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Judges2:1–5

Israel Rebuked at Bochim

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Judges 2:1–5 — Israel Rebuked at Bochim. Each verse below carries the full apparatus: the Berean Standard Bible, the vocalized original (tap any word), and a parsed breakdown of every term transcribed from the interlinear. Synthesized commentary, canonical threads, and the reading of Christ gather at the end, over the whole unit.

1

Now the angel of the LORD went up from Gilgal to Bochim and said, “I brought you up out of Egypt and led you into the land that I had promised to your fathers, and I said, ‘I will never break My covenant with you,

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Hebrew — tap a word ↓

mal·’aḵ- Yah·weh way·ya·‘al min- hag·gil·gāl ’el- hab·bō·ḵīm p̄ way·yō·mer ’a·‘ă·leh ’eṯ·ḵem mim·miṣ·ra·yim wā·’ā·ḇî ’eṯ·ḵem ’el- hā·’ā·reṣ ’ă·šer niš·ba‘·tî la·’ă·ḇō·ṯê·ḵem wā·’ō·mar lō- lə·‘ō·w·lām ’ā·p̄êr bə·rî·ṯî ’it·tə·ḵem

Word by word24 · parsed
מַלְאַךְ־mal·’aḵ-Now the angelH4397
√ mălʼâk — a messengerNounmasculine singular construct
mălʼâk — a messenger The construct “messenger-of-YHWH.” Barnes: the phrase “is used nearly 60 times to designate the Angel of God's presence,” and in every case the messenger delivers the message “as if God Himself were speaking, without the intervening words ‘Thus saith the Lord.’” That formal test — no prophetic formula, first-person divine speech — is the hinge on which Barnes, K&D, Gill, Benson, Poole, Henry and Maclaren all read this as the Angel of the Covenant, and on which Ellicott, Geneva and the Targum demur.
יְהוָ֛הYah·wehof the LORDH3068
√ Yᵉhôvâh — Jehovah, Jewish national name of GodNounpropermasculine singular
וַיַּ֧עַלway·ya·‘alwent upH5927
√ ʻâlâh — to ascend, intransitively (be high) or actively (mount)Conjunctive wawVerbQalConsecutive imperfectthird person masculine singular
ʻâlâh — to ascend, to go up Qal consecutive imperfect: the messenger went up. The same root will be used two words later in the Hifil for what He did to Israel — He brought them up out of Egypt. The narrator's verb for the messenger's journey and the messenger's verb for the exodus are one root: the One who brought a nation up out of Egypt now comes up from Gilgal to ask what they have done with it.
מִן־min-fromH4480
√ min — properly, a part ofPreposition
הַגִּלְגָּ֖לhag·gil·gālGilgalH1537
√ Gilgâl — Gilgal, the name of three places in PalestineArticleNounproperfeminine singular
Gilgâl — Gilgal Not merely a starting point. JFB: “His coming from Gilgal had a peculiar significance, for there the Israelites made a solemn dedication of themselves to God on their entrance into the promised land.” Cambridge adds that the name denotes a sacred circle of stones, not “rolling,” and that the Angel's presence shews Gilgal was a sanctuary. The rebuke travels from the place of Israel's covenant-renewal to the place that will be named for their tears.
אֶל־’el-toH413
√ ʼêl — near, with or amongPreposition
הַבֹּכִ֑ים פhab·bō·ḵīm p̄BochimH1066
√ Bôkîym — Bo-kim, a place in PalestineArticleNounproperfeminine singular
Bôkîym — Bochim, “weepers” A proleptic name: the place is called by what happens in v. 4 before v. 4 happens. Cambridge presses this as evidence of the text's shaping and, with the LXX (“to the weeping-place, and to Bethel, and to the House of Israel”), argues that to Beth-el is original. Barnes and Pulpit locate it near Shechem or Shiloh; all agree the site is unknown.
וַיֹּאמֶר֩way·yō·merand saidH559
√ ʼâmar — to say (used with great latitude)Conjunctive wawVerbQalConsecutive imperfectthird person masculine singular
אַעֲלֶ֨ה’a·‘ă·lehI brought you upH5927
√ ʻâlâh — to ascend, intransitively (be high) or actively (mount)VerbHifilImperfectfirst person common singular
ʻâlâh — to bring up (Hifil) First person, imperfect: the exodus spoken in the speaker's own name, with no “thus saith the Lord” between. Maclaren: “His reiterated ‘I's’ are incomprehensible on any other hypothesis” than that the speaker is one with Jehovah. The grammatical oddity of the tense (Cambridge) and the theological weight of the pronoun (Maclaren, K&D) sit in the same word.
אֶתְכֶ֜ם’eṯ·ḵemH853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Direct object markersecond person masculine plural
Direct object marker with second person plural suffix — “you,” marked as the object of the bringing-up.
מִמִּצְרַ֗יִםmim·miṣ·ra·yimout of EgyptH4714
√ Mitsrayim — Mitsrajim, iPreposition-mNounproperfeminine singular
וָאָבִ֤יאwā·’ā·ḇîand ledH935
√ bôwʼ — to go or come (in a wide variety of applications)Conjunctive wawVerbHifilConsecutive imperfectfirst person common singular
אֶתְכֶם֙’eṯ·ḵemH853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Direct object markersecond person masculine plural
אֶל־’el-you intoH413
√ ʼêl — near, with or amongPreposition
הָאָ֗רֶץhā·’ā·reṣthe landH776
√ ʼerets — the earth (at large, or partitively a land)ArticleNounfeminine singular
אֲשֶׁ֤ר’ă·šerthatH834
√ ʼăsher — who, which, what, thatPronounrelative
נִשְׁבַּ֙עְתִּי֙niš·ba‘·tîI had promisedH7650
√ shâbaʻ — to seven oneself, iVerbNifalPerfectfirst person common singular
shâbaʻ — to swear, to bind by oath Nifal perfect: the oath already sworn and standing. Ellicott sends the reader to Genesis 17:7, Psalm 89:28, Psalm 89:34, Luke 1:54-55; Cambridge notes the oath to the fathers is a JE and Deuteronomic refrain. The land Israel is failing to clear is land held by divine oath — which is why the punishment in v. 3 withdraws help, and never withdraws the grant.
לַאֲבֹ֣תֵיכֶ֔םla·’ă·ḇō·ṯê·ḵemto your fathersH1
√ ʼâb — father, in a literal and immediate, or figurative and remote applicationPreposition-lNounmasculine plural constructsecond person masculine plural
וָאֹמַ֕רwā·’ō·marand I saidH559
√ ʼâmar — to say (used with great latitude)Conjunctive wawVerbQalConsecutive imperfectfirst person common singular
לֹֽא־lō-I will neverH3808
√ lôʼ — not (the simple or absAdverbNegative particle
לְעוֹלָֽם׃lə·‘ō·w·lām. . .H5769
√ ʻôwlâm — properly, concealed, iPreposition-lNounmasculine singular
ʻôwlâm — long duration, perpetuity Literally “to the vanishing point” — Strong's root sense is concealed, time whose end is out of sight. It is the last word of the verse: the interlinear surface לְעוֹלָֽם׃ carries the sof pasuq, the verse-ending mark, even though the row is displayed at index 20 ahead of the verb. The oath therefore closes not on “covenant” nor on “with you” but on the horizon — not-will-I-annul my-covenant with-you, to-the-vanishing-point. Ellicott reaches for Genesis 17:7 and Psalm 89 at exactly this word; it is this perpetuity, not Israel's performance, that makes what follows a discipline and not a divorce.
אָפֵ֧ר’ā·p̄êrbreakH6565
√ pârar — to break up (usually figuratively), iVerbHifilImperfectfirst person common singular
pârar — to break up, annul (Hifil) The covenant verb of voidance. Maclaren draws the hard conclusion the text forces: “a covenant which He has sworn that He will never break He does count as non-existent when men break it.” Benson and Poole soften it to a condition — “upon condition of your keeping covenant with me” — while Gill puts it forensically: “if the covenant between them was broken, it should not begin with him.” The ⚙ tension is real and the commentators do not resolve it in one direction.
בְּרִיתִ֛יbə·rî·ṯîMy covenantH1285
√ bᵉrîyth — a compact (because made by passing between pieces of flesh)Nounfeminine singular constructfirst person common singular
bᵉrîyth — a compact, made by passing between pieces of flesh The same noun Israel is forbidden to cut with the land's dwellers in v. 2. One word, two parties: God will not void His; Israel has cut theirs with the Canaanites. The unit's whole indictment turns on that single repeated noun.
אִתְּכֶ֖ם’it·tə·ḵemwith youH854
√ ʼêth — properly, nearness (used only as a preposition or an adverb), nearPrepositionsecond person masculine plural
Preposition of nearness (ʼêth, H854) with second person plural — “with you”: the covenant is not merely about Israel but bound to them.
2

