Judges 1:16

THE FAILURE OF THE TRIBE OF JUDAH AND THE TRIBE OF BENJAMIN

"And the children of the Kenite, Moses' brother-in-law, went up out of the city of palm trees with the children of Judah into the wilderness of Judah, which is in the south of Arad; and they went and dwelt with the people. And Judah went with Simeon his brother, and they smote the Canaanites that inhabited Zephath, and utterly destroyed it. And the name of the city was called Hormah. Also Judah took Gaza with the border thereof, and Ashkelon with the border thereof, and Ekron with the border thereof. And Jehovah was with Judah; and he drove out the inhabitants of the hill-country; for he could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron. And they gave Hebron unto Caleb, as Moses had spoken: and he drove out thence the three sons of Anak. And the children of Benjamin did not drive out the Jebusites that inhabited Jerusalem; but the Jebusites dwell with the children of Benjamin in Jerusalem unto this day."

"City of palm trees ... dwelt with the people" (Judges 1:16). `City of palm trees' is a reference to Jericho; and the `people' with whom the kinsmen of Moses dwelt were the Israelites.

"Zephath" (Judges 1:17). Yates has a very interesting discussion of this word. "From the same Hebrew root two words are formed: [~cherem], meaning `devoted' to a pagan god, and [~charam], meaning `destroyed.'[9] Zephath was [~cherem], that is, `devoted' to a pagan god and therefore offensive to the true God, and God ordered it to be utterly destroyed, which was thoroughly done. "They renamed the place `Hormah', which means `utter destruction.'"[10]

"Gaza ... Ashkelon ... Ekron" (Judges 1:18). These were three of the five leading cities of the Philistines, but Judah's taking them was apparently only a temporary achievement, for these cities continued to be controled by the Philistines. The next verse explains why Judah failed to keep these cities. The iron chariots of the Philistine (they were the people who dwelt in the "valley," that is, the Shephelah) gave them a military advantage. However, Judah held on to these cities for at least a century.

"It is a curious fact that when the Egyptian Pharaoh, Rameses III (1269-1244 B.C.) took Ashkelon, he found it inhabited not by Philistines, but by Hebrews."[11]

There is profound support in this fact for the date which we have assigned to the Conquest of Canaan, :1405 B.C.

"Rameses III possessed spears made of iron in the 13th Century B.C.,"[12] and Judges 1:19 here indicates that the Philistines were familiar with the use of iron at the time of the conquest of Canaan.

"The Jebusites dwelt with the children of Benjamin in Jerusalem unto this day" (Judges 1:21). The meaning of this is that when Judges was written, King David of Israel had not taken Jerusalem away from the Jebusites, strongly supporting our placement of the date of its composition in the reign of Saul, as was the opinion of Sir Isaac Newton.