Judges 16-21, Book of Ruth 1-4, First Book of Samuel 1-10

Judges picks up again with the familiar conclusion of the Samson affair, the challenges of Delilah, the lost hair and strength, and the two pillars he still manages to bring down on top of a vast assembly of Philistines.

Wouldn't it be nice if that were the last of the Philistines, or the last heroic judge the Hebrews needed?  Except Samson seemed to spend all his time doing very much his own thing.  His story is a little bit about hubris and personal redemption more than anything directly concerned with Jewish history or faith.

The next judge is Micah, who leads all of Israel, basically, into idolatry, so he's not a very good one at all.  Bethlehem is mentioned.  The Hebrews fall into some of their worst habits.  There's a terrible story about a concubine who's raped all night and then chopped into bits.

However, it's fun on a purely Jewish cultural note when the phrase "such a thing" at the start of a sentence appears.  Apparently it has long roots!

And then they all further degenerate into inter-tribal warfare, and thus ends Judges.

The first incredibly short book of the Bible, the Book of Ruth, comes next, and it's set during the time of the judges.  It's very much a story about the Jewish faith being kept alive despite the troubled times, by a widow and her daughter-in-law, Ruth, who is rewarded by winning a husband, which results in the birth of Obid, who becomes the father of Jesse, who becomes the father of David.  At this point in the beginnings of the Bible, we have what previously could very easily have been included in a larger book, but clearly the books have already begun to be codified.  Ruth's story is intended to fill in a gap that would otherwise have existed, and explain that not all Jews were behaving badly in those times.

The phrase, "the Lord be with you," appears, which later generations of the faithful will certainly recognize.

The First Book of Samuel begins and we find ourselves in familiar echoing material.  Hannah's journey to motherhood would certainly have sounded familiar to those familiar with Genesis and how Rebekah and Isaac ended up conceiving their children Jacob and Esau. It also evokes Abraham and Sarah, Jacob himself with Rachel, and the New Testament's Mary and Elizabeth.  Hannah is the mother of Samuel, by the way.

Hannah's prayer reads a lot like a revised statement of faith in God, now that the relationship between Israel and the Lord has altered since the time of Moses and other such generations.  It's a lot more relaxed, and familiar to our own times, another touchstone in the development of everything we know and believe now.  It includes the phrase, "the pillars of the earth," as well as "not by might shall a man prevail," which is rank contradiction to the time of Moses and Joshua, when I saw all that blatant conquering going on.  It represents another clear theological shift.  One might say that the Jews had begun to distance themselves from the idea that it was God telling them to fight so much.

Eli, who previously appears as Hannah's religious confessor, becomes Samuel's mentor, including the famous moment where Samuel is confused when God begins speaking with him, confusing the Lord for his mentor.  Hey, at this point it was increasingly rare to be granted an audience with the Almighty.

It's stated that "the boy Samuel continued to grow both in stature and in favor with the Lord and with men," which the gospels later evoke with Jesus.  There's a clear connection between the New Testament and the emerging story of David, and that should come as no surprise.

There's a little summary and a little prophecy, by now standard biblical material.  Samuel is the first person in the Bible since Abraham to speak with God so freely.

The Philistines!  The Hebrew tribes, in their compromised state, do battle with their perennial foes, and make a curious decision on the battlefield.  They elect to use the ark of the covenant as a means of intimidation.  The ark has taken on perhaps a different kind of meaning at this point in history, not so much a symbol of faith and the accord with God, but a totem of power.  The Philistines are suitably impressed (though they seem to believe it represents not God but many Hebrew gods, which wouldn't be far from the mark, and shows just how far the chosen people had fallen).  They end up stealing it!

Eli dies from the shock of learning this.  He lasted as a judge for 40 years.  The ark causes the Philistines a lot of trouble.  They decide it would be a better idea to negotiate it back into the hands of Israel, and so that actually happens, which also has the effect of proving the Philistines aren't always so bad.

Like the later Egyptian pyramids and those who sought to loot them, the returned ark proves a cursed curiosity to some of the happy Hebrews.  They open it.  God smites them.  Raiders of the lost ark.

Twenty years pass.  God tells Samuel about the future Hebrew king, and he accurately describes the coming reign of Saul.  Saul is then introduced.  He's described as the most handsome man in all the land, which funny enough evokes his successor David (and Snow White).  All in all, Saul comes off well in his younger years.  He's even a prophet.  Samuel anoints him, he becomes king.  He might even be described as a sort of John the Baptist figure, or maybe he fights for that role with Samuel.  Either way, David is coming...