How “coming forth” is cursed in Judges 9

Even innocuous and ubiqituous words can take on sinister shades and cursed implications, when we are attentive to their “heads.”

In Judges 9:42, after Avi-Melek has given Ga’al and the Shekhemites a good whooping, we read:

And it came to be on the morrow, and the people went forth to the field, and they told it unto Avi-Melek.

On the surface, this presents a puzzle. Why would Avi-Melek’s allies in the city alert him to the people going out into the field? Why would he care? Is this not a perfectly normal and innocent thing for people to do? The word in Hebrew just means to “go forth,” “come forth,” or “bring forth,” depending on context — it is a common, even ubiquitous term in scripture, and does not suggest anything nefarious.

Here in Judges 9, however, it is used much more specifically. Scripture uses a curiously small number of words to say a great many things — and the initial occurrence of a word is very important for setting its meaning. I call this the “head” of the word, following scripture’s own way of speaking. For instance, the head of the word “head” in scripture, is actually the head of scripture itself: the first word of Genesis is b’reshiyt, “in the head.”

When we are trying to decipher a puzzle like the one here in Judges 9:42, knowing the head of the word is important for knowing what God means by it. Where it is first used, and how? And we must remember that what counts as the “first” use, the head of the word, depends on the body. Scripture is fractal as bodies are fractal, and so there can be multiple heads. You can have the first use of a word in the whole Bible, or the first use in a book, or the first use in a chapter or pericope or passage.

The head of “come forth” in scripture as a whole is Genesis 1:12, where the land brings forth plants. But we’re doing a study of this word in this story, here in Judges 9 — so we need to be alert to the possibility that it has a somewhat different head. And indeed, the first time it is used in this story “resets” its meaning for the story. I don’t mean it has a completely new meaning, but the word is filled with a very particular connotation that isn’t usually there in the rest of scripture.

Verses 15 and 20 are the head of this particular word — where Yotham is pronouncing his curse:

And said the bramble unto the trees, “If in trueness ye are anointing me to be king upon you, come, take refuge in my shadow; and if not, let fire come forth from the bramble and eat up the cedars of Lebanon… 20 Let fire come forth from Avi-Melek and eat up the masters of Shekhem and Beyt Millo, and let fire come forth from the masters of Shekhem and from Beyt Millo and eat up Avi-Melek!” (Judges 9:15, 20)

Does the initial use here set a certain connotation for this otherwise innocuous and ubiquitous term here in Judges 9? Has Yotham’s curse, as it were, cursed the “coming forth,” and made it something hostile, something under judgment, something leading to destruction, and something connected with idolatry (since the selection of Avi-Melek as king is actually a selection of Ba’al as god)? Perhaos, every time we read this phrase, “come forth” or “go forth,” we should read it as a hostile or cursed act.

This does indeed seem to be the case. Look at verses 26–27:

26 And Ga’al son of Eved came, and his brothers, and crossed into Shekhem, and in him the masters of Shekhem put their confidence, 27 and they went forth into the field and harvested their vineyards and trod and made praises and went to the house of their god and they ate and they drank and they reduced Avi-Melek (vv 26–27)

Going forth is here an act of idolatry followed by an act of cursing the man they crowned king. And during this boastful cursing, Ga’al then says, “I would say unto Avi-Melek, ‘Multiply thine army and come forth!’” (v. 29).

In response, Zevul instructs Avi-Melek in preparing an ambush, so that Ga’al “and the people that are with him shall come forth unto thee, and mayest thou do unto them as that thy hand finds” (v. 33). Clearly, coming forth here is envisaged as some kind of military act: a skirmish, a sortie.

Then verse 35, Ga’al goes forth from the gate in the morning. This is where the puzzle begins, however. It isn’t clear that he is really prepared for combat. It does not seem that he is on the offensive — or even on the defensive. This puzzle is solved by referring back to verse 25, where the masters of Shekhem are being depicted as going forth to prey on the people of the land. This is what Ga’al has been commissioned to do; the masters (lit: ba’als) of Shekhem “put their confidence” in him. They are sending Ga’al and his brothers out to lie in wait on the heads of the mountains, and rob all who cross them, and hopefully waylay Avi-Melek. This time however, in verse 35, the heads of the mountains are swarming with people who are coming down to prey on them — an ironic reversal they are completely unprepared for. The Shekhemites are “going forth” as unto hyenas or jackals, not lions or wolves; they are scavengers, no match for the predator that awaits them. Nonetheless, they are forced into battle, and we read in verse 38, Zevul challenges Ga’al, “Go thee forth now, pray, and war with him.” And so he does in verse 39 — upon which he is routed.

This sets up what happens in verse 42:

And it came to be on the morrow, and the people went forth to the field, and they told it unto Avi-Melek…

Essentially, this is the Shekhemites up to their old tricks again. They haven’t learned a thing. Look at how verse 42 echoes verse 25 — they rhyme:

25 And the masters of Shekhem set for him lyings-in-wait upon the heads of the mountains [a hostile action]… and it was told unto Avi-Melek.

42 And it came to be on the morrow, and the people went forth to the field [a hostile action], and they told it unto Avi-Melek…

They are going forth to do more robbing. As the king — so-called; he is not really king — Avi-Melek cannot wink at this kind of thing. It is his job to make sure the highways are safe, and that bandits are brought to justice. More importantly, it is his job to make sure that traitors are caught and insurrections are put down. He can’t have the Shekhemites going forth, defying him, harrassing his subjects, and lurking in ambush to destroy him. So when it is told to him that Shekhem have not learned their lesson, but are still up to the same old tricks, he has to come back the next day to deal to them more severely.