The Fallible · Synthetic · Study Bible
Ehud
Judges 3:12–30 — Ehud. 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.
12Once again the Israelites did evil in the sight of the LORD. So He gave Eglon king of Moab power over Israel, because they had done evil in the sight of the LORD.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·yō·si·p̄ū bə·nê yiś·rā·’êl la·‘ă·śō·wṯ hā·ra‘ bə·‘ê·nê Yah·weh Yah·weh ’eṯ- ‘eḡ·lō·wn me·leḵ- mō·w·’āḇ way·ḥaz·zêq ‘al- yiś·rā·’êl ‘al kî- ‘ā·śū ’eṯ- hā·ra‘ bə·‘ê·nê Yah·weh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-they-added, sons-of-Israel, to-do the-evil in-eyes-of YHWH; and-He-made-strong YHWH ʼeth-Eglon king-of-Moab over Israel, because that they-did ʼeth-the-evil in-eyes-of YHWH.”
Where the English smooths the original
It may be so, since Eglon means “a fat bullock”Ellicott offers the scornful etymology as a question, not a settled fact; the unit's wordplay reading rests on it and is therefore provisional.
The "strengthening" Eglon was the special work of God, and because Israel "had done evil," etc. Samuel's comment on the event is to the same effect 1 Samuel 12:9 .
(g) So that the enemies of God's people have no power over them, but by God's appointment.
Thus every epocha of their history, during the administration of the judges, is only an alternate succession of sinning and contrition, of servitude and deliverance.
13After enlisting the Ammonites and Amalekites to join forces with him, Eglon attacked and defeated Israel, taking possession of the City of Palms.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
bə·nê ‘am·mō·wn wa·‘ă·mā·lêq way·ye·’ĕ·sōp̄ ’ê·lāw ’eṯ- way·yê·leḵ way·yaḵ ’eṯ- yiś·rā·’êl way·yî·rə·šū ’eṯ- ‘îr hat·tə·mā·rîm
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-he-gathered unto-him ʼeth-sons-of-Ammon and-Amalek; and-he-went and-he-struck ʼeth-Israel, and-they-took-possession-of ʼeth-the-City-of-the-Palms.”
Where the English smooths the original
The district was once famous for its palms, balsam woods, and gardens
Though no longer a fenced city, it was important from the fertility of the plain, and from its commanding the fords.
Sixty years had passed since Jericho had been burnt by Joshua. During that time the Israelites had rebuilt the ruined city, but they had not fortified it, on account of the curse pronounced by Joshua upon any one who should restore it as a fortress
Eighteen years — The former servitude lasted but eight years; this eighteen; for if smaller troubles do not the work, God will send greater.Benson's note is filed at vv. 13-14 and looks ahead to the eighteen years of v. 14.
14The Israelites served Eglon king of Moab eighteen years.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ḇə·nê- yiś·rā·’êl ’eṯ- way·ya·‘aḇ·ḏū ‘eḡ·lō·wn me·leḵ- mō·w·’āḇ šə·mō·w·neh ‘eś·rêh šā·nāh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-they-served, sons-of-Israel, ʼeth-Eglon king-of-Moab eighteen year.”
Where the English smooths the original
Ten years longer than they served the king of Mesopotamia, Judges 3:8 , as a severer correction of them for their relapse into idolatry.
One instance of that receiving of “a yoke of iron” which had been threatened as a punishment of apostasy ( Deuteronomy 28:47-48 ).
If lesser troubles do not do the work, God will send greater.Henry's entry is a single block comment on the whole of vv. 12-30; the sentence is his, but it is not a note on v. 14 in particular.
15And again they cried out to the LORD, and He raised up Ehud son of Gera, a left-handed Benjamite, as their deliverer. So they sent him with tribute to Eglon king of Moab.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ḇə·nê- yiś·rā·’êl way·yiz·‘ă·qū ’el- Yah·weh Yah·weh way·yā·qem lā·hem ’ê·hūḏ ben- gê·rā ben- ’iṭ·ṭêr yaḏ- yə·mî·nōw ḇə·nê- hay·mî·nî ’îš mō·wō·šî·a‘ ’eṯ- yiś·rā·’êl way·yiš·lə·ḥū bə·yā·ḏōw min·ḥāh lə·‘eḡ·lō·wn me·leḵ mō·w·’āḇ
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-they-cried-out, sons-of-Israel, unto YHWH; and-He-raised-up YHWH for-them a-saviour — Ehud son-of-Gera, a-Benjamite, a-man shut-as-to-his-right-hand; and-they-sent by-his-hand a-tribute-gift to-Eglon king-of-Moab.”
Where the English smooths the original
"A man shut with regard to his right hand," i.e., hindered in the use of his right hand, not necessarily crippled, but in all probability disabled through want of use from his youth upwards.
but still there seems to be an intentional play on words, for “Ben-ha-jemînî” may also mean “a son of the right hand,
being left-handed he naturally fastened his sword on the right side instead of the left, and thus was able to conceal a weapon without rousing suspicion.
This tribe was next to him and doubtless most afflicted by him; and hence God raiseth a deliverer.
16Now Ehud had made for himself a double-edged sword a cubit long. He strapped it to his right thigh under his cloak
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ê·hūḏ way·ya·‘aś lōw šə·nê p̄ê·yō·wṯ ḥe·reḇ wə·lāh gō·meḏ ’ā·rə·kāh way·yaḥ·gōr ’ō·w·ṯāh ‘al yə·mî·nōw ye·reḵ mit·ta·ḥaṯ lə·mad·dāw
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-he-made for-himself, Ehud, a-sword, and-to-it two mouths, a-gomed its-length; and-he-girded it under his-garments upon thigh-of his-right.”
Where the English smooths the original
Ehud’s weapon was a short two-edged sword, or long dagger, without a cross-piece (to judge from Jdg 3:22 ), such as could be buried, hilt and all, in the belly of the corpulent king.
The “two edges” (comp. Revelation 1:16 ) show that it was not a mere knife (comp. Psalm 144:6 ; Hebrews 4:12 ).Ellicott's New Testament references are lexical comparisons of the image, not a claim that Hebrews or Revelation cites this verse.
A cubit length — Long enough for his design, and not too long for concealment.
The sword was usually worn on the left side; so that Ehud's was the more likely to escape detection.
