Judith: Chapters 1 to 8

Last time, the Book of Tobit ended.  Now for the second book only in the Catholic Bible.

CHAPTER 1

OK, now for the Book of Judith.  I have no memory of this one at all.  Reading the intro section, it sounds like it’ll be an alternate version of Esther or something.  I guess that’s why it’s not in the Protestant and Jewish Bibles – they already got one story like this, so why have another?  Anyhow, on with the story.

We meet Nebuchandnezzar, an Assyrian king.  I don’t like him, because I don’t look forward to having to spell that name.  Ah, just control-c/control-v it: Nebuchandnezzar.  Well, he’s going to war with Medes and asks for all people to his west to supply troops.  None of them do. 

They blow it off, saying they’re not afraid of him, since he’s just one opponent.  OK, right now this sounds odd. Sure he’s just one king, but he’s king of Assyria.  That’s typically a major power. 

And sure enough, Nebuchandnezzar has the stuff of old, because he beats the Medians in battle.  And now he remembers how the people to his west stiffed him.  He plans revenge – full revenge.  He wants to slaughter them all – Syria, Ammon, Moab, Judeah, the works. 

So far, this seems like a weak story.  Everything seems a bit too extreme and detached from reality.  The Assryians were capable of brutality, no doubt about it.  But they didn’t wipe out multiple nations over one campaign.  And the people knew enough to be more afraid of Assyria than this book indicates.

CHAPTER 2

Time for that revenge.  Nebuchandnezzar has his top general lead a big army outward to slaughter and plunder and occupy.  Again, it wasn’t this easy to conquer entire swaths of the ancient world, people. 

The army does superhuman achievements.  It marches 300 miles in three days (impossible, the Bible’s footnotes tell me), and devastates “Put and Lud,” places nowhere near each other.  Put is Lybia, so the author is naming them for literary affect I guess.  He slaughters everyone.

CHAPTER 3

The people he hasn’t yet slaughtered sure are scared.  And now he’s approaching Judea.  That’s about it here, in a very short chapter (10 verses and maybe a third of a page).

CHAPTER 4

Judea is freaking out.  Their leaders can’t believe this.  They’ve just recently returned from Babylon – oh, so that’s when this is set.  Well, that doesn’t make any sense.  Assyria never was a major power during the Persian Empire.  I knew this book wasn’t very historically accurate, but this is just silly.  It’s like having Robert E. Lee tromp up and down the east coast in the 1950s.  Folks, this is dumb. 

Anyhow, people fortify themselves in cities and flee to the high ground.  More than that, they pray to God.  Oh, hi God!  I was wondering if he would ever get named.  I know he isn’t mentioned at all in Esther, but I don’t recall seeing him referred to here at all.  But there he is.  Well, Judith has that on Esther at least.

Good news – God hears the prayers of the Jews.  So they won’t be wiped out after all.  That’s nice. 

CHAPTER 5

The Assyrians have a war council and ask Ammonite leader Achior for the inside scoop on the Hebrew.  What’s with these people?  Everyone else surrendered in advance – how come they haven’t?

Well, Achior recounts the historical portions of the Bible in short order – patriarchs, Egypt, Red Sea parting, Jordan River crossed, conquer, go away from God, get conquered, then come back – in short order.  And it looks like Achior, though not a Hebrew himself, believes in all that their God has done.  So he warns the Assyrians not to assault, saying that if the Jews are blameless before God, you can’t beat them. 

CHAPTER 6

The Assyrian general doesn’t like what he’s heard.  This Achior guy seems to think the Assyrians shouldn’t attack.  Hadn’t he read the opening chapters of this book?  Nothing stops the Assyrians! 

He has Achior thrown out and bound.  The Jews find the bound Achior and he tells them about their meeting.  Well, this is good to know, but it’s certainly not good news.  The Assyrians will attack them.

And here it gets weird.  The Jews: “fell prostrate and worshipped God, and they cried out, `Lord, God of heaven, look at their arrogance.  Have mercy on our people in their abject state.”  Yeah, calling the Assyrian arrogant seemed odd to me.  It indicates a sense of confidence that seems out of character for the Jews.  He’s only arrogant if it’s silly for him to think he can win.  Look, I know the Bible has it that God always wins, but then again the Jews throughout haven’t been very faithful to God at all.  They turn away from him whenever they can, ever since Exodus.  So calling the Assyrians “arrogant” really strikes me as out of character.

CHAPTER 7

Now it’s time to campaign against the Jews.  Assyria has a huge army – 170,000 infantry plus others.  They get advice, too.  They’re told that the Jews rely on the high ground to fight, so the trick is to keep control of the water springs.  The Assyrians do just that, and with their allies, attack from all sides.

The Children of Israel run out of water and are might damn distressed.  Now they act like how they typically do in the Bible – they lose faith.  They wail that they should’ve surrendered.  It’s better to live as a slave then die like this.  We get some pictures of people weak from want, but it’s nothing too well down – just that people are fainting from thirst, nothing too dramatic. 

But the leader, Uzziah, tells them that he’ll give God five days.  If God hasn’t delivered the town in five days, he’ll surrender the town. 

I’m recapping this pretty quickly, because nearly halfway into it, and I don’t see any reason to give a shit.  The plot and the characters are all paper-thin.  I completely see why the Protestants and Jews leave it out.  It’s a B.S. book that isn’t very interesting or memorable.  It deserves to be left out.  Big mistake by the Catholic Church including it.  Tobit was at least a good story. 

CHAPTER 8

Nearly halfway into the Book of Judith, and we finally meet Judith.  She is an ideal woman.  She is devout.  She is wise.  She is beautiful.

She is also a widow who faithfully mourns her husband and also observes the Sabbath.  But when she hears that Uzziah has decided to put God on a timer, she is appalled.  Who is he to tell God when to act?  She goes to the elders of Judea and chews everyone out.  Let’s keep the faith, people.

She then ends the chapter with an interesting vow.  She says the people will be saved by her hand, that God will work through her.  What will she do?  We don’t know, but clearly she has a plan.  OK, I’ll give this book some points for ending the chapter on a note of suspense.  

Click here for the second half of the Book of Judith.