Hakim-hakim 3:9

3:9 When the Israelites cried out for help to the Lord, he ¹  raised up a deliverer for the Israelites who rescued ²  them. His name was Othniel son of Kenaz, Caleb’s younger brother. ³ 

Hakim-hakim 3:15

3:15 When the Israelites cried out for help to the Lord, he ⁴  raised up a deliverer for them. His name was Ehud son of Gera the Benjaminite, a left-handed man. ⁵  The Israelites sent him to King Eglon of Moab with their tribute payment. ⁶ 

Hakim-hakim 4:3

4:3 The Israelites cried out for help to the Lord, because Sisera ⁷  had nine hundred chariots with iron-rimmed wheels, ⁸  and he cruelly ⁹  oppressed the Israelites for twenty years.

Hakim-hakim 6:7

6:7 When the Israelites cried out to the Lord for help because of Midian,

Hakim-hakim 10:10

10:10 The Israelites cried out for help to the Lord: “We have sinned against you. We abandoned our God and worshiped ¹⁰  the Baals.”

Hakim-hakim 10:15

10:15 But the Israelites said to the Lord, “We have sinned. You do to us as you see fit, ¹¹  but deliver us today!” ¹² 

[3:9]  ¹ tn Heb “the Lord.”

[3:9]  ² tn Or “delivered.”

[3:9]  ³ tn “Caleb’s younger brother” may refer to Othniel or to Kenaz (in which case Othniel is Caleb’s nephew).

[3:15]  ⁴ tn Heb “the Lord.” This has been replaced by the pronoun (“he”) in the translation for stylistic reasons.

[3:15]  ⁵ tn The phrase, which refers to Ehud, literally reads “bound/restricted in the right hand,” apparently a Hebrew idiom for a left-handed person. See Judg 20:16, where 700 Benjaminites are described in this way. Perhaps the Benjaminites purposely trained several of their young men to be left-handed warriors by restricting the use of the right hand from an early age so the left hand would become dominant. Left-handed men would have a distinct military advantage, especially when attacking city gates. See B. Halpern, “The Assassination of Eglon: The First Locked-Room Murder Mystery,” BRev 4 (1988): 35.

[3:15]  ⁶ tn Heb “The Israelites sent by his hand an offering to Eglon, king of Moab.”

[4:3]  ⁷ tn Heb “he”; the referent (Sisera) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[4:3]  ⁸ tn Regarding the translation “chariots with iron-rimmed wheels,” see Y. Yadin, The Art of Warfare in Biblical Lands, 255, and the article by R. Drews, “The ‘Chariots of Iron’ of Joshua and Judges,” JSOT 45 (1989): 15-23.

[4:3]  ⁹ tn Heb “with strength.”

[10:10]  ¹⁰ tn Or “served”; or “followed.”

[10:15]  ¹¹ tn Heb “according to all whatever is good in your eyes.”

[10:15]  ¹² sn You do to us as you see fit, but deliver us today. The request seems contradictory, but it can be explained in one of two ways. They may be asking for relief from their enemies and direct discipline from God’s hand. Or they may mean, “In the future you can do whatever you like to us, but give us relief from what we’re suffering right now.”