Abimelech

“ Gaal aimed not to recover Shechem's liberty, only to change their tyrant: " O that this people were under my hand! What I would do! I would challenge Abimelech to try titles for the crown;" and it should seem he desired his friends to send him word that he was ready to dispute it with him whenever he pleased: " Increase thy army, and come out. Do thy worst; let the point be determined by the sword." This pleased the Shechemites, who were now as sick of Abimelech as ever they had been fond of him. Men of no conscience will be men of no constancy. ”

“ And his young man thrust him through, and he died.
9:55 And when the men of Israel saw that Abimelech was dead, they departed every man unto his place.
9:56 Thus God rendered the wickedness of Abimelech, which he did unto his father, in slaying his seventy brethren: 9:57 And all the evil of the men of Shechem did God render upon their heads: and upon them came the curse of Jotham the son of Jerubbaal.
10:1 And after Abimelech there arose to defend Israel Tola the son of Puah, the son of Dodo, a man of Issachar; and he dwelt in Shamir in mount Ephraim. ”

“ Abraham removed from thence to the south country, and dwelt between Cades and Sur, and sojourned in Gerara.
20:2. And he said of Sara his wife: She is my sister. So Abimelech the king of Gerara sent, and took her.
20:3. And God came to Abimelech in a dream by night, and he said to him: Lo thou shalt die for the woman that thou hast taken: for she hath a husband.
20:4. Now Abimelech had not touched her, and he said: Lord, wilt thou slay a nation that is ignorant and just? ”

“ And he said to the people who were with him, Be quick and do as you have seen me do.
9:49 So all the people got branches, every man cutting down a branch, and they went with Abimelech at their head and, massing the branches against the inner room, put fire to the room over them; so all those who were in the tower of Shechem, about a thousand men and women, were burned to death with it.
9:50 Then Abimelech went to Thebez, and put his army in position against Thebez and took it. ”

“ Abimelech reigns in his place, and has slain all the children of Gideon save myself. Israel has returned to Baal; its strength has departed; before long we shall be subdued under the Philistines. Excepting in our own house, there are none that have not gone a-whoring after Baal; the memory of the battle by the hill Moreh is clean forgotten; and soon the memory of my father will also disappear, and it will be as if he had never lived. To think that the vision of the angel in Ophrah and the night in the valley of Jezreel should end in nothing! ”

“ Thou hast created man that he may increase and propagate his kind. Grant that Abimelech and his house may multiply and increase!" [200] God fulfilled Abraham's petition in behalf of Abimelech and his people, and it was the first time it happened in the history of mankind that God fulfilled the prayer of one human being for the benefit of another. [201] Abimelech and his subjects were healed of all their diseases, and so efficacious was the prayer offered by Abraham that the wife of Abimelech, barren hitherto, bore a child. ”

“ And when he shall come out against thee with his people, do to him what thou shalt be able.
34 Abimelech therefore arose with all his army by night, and laid ambushes near Sichem in four places.
35 And Gaal the son of Obed went out, and stood in the entrance of the gate of the city. And Abimelech rose up, and all his army with him from the places of the ambushes.
36 And when Gaal saw the people, he said to Zebul: Behold a multitude cometh down from the mountains. And he answered him: Thou seest the shadows of the mountains as if they were the heads of men, and this is thy mistake. ”

“ According to verse 6, Abimelech was not free and responsible; this makes the punishment still more remarkable; and why punish others for Abimelech's offence (if offence was really committed) ? If God withheld Abimelech from committing sin, why is he not as merciful to every one? it would be more Godlike to prevent sin than to punish the sinner.
Chapter xxi., v. 12 and 14. The sending Hagar and Ishmael into the desert with only one bottle of water is cruel and barbarous conduct. Abraham does not seem to have had much parental affection ”

“ Verses 1-2Verses 1-2 Jdg 10:1-2Tola arose after Abimelech's death to deliver Israel, and judged Israel twenty-three years until his death, though certainly not all the Israelites of the twelve tribes, but only the northern and possibly also the eastern tribes, to the exclusion of Judah, Simeon, and Benjamin, as these southern tribes neither took part in Gideon's war of freedom nor stood under Abimelech's rule. ”

“ Yet was God still angered against Abimelech for the wrong he had wrought against Sarah and against Abraham, in severing the bonds of these beloved, man and wife. He suffered woe and bitter punishment; the maidens, slave nor free, might not bear children to their lords, but God denied them, till holy Abraham prayed his Lord, Eternal God, for mercy. ”

“ Abraham lived twenty-six years in the land of the Philistines; then he went to Hebron, and there his servants dug wells, and there they encamped.
When Abimelech's servants heard of these wells that they had dug, they came with their flocks, and desired to use them also, and the largest of the wells they claimed as their own. But Abraham's shepherds said, "Let the well belong to those to whom it gives water. The Lord shall decide between us!"
To this the servants of Abimelech agreed. And when the flocks of Abraham came to drink, the well sprang up and overflowed ”

“ There is no man of spirit to oppose Abimelech in the field. The duped nation must drink its cup of misrule and blood. But one appears of keen wit, apt and trenchant in speech. At least the tribes shall hear what one sound mind thinks of this coronation. Jotham, as we saw, escaped the slaughter at Ophrah. In the rear of the murderer he has crossed the hills and he [214] will now utter his warning, whether men hear or whether they forbear. There is a crowd assembled for worship or deliberation at the oak of the pillar. ”