Judges
Judges has 21 chapters. Read Judges in the New American Standard Bible 2020, chapter by chapter, free and without an account.
Judges describes Israel’s life in the land after Joshua, when worship of other gods is repeatedly followed by oppression and deliverance. Leaders including Deborah, Gideon, Jephthah, and Samson figure in accounts of rescue, conflict, and failure. The book ends with idolatry, violence against women, and war within Israel, emphasizing the disorder of a people without a king.
In Christian Bibles, Judges is one of the Historical Books of the Old Testament. In the Jewish Tanakh it belongs to the Nevi’im, the Prophets. See it on the shelf.
Judges 1 recounts Israel’s early campaigns after Joshua and the tribes’ repeated failure to complete the conquest.
Judges 2 introduces Israel’s recurring cycle of covenant failure, oppression, divine compassion, judges, and renewed corruption.
Judges 3 presents Othniel, Ehud, and Shamgar as deliverers raised during Israel’s recurring oppression.
Judges 4 recounts Deborah and Barak’s victory over Sisera, completed through Jael’s courageous action.
Judges 5 celebrates God’s deliverance through Deborah, Barak, Jael, and Israel’s willing volunteers.
Judges 6 tells how God calls fearful Gideon, confronts Baal worship, and patiently confirms his mission against Midian.
Judges 7 recounts Gideon’s victory with three hundred men using trumpets, jars, torches, and trust in God.
Judges 8 follows Gideon’s final victory, harsh reprisals, rejected kingship, troubling ephod, and Israel’s renewed unfaithfulness.
Judges 9 traces Abimelech’s bloody rise and fall through Jotham’s warning, Shechem’s rebellion, and destructive judgment.
Judges 10 recounts renewed idolatry, severe oppression, Israel’s confession, removal of idols, and gathering at Mizpah.
Judges 11 tells of Jephthah’s leadership, negotiations, victory over Ammon, and the tragedy caused by his reckless vow.
Judges 12 recounts Jephthah’s conflict with Ephraim at the Jordan and the later judges Ibzan, Elon, and Abdon.
Judges 13 announces Samson’s miraculous birth and Nazirite calling to begin delivering Israel from Philistine rule.
Judges 14 follows Samson’s Timnah marriage, encounter with a lion, wedding riddle, betrayal, and escalating conflict.
Judges 15 recounts Samson’s escalating conflict with Philistia, his deliverance from bonds, victory, and desperate thirst.
Judges 16 recounts Samson’s betrayal by Delilah, capture and blindness, renewed prayer, and final act against Philistia.
Judges 17 describes Micah’s household shrine, carved idol, and hired Levite, revealing deeply compromised worship.
Judges 18 follows Dan’s migration, theft of Micah’s shrine and priest, conquest of Laish, and establishment of idolatry.
Judges 19 recounts failed hospitality and horrific abuse at Gibeah, revealing the depth of Israel’s moral collapse.
Judges 20 recounts Israel’s war against Benjamin after Gibeah, repeated defeats, prayer, ambush, and devastating tribal loss.
Judges 21 records Israel’s grief and troubling efforts to preserve Benjamin, ending with the nation’s moral disorder.