Bible Commentaries
Judges 9

Verses 1-57

Judges 9:11

A tallow dip, of the long-eight description, is an excellent thing in the kitchen candlestick, and Betty's nose and eye are not sensitive to the difference between it and the finest wax; it is only when you stick it in the silver candlestick, and introduce it into the drawing-room, that it seems plebeian, dim, and ineffectual. Alas for the worthy man who, like that candle, gets himself into the wrong place!

George Eliot, Amos Barton.

Does he not drink more sweetly that takes his beverage in an earthen vessel, than he who looks and searches into his golden chalices, for fear of poison, and looks pale at every sudden noise, and sleeps in armour, and trusts no body, and does not trust God for his safety?

Jeremy Taylor.

Verily, I swear 'tis better to be lowly born,

And range with humble livers in content,

Than to be perk'd up in a glistering grief,

And wear a golden sorrow.

Anne Bullen in King Henry VIII.

Reference. IX. 14, 15. C. F. Aked, The Courage of the Coward, p. 205.

Judges 9:17-18

As I re-read the chapter of Judges now, except in my memory, unread, as it chances, for many a year the sadness of that story of Gideon fastens on me, and silences me. This the end of his angel visions, and dream-led victories, the slaughter of all his sons but this youngest and he never again heard of in Israel.

You Scottish children of the Rock, taught through all your once pastoral and noble lives by many a sweet miracle of dew on fleece and ground once servants of mighty kings and keepers of sacred covenant; have you indeed dealt truly with your warrior kings and prophet saints?

Ruskin in Proserpina.

Reference. IX. 48. S. Baring-Gould, Village Preaching for a Year, vol. i. p. 270.

Judges 9:53

There now lies the greatness of Abimelech! upon one stone had he slain his seventy brethren, and now a stone slays him.

Bishop Hall.