and you are not to make a covenant with the people of this land, but you shall tear down their altars.’ Yet you have not obeyed My voice. What is this you have done?

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Hebrew — tap a word ↓

wə·’at·tem lō- ṯiḵ·rə·ṯū ḇə·rîṯ lə·yō·wō·šə·ḇê haz·zōṯ hā·’ā·reṣ tit·tō·ṣūn miz·bə·ḥō·w·ṯê·hem wə·lō- šə·ma‘·tem bə·qō·lî mah- zōṯ ‘ă·śî·ṯem

Word by word15 · parsed
וְאַתֶּ֗םwə·’at·temand youH859
√ ʼattâh — thou and thee, or (plural) ye and youConjunctive wawPronounsecond person masculine plural
Emphatic independent pronoun fronted before the negative — “and you, you shall not…” The stress falls on the party under obligation.
לֹֽא־lō-are notH3808
√ lôʼ — not (the simple or absAdverbNegative particle
תִכְרְת֤וּṯiḵ·rə·ṯūto makeH3772
√ kârath — to cut (off, down or asunder)VerbQalImperfectsecond person masculine plural
kârath — to cut (off, down, asunder) The covenant verb. Its ordinary sense is violent: to cut down, to cut off. Israel was to cut down the altars and instead cut a covenant; the same semantic field serves both the command and the crime. Cambridge locates the law itself in Exodus 23:31-33 (the Book of the Covenant) and Exodus 34:12, thence into Deuteronomy 7:2-4.
בְרִית֙ḇə·rîṯa covenantH1285
√ bᵉrîyth — a compact (because made by passing between pieces of flesh)Nounfeminine singular
bᵉrîyth — a compact The hinge-word of the unit. God's bᵉrîyth (v. 1) is unbreakable; Israel's bᵉrîyth with the land's dwellers is forbidden. Barnes observes that the two articles named here are precisely the two Israel had at this point broken, and that the third prohibition of Deuteronomy 7:3 (intermarriage) goes unmentioned — evidence, he argues, that Judges 3:6 had not yet happened.
לְיֽוֹשְׁבֵי֙lə·yō·wō·šə·ḇêwith the peopleH3427
√ yâshab — properly, to sit down (specifically as judgePreposition-lVerbQalParticiplemasculine plural construct
yâshab — to sit down, to dwell A participle, not a noun: these are the ones sitting in the land. The word quietly concedes the problem of Judges 1 — the Canaanites are still seated where Israel was to be settled.
הַזֹּ֔אתhaz·zōṯof thisH2063
√ zôʼth — this (often used adverb)ArticlePronounfeminine singular
הָאָ֣רֶץhā·’ā·reṣlandH776
√ ʼerets — the earth (at large, or partitively a land)ArticleNounfeminine singular
תִּתֹּצ֑וּןtit·tō·ṣūnbut you shall tear downH5422
√ nâthats — to tear downVerbQalImperfectsecond person masculine pluralParagogic nun
nâthats — to tear down The one positive command in the indictment, and the one most visibly unkept. Gill: this “they aught to have done as soon as they were come into the land… to show their detestation of idolatry, and to prevent the use of them to idolatrous purposes.” Standing altars are not neutral architecture; left standing, they become the snare of v. 3.
מִזְבְּחוֹתֵיהֶ֖םmiz·bə·ḥō·w·ṯê·hemtheir altarsH4196
√ mizbêach — an altarNounmasculine plural constructthird person masculine plural
וְלֹֽא־wə·lō-Yet you have notH3808
√ lôʼ — not (the simple or absConjunctive wawAdverbNegative particle
שְׁמַעְתֶּ֥םšə·ma‘·temobeyedH8085
√ shâmaʻ — to hear intelligently (often with implication of attention, obedience, etcVerbQalPerfectsecond person masculine plural
shâmaʻ — to hear intelligently, to obey Qal perfect, second masculine plural: a completed record, not an ongoing tendency. Cambridge points to Exodus 23:21f., where the voice Israel is charged to heed is the voice of the very Angel who was to lead them into Canaan — which would make this the Messenger indicting them for not hearing Himself.
בְּקֹלִ֖יbə·qō·lîMy voiceH6963
√ qôwl — a voice or soundPreposition-bNounmasculine singular constructfirst person common singular
qôwl — a voice or sound “In my voice.” The same noun returns in v. 4, inverted: they did not hear His voice, so they lift up their own and weep.
מַה־mah-WhatH4100
√ mâh — properly, interrogative what? (including how? why? when?)Interrogative
Interrogative mâh — “what?” Cambridge: “what have you done, with emphasis on ‘what’; cf. Jdg 15:11, Genesis 3:13 etc.”
זֹּ֥אתzōṯis thisH2063
√ zôʼth — this (often used adverb)Pronounfeminine singular
עֲשִׂיתֶֽם׃‘ă·śî·ṯemyou have doneH6213
√ ʻâsâh — to do or make, in the broadest sense and widest applicationVerbQalPerfectsecond person masculine plural
ʻâsâh — to do or make Qal perfect: the deed is done and cannot be undone by explanation. Maclaren hears the garden in it: He “asks the same question as had been asked of Eve, ‘What is this ye have done?’… No man dare answer when God asks, ‘What hast thou done?’” The question is not a request for information; it is the arraignment itself.
3

So now I tell you that I will not drive out these people before you; they will be thorns in your sides, and their gods will be a snare to you.”

