Judges 2

1Then the angel of Yahweh went up from Gilgal to Bochim and said, “I brought you up from Egypt and brought you into the land that I swore to your fathers, and I said, ‘I will never break my covenant with you.’”

2And you were not to make a covenant with the inhabitants of this land; you were to tear down their altars. But you have not listened to my voice. What is this you have done?

3So I also said, ‘I will not drive them out from before you; they will become adversaries to you, and their gods will become a snare to you.’

4And when the angel of Yahweh spoke these words to all the sons of Israel, the people raised their voices and wept.

5So they called the name of that place Bochim, and they sacrificed there to Yahweh.

6Then Joshua sent the people away, and the sons of Israel went, each man to his inheritance, to take possession of the land.

7And the people served Yahweh all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who lived on after Joshua, who had seen all the great work of Yahweh that he had done for Israel.

8And Joshua son of Nun, the servant of Yahweh, died at the age of one hundred and ten years.

9And they buried him within the territory of his inheritance, in Timnath-heres, in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash.

10And all that generation also were gathered to their fathers, and another generation arose after them who did not know Yahweh, or even the work that he had done for Israel.

11And the sons of Israel did what was evil in the sight of Yahweh, and they served the Baals.

12And they abandoned Yahweh, the God of their fathers, who had brought them out from the land of Egypt, and went after other gods from among the gods of the peoples who were around them, and they bowed down to them and provoked Yahweh to anger.

13They abandoned Yahweh and served Baal and the Ashtoreths.

14Then the anger of Yahweh burned against Israel, and he gave them into the hand of plunderers, who plundered them. He sold them into the hand of their enemies all around, so that they could no longer stand before their enemies.

15Wherever they went out, the hand of Yahweh was against them for harm, just as Yahweh had spoken and just as Yahweh had sworn to them, and they were greatly distressed.

16Then Yahweh raised up judges, and they saved them from the hand of those who plundered them.

17Yet they did not listen even to their judges, for they prostituted themselves after other gods and bowed down to them. They quickly turned aside from the way in which their fathers had walked in obeying the commandments of Yahweh; they did not do so.

18Whenever Yahweh raised up judges for them, Yahweh was with the judge and saved them from the hand of their enemies all the days of the judge, for Yahweh was moved to pity by their groaning because of those who oppressed and afflicted them.

19And when the judge died, they turned back and acted more corruptly than their fathers, going after other gods to serve them and to bow down to them. They did not drop any of their deeds or their stubborn way.

20So the anger of Yahweh burned against Israel, and he said, “Because this nation has transgressed my covenant that I commanded their fathers, and they have not listened to my voice,”

21I also will no longer continue to drive out before them any of the nations that Joshua left when he died.

22in order to test Israel by them, whether they would keep the way of Yahweh by walking in it, as their fathers kept it, or not.

23So Yahweh left these nations, not driving them out quickly, and he did not give them into the hand of Joshua.