Yet they didn’t listen to their judges; for they prostituted themselves to other gods, and bowed themselves down to them. They quickly turned away from the way in which their fathers walked, obeying Yahweh’s commandments. They didn’t do so.
Parallel Translations
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Yet they didn’t listen to their judges; for they prostituted themselves to other gods, and bowed themselves down to them. They quickly turned away from the way in which their fathers walked, obeying Yahweh’s commandments. They didn’t do so.
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And yet they would not hearken unto their judges, but they went a whoring after other gods, and bowed themselves unto them: they turned quickly out of the way which their fathers walked in, obeying the commandments of the LORD; but they did not so.
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And yet they hearkened not unto their judges, for they went astray after other gods, and worshipped them; they turned aside quickly out of the way wherein their fathers walked, obeying the commandments of the LORD; they did not so.
Cross-references (19)
Passages linked to Judges 2:17 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Deuteronomy 9:12 Yahweh said to me, “Arise, get down quickly from here; for your people whom you have brought out of Egypt have corrupted themselves. They have quickly turned away from the way which I commanded them. They have made a molten image for themselves!”
- Galatians 1:6 I marvel that you are so quickly deserting him who called you in the grace of Christ to a different “good news”,
- Judges 2:7 The people served Yahweh all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great work of Yahweh that he had worked for Israel.
- Hosea 2:2 Contend with your mother! Contend, for she is not my wife, neither am I her husband; and let her put away her prostitution from her face, and her adulteries from between her breasts;
- Revelation 17:1-5 One of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and spoke with me, saying, “Come here. I will show you the judgment of the great prostitute who sits on many waters, with whom the kings of the earth committed sexual immorality. Those who dwell in the earth were made drunken with the wine of her sexual immorality.” He carried me away in the Spirit into a wilderness. I saw a woman sitting on a scarlet-colored beast, full of blasphemous names, having seven heads and ten horns. The woman was dressed in purple and scarlet, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having in her hand a golden cup full of abominations and the impurities of the sexual immorality of the earth. And on her forehead a name was written, “MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF THE PROSTITUTES AND OF THE ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.”
- Exodus 32:8 They have turned away quickly out of the way which I commanded them. They have made themselves a molded calf, and have worshiped it, and have sacrificed to it, and said, ‘These are your gods, Israel, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt.’ ”
- Exodus 34:15-16 “Don’t make a covenant with the inhabitants of the land, lest they play the prostitute after their gods, and sacrifice to their gods, and one call you and you eat of his sacrifice; and you take of their daughters to your sons, and their daughters play the prostitute after their gods, and make your sons play the prostitute after their gods.
- Leviticus 17:7 They shall no more sacrifice their sacrifices to the goat idols, after which they play the prostitute. This shall be a statute forever to them throughout their generations.’
- Deuteronomy 9:16 I looked, and behold, you had sinned against Yahweh your God. You had made yourselves a molded calf. You had quickly turned away from the way which Yahweh had commanded you.
- Joshua 24:24 The people said to Joshua, “We will serve Yahweh our God, and we will listen to his voice.”
- Joshua 24:31 Israel served Yahweh all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, and had known all the work of Yahweh, that he had worked for Israel.
- 1 Samuel 8:5-8 They said to him, “Behold, you are old, and your sons don’t walk in your ways. Now make us a king to judge us like all the nations.” But the thing displeased Samuel, when they said, “Give us a king to judge us.” Samuel prayed to Yahweh. Yahweh said to Samuel, “Listen to the voice of the people in all that they tell you; for they have not rejected you, but they have rejected me as the king over them. According to all the works which they have done since the day that I brought them up out of Egypt even to this day, in that they have forsaken me, and served other gods, so they also do to you.
- 1 Samuel 12:12 “When you saw that Nahash the king of the children of Ammon came against you, you said to me, ‘No, but a king shall reign over us;’ when Yahweh your God was your king.
- 1 Samuel 12:17 Isn’t it wheat harvest today? I will call to Yahweh, that he may send thunder and rain; and you will know and see that your wickedness is great, which you have done in Yahweh’s sight, in asking for a king.”
- 1 Samuel 12:19 All the people said to Samuel, “Pray for your servants to Yahweh your God, that we not die; for we have added to all our sins this evil, to ask for a king.”
- 2 Chronicles 36:15-16 Yahweh, the God of their fathers, sent to them by his messengers, rising up early and sending, because he had compassion on his people, and on his dwelling place; but they mocked the messengers of God, and despised his words, and scoffed at his prophets, until Yahweh’s wrath arose against his people, until there was no remedy.
- Psalms 73:27 For, behold, those who are far from you shall perish. You have destroyed all those who are unfaithful to you.
- Psalms 106:39 Thus they were defiled with their works, and prostituted themselves in their deeds.
- Psalms 106:43 He rescued them many times, but they were rebellious in their counsel, and were brought low in their iniquity.
