Big Ideas · 23 · The Hero
Women are the canaries in the coal mine
Judges begins with strong women like Achsah, Deborah, and Jael. It ends with nameless women abused and killed. Their fate tracks the nation's.
When women are silenced, something is rotten in the state.
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Thirteen of Judges' twenty-one chapters include women. After Abimelek, women go unnamed, a sign of their declining value as men's lust for power spirals out of control. Violence against women's bodies mirrors the dismantling of the body politic.
Source: Why the Bible Began, pp. 370–373
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