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Hebrew — tap a word ↓

wə·ḡam ’ā·mar·tî lō- ’ă·ḡā·rêš ’ō·w·ṯām mip·pə·nê·ḵem wə·hā·yū lā·ḵem lə·ṣid·dîm wê·lō·hê·hem yih·yū lə·mō·w·qêš lā·ḵem

Word by word13 · parsed
וְגַ֣םwə·ḡamSo nowH1571
√ gam — properly, assemblageConjunction
gam — moreover, also A small particle carrying the unit's largest ambiguity: new sentence, or standing threat now enforced. Cambridge and K&D read it as invoking the earlier warnings of Numbers 33:55 and Joshua 23:13; Barnes and Pulpit read it as a verdict declared on the spot — “I now protest and declare” — and Barnes adds that it was this announcement “that caused the people to weep.”
אָמַ֔רְתִּי’ā·mar·tîI tell youH559
√ ʼâmar — to say (used with great latitude)VerbQalPerfectfirst person common singular
ʼâmar — to say Qal perfect, first person: “I have said.” Divine speech as legal act; the saying is the sentence.
לֹֽא־lō-that I will notH3808
√ lôʼ — not (the simple or absAdverbNegative particle
אֲגָרֵ֥שׁ’ă·ḡā·rêšdrive out [these people]H1644
√ gârash — to drive out from a possessionVerbPielImperfectfirst person common singular
gârash — to drive out from a possession (Piel) The exact reversal of the conquest. Gill draws the line back through Judges 1: this “accounts for the various instances related in the preceding chapter; where it is observed, that they could not, or did not, drive the old inhabitants out of such and such places, because they sinned against the Lord.” The military failures of ch. 1 are here given their cause — and Maclaren names the mechanism: “God punishes our making truce with our spiritual foes by letting the effects of the truce work themselves out.”
אוֹתָ֖ם’ō·w·ṯāmH853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Direct object markerthird person masculine plural
מִפְּנֵיכֶ֑םmip·pə·nê·ḵembefore youH6440
√ pânîym — the face (as the part that turns)Preposition-mNounmasculine plural constructsecond person masculine plural
pânîym — the face “From before your faces.” The idiom of conquest — the enemy driven from the face — is retained only to be negated.
וְהָי֤וּwə·hā·yūthey will be [thorns]H1961
√ hâyâh — to exist, iConjunctive wawVerbQalConjunctive perfectthird person common plural
hâyâh — to exist, to become Conjunctive perfect: “and they shall become to you.” Not a description of what the Canaanites are, but a sentence on what they will turn into for Israel — a relation created by the withdrawal just announced.
לָכֶם֙lā·ḵemin your
Prepositionsecond person masculine plural
לְצִדִּ֔יםlə·ṣid·dîmsidesH6654
√ tsad — a sidePreposition-lNounmasculine plural
tsad — a side The textual crux of the unit. K&D defends the Masoretic text: the phrase “is an abbreviated expression for” the fuller phrase of Numbers 33:55, “so that there is no necessity for the conjecture that it stands for” tsarim. Ellicott and Cambridge canvass the alternatives — tsarim “adversaries” (Vulgate, Targum), the LXX's “straits, distresses,” a proposed tsaddim “nets” on an Assyrian cognate — and Cambridge judges these “probably only conjectures.” The honest position: the received text says “sides,” and every English rendering supplies something.
וֵאלֹ֣הֵיהֶ֔םwê·lō·hê·hemand their godsH430
√ ʼĕlôhîym — gods in the ordinary senseConjunctive wawNounmasculine plural constructthird person masculine plural
ʼĕlôhîym — gods The gods of the dispossessed, left with their altars intact. What Israel spared as harmless furniture becomes the instrument of their undoing.
יִהְי֥וּyih·yūwill beH1961
√ hâyâh — to exist, iVerbQalImperfectthird person masculine plural
לְמוֹקֵֽשׁ׃lə·mō·w·qêša snareH4170
√ môwqêsh — a noose (for catching animals) (literally or figuratively)Preposition-lNounmasculine singular
môwqêsh — a noose for catching animals K&D: “The last clause of Judges 2:3 is formed after Exodus 23:33.” Gill spells out the working: the gods “they suffered to continue, and did not destroy them, as they ought to have done; they would be, as they proved, ensnaring to them.” The sentence is not arbitrary; it is the unremoved altar doing what an unremoved altar does.
לָכֶ֖םlā·ḵemto you
Prepositionsecond person masculine plural
4

When the angel of the LORD had spoken these words to all the Israelites, the people lifted up their voices and wept.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Hebrew — tap a word ↓

way·hî mal·’aḵ Yah·weh ’eṯ- kə·ḏab·bêr hā·’êl·leh had·də·ḇā·rîm ’el- kāl- bə·nê yiś·rā·’êl hā·‘ām ’eṯ- way·yiś·’ū qō·w·lām way·yiḇ·kū

