Bully's Blog

One of the best ways to communicate truth in such a way as to grip the hearts and minds of the hearer is by means of story telling. The Bible is full of stories, designed for just this purpose. The whole theology of story telling could use a treatment in itself…

God is Himself the Great Story Teller. Being God, He can sovereignly superintend all events so as to bring His stories to life. His stories really happened. The fact that they are told as stories does not subtract one whit from their real historical character. Still, what gives them their thrilling power is not only that we know that they really happened in a certain year and at a certain place, but because they speak to us today.

Why do good stories speak to us today? Because, as students of literature would say, they embody universal characteristics, and deal with universal problems, hopes, fears, symbols, and so forth. This is exactly correct. Universal truths are not the same as abstract generalities, however. It is precisely in the specific events themselves that the most universal aspects of the stories are seen.

James B. Jordan, Judges: God’s War Against Humanism, p.ix
http://www.biblicalhorizons.com/pdf/jjju.pdf

Judges, like all the so-called “history books” of the Old Testament, is really a prophecy. Judges is numbered among what are called the “Former Prophets.” These books were called prophecies because the histories they recorded were regarded as exemplary. The histories showed God’s principles in action, and thus formed prophetic warnings to the people. If we read Judges merely as a set of exciting stories, we miss this.

To get at the prophetic meaning, we need to know four “secrets” of interpreting Biblical narratives. First, we have to take seriously the universals, as mentioned above. The first enemy who invades Israel in the book of Judges is Cushan-of-Double-Wickedness from Aram-of-Double-River. This is Mesopotamia. What is the prophecy? If the people do not live righteously, the enemy will come from Mesopotamia. And so it was. First Assyria conquered Northern Israel, and later Babylon conquered Southern Israel, so that even the idea of a two-fold destruction came to pass.

James B. Jordan, Judges: God’s War Against Humanism, p.xi
http://www.biblicalhorizons.com/pdf/jjju.pdf