17and brought the tribute to Eglon king of Moab, who was an obese man.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·yaq·rêḇ ’eṯ- ham·min·ḥāh lə·‘eḡ·lō·wn me·leḵ mō·w·’āḇ wə·‘eḡ·lō·wn mə·’ōḏ bā·rî ’îš
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-he-brought-near ʼeth-the-offering to-Eglon king-of-Moab; and-Eglon a-man fatted exceedingly.”
Where the English smooths the original
The LXX. render it by the word asteios, a word which may mean either “graceful,” or, as more probably in this place, “ridiculous.”
A very fat man, and therefore more unwieldy and unable to ward off Ehud’s blow.
Provided with this weapon, he brought the present to king Eglon, who - as is also mentioned as a preparation for what follows - was a very fat man.
18After Ehud had finished presenting the tribute, he ushered out those who had carried it.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·hî ka·’ă·šer kil·lāh lə·haq·rîḇ ’eṯ- ham·min·ḥāh way·šal·laḥ ’eṯ- hā·‘ām nō·śə·’ê ham·min·ḥāh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-it-was, when he-had-finished to-bring-near ʼeth-the-offering, and-he-sent-away ʼeth-the-people, bearers-of the-offering.”
Where the English smooths the original
From the foll. verse it seems that Ehud accompanied the carriers (cf. the same vb. in Genesis 18:16 ‘to bring them on the way’) until they were at a safe distance, and then returned to the king’s house alone.
The tribute-bearers, headed by Ehud, would carry their offerings in long and pompous array, according to the fashion of the East, which always aims at making a present seem as large as possible
and this he did for the greater secrecy of his design, and that he might when he had finished it the more easily escape alone, and be without any concern for or care of the safety of others.
19But upon reaching the idols near Gilgal, he himself turned back and said, “I have a secret message for you, O king.” “Silence,” said the king, and all his attendants left him.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
min- hap·pə·sî·lîm ’ă·šer ’eṯ- hag·gil·gāl wə·hū šāḇ way·yō·mer sê·ṯer lî də·ḇar- ’ê·le·ḵā ham·me·leḵ hās way·yō·mer kāl- hā·‘ō·mə·ḏîm ‘ā·lāw mê·‘ā·lāw way·yê·ṣə·’ū
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-he-himself turned-back from the-pesilim which were-near the-Gilgal, and-he-said: ‘A-word of-secret I-have unto-thee, O-king.’ And-he-said: ‘Hush!’ And-they-went-out from-upon-him all the-ones-standing over-him.”
Where the English smooths the original
The rendering "stone quarries," from פּסל, to hew out stones ( Exodus 34:1 , etc.), which is the one adopted in the Chaldee, and by Rashi and others, is more likely to be the correct one.K&D's preference for "quarries" is a minority position among the voices here; Cambridge, Ellicott, JFB and the LXX read "graven images."
Ehud waited at the sanctuary to find a pretext for returning unexpectedly to speak with the king; he had received an oracle there, ‘a message from God,’ which he must communicate to the king personally (so Lagrange).This is Lagrange's reconstruction, adopted by Cambridge; the text does not say Ehud received an oracle.
Similarly Darius obtained an interview with the Pseudo-Smerdis, for the purpose of assassinating him, by pretending to have a secret message to him
Some suppose that these images had been placed there by the Moabites, in contempt of the God of Israel
20Then Ehud approached him while he was sitting alone in the coolness of his upper room. “I have a word from God for you,” Ehud said, and the king rose from his seat.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
wə·’ê·hūḏ bā ’ê·lāw wə·hū- yō·šêḇ lə·ḇad·dōw ham·mə·qê·rāh ba·‘ă·lî·yaṯ ’ă·šer- lōw də·ḇar- ’ĕ·lō·hîm lî ’ê·le·ḵā ’ê·hūḏ way·yō·mer way·yā·qām mê·‘al hak·kis·sê
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-Ehud came unto-him, and-he was-sitting in-the-upper-room of-the-coolness which-was-his, by-himself-alone. And-Ehud said: ‘A-word of-God I-have unto-thee.’ And-he-rose from-upon the-throne.”
Where the English smooths the original
he designedly useth the name Elohim, which was common to the true God and false ones, and not Jehovah, which was peculiar to the true God
The expression reminds us that the scene of the incident is placed in the Ghôr—the Jordan valley, which lies nearly a thousand feet below the level of the Mediterranean, and is probably the hottest district in the world.
Ehud believed himself to be accomplishing the divine mandate, and so his words were true in a certain sense. But it was also a stratagem to cause the king to rise, that the thrust might be sure.
It seems to have been Eglon's habit to sit quite alone in this summer parlour for coolness sake, his attendants waiting in the adjoining antechamber.
21And Ehud reached with his left hand, pulled the sword from his right thigh, and plunged it into Eglon’s belly.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ê·hūḏ ’eṯ- way·yiš·laḥ śə·mō·lōw yaḏ way·yiq·qaḥ ’eṯ- ha·ḥe·reḇ mê·‘al yə·mî·nōw ye·reḵ way·yiṯ·qā·‘e·hā bə·ḇiṭ·nōw
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-Ehud sent-out ʼeth-hand-of his-left, and-he-took ʼeth-the-sword from-upon thigh-of his-right, and-he-drove-it into-his-belly.”
Where the English smooths the original
But when the king stood up, Ehud drew his sword from under his garment, and plunged it so deeply into his abdomen that even the hilt followed the blade
The whole circumstance of this daring act—the death of Eglon without a shriek, or noise—the locking of the doors—the carrying off the key—the calm, unhurried deportment of Ehud—show the strength of his confidence that he was doing God service.JFB reads Ehud's composure as faith; Barnes, K&D and Ellicott judge the same act far more severely. The disagreement is left standing.
A divine warrant, in such a case, is a clear ground to go upon, but it can be no precedent for others to go upon, who have no divine warrant at all, but quite the contrary.
Thrust it into his belly. —This would involve certain, though not necessarily instant death.
22Even the handle sank in after the blade, and Eglon’s fat closed in over it, so that Ehud did not withdraw the sword from his belly. And Eglon’s bowels emptied.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ḡam- han·niṣ·ṣāḇ way·yā·ḇō ’a·ḥar hal·la·haḇ ha·ḥê·leḇ way·yis·gōr bə·‘aḏ hal·la·haḇ kî lō šā·lap̄ ha·ḥe·reḇ mib·biṭ·nōw hap·par·šə·ḏō·nāh way·yê·ṣê
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-came-in also the-haft after the-flame, and-closed the-fat over the-flame, for he-did-not draw the-sword from-his-belly; and-it-went-out the-parshedonah.”
