Everyone did what was right in his own eyes | Are we any different today? (Judges 16 – Ruth 1)

Enabling or Caring…

There was a man of the hill country of Ephraim, whose name was Micah. And he said to his mother, “The 1,100 pieces of silver that were taken from you, about which you uttered a curse, and also spoke it in my ears, behold, the silver is with me; I took it.”

And his mother said, “Blessed be my son by the Lord.”And he restored the 1,100 pieces of silver to his mother.

And his mother said, “I dedicate the silver to the Lord from my hand for my son, to make a carved image and a metal image. Now therefore I will restore it to you.” So when he restored the money to his mother, his mother took 200 pieces of silver and gave it to the silversmith, who made it into a carved image and a metal image. And it was in the house of Micah.

And the man Micah had a shrine, and he made an ephod and household gods, and ordained one of his sons, who became his priest.
In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.
Judges 17:1-6, emphasis added

We may start out reading this passage thinking, ‘oh, his Mom was blessing his honesty.’ However, let’s break that down a bit.

• Her son stole 1100 pieces of silver from his own Mom. Think about that, back in the day he could have bought Joseph (Gen 37:28) 55 times. To put it another way, he offered the Levite a salary of 10 shekels a year (Judges 17:10);
• He only gave it back once he knew she cursed about it;
• His Mom tries to offset the curse with a blessing;
• She gifts the money back to him TO MAKE FALSE IDOLS;
• He keeps it in his house that hosts his own shrine, ie., his own place of worship;
• He creates an ephod, used for divining. Since the ephod wasn’t located in the temple, it wasn’t for a holy use. Gideon also made his own ephod with 1700 shekels, in which ‘all Israel whored after it there, and it became a snare to Gideon and to his family’; and
• He created his own priest by ordaining his son himself.

Does this seem like a caring mother who calls out and helps her son see his sins and change? Or is it of one who was right there in the midst of sin herself, encouraging and enabling it?

Everyone did what was right in his own eyes…

In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.
Judges 17:6, emphasis added

Not only do we see an entire family from Ephraim turn away, we see problems with the Levites now (Judges 17).

The young Levite left for wealth, to make it on his own. If we look at the succession and placement of verses, this comes right after it’s declared that ‘everyone did what was right in his own eyes’. This was not an honorable mission, and we find out soon enough in chapter 18 that he skipped out of Ephraim’s house when offered more money and a bigger audience.

Next, we are told about another tribe in Israel who are not honoring the Lord. They leave the land that was their God-given gift and look to settle elsewhere, taking the Levite priest with them and taking over an unsuspecting town.

The worst chapter in the Bible…

WARNING: Please use discretion if you are going through the Bible with your family. You may want to consider skipping over these next couple of sections as it talks about some graphic details.

Personally, I think this is the worst chapter in the entire Bible to read. I dread reading it, it’s so disturbing. But it’s there, and we need to understand and learn from it: Judges 19.

Now, we are brought to a Levite with an unfaithful Judahite concubine who leaves him. While seemingly honorable, he goes after her to bring her home and on the way they stop in Gibeah, a Benjamite city. (If you’ll note, the last couple chapters are bringing up that not just one tribe has swayed, but everyone did what was right in his own eyes at this time.)

Come to find out, Gibeah is host to the same degraded fools that made up Sodom and Gomorrah however many years earlier (and however many years later, we find the same today).

Again, seemingly honorable, a man approaches them and offers them a place to stay as he worries for their safety. Rightfully so as the mob surrounds the house demanding the man be brought out to sexually abuse.

Brace yourselves…

And the man, the master of the house, went out to them and said to them, “No, my brothers, do not act so wickedly; since this man has come into my house, do not do this vile thing. Behold, here are my virgin daughter and his concubine. Let me bring them out now. Violate them and do with them what seems good to you, but against this man do not do this outrageous thing.”
Judges 19:23-24, emphasis added

Ummm, as a woman I take great disgust with this. While I do realize that times were different, it leaves no excuse for sending a woman out to get raped. But that’s sadly not even the worst of it.

So the man seized his concubine and made her go out to them. And they knew her and abused her all night until the morning. And as the dawn began to break, they let her go. And as morning appeared, the woman came and fell down at the door of the man's house where her master was, until it was light.
Judges 19:25-26

All night long she was abused and raped. How utterly deplorable. ‘Everyone did what was right in his own eyes at this time’ takes on a whole new meaning when we realize how far all of Israel had come from being a godly nation.

Ugh, it gets worse…

And her master rose up in the morning, and when he opened the doors of the house and went out to go on his way, behold, there was his concubine lying at the door of the house, with her hands on the threshold. He said to her, “Get up, let us be going.” But there was no answer.
Judges 19:27-28

He SLEPT?! He sent his concubine out, after we thought he valiantly went to bring her home, then sent her to the wolves and SLEPT the night away! What in the world?! This was a Levite, the priestly line! EVERYONE did what was right in their own eyes during this time with no one to call them to account.