Word by word16 · parsed
וַיְהִ֗יway·hîH1961
√ hâyâh — to exist, iConjunctive wawVerbQalConsecutive imperfectthird person masculine singular
hâyâh — and it came to pass The narrative hinge-formula; it marks the turn from oracle to consequence.
מַלְאַ֤ךְmal·’aḵWhen the angelH4397
√ mălʼâk — a messengerNounmasculine singular construct
יְהוָה֙Yah·wehof the LORDH3068
√ Yᵉhôvâh — Jehovah, Jewish national name of GodNounpropermasculine singular
אֶת־’eṯ-H853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Direct object marker
כְּדַבֵּ֞רkə·ḏab·bêrhad spokenH1696
√ dâbar — perhaps properly, to arrangePreposition-kVerbPielInfinitive construct
dâbar — to speak (Piel infinitive construct) The intensive stem with kᵉ-: “at the speaking.” Note the pairing with the next noun from the same root — while the words were being worded. The construction makes the speech an event in progress, which is why the reaction reads as involuntary rather than deliberated.
הָאֵ֔לֶּהhā·’êl·lehtheseH428
√ ʼêl-leh — these or thoseArticlePronouncommon plural
הַדְּבָרִ֣יםhad·də·ḇā·rîmwordsH1697
√ dâbâr — a wordArticleNounmasculine plural
dâbâr — a word “These words.” The same root as the verb immediately preceding: the speaking and the thing spoken are one stem. In Judges the dâbâr of the Messenger functions as the covenant lawsuit does in the prophets — recital of benefits, charge, verdict.
אֶֽל־’el-toH413
√ ʼêl — near, with or amongPreposition
כָּל־kāl-allH3605
√ kôl — properly, the wholeNounmasculine singular construct
בְּנֵ֖יbə·nêthe IsraelitesH1121
√ bên — a son (as a builder of the family name), in the widest sense (of literal and figurative relationship, including grandson, subject, nation, quality or condition, etcNounmasculine plural construct
bên — a son The covenant designation: sons of Israel, heirs of the fathers to whom the oath of v. 1 was sworn. The indictment is addressed to them precisely as heirs.
יִשְׂרָאֵ֑לyiś·rā·’êl. . .H3478
√ Yisrâʼêl — Jisrael, a symbolical name of JacobNounpropermasculine singular
הָעָ֛םhā·‘āmthe peopleH5971
√ ʻam — a people (as a congregated unit)ArticleNounmasculine singular
אֶת־’eṯ-H853
√ ʼêth — properly, self (but generally used to point out more definitely the object of a verb or preposition, even or namely)Direct object marker
וַיִּשְׂא֥וּway·yiś·’ūlifted upH5375
√ nâsâʼ — to lift, in a great variety of applications, literal and figurative, absolute and relativeConjunctive wawVerbQalConsecutive imperfectthird person masculine plural
nâsâʼ — to lift, in a great variety of applications The idiom “lift up the voice” is the Hebrew gesture of public lament (Cambridge compares Judges 21:2 at Beth-el). It is the same verb used elsewhere for lifting up a burden and for bearing away guilt — a resonance the text does not press, but the congregation's only available action here is to lift something.
קוֹלָ֖םqō·w·lāmtheir voicesH6963
√ qôwl — a voice or soundNounmasculine singular constructthird person masculine plural
qôwl — a voice or sound Singular: one corporate voice. The exchange with v. 11 of the previous verse — “you have not hearkened to my voice” — is exact and, in Hebrew, unmissable.
וַיִּבְכּֽוּ׃way·yiḇ·kūand weptH1058
√ bâkâh — to weepConjunctive wawVerbQalConsecutive imperfectthird person masculine plural
bâkâh — to weep Consecutive imperfect, third masculine plural: the weeping is the narrative's next event, not its mood. K&D grants it real theological weight — “this grief led on to such repentance that ‘they sacrificed there unto the Lord’” — while JFB and Poole read it colder. Both readings are in the received commentary and neither can be settled from the verb alone; bâkâh reports tears, not their cause.
5

So they called that place Bochim and offered sacrifices there to the LORD.

Berean Standard Bible · CC0

Hebrew — tap a word ↓

way·yiq·rə·’ū šêm- ha·hū ham·mā·qō·wm bō·ḵîm way·yiz·bə·ḥū- šām Yah·weh

Word by word8 · parsed
וַֽיִּקְרְא֛וּway·yiq·rə·’ūSo they calledH7121
√ qârâʼ — to call out to (iConjunctive wawVerbQalConsecutive imperfectthird person masculine plural
qârâʼ — to call out to, to name Naming as confession. The people do not name the place for the theophany, nor for the verdict, but for their own tears — the one thing in the episode that was theirs.
שֵֽׁם־šêm-. . .H8034
√ shêm — an appellation, as amark or memorial of individualityNounmasculine singular construct
הַה֖וּאha·hūthatH1931
√ hûwʼ — he (she or it)ArticlePronounthird person masculine singular
הַמָּק֥וֹםham·mā·qō·wmplaceH4725
√ mâqôwm — properly, a standing, iArticleNounmasculine singular
mâqôwm — properly a standing, a place The word that carries the sanctuary question. Ellicott: sacrifice “was always freely offered at places where there had been any manifestation of the Divine Presence,” citing Gideon (Judges 6:20), Manoah, and David (2 Samuel 24:25) — K&D's parallel list adds Judges 6:26, 6:28 and Judges 13:16. Pulpit and Gill instead take the sacrifice as proof the place was Shiloh, where the tabernacle stood. K&D takes the opposite inference from the same fact.
בֹּכִ֑יםbō·ḵîmBochimH1066
√ Bôkîym — Bo-kim, a place in PalestineNounproperfeminine singular
Bôkîym — “weepers” Ellicott compares the naming to Allon-Bachuth, “the oak of weeping” (Genesis 35:8), and to Abel-Mizraim (Genesis 50:11); Barnes cites the same two. A place in Israel is permanently marked by a national collapse into tears — and, as JFB observes, by a repentance that did not hold.
וַיִּזְבְּחוּ־way·yiz·bə·ḥū-and offered sacrificesH2076
√ zâbach — to slaughter an animal (usually in sacrifice)Conjunctive wawVerbQalConsecutive imperfectthird person masculine plural
zâbach — to slaughter (usually in sacrifice) K&D reads the offerings as “sin-offerings and burnt-offerings, that they might obtain mercy and the forgiveness of their sins,” and argues that sacrifice accepted at an unsanctioned site proves the identity of the One who appeared. Gill adds the conditional the whole canon turns on: “if they did this in the faith of the great sacrifice of the Messiah, they did well.” Henry supplies the limit — tears, prayers and amendment “cannot atone for sin.”
שָׁ֖םšāmthereH8033
√ shâm — there (transferring to time) thenAdverb
Adverb of place — “there,” at the very spot of the appearing. The location of the sacrifice is the argument (K&D), not an incidental detail.
לַֽיהוָֽה׃פYah·wehto the LORDH3068
√ Yᵉhôvâh — Jehovah, Jewish national name of GodPreposition-lNounpropermasculine singular
Yᵉhôvâh — the covenant name The sacrifice is offered to YHWH, closing the unit where it opened: the Messenger who spoke as YHWH in v. 1 receives worship directed to YHWH in v. 5, and the narrator records no correction.

The verse-by-verse work is done. What follows gathers the whole unit. All three layers below are machine-generated (⚙). Weigh them; they have no authority.

⚙

Grand Commentary — the unit, read whole

synthesis · verify

AI synthesis — woven from the public-domain voices above and the original text; generated and fallible.

i. The Messenger who says “I” — 2:1

The unit opens with a journey and a pronoun. The Messenger goes up from Gilgal — and JFB insists the geography is the argument: “there the Israelites made a solemn dedication of themselves to God on their entrance into the promised land… the memory of that religious engagement, which the angel's arrival from Gilgal awakened, gave emphatic force to his rebuke of their apostasy.” Cambridge adds that Gilgal was a sanctuary, a sacred circle of stones, where the Deity manifests Himself because He has His dwelling there. Benson hears in the route a deliberate reminder of the appearance to Joshua near Jericho and of “the solemn covenant they made with him by the renewal of circumcision.”