Where the English smooths the original
The Hebrew for “blade” is “flame,” as the LXX. here render it. It is as though the vivid narrator would make us see the flash of the dagger ere it is buried, hilt and all, in the huge body.
The explanation given by Gesenius in his Thes. and Heb. lex. has much more in its favour, viz., interstitium pedum, the place between the legs
The AV. renders and the dirt came out , so Vulgate statimque per secreta naturae alvi stercora proruperunt, Targ., Jews, and many moderns, correcting the unknown and corrupt Hebr. word parshědon to peresh = dung . “This somewhat drastic touch is altogether in the vein of the narrator” (Moore)Cambridge quotes Moore approvingly while elsewhere in the same note proposing that the clause may be a scribal dittograph; both positions are his.
The words parshedon and misederon occur only here, and the former is very variously rendered.
23Then Ehud went out through the porch, closing and locking the doors of the upper room behind him.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
’ê·hūḏ way·yê·ṣê ham·mis·də·rō·w·nāh way·yis·gōr wə·nā·‘āl dal·ṯō·wṯ hā·‘a·lî·yāh ba·‘ă·ḏōw
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-Ehud went-out the-misderonah, and-he-shut doors-of the-upper-room round-about-him, and-bolted.”
Where the English smooths the original
the Hebr. word misděron , perhaps = ‘a row’ of pillars, must denote the part of the building to which Ehud went out when he left the ‘upper chamber,’ but the precise meaning is unknown
shut the door of the room behind him (בּעדו, not behind himself, but literally round him, i.e., Eglon
Ehud went forth, with a composed countenance and gait, without any fear; being well assured that God, who by his extraordinary call had put him upon that enterprise, would by his special providence preserve him
The lock was probably of a character similar to that used by all ancient nations, namely, wooden slides which entered into a hole in the doorpost
24After Ehud was gone, Eglon’s servants came in and found the doors of the upper room locked. “He must be relieving himself in the cool room,” they said.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
wə·hū yā·ṣā wa·‘ă·ḇā·ḏāw bā·’ū way·yir·’ū wə·hin·nêh dal·ṯō·wṯ hā·‘ă·lî·yāh nə·‘u·lō·wṯ ’aḵ hū ’eṯ- mê·sîḵ raḡ·lāw ham·mə·qê·rāh ba·ḥă·ḏar way·yō·mə·rū
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-he had-gone-out; and-his-servants came, and-they-saw, and-behold! doors-of the-upper-room bolted. And-they-said: ‘Surely he is-covering his-feet in-the-chamber of-the-coolness.’”
Where the English smooths the original
It is an Eastern euphemism taken from spreading out the garments while relieving the needs of nature (Bochart, Hierozoicon, i. 677).
Ehud's conduct must be judged according to the spirit of those times, when it was thought allowable to adopt any means of destroying the enemy of one's nation. The treacherous assassination of a hostile king is not to be regarded as an act of the Spirit of GodK&D files the unit's central moral verdict here, at the servants' discovery rather than at the killing itself.
but a late judicious interpreter expounds it of composing himself to take a little sleep or rest, as was very usual to do in the day-time in those hot countriesPoole argues for the 'sleeping' reading against the euphemism Ellicott and K&D adopt; the Hebrew idiom is genuinely disputed.
It is implied that Eglon’s servants saw Ehud go out by the usual way, for they evidently believe their master to be alone
25So they waited until they became worried and saw that he had still not opened the doors of the upper room. Then they took the key and opened the doors—and there was their lord lying dead on the floor.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·yā·ḥî·lū ‘aḏ- bō·wōš wə·hən·nēh ’ê·nen·nū p̄ō·ṯê·aḥ dal·ṯō·wṯ hå̄·ʿă·lī·yå̄h way·yiq·ḥū ’eṯ- ham·map̄·tê·aḥ way·yip̄·tā·ḥū wə·hin·nêh ’ă·ḏō·nê·hem nō·p̄êl mêṯ ’ar·ṣāh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-they-writhed until shame, and-behold! he-was-not opening the-doors of-the-upper-room. And-they-took the-opener and-they-opened; and-behold! their-lord fallen to-the-earth, dead.”
Where the English smooths the original
The ancient key was simply a bar of wood, hooked at the end, which passed through a hole in the door and caught the bolt inside.
till they were ashamed ] Cf. 2 Kings 2:17 ; 2 Kings 8:11 ; an idiom expressive of surprise and perplexity.
Chardin (k) says, that a lock among the eastern people is like a little harrow, which enters half way into a wooden staple, and the key is a wooden handle with points at the end of it, which are pushed into the staple, and so raise this little harrowGill is quoting Chardin's seventeenth-century travel observation of contemporary eastern locks, not evidence from the period of Judges.
Another key, it being usual in the courts of kings for more persons than one to be intrusted with keys to the same room.
26Ehud, however, had escaped while the servants waited. He passed by the idols and escaped to Seirah.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
wə·’ê·hūḏ nim·laṭ ‘aḏ hiṯ·mah·mə·hām wə·hū ‘ā·ḇar ’eṯ- hap·pə·sî·lîm way·yim·mā·lêṭ haś·śə·‘î·rā·ṯāh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-Ehud slipped-away while they-lingered; and-he-himself passed-over ʼeth-the-pesilim, and-he-slipped-away the-Seirah-ward.”
Where the English smooths the original
Perhaps, rather, into the bush, or woodland, as the word has the article, and does not occur again.
Seirah is a place that is never mentioned again; and, judging from the etymology (the hairy), it was a wooded region
Instead of passed the sculptured stones we should probably translate crossed (i.e. the river Jordan, not mentioned but implied in the general situation) near the sculptured stonesCambridge's emendation of sense (crossing the Jordan) would place Eglon's residence east of the river, against K&D and Gill, who keep the action near Jericho.
Seirath - "The forest" or "weald," which evidently bordered on the cultivated plain near Gilgal, and extended into "the mountain or hill country of Ephraim."