Let’s not forget either, he was going to leave without her. But, oh, behold, she was right there on the steps laying there dead as he was trying to leave. While we can’t know the tone in his voice or the emotion he felt, the Bible relays to us a very callous and cold response to seeing his concubine laying there with arms on the threshold of the house, ‘Get up, let us be going.’

I’m sorry to hammer this home, but the gravity of the situation was not just that a woman lying there, but that she had been abused and raped all night long and ended up dying there. This was a woman who was likely bloody, ragged, and bruised laying dead on, essentially, the front porch. She was a defenseless woman he gave to the mob to be abused, and he had no plans to save her or bring her home.

Wake up call…

The gruesome details after this event served as a wake up call to the nation of Israel; since the Levite chopped her body up and sent a piece of her to every tribe that is. I don’t understand this, but it did serve a purpose.

The Israelites, for the most part, decided that was too disgusting and needed a change. After requesting the tribe of Benjamin to give up the men of Gibeah and being denied, they ended up going to war against the entire tribe of Benjamin. Multiple times they were losing the battles but turned to God for advice; it seems to be of relative importance that at this time they decided to seek the Lord, not their ephods or their gods. The body parts woke them up.

The people of Israel arose and went up to Bethel and inquired of God.
Judges 20:18a

And the people of Israel went up and wept before the Lord until the evening. And they inquired of the Lord....
Judges 20:23a

Then all the people of Israel, the whole army, went up and came to Bethel and wept. They sat there before the Lord and fasted that day until evening, and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before the Lord. And the people of Israel inquired of the Lord (for the ark of the covenant of God was there in those days, and Phinehas the son of Eleazar, son of Aaron, ministered before it in those days), saying, “Shall we go out once more to battle against our brothers, the people of Benjamin, or shall we cease?”
Judges 20:26-28a

And the Lord defeated Benjamin before Israel, and the people of Israel destroyed 25,100 men of Benjamin that day.
Judges 20:35a

Wait, what?

Again, what seems noble turns out into a convoluted story. The Israelites are grieved for the loss of a tribe, Benjamin, and seek to ensure it will not die out but remain a part of Israel.

However, the method they choose is a hard one to wrap our minds around in this day and age, especially since we don’t fully understand their customs and culture.

One city, Jabesh Gilead, did not send anyone to fight against Benjamin directly defying their mutual responsibility for military action. They were put to the sword for the dual purpose of punishment and taking the virgin women to give to the remaining Benjamites. There weren’t enough women to play matchmaker with, so they had to get creative now.

And they commanded the people of Benjamin, saying, “Go and lie in ambush in the vineyards and watch. If the daughters of Shiloh come out to dance in the dances, then come out of the vineyards and snatch each man his wife from the daughters of Shiloh, and go to the land of Benjamin.
Judges 21:20-21, emphasis added

So, kidnapping was their solution. Great.

Are we any different today…

When we look at it, the USA is similar in some ways to the nation of Israel. We took over a land, were founded on Godly principles, split up into sections with our own laws, and slowly led ourselves further away from our fundamental precepts. The founding fathers intended for this to be a Christian nation, but look how fast we strayed away.

• There is no longer prayer in school;
• Our pledge of allegiance has been modified by some to take out ‘under God’;
• Women are treated abominably with the rising of prostitution and pornography, even among ‘Christian’ men;
• Little kids are even being kidnapped and sexually abused as women just aren’t cutting it anymore for that ‘sexual rush’;
• Mobs are littering the street as people have stripped themselves of all personal responsibility and accountability;
• Parents are justifying their kids’ felons and blaming anyone they can;
• Definitions are being twisted to fit a narrative so no one can sensibly and logically apply Biblical principles;
• Underhanded leaders are manipulating hordes of people to create heinous crimes;
• People are dying based on the color of their skin;
• Multiple Bibles sit in ‘Christian’ homes unopened;
• Family units are being destroyed and encouraged to remain that way through the laws we enact;
• Violence is at an all time high and those who do it justify it;
• Our election is currently being threatened by one party with military involvement or violent fights if their candidate does not win;
• Our lives have become intentionally busied to the point that we don’t have time to worry about others;
• etc.

Our nation is in need of repentance, a complete turning around from where we are heading to where we should be heading. A complete reversal.

Everyone did what was right in his own eyes then, but our nation is no different today. Click To Tweet

Everyone did what was right in his own eyes then, but our nation is no different today.

Learn from them…

Let us focus on the good things the Israelites did and make it our mission to do those same things. They made tons of mistakes, but they also learned in the Benjamite battles to turn to the Lord and seek Him. We, too, should start there. Let’s seek the Lord in prayer, humbly and constantly! Ask for His guidance and direction and peace.

The US may be a nation far from God at the moment, but let’s bring it down to an individual level: whether a person is part of a mob or a neighbor in your church. Let’s pray that individual hearts may be turned toward God and that they may become in right relationship with Him, no matter their current place in life.

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