Then the pronoun. Four first-person verbs land without a single “thus saith the Lord”: אַעֲלֶה I bring you up, וָאָבִיא I brought you in, נִשְׁבַּעְתִּי I swore, אָפֵר I will not annul. Barnes makes the formal test explicit — in all sixty or so occurrences of this phrase, the messenger speaks “as if God Himself were speaking, without the intervening words ‘Thus saith the Lord,’ which are used in the case of prophets.” K&D presses the philology: “In the simple historical narrative a prophet is never called Maleach Jehovah,” and no prophet “ever identifies himself so entirely with God.” Maclaren puts it as a reader's plain observation: “Nothing can be plainer than that the Angel speaks as one in whom the divine name dwells.”

⚙ And yet the brief also preserves the dissent, and this synthesis will not bury it. Ellicott catalogues Maleak Jehovah applied to Haggai, to prophets, to priests; the Targum renders it “a prophet with a message from Jehovah”; R. Tanchum infers Joshua, Kimchi and others Phinehas; Geneva glosses “That is, messenger, or prophet, as some think, Phinehas”; Ellicott notes honestly that “in no other instance does an angel appear to, or preach to, multitudes.” The majority of the named voices here — Henry, Benson, Barnes, JFB, Gill, Poole, K&D, Pulpit, Cambridge, Maclaren — read the Angel of the Covenant. The minority is old, learned, and reading the same noun. The text does not settle it by naming Him; it settles it, if at all, by letting Him speak in the first person and, in v. 5, receive sacrifice.

ii. One noun, two covenants — the indictment — 2:1b–2:2

The charge is built on a single repeated word. In v. 1 God will not annul (אָפֵר, pârar) His בְּרִית; in v. 2 Israel was not to cut (תִכְרְתוּ, kârath) a בְּרִית with the land's dwellers. Two covenants, one noun. Ellicott sources the prohibition to Deuteronomy 7:2 and Deuteronomy 12:2-3, comparing Exodus 23:31-33 and Exodus 34:12-13; Cambridge traces the same law from the Book of the Covenant into the Deuteronomic Code. Barnes notices what is not charged — the intermarriage ban of Deuteronomy 7:3 goes unmentioned — and argues from that silence for an early date, before Judges 3:6.

Maclaren sharpens the covenantal logic into something genuinely hard: “note how His promises are contingent on our fulfilment of their conditions, and how a covenant which He has sworn that He will never break He does count as non-existent when men break it.” Benson and Poole reach for the softer formulation — the promise stands “upon condition of your keeping covenant with me” — and Gill turns it forensic: “if the covenant between them was broken, it should not begin with him, it would be their own fault.” JFB states the resolution the passage itself gives: “God would inviolably keep His promise; but they, by their flagrant and repeated breaches of their covenant with Him, had forfeited all claim to the stipulated benefits.”

The indictment ends in a question rather than a sentence: מַה־זֹּאת עֲשִׂיתֶם. Cambridge renders it “what have you done, with emphasis on ‘what’,” and sends the reader to Genesis 3:13; Ellicott sends him to Genesis 3:13 and Genesis 12:18; Maclaren hears it directly — “the same question as had been asked of Eve” — and draws the conclusion: “No man dare answer when God asks, ‘What hast thou done?’” Cambridge also records the fault-line with Judges 1: there Israel's failure is inferiority in battle, here it is “ascribed to neglect of religious duty.” K&D reads the same two chapters as one movement, holding that the design of the survey in ch. 1 is “only to be learned from the reproof of the angel.”

iii. The sentence: no thorns in the Hebrew — 2:3

The verdict is not destruction but withdrawal. אֲגָרֵשׁ — the Piel of gârash, to drive out from a possession — is negated. Gill draws the line straight back through the preceding chapter: this “accounts for the various instances related in the preceding chapter; where it is observed, that they could not, or did not, drive the old inhabitants out of such and such places, because they sinned against the Lord.” Maclaren names the mechanism without softening it: “God punishes our making truce with our spiritual foes by letting the effects of the truce work themselves out.” Henry says it in one line: “God often makes men's sin their punishment.”

⚙ Here the machine must be more careful than the English Bible. The received Hebrew of the middle clause is וְהָיוּ לָכֶם לְצִדִּים — “and they shall be to you for sides.” The word “thorns” is not in the verse. Ellicott: “The words ‘as thorns’ are conjecturally supplied from Numbers 33:55.” Barnes: the word “is supplied by the King James Version from the similar passage in Joshua.” Pulpit: “This is not a translation of the Hebrew text, which only has ‘for sides’.” Cambridge canvasses the conjectures — ṣarim “adversaries” with the Vulgate and Targum, the LXX's “straits,” a proposed ṣaddim “net” on an Assyrian cognate — and judges them “probably only conjectures.” K&D alone defends the text as it stands: the phrase “is an abbreviated expression for” Numbers 33:55's fuller wording, “so that there is no necessity for the conjecture.” Six named commentators, one crux, no consensus — and a reader of the English who was never told.

The second half of the sentence needs no conjecture at all. לְמוֹקֵשׁ is a noose for catching animals. K&D: “The last clause of Judges 2:3 is formed after Exodus 23:33.” The gods whose altars went untorn-down in v. 2 become the trap in v. 3. The punishment is not imported from outside; it is the unremoved altar doing what an unremoved altar does.

iv. Weepers — the name that stuck — 2:4–2:5

The response is immediate and corporate: כְּדַבֵּר, a Piel infinitive construct — at the speaking, while the words are still landing. They lift up קוֹלָם, their voice, singular: the same noun they would not hearken to in v. 2. Barnes and Pulpit agree the trigger is the sentence of v. 3, not the charge of v. 2 — “it was the annonncement of this resolution by the Angel that caused the people to weep.”

Henry reads the tears as right and insufficient at once: “It is a wonder sinners can ever read the Bible with dry eyes… Had they kept close to God and their duty, no voice but that of singing had been heard in their congregation… The worship of God, in its own nature, is joy, praise, and thanksgiving; our sins alone render weeping needful.” K&D credits the grief with genuine motion — it “led on to such repentance that ‘they sacrificed there unto the Lord’.” Poole, reading backwards from the book's own sequel, judges most of the tears to be fear: “Some of them from a true sense of their sins; but most of them from a just apprehension of their danger.” JFB records the outcome: “the reformation was but temporary… blasted by speedy and deeper relapses.”