27On arriving in Seirah, he blew the ram’s horn throughout the hill country of Ephraim. The Israelites came down with him from the hills, and he became their leader.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·hî bə·ḇō·w·’ōw way·yiṯ·qa‘ baš·šō·w·p̄ār bə·har ’ep̄·rā·yim ḇə·nê- yiś·rā·’êl way·yê·rə·ḏū ‘im·mōw min- hā·hār wə·hū lip̄·nê·hem
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-it-was, when-he-came, and-he-sounded with-the-shophar in-the-hill-country of-Ephraim; and-they-went-down, sons-of-Israel, with-him from the-hill — and-he before-their-faces.”
Where the English smooths the original
Like Alfred in the marshes of Somerset, he gathered a host around him in the shelter of the forest; and then, full of faith in his Divine mission, "strong in the Lord, and in the power of his might," dashed down boldly into the plain
In the mountain of Ephraim. —The hill country of Ephraim was always the fastness of Israelitish freedom
it was the Israelites of this neighbourhood, i.e. the Benjamites, who responded to their clansman’s call.
summoned to arms the people of that mountainous region, which, adjoining the territory of Benjamin, had probably suffered most from the grievous oppression of the Moabites.
28“Follow me,” he told them, “for the LORD has delivered your enemies the Moabites into your hand.” So they followed him down and seized the fords of the Jordan leading to Moab, and they did not allow anyone to cross over.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
riḏ·p̄ū ’a·ḥă·ray way·yō·mer ’ă·lê·hem kî- Yah·weh ’eṯ- nā·ṯan ’ō·yə·ḇê·ḵem ’eṯ- mō·w·’āḇ bə·yeḏ·ḵem way·yê·rə·ḏū ’a·ḥă·rāw way·yil·kə·ḏū ’eṯ- ma‘·bə·rō·wṯ hay·yar·dên lə·mō·w·’āḇ wə·lō- nā·ṯə·nū ’îš la·‘ă·ḇōr
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-he-said unto-them: ‘Pursue after-me, for YHWH has-given ʼeth-your-enemies, ʼeth-Moab, into-your-hand.’ And-they-went-down after-him, and-they-seized ʼeth-the-fords of-the-Jordan toward-Moab, and-they-did-not give a-man to-cross-over.”
Where the English smooths the original
The fords of Jordan were few, and far distant from each other. ( Joshua 2:7 .) The steep ravine through which it flows forms a natural barrier to Western Palestine, and by securing the fords they cut off from the Moabites all chance of succour.
Follow after me ] lit. pursue after me ; the slight correction of the LXX come down after me
which he concluded from the success he had had in cutting off the king of Moab which had thrown the Moabites into great confusion and distress, and from an impulse on his mind from the Lord
The fords, where they passed over Jordan, that neither the Moabites that were got into Canaan might escape, nor any more Moabites come over Jordan to their succour.
29At that time they struck down about ten thousand Moabites, all robust and valiant men. Not one of them escaped.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ha·hî bā·‘êṯ way·yak·kū ’eṯ- ka·‘ă·śe·reṯ ’ă·lā·p̄îm mō·w·’āḇ kāl- šā·mên wə·ḵāl ḥā·yil ’îš wə·lō ’îš nim·laṭ ’îš
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-they-struck Moab at-the-time the-that, about-ten thousand men — every-one fat and-every-one man-of strength — and-not slipped-away a-man.”
Where the English smooths the original
Literally, every fat man and every soldier of strength, the word being the same as that used in Judges 3:17 to describe the fatness of Eglon. The choice of the word seems to be dictated by a certain grim sense of humour.Ellicott states the word here is the same as in v. 17; the interlinear shows two different Hebrew words (H1277 bârîʼ, H8082 shâmên). His literary point stands; his lexical claim does not.
The expression "at that time" seems to imply that they did not destroy this number in one single engagement, but during the whole course of the war.
A round number, Jdg 1:4 n. The Moabites who formed the army of occupation were all picked men.
the word for "lusty" signifies "fat", living in ease for a long time, and in a plentiful country were grown fat
30So Moab was subdued under the hand of Israel that day, and the land had rest for eighty years.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
mō·w·’āḇ wat·tik·kā·na‘ ta·ḥaṯ yaḏ yiś·rā·’êl ha·hū bay·yō·wm hā·’ā·reṣ wat·tiš·qōṭ šə·mō·w·nîm šā·nāh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
“And-Moab was-bowed-down in-the-day the-that under the-hand of-Israel; and-the-land was-quiet eighty year.”
Where the English smooths the original
As to the moral aspect of the assassination committed by Ehud, it is only necessary to say that while his courage, and capacity, and readiness to sacrifice himself, if need be, for the deliverance of his country were thoroughly noble, the act by which he achieved his end was unjustifiable.Ellicott's verdict is the sharpest in the brief; he goes on to catalogue historical crimes defended by appeal to this chapter.
It is remarkable that neither Ehud nor Jael are included in Paul's list in Hebrews 11:32 .
It was a great while for the land to rest; yet what is that to the saints' everlasting rest in the heavenly Canaan.
eighty years, which, according to Ben Gersom, are to be reckoned from the beginning of their servitude
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.
AI synthesis — woven from the public-domain voices above and the original text; generated and fallible.
The unit opens with an accounting verb: וַיֹּסִפוּ (yâçaph, H3254), “they added to do the evil.” Ellicott gives the literal sense and hears the same Hebraism in Luke 20:11–12; K&D observes that the writer has traded the formula of Judges 3:7 for this one, the idiom that will recur at Judges 4:1, 10:6 and 13:1. What follows is the sentence the book never softens: וַיְחַזֵּק יְהוָה, “and YHWH made strong” Eglon over Israel. K&D parses it flatly — “על חזּק, to give a person strength to overcome or oppress another” — and Barnes insists the strengthening “was the special work of God,” pointing to Samuel's own retrospect on this episode at 1 Samuel 12:9. Geneva turns it into doctrine: the enemies of God's people “have no power over them, but by God's appointment.” Benson, reading the whole period, calls it “an alternate succession of sinning and contrition, of servitude and deliverance.” ⚙ The eighteen years of v. 14 are governed by וַיַּעַבְדוּ (ʻâbad, H5647), the one Hebrew root that covers both slavery and worship: what Israel withheld from YHWH it renders to Eglon. Ellicott names the covenant sanction behind it — “a yoke of iron … threatened as a punishment of apostasy (Deuteronomy 28:47–48)” — and Gill measures the increase: “Ten years longer than they served the king of Mesopotamia.” Two names carry the irony. Ellicott asks whether Eglon, like Cushan-Rishathaim, is a name of scorn, “since Eglon means ‘a fat bullock’”; Cambridge independently glosses it “= calf.” And the prize is עִיר הַתְּמָרִים, the City of Palms — Jericho, taken with the verb yârash (H3423), “to occupy by driving out previous tenants.” K&D dates it: sixty years after Joshua burned it, rebuilt but left unfortified under his curse, and therefore easy for Moab to take.
