God from the womb until the day of his death.’ ”

An awesome looking stranger who might be an angel told me I'm going to have a baby. He also told me to stop drinking.

If everyone in this book thinks it’s fine to drink while pregnant, then maybe the one child not born with fetal alcohol syndrome would seem to be chosen by God.

Manoah prays to the Lord to give him instructions on how to raise the baby. God hears his message and sends the angel to reiterate the same three instructions.

“ ‘The angel of the Lord answered, “Your wife must do all that I have told her. She must not eat anything that comes from the grapevine, nor drink any wine or other fermented drink nor eat anything unclean.She must do everything I have commanded her.’ ”

Your drunk wife couldn’t remember three instructions huh?

Manoah then offers the stranger food. The angel tells him to burn it as an offering to Lord instead. Manoah asks the man’s name.

“ ‘Why do you ask my name? It is beyond understanding’ “

Is it really that hard to pronounce?

Manoah and Myrtle burn food for God and the angel shows himself in the flame. They both freak out and fall on their faces which sounds like something drunk people might do. Manoah is sure that the angel will murder them. Myrtle is pretty chill about it and says they wouldn’t put them through all that just to kill them presumably because she has not read this book.

Myrtle turns out to be right and they have their hairy baby free of murder...so far.

14: We Need to Talk about Samson

We skip right to puberty Samson who gets a crush on a Philistine woman which if you remember is the enemy. Samson doesn't know how to flirt yet and instead goes full Veruca Salt on his parents.

“ ‘I have seen a Philistine woman in Timnah; now get her for me as my wife.’ “

Rather than slapping their hairy child, they try to plea with him:

“ ‘Isn’t there an acceptable woman among your relatives or among all our people? Must you go to the uncircumcised Philistines to get a wife.’ “

1. Samson might be a dick but I don't blame him for not wanting to bang his relatives.
2. Manoah and Myrtle's concern is not "Her people enslaved us" but "Her people have foreskins, gross."

Samson: “ ‘Get her for me. She’s the right one for me.’ ” i.e. She isn't my cousin.

The authors tell us a secret in parenthesis as to why Samson is being so salty. Lord is speaking through Samson to fulfill a prophecy and Lord doesn’t say please.

Samson goes down to meet the Philistine lady with his parents. Why would her parents allow her to be married off to the hairy child of the slave class? Because reasons.

On the way, a young lion came roaring toward Samson and “The Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon him”

And then: “he tore the lion apart with his bare hands as he might have torn a young goat. But he told neither his father nor his mother what he had done. Then he went down and talked with the woman, and he liked her.”

1. He tore the lion apart with his bare fucking hands.
2. The author’s analogy is “as he might have torn a young goat.” Is the author able to tear goats up easily? Is the author confusing a goat with a block of cheese?
3. “But he told neither his father nor his mother what he had done” They were walking together. Continuity is not this book's thing.
4. “Then he went down and talked with the woman, and he liked her.”
5. Oh, I'm glad the Lion Ripper found love. That's what I was really worried about.
6. Samson is going to be a serial killer.

Sometime later, Samson goes back to visit his nameless Philistine lady to marry her and on the way: “he turned aside to look at the lion’s carcass, and in it he saw a swarm of bees and some honey. He scooped out the honey with his hands and ate as he went along.”

I repeat, serial killer.

Also, the authors understand neither goats nor bees.

“When he rejoined his parents, he gave them some, and they too ate it. But he did not tell them that he had taken the honey from the lion’s carcass.”

During the wedding, Samson wagers a bet that the Philistines can’t solve his riddle in seven days. If they do, he’ll give them all 30 pieces of linen garments and 30 sets of clothes. If they don’t, he gets 30 pieces of linen garments and 30 sets of clothes.

The riddle:

“ ‘Out of the eater, something to eat;

   out of the strong, something sweet’ “

Uhhh that's not a riddle, that's a sociopath's inside joke with himself.

For three days the Philistines couldn’t figure out the riddle because who the fuck would? On the fourth day, they tell Samson’s wife to figure it out for them or they’ll burn her and her father’s household to death. The Philistine’s take fashion very seriously.

The wife’s strategy is to have a meltdown:

“Samson’s wife threw herself on him, sobbing, ‘You hate me! You don’t really love me. You’ve given my people a riddle, but you haven’t told me the answer.’ ” . . . “She cried the whole seven days of the feast. So on the seventh day he finally told her.”

Anything to get her to stop nagging. Women amiright?

On the last day, the Philistine’s solve the riddle:

“ ‘What is sweeter than honey?

   What is stronger than a lion?’ ”

And Samson loses it:

“ ‘If you had not plowed with my heifer,

   you would not have solved my riddle.’ ”

Um, does he refer to his wife as heifer?

“Then the Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon him.”

Then Samson went a murdering. He killed 30 people and took their clothes. Like I said, serial killer.

When Samson returns to his father’s home after his murder tantrum, he discovers that his wife has been given away to his companion because in this book, you can just give women away because they are merely nameless baby vessels.

This book has some really questionable morals. Thank goodness it's only fiction that only adults would read and not take too seriously.