Alrighty, so what’s the NUMBER ONE characteristic of a true Biblical judge?
It is this: Being specifically called by God for a specific purpose.
So in that sense, a judge wasn’t much different than a Biblical prophet.
And let’s face it.
Throughout Israel’s history, many Israelites came out of the woodwork and claimed to be prophets but they were proven false.
In fact, this is still happening today.
Which reminds me by the way of some folks a while back who accused me of being a false prophet.
I find that accusation funny because I never made such a claim.
So let me make it clear.
I am NOT a prophet, never have been and since I’m not Jewish (as far as I know), I never will be.
I’m a sin-stained believer just like everyone else in the world.
Anyways, back to the topic at hand.
Based on a Biblical perspective, a person can only be a legitimate prophet when he (or she) has been chosen by God to be one.
Again, the 2 non-negotiable points every prophet has to meet in order to be legit are…
…1) they have to be chosen by God and 2) they acted as a savior-warrior to rescue a select number of Israelite tribes from an enemy force.
Here are the 12 judges in order as they appear in the Scriptures:
Othniel
Ehud
Shamgar
Barak
Gideon
Tola
Jair
Jephthah
Ibzan
Elon
Samson
Abdon
And actually, I think we can add a 13th one: Deborah.
She served as a judge at the same time as Barak.
Also, one could make the case that Samuel was a judge.
But that’s arguable because he was much more like a prophet than a judge.
And I don’t really see how he served as a savior for Israel.
Finally, out of the 12 God-ordained judges, only 7 of them have their stories told in the Bible.
They are Othniel, Ehud, Shamgar, Barak (I think we could also include Deborah here), Gideon, Jephthah and Samson.
The other five Shophetim are given brief mentions but unfortunately there are no detailed accounts of what exactly they did to save Israel.
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