Judges3:12–30

Seven hundred like him — the shut right hand of Benjamin verbal / quotation — confirmed

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.

A sword of two mouths in their hand verbal / quotation — confirmed

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.

The key on the shoulder — an opener that shuts and none opens verbal / quotation — confirmed

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.

They added to do evil — the formula that runs the book structural / thematic — confirmed

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.

Bolted from the inside — doors, bolts, and what is behind them structural / thematic — confirmed

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.

Eglon the king and Eglon the town — a name-collision, flagged flagged — verify source

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.

Two-mouthed and living — the image crosses into Greek typological

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.

The saviour God raised up — mōwšîaʻ and the name of Jesus ancient/widely-held

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

The word that goes in and does not come back out novel

“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

God delivers left-handed novel

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