Then the naming, which English conceals. וַיִּבְכּוּ (bâkâh) in v. 4 and בֹּכִים (Bôkîym) in v. 5 are the same root: they wept, so the place is Weepers. Cambridge, on philological grounds, doubts the participle can be an original place-name and proposes Bekaim, “balsam-trees,” later heard as “weepers”; Ellicott and Barnes compare Allon-Bachuth (Genesis 35:8) and Abel-Mizraim (Genesis 50:11). The site is unknown: Cambridge and the LXX argue for Beth-el, Pulpit and Gill for Shiloh — “a clear intimation that they were near Shiloh, where the tabernacle was” — Barnes for the neighbourhood of Shechem. And K&D reverses the argument entirely: because they sacrificed at Bochim “where there was no sanctuary of Jehovah,” the One who appeared cannot have been a prophet or an ordinary angel. The same fact, four locations, two opposite inferences. All of it is recorded here; none of it is decided.

Read under Sola Scriptura — this tool’s own fallible reading (⚙)

⚙ This is the tool's own fallible reading, offered to be tested against the text and the fathers. Bochim is not the story of a people who refused God's word; it is the story of a people who made a second covenant. Verse 2 uses one noun — בְּרִית — for both agreements, and that is the indictment in miniature. Israel never renounced the covenant of v. 1; they simply cut another alongside it, with the dwellers of the land, and left the altars standing as the price of peace. The Messenger's sentence in v. 3 is therefore not an eruption of wrath but a handing-over: He will no longer drive out what Israel has decided to live with. The gods become a noose not by divine addition but by divine non-removal. What the nation kept for convenience becomes the thing that holds them.

⚙ Two observations follow, and both are checkable. First, the sentence is enacted through geography. He comes up from Gilgal, the ground of the first dedication (JFB), and the message is: the help that began there stops here. God's discipline in this book is rarely an added blow; it is the withdrawal of an unearned advantage, and the consequences of compromise then run their own course — which is exactly what Maclaren sees, that God lets “the effects of the truce work themselves out.” Second, the ending is more ambiguous than English suggests. The people weep, sacrifice, and name a place for their own tears — and the very next movement of the book (JFB: “the reformation was but temporary”) shows the tears outlasting nothing. Henry's limit is the right one: tears, prayers, and even amendment “cannot atone for sin.” Bochim gives its name to a permanent Israelite condition: grief that is real, immediate, corporate, sacrificial — and still not sufficient. Something more than weeping at the place of the appearing is required, and the book of Judges will spend twenty-one chapters proving it.

⚙ Held loosely: if the Messenger who says “I brought you up out of Egypt” is who Henry, Benson, Gill, K&D, Poole, Barnes and Maclaren say He is, then the One arraigning Israel at Bochim is the One who will later stand in the place of the arraigned. That reading is not forced by the noun מַלְאָךְ, which means only messenger, and Ellicott, Geneva and the Targum decline it. It is the first-person speech and the accepted sacrifice, not the title, that carry the weight.

They did not break the covenant; they cut a second one — and God's judgment was simply to let them keep it.

⚙

Canonical Threads — out to the whole of Scripture

cross-refs · verify

AI-generated connections. Each carries a verification badge with a recorded basis; contested links are flagged.

The thorns that are not in the text — Judges 2:3 and its two sources verbal / quotation — confirmed

The sentence “they shall be thorns in your sides” is assembled in English from two other passages. The Hebrew of Judges 2:3 reads only לְצִדִּים, “for sides.” Numbers 33:55 supplies the thorns; Joshua 23:13 supplies the whole idiom, and shares with our verse both distinctive nouns of the clause — tsad (sides) and môwqêsh (snare) — in one verse. Ellicott, Barnes, Pulpit and Cambridge all state that the English word is supplied; K&D alone defends the Masoretic text as an abbreviation of Numbers 33:55's fuller phrase rather than a corruption, and Cambridge allows that “the word ‘as thorns’ may have been omitted here by accident.”

Numbers 33:55 · Joshua 23:13

basis: Verifier: Numbers 33:55 shares H6654 tsad (in 27 vv); Joshua 23:13 shares both H6654 tsad (in 27 vv) and H4170 môwqêsh (in 27 vv) — two low-frequency lexemes co-occurring in a single verse. K&D states the phrase here is an abbreviated form of the Numbers 33:55 wording, and Cambridge, Ellicott, Barnes and Pulpit all treat Judges 2:3 as borrowing from these two places.

Cutting a covenant with the dwellers of the land structural / thematic — confirmed

The prohibition of v. 2 is a fixed legal formula, not an ad hoc rebuke: kârath bᵉrîyth with the land's inhabitants. Cambridge locates its origin in the Book of the Covenant (Exodus 23:31-33) and Exodus 34:12, “and thence incorporated into the Deuteronomic Code”; Ellicott cites Deuteronomy 7:2 and Deuteronomy 12:2-3 as the immediate source; Gill cites Deuteronomy 7:2 for the league and Deuteronomy 7:5 for the altars. What Judges 2:2 does is set that old formula beside God's own bᵉrîyth in v. 1, so that the same noun indicts on both sides of the ledger.

Exodus 34:12 · Deuteronomy 7:2

basis: Verifier: Exodus 34:12 shares H3772 kârath (in 280 vv) and H1285 bᵉrîyth (in 264 vv). Both lexemes are far too common to carry a verbal tier on frequency alone — the link is the fixed idiom plus the commentators' own sourcing (Cambridge to Exodus 23:31-33 / 34:12; Ellicott and Gill to Deuteronomy 7:2). Deuteronomy 7:2 is added on that commentary basis, not from the Verifier's computed candidates.

The covenant God will not annul, and the prince who did structural / thematic — confirmed

The verb of v. 1 is pârar — to break up, to annul. God declares He will not do it. Ezekiel 17:15 turns the same verb against a man: there a covenant is broken by one who sends מַלְאָךְ — messengers, the identical noun that names the speaker here. The two passages stand at opposite poles of one small vocabulary: a Messenger who will not void a covenant, and a covenant voided by one who sent messengers. (The shared lexemes are the Verifier's; the detail of Ezekiel's oracle is not reproduced here.) JFB draws the working principle from our verse — God “would inviolably keep His promise,” while Israel “had forfeited all claim to the stipulated benefits.”

Ezekiel 17:15

basis: Verifier: shared H6565 pârar (in 46 vv — moderately rare), H1285 bᵉrîyth (in 264 vv), H4397 mălʼâk (in 197 vv). A genuine verbal echo on the covenant-voiding verb, but there is no quotation in either direction, so the tier is deliberately held at structural rather than verbal.

