In the
seventh episode, there appears to be no judge in Israel at all, and we are told
that “every man did that which was right in his own eyes.” The Danites, unable
to defeat the enemy that God has judged deserving of destruction, find a
weaker, innocent people on the northern border of Israel, fall upon them, and
destroy them instead. Their priest is a feckless man, a Levite who ministers to
a statue fashioned from silver that becomes the idol of the tribe of Dan. The
name of this purveyor of idolatry before a desperate tribe, we are told, is
Yehonathan, son of Gershon—the grandson of Moses. (Yoram Hazony, The
Philosophy of Hebrew Scripture [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012],
147)
Judges
18:30. Look at the Hebrew text for this verse, in which the letter nun
in the name “Menasheh” (מנשה) is suspended above the rest of the word; if this
letter is ignored, the text reads “Mosheh” (משה)—Moses. That this is the intention
is evident from the fact that Moses’ son was Gershon, a Levite, whereas Menasheh
has no such son, and is not a Levite. (Ibid., 323 n. 54)