Israel shrieks — וַיִּזְעֲקוּ (zâʻaq, H2199, “to shriek from anguish or danger”) — and God raises up a מוֹשִׁיעַ (yâshaʻ, H3467, Hifil participle). Pulpit refuses the softer English: “A deliverer. Hebrew, a saviour.” The saviour is described by a disability. אִטֵּר יַד־יְמִינוֹ means “shut as to his right hand”; K&D reads it as “hindered in the use of his right hand, not necessarily crippled,” and Ellicott argues that ittêr means “shut” and “cannot possibly mean ‘ambidextrous’ ” — against the LXX's amphoterodexion, which Benson, Barnes, JFB and Gill all report. Ellicott also catches the wordplay the translations cannot carry: the man is Ben-ha-jemînî, a son of the right hand, shut in the right hand. Cambridge draws the plot consequence without any flourish: “being left-handed he naturally fastened his sword on the right side instead of the left, and thus was able to conceal a weapon without rousing suspicion.” ⚙ The Verifier makes the rarity concrete: ʼiṭṭêr (H334) stands in only two verses of the Hebrew Bible, here and Judges 20:16, where 700 Benjamite slingers bear the same description. The weapon is as odd as the man: two mouths (פֵיוֹת, H6366, a noun the Verifier finds in only one other verse, Psalm 149:6), a gomed long — a measure, K&D says, that occurs nowhere else, which the versions split between a span and a cubit, and which Cambridge sizes by the story rather than the lexicon: short enough to hide, short enough to vanish hilt and all. Benson supplies the political reason it had to be homemade: “It is probable that none of the Israelites were suffered to wear arms.” And JFB gives the tactical reason for the right thigh: “The sword was usually worn on the left side; so that Ehud's was the more likely to escape detection.” Over it all lies the offering vocabulary — minchâh four times in vv. 15–18, and qârab in the Hifil (“bring near”) at vv. 17 and 18, the technical verb for presenting a sacrifice. Ellicott notes the literal sense at v. 17: “caused it to come near.” ⚙ The tool's own reading is that the narrator has staged a coup in the vocabulary of the sanctuary; no commentator in this brief says so.
Ehud turns back alone at the פְּסִילִים near Gilgal. Cambridge and Ellicott read them as graven images; K&D prefers stone quarries, from pâsal, “to hew out stones”; Geneva prints the alternative in its margin. The reconstructions differ sharply — Benson reports the suggestion that the sight of Moabite idols “in contempt of the God of Israel” fired Ehud's zeal; Cambridge follows Lagrange in having him wait at the Gilgal sanctuary for the oracle he is about to claim — and the text itself supports neither, saying only that he turned back from them. He asks for דְּבַר־סֵתֶר, “a word of covering.” Ellicott sets the stratagem beside Herodotus: Darius reached the Pseudo-Smerdis “by pretending to have a secret message to him.” One syllable empties the room: הָס — “Rather, ‘And he said, Hush!’ ” (Ellicott); “Let there be quiet” (K&D). Then, in the מְקֵרָה, the room of cooling, the sentence that turns the scene: דְּבַר־אֱלֹהִים לִי אֵלֶיךָ, “a word of ʼĕlōhîm I have to thee.” Poole notices the divine name chosen — “he designedly useth the name Elohim, which was common to the true God and false ones, and not Jehovah” — so that a Moabite king would rise for it. And he does rise: K&D, “from reverence towards the word of God which Ehud pretended that he had to deliver to him.” Barnes holds both halves at once: “Ehud believed himself to be accomplishing the divine mandate, and so his words were true in a certain sense. But it was also a stratagem to cause the king to rise, that the thrust might be sure.” The blow follows in one breath. K&D: “Ehud drew his sword from under his garment, and plunged it so deeply into his abdomen that even the hilt followed the blade.” JFB reads Ehud's nerve as faith — “the calm, unhurried deportment of Ehud — show the strength of his confidence that he was doing God service” — while Benson attaches the warning: “A divine warrant, in such a case, is a clear ground to go upon, but it can be no precedent for others to go upon.” ⚙ Two Hebrew roots bind the movement to the rest of the unit: shâlach (H7971), which sent Ehud with tribute in v. 15 and sends out his left hand in v. 21, and tâqaʻ (H8628), the verb that drives the blade here and blows the ram's horn in v. 27.
Verse 22 is where the Hebrew goes dark and the translators start guessing. The “blade” is לַהַב (H3851), literally a flame; Ellicott: “It is as though the vivid narrator would make us see the flash of the dagger ere it is buried, hilt and all, in the huge body.” The חֵלֶב closes over it. And then הַפַּרְשְׁדֹנָה, a word found nowhere else, which Benson concedes is understood only “from the Chaldee,” which K&D reads with Gesenius as interstitium pedum, “the place between the legs,” with the blade as subject, and which Pulpit admits “occur[s] only here, and … is very variously rendered.” Cambridge even suspects a scribal dittograph of the next verse — while quoting Moore's verdict that “this somewhat drastic touch is altogether in the vein of the narrator.” The narrator's vein continues in the servants' guess: מֵסִיךְ רַגְלָיו, “covering his feet.” Ellicott: “an Eastern euphemism taken from spreading out the garments while relieving the needs of nature”; Poole and Pulpit prefer the alternative, that the king was asleep, which better explains how long they waited. And they waited with וַיָּחִילוּ (chûwl, H2342, “to twist or whirl”) until בּוֹשׁ, “to pale, to be ashamed”; Cambridge calls the idiom “expressive of surprise and perplexity.” Ellicott describes the key they finally fetch — “literally, the opener … a bar of wood, hooked at the end, which passed through a hole in the door and caught the bolt inside” — and Gill adds Chardin's eyewitness account of eastern locks “like a little harrow.” ⚙ The comedy is structural: an empire's court is held at bay by a wooden latch and its own deference, while the man who killed the king walks past the idols and out. It is here that K&D enters the moral caveat that governs the whole unit: “The treacherous assassination of a hostile king is not to be regarded as an act of the Spirit of God” — and he presses the point that the text never says the Spirit of YHWH came upon Ehud, as it says of Othniel and Gideon.
