ted story of the
book of Judges. All this was in accordance with the promises and
threatenings of the Law, and it illustrated alike the perverseness of
the nation and God's faithfulness in the fulfilment of his covenant. The
incidents recorded in this book are of a peculiarly checkered character,
and many of them are full of romantic interest. In the history of
redemption, the book of Judges has a well-defined place. It unfolds to
our view the operation of the Theocracy in the first stage of the
nation's existence, and under its first outward form of government.

7. As it respects the _arrangement of materials_, the book of Judges
opens with a two-fold _introduction_, giving, first, a brief notice of
the wars carried on against the Canaanites by certain tribes after
Joshua's death, of the failure of the people to effect a complete
extirpation of the Canaanites, and of the reproof administered to them
by an angel of the Lord (chap. 1-2:5); secondly, a survey of the course
of events during the time of the judges, with especial reference to
God's faithfulness in the fulfilment of his promises and threatenings.
Chap. 2:6-3:6. Then follows the _body of the work_, giving an account of
the _seven servitudes_ to which the people were subjected for their
sins, and of the judges raised up by God for their deliverance, with
some incidental notices, as the history of Abimelech, (chap. 9) and the
quarrel of the men of Ephraim with Jephthah. Chap. 12:1-6. The book
closes with a two-fold _appendix_, recording, first, the conquest of
Laish by the Danites, and in connection with this the story of Micah and
his idolatrous establishment (chaps. 17, 18); secondly, the punishment
of the Benjamites for espousing the cause of the wicked men of Gibeah
(chaps. 19-21). These events are not to be conceived of as subsequent to
those recorded in the body of the book, but as contemporaneous with
them.

8. The remark: "In those days there was no king in Israel" (chaps. 18:1;
19:1) plainly implies that the _date_ of the book of Judges must be
assigned to a period after the establishment of the kingdom. The
statement, on the other hand, that the children of Benjamin did not
drive out the Jebusites from Jerusalem, "but the Jebusites dwell with
the children of Benjamin in Jerusalem unto this day" (chap. 1:21),
limits the time of its composition to the period before David's conquest
of the city. 2 Sam. 5:6-9. The author of the book is unknown. Jewish
tr