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (10 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
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Geneva Bible translators 1599 · Public Domain Meaning, from the true religion.
Meaning, from the true religion.
Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Jdg 2:17 And yet they would not hearken unto…
Jdg 2:17 And yet they would not hearken unto their judges, but they went a whoring after other gods, and bowed themselves unto them: they turned quickly out of the way which their fathers walked in, obeying the commandments of the LORD; [but] they did not so.
Ver. 17. But they went a whoring.] Carried on by a spirit of fornication, a strong inclination, a vehement impetus to whoredom; so that they care not how they waste all upon it, and will not be reclaimed: so idolaters.
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They turned quickly out of the way.] See Gal 1:6, with the note.
Which their fathers walked in.] Grace is not hereditary. Good progenitors may have a degenerate and unregenerate offspring.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain Their judges admonished them of their sin and folly,…
Their judges admonished them of their sin and folly, and of the danger and misery which would certainly befall them.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Gill 1763 · Public Domain And yet they would not hearken unto their judges,....…
And yet they would not hearken unto their judges,.... Afterwards, or not always; but when they admonished them of their sins, and advised them to walk in the good ways of God, and serve him only; they turned a deaf ear to them, and went on in their own ways, which is a sad aggravation of their iniquities:
but they went a whoring after their gods, and bowed themselves unto them; committing spiritual adultery, for such idolatry is, and is often so represented in Scripture; for by it they broke the covenant God made with them, which had the nature of a matrimonial contract, and in which God was an husband to them; and therefore serving other gods was rejecting him as such, and committing whoredom with others; than which nothing was more provoking to God, jealous of his honour and glory:
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they turned quickly out of the way which their fathers walked in; as soon as ever Joshua and the elders were dead, they departed from the God of their fathers, and the way in which they worshipped him; and so likewise quickly after they had been delivered by the judges, or however as soon as they were dead:
obeying the commandments of the Lord; serving him at his tabernacle, according to the laws, commands, and ordinances he gave to Moses, which is to be understood of their fathers:
but they did not so; did not walk in the same way, nor serve the Lord, and obey his commands, as their fathers did; but all the reverse.
John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain Their Judges - Who admonished them of their sin…
Their Judges - Who admonished them of their sin and folly, and of the danger and misery which would certainly befall them.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 17. Went a whoring after other gods] Idolatry,…
Verse 17. Went a whoring after other gods] Idolatry, or the worship of strange gods, is frequently termed adultery, fornication, and whoredom, in the sacred writings. As many of their idolatrous practices were accompanied with impure rites, the term was not only metaphorically but literally proper.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain Quickly. They had persevered in virtue under the government…
Quickly. They had persevered in virtue under the government of Josue and of the elders, for the space of forty years, according to Marsham and Houbigant. The former places the first state of anarchy and of idolatry 34 years after Josue, allowing 15 years for the administration of the surviving ancients, and the remainder to bring the nation to such a pitch of wickedness as to force God to abandon it to the dominion of Chusan, for eight years. --- Walked. Hebrew and Septuagint, "walked, obeying the commands of the Lord: they did not so."
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 17. And yet they would not hearken unto their…
17. And yet they would not hearken unto their judges — It is natural that they who have redeemed a nation should be its first rulers. Against the commands of these, the ungrateful people ran headlong into those idolatries for which they had just been suffering punishment.
Went a whoring after other gods — The covenant of God is regarded as sacred as the marriage tie. To break that covenant, and worship another god, corresponds to an act of infidelity on the part of a wife. Hence idolatry is spiritual adultery.
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They turned quickly out of the way — The leaven of idolatry, with its moral abominations, was brought into contact with the people at so many points that the whole commonwealth was quickly pervaded with the dreadful abomination. Worship is a powerful assimilator. Men become like their gods.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 17. they went a whoring after other gods] As…
17. they went a whoring after other gods] As notoriously after the death of Gideon Jdg_8:33 (cf. Jdg_8:27). This figurative expression occurs in the Pent., and especially in the prophets Hos. and Ezek., to denote forcibly Israel’s unfaithfulness to Jehovah. As prostitution was a common feature of Semitic cults, the words may have been used originally in a literal sense, and afterwards metaphorically.
their fathers] i.e. Joshua and his contemporaries, Jdg_2:7.
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This verse interrupts the connexion between Jdg_2:16; Jdg_2:18, and the phraseology and thought are not so distinctly Deuteronomic as the rest of the passage. The verse “seems to be the exclamation of a reader rather than the reflexion of a compiler” (Lagrange).
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (17) Went a whoring.—Idolatry throughout the Bible is regarded…
(17) Went a whoring.—Idolatry throughout the Bible is regarded as a spiritual adultery. (Exo_34:15; Isa_54:5; Jer_3:8; Eze_23:37; Hos_2:7; 2Co_11:2, &c.)
The way which their fathers walked in.—As described in Jdg_2:7.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.