Gilgal — from the camp of dedication to the place of driving out structural / thematic — confirmed

The Messenger comes up from Gilgal, where, JFB says, “the Israelites made a solemn dedication of themselves to God on their entrance into the promised land.” ⚙ Hosea keeps the same place-name and puts beside it the same verb: Hosea 9:15 holds both Gilgâl and gârash — the very verb of dispossession that the Messenger here refuses to go on performing for Israel, now standing in an oracle of judgment against Israel. Hosea 12:11 holds Gilgâl together with altars (mizbêach) and sacrificing (zâbach), the two acts of Judges 2:2 and 2:5. Cambridge independently notes that Gilgal was still much frequented in the eighth century, citing Hosea 4:15, 9:15, 12:11 and Amos 4:4, 5:5. Cambridge notes Gilgal was still much frequented in the eighth century, citing Hosea 4:15, 9:15, 12:11 and Amos 4:4, 5:5.

Hosea 9:15 · Hosea 12:11

basis: Verifier: Hosea 9:15 shares H1537 Gilgâl (in 38 vv) and H1644 gârash (in 45 vv); Hosea 12:11 shares H1537 Gilgâl (in 38 vv), H4196 mizbêach (in 338 vv) and H2076 zâbach (in 127 vv). Two relatively low-frequency lexemes recur, but neither prophet quotes Judges and the motif-level reversal is the real link, so the tier is structural, not verbal.

“What is this you have done?” — the question first asked in the garden structural / thematic — confirmed

The arraignment ends where arraignment in Scripture begins. Maclaren states it directly: the Messenger “asks the same question as had been asked of Eve, ‘What is this ye have done?’” Ellicott cross-references Genesis 3:13 and Genesis 12:18; Cambridge, glossing “what have you done, with emphasis on ‘what’,” cites Judges 15:11 and Genesis 3:13. Maclaren adds the reason the form matters: “No man dare answer when God asks, ‘What hast thou done?’ No man can answer reasonably when He asks, ‘Why hast thou done it?’” The question is the verdict.

Genesis 3:13

basis: Not among the Verifier's computed candidates; the constituent lexemes (H4100 mâh, H2063 zôʼth, H6213 ʻâsâh) are all far too common to support a verbal tier on shared-Strong's grounds. The link is the identical interrogative idiom, named independently by Ellicott, Maclaren and Cambridge — recorded here as their judgment, not as a computed verbal basis.

Bochim, Beth-el, and the oak of weeping — a link that rests on a disputed text flagged — verify source

A tempting cross-reference runs from Bochim (“weepers”) to Allon-Bachuth, “the oak of weeping,” at Genesis 35:8, and so to Beth-el. It should be handled with tongs. The chain depends on the LXX, which after “to the weeping-place” adds “and to Bethel, and to the House of Israel.” Cambridge accepts it — “There is little doubt that we should substitute to Beth-el” — treating “to Bochim and” as a harmonizing insertion, and then reads the sacrifice of v. 5 as happening at Beth-el. Ellicott reports the same LXX reading but suspects its origin: “Possibly however, the LXX. may have been led to this interpretation by the vicinity to Bethel of Allon-Bachuth, ‘the oak of weeping’ (Genesis 35:8).” If Ellicott is right, Genesis 35:8 is not the evidence for the Beth-el reading but its cause, and the link is circular. Cambridge itself calls the trailing clause “suspiciously like a corrupt repetition.” The Masoretic text reads Bochim and explains the name from v. 4.

Genesis 35:8

basis: Provenance disputed. Not a Verifier candidate; the link runs through a contested LXX plus at Judges 2:1 (“and to Bethel, and to the House of Israel”) which Cambridge would adopt into the text and which Ellicott suspects was itself generated by the proximity of Allon-Bachuth. Ellicott and Barnes cite Genesis 35:8 only as a parallel for naming a place from an event (as they also cite Genesis 50:11), not as a textual link. Recorded so a reader can check it; nothing above relies on it.

Bochim and the two kinds of grief structural / thematic — confirmed

⚙ The unit ends with tears that name a place and change nothing: JFB records that “the reformation was but temporary… blasted by speedy and deeper relapses,” and Poole judges that most wept “from a just apprehension of their danger.” Paul distinguishes exactly these two griefs — one that works repentance unto salvation, one that works death — and Hebrews 12:17 offers the limiting case of tears that found no place of repentance. Henry, on this verse, holds the same line from the other end: it is “pleasing to see men weep for their sins,” yet tears, prayers and amendment “cannot atone for sin.”

2 Corinthians 7:10 · Hebrews 12:17

basis: Cross-Testament (Greek ↔ Hebrew): no shared Strong's number is possible between these texts, so no verbal tier can be claimed. The basis is motif-level — weeping that does and does not issue in repentance — supported from within this unit by JFB's and Poole's readings of Judges 2:4 and Henry's on 2:5. Neither NT passage cites Judges.

⚙Christ in the Unittypology · verify

AI-generated reading; weigh it against the text.

The Messenger who speaks in the first person ancient/widely-held

The whole christological case here is a grammatical one, and the commentators make it as such. Barnes: in every one of the roughly sixty occurrences of this phrase, the messenger delivers his message “as if God Himself were speaking, without the intervening words ‘Thus saith the Lord,’ which are used in the case of prophets.” K&D: “In the simple historical narrative a prophet is never called Maleach Jehovah… Moreover, no prophet ever identifies himself so entirely with God as the angel of Jehovah does here.” Benson: “He alone could speak the following words in his own name and person.” Gill: “neither a man nor a created angel is meant, or otherwise he would have spoken in the name of the Lord.” Henry names Him outright: “It was the great Angel of the covenant, the Word, the Son of God, who spake with Divine authority as Jehovah.” Poole and JFB concur, JFB identifying Him with the one “who appeared in human form and announced himself captain of the Lord's host” at Joshua 5:14. Cambridge, more guardedly, calls the Angel “the self-manifestation of Jehovah,” quoting A. B. Davidson: “the only distinction implied is between Jehovah and Jehovah in manifestation.” Maclaren draws the line to the incarnation: the reiterated “I”s are unintelligible unless He is “that mysterious person, distinct from and yet one with Jehovah, whom we know as the ‘Word made flesh.’”

⚙ Honesty requires the other column. Ellicott lists the same title used of Haggai, of prophets, of priests; the Targum reads “a prophet with a message from Jehovah”; the Rabbis propose Joshua or Phinehas; Geneva glosses “messenger, or prophet, as some think, Phinehas”; Ellicott concedes the real difficulty that elsewhere “angels are sent to individuals, but prophets to nations.” The noun itself decides nothing. What the passage supplies is unprefaced divine first-person speech (v. 1) and accepted sacrifice at the site of the appearing (v. 5) — and that, not the title, is the argument.