The same verb that drove the blade now sounds the horn: וַיִּתְקַע בַּשּׁוֹפָר (tâqaʻ, H8628). Ellicott notes that “the hill country of Ephraim was always the fastness of Israelitish freedom,” and Pulpit, characteristically, reaches for English history: “Like Alfred in the marshes of Somerset, he gathered a host around him in the shelter of the forest.” Cambridge identifies the responders as the local men: “it was the Israelites of this neighbourhood, i.e. the Benjamites, who responded to their clansman's call.” Ehud's summons is in the perfect tense — נָתַן, YHWH has given — the deliverance announced as accomplished before the fighting starts. The fords are the whole campaign: Ellicott, “the fords of Jordan were few, and far distant from each other … by securing the fords they cut off from the Moabites all chance of succour,” and Poole, that neither could the Moabites in Canaan escape “nor any more Moabites come over Jordan to their succour.” Ten thousand fall, שָׁמֵן — “greasy, fat” — and Ellicott hears the narrator closing his own circle: “The choice of the word seems to be dictated by a certain grim sense of humour,” quoting Stanley on “the well-fed carcases of those who, corpulent like their chief, lay dead along the shore of the river.” ⚙ One verb seals it: mâlaṭ (H4422), “properly, to be smooth, to slip away.” Ehud slipped away (v. 26, twice); of Moab, “there escaped not a man” — lōʼ nimlaṭ (v. 29). The same root, opposite outcomes, four verses apart. Moab is then וַתִּכָּנַע (kânaʻ, H3665, “properly, to bend the knee”) under the hand of Israel, and the land וַתִּשְׁקֹט — reposes — eighty years. Ellicott reports that the LXX adds “And Ehud judged them till he died,” and that Josephus seems to have read eight years rather than eighty; Poole notes the same variant, “Instead of eighty, some copies read eight years.” Benson and Gill both limit the rest geographically, to the part of the land that had borne this yoke. Henry alone lifts his eyes off the number: “It was a great while for the land to rest; yet what is that to the saints' everlasting rest in the heavenly Canaan.”
⚙ This is the tool's own fallible reading, offered to be tested against the text and against the named voices above. Judges 3 does not ask us to admire Ehud's method, and the commentators who tried hardest to defend it did the worst damage — Ellicott catalogues what has been built on this chapter, down to a pope excusing a regicide, and quotes Cassel: “Worse than the dagger is such doctrine.” Barnes notices what Scripture itself withholds: “It is remarkable that neither Ehud nor Jael are included in Paul's list in Hebrews 11:32.” K&D notices what the narrator withholds: the Spirit of YHWH is never said to come upon this man. So the text praises the deliverance and declines to praise the knife.
What the Hebrew does press is a pattern of reversal running through every root. Israel is shut in (ʻâbad, eighteen years) and God's answer is a man who is himself shut (ʼiṭṭêr) — and the title given him, mōwšîaʻ, comes from a root whose first sense is to be open, wide, free. The offering brought near (qârab) becomes the weapon driven home (tâqaʻ); the hand that was sent with tribute (shâlach, v. 15) is the hand sent out for the sword (v. 21); the verb that buries a blade (v. 21) is the verb that sounds the horn of liberty (v. 27); the man who slips away (mâlaṭ, v. 26) leaves an army of which not one man slips away (v. 29). God's deliverance in this chapter comes left-handed, off the wrong side, through the disqualified thing. That is a real pattern in the words, and it is the one thing here the New Testament will pick up and carry.
And one sentence in this story is truer than the man who said it. Ehud told Eglon, “A word of God I have to thee,” and Barnes is right that it was at once a lie of stratagem and a fact: the word came, and it was a verdict, and the king stood up to receive it. ⚙ That, not the dagger, is what a reader can carry out of Judges 3 — that the word of God arrives whether or not the one who hears it knows what it is, and that a proud man may rise politely for a message he will not survive. The line below is the tool's own; it is not Scripture and carries none of Scripture's authority.
The tyrant rose to his feet for a word from God — and the word had an edge.
AI-generated connections. Each carries a verification badge with a recorded basis; contested links are flagged.
The phrase that describes Ehud, אִטֵּר יַד־יְמִינוֹ, occurs exactly twice in the Hebrew Bible: here and at Judges 20:16, of the 700 chosen Benjamites who could sling a stone at a hair and not miss. Cambridge states the fact without embroidery: the word is “only again in Jdg 20:16.” The two passages pull in opposite directions — here the trait delivers Israel, there it arms Israel's civil war against itself — and Ellicott notes the chronology matters for both: “Ehud would hardly have been chosen for this honourable function after the terrible degradation and decimation of the tribe of Benjamin,” which is why he places this episode earlier. K&D adds that 700 slingers can hardly all have been cripples, which is his reason for reading ʼiṭṭêr as disuse rather than deformity.
Judges 20:16
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexeme H334 ʼiṭṭêr — the Verifier finds it in only 2 verses of the Hebrew Bible (this unit and Judges 20:16), with H3225 yâmîyn (freq 134) in the same construct phrase. A genuine verbal link by rare shared lexeme; neither passage quotes the other.
Ehud's weapon has שְׁנֵי פֵיוֹת, “two mouths.” The noun pêyâh (H6366) occurs in only one other verse in the whole Hebrew Bible: Psalm 149:6, where the same “two-mouthed” sword is set in the hand of those whose throats carry the high praises of God. ⚙ The pairing is striking — in the Psalm the mouth that praises and the sword with two mouths stand in a single line, and in Judges 3 the man who says “I have a word for you” is carrying the two-mouthed thing under his robe. Ellicott, at v. 16, reaches instead toward Psalm 144:6, Hebrews 4:12 and Revelation 1:16 for the image. The Judges–Psalm link is the one the Verifier can confirm from shared vocabulary; the New Testament ones cannot be confirmed that way, because they are in Greek.
Psalm 149:6
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexeme H6366 pêyâh — only 2 verses in the Hebrew Bible carry it (Judges 3:16 and Psalm 149:6); also shared H2719 chereb (freq 371, common, carrying no weight on its own). Rare lexeme, so verbal; no quotation is claimed in either direction.
