{"id":56263,"date":"2019-05-28T06:43:31","date_gmt":"2019-05-28T03:43:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=56263"},"modified":"2022-12-19T13:20:15","modified_gmt":"2022-12-19T11:20:15","slug":"foreshadowing-of-reconciliation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/foreshadowing-of-reconciliation\/","title":{"rendered":"Foreshadowing Of Reconciliation"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"entry-content\"><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[564,459,451,429,604],"acf":{"old_id":"56263","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":34245,"related_cahpter":"228","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"Serious dysfunctionality, with a glimmer of hope\u2026","content":"<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Judges 17 starts with a deceptively positive story. Instead of telling us how Micha stole his mother\u2019s money, the narrative jumps straight from \u201cthere was a man in the hill country of Ephraim whose name was Micah\u201d to Micha\u2019s confession: \u201che said to his mother, \u2018The eleven hundred shekels of silver that were taken from you\u2026 I have that silver; I took it.\u2019\u201d (17:1) This opening shifts our attention from Micha\u2019s transgression to his attempt to correct it, and predisposes us to expect a story about self-betterment and redemption. When Micha\u2019s mother forgives her son immediately, this expectation is temporarily validated. Though other reconciliation attempts in Judges lead to disaster (think of Samson\u2019s doomed attempt to visit his first wife, or the Levite\u2019s attempt to reconcile with his concubine two chapters hence), we can conclude that the reconciliation between Micha and his mother is successful. Furthermore: nothing comes along to challenge it down the line.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">This little scene is so benign that it seems out of place in the book of Judges. What does it have to do with the collapse of Israelite society? Why does the narrator not only record this story, but also highlight it by placing it in the beginning of Micha\u2019s tale? Sure, Micha\u2019s reconciliation with his mother explains how he came to own a house of God with a molten image (she dedicated the stolen-then-returned money to this enterprise). But why is this something that we the readers need to know?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Perhaps the biblical storyteller uses this tale as a way to set us up to be surprised. The reconciliation lulls us into expecting a pleasant story about family bonds surviving hardships. This expectation carries through into our encounter with the Levite boy, whom Micha first calls \u201cfather\u201d and then treats \u201clike one of his own sons.\u201d Against this backdrop, the Levite boy\u2019s betrayal in Judges 18 is bound to shock us. After watching Micha\u2019s reconciliation with the mother he stole from, we do not expect the Levite boy to steal from Micha so callously, and leave.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">But the reconciliation story highlights yet another, and deeper, betrayal. Micha may have restored the stolen money to his mother, but he went on to use it for idolatry, thus betraying Israel\u2019s father \u2013 God. Micha\u2019s story draws our attention to this manifestation of the chronic problems of Judges. It also, however, offers us a glimmer of hope: if Micha was able to reconcile with the parent he betrayed, maybe the Israelites can break the cycle of the book of Judges, and find a way to reconcile with God.<\/span><\/p>\n","image":{"ID":56264,"id":56264,"title":"jud17-hope","filename":"jud17-hope.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/foreshadowing-of-reconciliation\/jud17-hope\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"jud17-hope","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":56263,"date":"2019-05-28 03:43:18","modified":"2019-05-28 03:43:28","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","type":"image","subtype":"jpeg","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":1920,"height":1279,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope-300x200.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":200,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope-768x512.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":512,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope-1024x682.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":682,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":1023,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope.jpg","2048x2048-width":1920,"2048x2048-height":1279,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope-1200x799.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":799,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope-630x420.jpg","home_baner-width":630,"home_baner-height":420}},"embedded_video":"","video_duration":"","show_fb_comments":true,"credit_media":""},"tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"Foreshadowing Of Reconciliation","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"Serious dysfunctionality, with a glimmer of hope\u2026","preview_embedded":"","preview_image":{"ID":56264,"id":56264,"title":"jud17-hope","filename":"jud17-hope.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/foreshadowing-of-reconciliation\/jud17-hope\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"jud17-hope","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":56263,"date":"2019-05-28 03:43:18","modified":"2019-05-28 03:43:28","menu_order":0,"mime_type":"image\/jpeg","type":"image","subtype":"jpeg","icon":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-includes\/images\/media\/default.png","width":1920,"height":1279,"sizes":{"thumbnail":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope-150x150.jpg","thumbnail-width":150,"thumbnail-height":150,"medium":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope-300x200.jpg","medium-width":300,"medium-height":200,"medium_large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope-768x512.jpg","medium_large-width":768,"medium_large-height":512,"large":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope-1024x682.jpg","large-width":1024,"large-height":682,"1536x1536":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope.jpg","1536x1536-width":1536,"1536x1536-height":1023,"2048x2048":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope.jpg","2048x2048-width":1920,"2048x2048-height":1279,"post_full_size":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope-1200x799.jpg","post_full_size-width":1200,"post_full_size-height":799,"home_baner":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud17-hope-630x420.jpg","home_baner-width":630,"home_baner-height":420}},"preview_video":"","external_link":"","link_for_pay":false,"tile_gallery_items":false,"credits":""},"alternate_tile":{"top_caption":"","main_caption":"","main_caption_size":"1","sub_caption":"","hide_media":false},"tile_group":{"preview_image_url":false,"main_caption":"","sub_caption":"","":null,"popup_package_extra_content":"","read_time":""},"home_color":"","home_gallery_top":"","home_gallery_middle":"","home_gallery_book":"","home_gallery_bottom":"","seo":{"seo_title":"","seo_description":"","seo_default_title":"","seo_default_description":""},"links":false,"send_noty":false},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56263"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=56263"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56263\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":110243,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/56263\/revisions\/110243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=56263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=56263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=56263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}