Joshua 5:13-15 · Exodus 23:20-23 · John 1:14

The covenant He swore and will not annul ancient/widely-held

“I will never annul my covenant with you” is spoken in v. 1 before the indictment, not after it — the ground of the rebuke, not its softening. Ellicott sends the reader from this clause to four places — Genesis 17:7, Psalm 89:28, Psalm 89:34 and Luke 1:54-55 — and the chain is the argument: the oath sworn to Abraham, the psalm that stakes everything on God not violating that covenant, and finally a song in Luke's opening chapter that receives the mercy promised to the fathers as something now arriving. Ellicott makes the chain; the reading of its endpoint is ⚙. The Hebrew strengthens the point: נִשְׁבַּעְתִּי is I swore (Nifal of shâbaʻ), not “I promised,” and אָפֵר is the causative of pârar, to void an instrument.

⚙ Judges 2 shows what such an oath costs and what it does not do: Israel forfeits “all claim to the stipulated benefits” (JFB) while the covenant itself is never voided — the Messenger withdraws His arm, not His word. That asymmetry is the shape of the gospel in advance: a covenant God binds Himself to keep, under conditions the covenanted party demonstrably cannot keep. The question Judges leaves open — who then keeps Israel's side — the New Testament answers with a covenant-keeper who is also the Messenger.

Genesis 17:7 · Psalm 89:34 · Luke 1:54-55

Weeping that cannot atone, and the slaughter that can ancient/widely-held

At Bochim the people weep and then slaughter — וַיִּזְבְּחוּ, zâbach, the killing-verb, not a bloodless “offering.” K&D takes these to be “sin-offerings and burnt-offerings, that they might obtain mercy and the forgiveness of their sins,” and Benson and Poole say the same: the sacrifice was “for the expiation of their sins.” Henry sets the limit on the tears themselves: “It is pleasing to see men weep for their sins; but our tears, prayers, and even amendment, cannot atone for sin.” Gill states the condition on which the whole scene turns: “if they did this in the faith of the great sacrifice of the Messiah, they did well.”

⚙ Note that Gill frames it as a condition, not a report — he does not claim Israel at Bochim held that faith, and JFB's verdict on the sequel (“the reformation was but temporary”) suggests most did not. Read this way, Bochim is a working diagram of the insufficiency of contrition: real grief, immediate obedience in sacrifice, a place permanently named for it — and, on JFB's reading of what follows, undone almost at once. The remedy this unit gestures toward is therefore not better weeping but a better sacrifice.

Hebrews 10:4 · Hebrews 10:12 · 2 Corinthians 7:10

Apparatus & Provenance

The biblical text is the Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain (CC0). Hebrew/Greek text, transliteration, morphology and Strong’s are transcribed from the Berean interlinear (CC0) + Strong’s lexicons (PD); the literal renderings, divergence notes, word notes and all synthesis are this tool’s own work (⚙) — fallible; verify them.

Named voices, quoted verbatim from public-domain works:

  • Albert Barnes, Notes on the Bible (1834)
  • Alexander Maclaren, Expositions of Holy Scripture (c. 1905)
  • Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges, — (1880s)
  • Charles Ellicott, Commentary for English Readers (1878)
  • Geneva Study Bible, Marginal Notes (1599)
  • Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory (1871)
  • John Gill, Exposition of the Entire Bible (1746–63)
  • Joseph Benson, Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1810s)
  • Keil & Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament (1860s)
  • Matthew Henry, Concise Commentary on the Whole Bible (1706)
  • Matthew Poole, Annotations upon the Holy Bible (1685)
  • The Pulpit Commentary, Spence & Exell, eds. (1880s)

Text. Three real uncertainties sit in these five verses. (1) Judges 2:3, לְצִדִּים. The Masoretic text reads only “for sides”; “thorns” is supplied from Numbers 33:55 / Joshua 23:13, as Ellicott, Barnes, Pulpit and Cambridge all state. Conjectures canvassed and left unresolved: ṣarim “adversaries” (Vulgate, Targum), LXX “straits / distresses,” ṣaddim “net” on a doubtful Assyrian cognate. K&D defends the received text as an abbreviation. This synthesis follows the Masoretic reading and marks the supplement rather than adopting it. (2) Judges 2:1, the missing formula. Ellicott records that the LXX (Cod. Alex.) reads “the Lord, the Lord brought you out of Egypt,” that Houbigant conjectured the loss of “Thus saith the Lord” as in the Peshito, and that some MSS leave a blank (Piska) at this point. Cambridge judges the Hebrew tense of אַעֲלֶה (a historic present) unsustainable and notes a proposed emendation after Exodus 3:16f. The synthesis renders the Masoretic text and flags the difficulty rather than repairing it. (3) Bochim. The site is unknown. Cambridge, following the LXX addition, argues the original read “to Beth-el”; Pulpit and Gill infer Shiloh from the sacrifice of v. 5; Barnes says near Shechem; Ellicott finds all-Israel assembled at an unknown, unremembered place improbable. K&D argues from the same sacrifice in the opposite direction — that there was no sanctuary there. All positions are recorded above; none is asserted.

Interlinear display order. The Berean interlinear rows supplied in the brief are sequenced to the English line, not always to the Hebrew clause. Three places where the ⚙ literal renderings above follow the Hebrew instead, each verifiable from the brief's own surface forms: in 2:1 the verb וַיַּעַל (index 2) precedes מַלְאַךְ־יְהוָה (indices 0–1) in the Masoretic clause, and לְעוֹלָֽם׃ (index 20) carries the sof pasuq — the verse-ending mark — proving it stands last in the oath, after אִתְּכֶם (index 23), not before the verb; in 2:3 the sof pasuq sits on לְמוֹקֵֽשׁ׃ (index 11), so the final לָכֶם (index 12) in fact precedes it; in 2:4 the object markers at indices 3 and 12 are displayed ahead of the verbs they belong to. Note keys above are the brief's own indices, unaltered.

Sources. Twelve public-domain commentators are represented in the brief and all twelve are quoted in this unit — Ellicott, Maclaren, Benson, Henry, Barnes, JFB, Gill, Geneva, Cambridge, Pulpit, K&D, Poole. Henry's entry is a single note on 2:1-5 repeated under each verse in the source; it is quoted twice, from different sentences. Cambridge argues source-critically throughout (a later hand, national-unity language, Bochim adapted from Bekaim) and K&D argues against exactly such conclusions; both are preserved without adjudication. Maclaren's and K&D's entries are capped in the brief, and no claim above rests on text beyond the cap. ⚙ warning. The identification of the Messenger, the Gilgal-to-Hosea reversal, and the reading of Bochim as a diagram of insufficient contrition are machine synthesis built on the named voices; they are fallible and offered to be tested. Nothing in the ⚙ layer should be read as having the authority of the BSB text or of the ✦ commentary it cites.

✦ = human, public-domain source, quoted and named. ⚙ = machine synthesis, to be verified. Flagged cross-references are left visible on purpose — the verifier working in the open. “Search the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” (Acts 17:11)