Verse 25 turns on הַמַּפְתֵּחַ (H4668), literally “the opener,” a noun found in only three verses of the Hebrew Bible; one of the others is Isaiah 22:22, where the key of the house of David is laid on Eliakim's shoulder: “he shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none shall open.” The verb of shutting there, çâgar (H5462), is the same verb Judges uses twice in this unit — the fat that closes over the blade (v. 22) and the doors Ehud shuts behind him (v. 23). Ellicott describes the physical object in both scenes: “literally, the opener. The ancient key was simply a bar of wood, hooked at the end, which passed through a hole in the door and caught the bolt inside.” ⚙ In Judges the key finally opens on a dead lord; in Isaiah the key is a promise of authority that holds. Same Hebrew vocabulary, opposite endings — which is the point worth keeping.
Isaiah 22:22 · 1 Chronicles 9:27
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexeme H4668 maphtêach — in only 3 verses of the Hebrew Bible (Judges 3:25, Isaiah 22:22, 1 Chronicles 9:27); Isaiah 22:22 additionally shares H5462 çâgar (freq 87) with Judges 3:22-23. Rare shared lexeme = verbal link; no citation relationship is claimed.
The opening verb וַיֹּסִפוּ (yâçaph, H3254) is the frame's own vocabulary, and Judges 4:1 restarts the cycle with the identical idiom the moment Ehud dies. K&D lists the recurrences: “they added to do, i.e., did again, evil, etc., as in Judges 4:1; Judges 10:6; Judges 13:1.” Cambridge assigns the whole introduction here to the editor: “The introduction to the story is made up of the familiar phrases of Rd.” Judges 4:1 also carries Ehud's name (H164, a name found in only 8 verses), naming him as the one whose death releases the next collapse; the genealogical notice at 1 Chronicles 7:10 carries the name too, though Cambridge cautions that “the Chronicler may have adopted the name of Ehud merely from here, or the clan Ehud may have taken its name from the hero of this story.”
Judges 4:1 · 1 Chronicles 7:10
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H3254 yâçaph (freq 208 — common, so no verbal claim) and H164 ʼÊhûwd (in 8 vv). The link is the editor's recurring cycle formula plus the shared personal name, not a quotation; tiered structural for that reason.
Ehud shuts the doors and וְנָעָל — bolts them (H5274 nâʻal, “properly, to fasten up”), and in v. 24 the servants find them nᵉʻulôth. The verb is uncommon, and one of its other occurrences is 2 Samuel 13:17–18, where Amnon puts Tamar out and bolts the door after her. ⚙ Both scenes place a bolted door between a reader and a crime, and in both the bolt is the instrument of a man's control over what will be known. That is a motif, not a citation, and the shared vocabulary is thin enough that it should be tiered no higher: deleth (“door”) is very common, and nâʻal, while rare, is an ordinary household action. Cambridge adds a text-critical caution on the Judges side: the words “and locked them” have an irregular tense form and “were probably added by a scribe to account for the locked doors in Jdg 3:24–25 (Moore, Budde).”
2 Samuel 13:17
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H5274 nâʻal (in 7 vv — uncommon but an ordinary action word) and H1817 deleth (freq 78). Deliberately tiered structural rather than verbal: the shared motif of a bolted door carries the link, and Cambridge flags the Judges clause itself as a possible scribal addition.
The Verifier's strongest numeric matches for this unit are a cluster in Joshua 10 and 15 that share the lexeme H5700 ʻEglôwn. They are not about this king. Cambridge states it directly: “Elsewhere Eglon (= calf) is the name of a town in Judah, Joshua 10:3; Joshua 10:34.” The same consonants name a Canaanite city whose king Joshua defeated and a Moabite king two generations later — a homonym, not a thread. ⚙ It is recorded here precisely so the collision is visible rather than silently reused as a link. What the Joshua material genuinely contributes to this unit is elsewhere and non-lexical: Joshua's burning of Jericho and his curse on its refortification, which K&D uses to explain why Moab could seize the City of Palms so easily.
Joshua 10:3 · Joshua 10:34 · Joshua 15:39
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexeme H5700 ʻEglôwn (in 12 vv) across Joshua 10:3, 10:5, 10:23, 10:34, 10:36, 10:37, 12:12, 15:39. The computed basis is contested: Cambridge identifies the Joshua occurrences as a Judahite town, not the Moabite king, so the shared lexeme is a name-collision and supports no interpretive link.
Ellicott, glossing the two edges at v. 16, sends the reader to Hebrews 4:12 and Revelation 1:16, where the word of God and the mouth of the risen Christ carry a distomos sword — “two-mouthed,” the Greek reproducing the Hebrew idiom of v. 16 exactly. ⚙ In Judges the word-from-God and the two-mouthed blade are two separate things the same man carries into the room, and the blade is what he means; in Hebrews they are one thing, and it is the word that pierces. This cannot be tiered verbal: the link runs Hebrew to Greek, so no shared Strong's number exists and the Verifier can compute no lexical basis. The idiom is a real translational match; the reading of Judges through it is figural.
Hebrews 4:12 · Revelation 1:16 · Psalm 149:6
basis: Cross-Testament (Hebrew to Greek): no shared Strong's lexeme is possible and none is claimed. Basis is the translational match between Hebrew shᵉnê phêyôth, 'two mouths' (H6366, in 2 vv), and Greek distomos, plus Ellicott's own cross-reference at Judges 3:16 to Hebrews 4:12 and Revelation 1:16. The figural reading is the tool's; the lexical comparison is Ellicott's.
AI-generated reading; weigh it against the text.
Verse 15 does not call Ehud a judge. It calls him מוֹשִׁיעַ (mō·wō·šî·a‘, H3467 yâshaʻ, Hifil participle), and Pulpit refuses the softened English: “A deliverer. Hebrew, a saviour.” Barnes notes the sentence is verbatim the one used of Othniel in Judges 3:9 and echoed at Nehemiah 9:27 — a formula, not a compliment to one man. Strong's gives the root's ground sense as “to be open, wide or free,” and the noun it yields stands inside the names Joshua and Jesus (Matthew 1:21, “thou shalt call his name Jesus: for he shall save his people from their sins”). ⚙ The judges are the Old Testament's argument for a saviour who is given, not elected: Israel cries, and God raises up. That reading of the judge-cycle as a repeated, insufficient anticipation is the ancient and widely-held one; Henry, commenting on this unit, moves in exactly that direction when he sets the eighty years' rest against “the saints' everlasting rest in the heavenly Canaan,” and Hebrews 4:8–9 makes the same move with Joshua's rest. But the honesty belongs with it: Barnes observes that “neither Ehud nor Jael are included in Paul's list in Hebrews 11:32,” and K&D that the Spirit of YHWH is never said to have come upon Ehud. What is typed forward is the office and the pattern, not the man's method.
Judges 3:9 · Nehemiah 9:27 · Matthew 1:21 · Hebrews 4:8-9
“A word of God I have to thee.” Barnes will not let the sentence be simply a lie: “Ehud believed himself to be accomplishing the divine mandate, and so his words were true in a certain sense. But it was also a stratagem.” Poole shows the craft in the divine name chosen — ʼĕlōhîm, not YHWH, a name a Moabite would also rise for. And the king does rise, K&D says, “from reverence towards the word of God.” What he receives is לַהַב, a flame (H3851), that goes in hilt and all and cannot be drawn back. Henry, preaching this scene, turns it the same way: “What message from God but a message of vengeance can a proud rebel expect? Such a message is contained in the word of God; his ministers are boldly to declare it … But, blessed be God, they have to deliver a message of mercy and of free salvation.” ⚙ Read forward, Hebrews 4:12 takes the same two-mouthed image and puts it where Judges keeps it hidden under a robe: the word of God itself is living and active, piercing to the division of soul and spirit, and the one who meets it cannot get it out again. In Judges the word was a pretext for the blade; at the cross the blade falls on the one who is the Word, and the message that comes out of that room is the one Henry names — mercy. The link of image is Ellicott's (his note at v. 16 cites Hebrews 4:12 and Revelation 1:16); the reading of Eglon's death as its foil is the tool's own and is offered as novel.
Hebrews 4:12 · Revelation 1:16 · John 1:14
The saviour of Judges 3 is introduced by what he cannot do. אִטֵּר יַד־יְמִינוֹ — shut as to his right hand — and Ellicott catches the sting: he is Ben-ha-jemînî, a son of the right hand, who has no use of it. K&D reads a lifetime of disuse; Cambridge reads the tactical consequence, a sword hidden on the side nobody searches. ⚙ The pattern is the one the New Testament will name as a principle: God chooses the weak things and the things that are not, to bring to nothing the things that are (1 Corinthians 1:27–28), and strength is made perfect in weakness (2 Corinthians 12:9). Judges does not draw that conclusion, and no commentator in this brief draws it from ʼiṭṭêr; the pattern is real in the Hebrew — a shut hand producing an opening, since yâshaʻ means to make open and free — but the line to Paul is drawn here by the tool and should be tested. Marked novel for that reason, even though the doctrine it lands on is anything but new.
1 Corinthians 1:27-28 · 2 Corinthians 12:9
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:
Text. This unit contains an unusual density of words that occur nowhere else. גֹּמֶד (v. 16) is a hapax: K&D marks it ἁπ. λεγ. and argues for a cubit against the LXX and Vulgate's “span,” while Cambridge reports the Jewish measure of about 13½ inches; nobody can measure Ehud's sword. הַפַּרְשְׁדֹנָה (v. 22) is a hapax whose meaning is genuinely unknown: the AV and Targum read “the dirt came out,” Gesenius and K&D read “the place between the legs” with the blade as subject, the Syriac has “he went out hastily,” Ewald “he rushed out into the gallery,” and the LXX omits it. Benson concedes the English rendering comes only “from the Chaldee.” הַמִּסְדְּרוֹנָה (v. 23) is likewise unique; Cambridge: “the precise meaning is unknown.” הַשְּׂעִירָתָה (v. 26) names a place attested nowhere else — K&D infers a wooded region from the etymology, “the hairy,” and Pulpit and Ellicott follow.
Contested renderings. פְּסִילִים (vv. 19, 26): “idols/graven images” (Cambridge, Ellicott, JFB, LXX, Vulgate) against “stone quarries” (Targum, Rashi, K&D); Geneva prints both. אִטֵּר (v. 15): “shut, restricted as to the right hand” (Ellicott, K&D, Cambridge) against LXX amphoterodexion, “ambidextrous” (reported by Benson, Barnes, JFB, Gill). מֵסִיךְ רַגְלָיו (v. 24): relieving himself (Ellicott, LXX, Vulgate, Chaldee, Syriac, K&D) against sleeping (Poole, Barnes, Pulpit, Josephus). Each of these is left standing as a disagreement in the notes above rather than resolved by the machine.
Numbers and sources. Ellicott reports that Josephus appears to have read eight years rather than eighty at v. 30, and Poole that “some copies read eight years”; the eighty of the Hebrew is retained. Gill, Benson and Bishop Ussher are cited as disagreeing over whether the eighty run from the servitude, from Othniel's death, or from the earlier rest, and Benson and Gill both restrict the “rest” geographically. Cambridge suspects editorial doubling at vv. 19–20, 22–23 and 27–28 while judging the narrative “as a whole homogeneous”; that suspicion is reported, not adopted. Josephus (Antiquities v. 4) supplies several vivid details repeated by Ellicott and Gill — Ehud's youth, his familiarity with Eglon, the dream, the stab to the heart — none of which are in the Hebrew, and Ellicott calls the heart detail inaccurate.
Ethics. The strongest disagreement in this unit is moral, and it is not the machine's to settle. JFB reads Ehud's composure as confidence “that he was doing God service”; Gill defends the act on the ground that Ehud acted as a judge under divine impulse; Benson permits it only under a divine warrant that “can be no precedent for others”; Barnes, K&D and Ellicott judge the method itself wrong or at least unsanctioned, with Ellicott cataloguing the historical abuses built on it. The synthesis above sides with the under-claim — the text records a deliverance and never records the Spirit coming on the deliverer — and says so openly rather than smoothing the voices together.
⚙ layer. Every root gloss above comes from the brief's lexicon and every parse from the Berean interlinear. Where the synthesis draws a connection the sources do not draw — the sacrificial vocabulary of qârab/minchâh around the killing, the shâlach and tâqaʻ echoes, the mâlaṭ inclusion between vv. 26 and 29, the Pauline reading of the shut hand — it is marked ⚙ and is fallible.
✦ = 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)