Ehud and Eglon

The other day I was studying the story of Ehud and Eglon (Judges 3:15-30). While doing so, I was reminded of three films …

In Orson Welles’ Touch of Evil (1958), the hero, Mexican special prosecutor Miguel Vargas, confronts the evil and immense police captain Hank Quinlan. The way that Welles constructs the scene, Vargas is portrayed as a matador encountering Quinlan the bull.

In Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now (1979), Captain Benjamin L. Willard confronts the evil and immense U.S. Army Special Forces Colonel Walter E. Kurtz. The latter’s death is intercut with the ceremonial slaughter a water buffalo by indigenous people.

In Coppola’s The Godfather, Part II (1974), evil mafiosi Don Ciccio murders Vito Corleone’s father, Antonio Andolini, for refusing to give tribute. He then attempts to kill the young Vito, despite his mother’s protestations.

"But Vito is only nine, and dumb-witted. He never speaks."

"It is not his words that I am afraid of."

―Signora Andolini and Don Ciccio

The adult Vito eventually returns and avenges the death of his family, with a ritualistic dispatch. Traditionally, Ciccio was akin to “Chubby.”

The story of Ehud’s assassination of Eglon appears in Judges 3:15-30 – a passage I’ve frequently referred to as “The Gospel According to Quintin Tarantino.”[1] The passage is a thriller full of deception, mockery, humiliation, humor, puns, grotesqueness, the Grand Guignol, and death in the potty.

The obese King Eglon of Moab is a man of insatiable appetite and conquest. He gathers a small force, defeats Israel, seizes part of the land, and exacts tribute from the Israelites. Ehud, the left-handed Benjamite, is sent to deliver the “tribute” personally (v. 15).

Being left-handed, Ehud straps a two-edged sword to his right thigh under his cloak (vv. 16, 21). Thus, Eglon’s guards, who wouldn’t have known Ehud’s sinister difference, would’ve checked his left thigh for a weapon. Even more deceptively, Ehud tells Eglon, “I have a secret word for you” (v. 19). The Hebrew word for “word” (dāḇār) can also mean “thing” (i.e., sword). So, alone together in the rich restroom (v. 20), Ehud says to Eglon, “I have a word (dāḇār) from God for you …” (v. 20).[2] Ghastliness follows (vv. 21-22).[3]

While the story is exciting, there is a theological message. Significantly, Ehud passes idols when he goes to see Eglon (v. 19) and then passes them again (v. 26) after he leaves, making his Andy Dufresne-esque escape. This bookending indicates that idolatry relates to the king’s weight, greed, and conquest.[4] Even the Moabites soldiers are said to be “robust” (šāmēn), which can have connotations of fatness (Judg 3:29; Ezek 34:16; Hab 1:16). The name Eglon suggests "calf," indicating the hero confronts a "fatted calf.” There was no question about how this story would end. Interestingly, a fattened calf is one set aside for a special occasion. While most cattle simply grazed in fields, these select animals were fed in stalls. The extra food and the inability to roam freely meant that they would gain more weight.

The bible frequently notes that oppression, exploitation, and societal injustice are rooted in idolatry. Essentially, idolatry is the elevation of the good aspects of God’s creation to the point of “worship,” whether it be food, possessions, sex, entertainment, etc. When that happens, humans (who are made in the image of God) become less like the image of God (Rom 1:23; Phil 3:19-21) and more like the image of the idol they worship (Pss 115:8; 135:18; Rom 1:23; Phil 3:19-21). They become “slaves” to these idols thru sin – indulging in like a habit or addiction that becomes almost impossible to shake. The more they worship the idol and indulge sin, the deeper enslaved they become. The enslaving sin and idolatry has a deluding effect upon the worshipper, so they have difficulty recognizing the truth (Ps 115:5-8; Zech 10:2; Rom 1:21-22, 28, 31; Rev 21:8; 22:15; Isa 6:9-10). At the same time, the idolatry debases (Rom 1:24, 26-27; Col 3:5; Ezek 22:9-11; Phil 3:19; Eph 5:5; Judg 3:17).

The idol eventually has a totalizing effect upon the person, absolutizing itself in the mind of the idolater, becoming all-consuming, encompassing the individual or group making itself appear permanent, inevitable, and inescapable. The “prison” becomes the ultimate reality, and the prisoner can never even think that there is any other way than that of the idol. Now, not only does the idolater become more like the idol, but he or she begins to see other people thru that idol. That’s part of idolatry’s deluded all-encompassing effect. The image of God in other people begins to break down in the mind of the idolater. People are objectified and then exploited by the idolater in service of the sin and the idol. Thus, a person can be used by an idolater for sex, money, power, or food. Idolatry then is what leads to oppression. That is the overall, general biblical conception of why things are bad in our era.

Both the narrative structure of Judges 3 and how the story’s thematic dynamics work in other biblical passages, all indicate that the Ehud-Eglon episode isn’t just a thrilling adventure or a piece of anti-Moabite propaganda. It also presents, in narrative form, the common effects of idolatry (pagan or otherwise): insatiability, lethargy, debasement, loss of image, negative influence, and social injustice. Call Eglon of Moab the pre-summation of our times.

Here ends the word of God for you.

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[1] Perhaps “The Gospel According to Francis Ford Coppola” would be more accurate.

[2] See Hebrews 4:12 and Ephesians 6:17.

[3] The king dies on the throne?

[4] See also Psa 73:3-8; Ezek 34:16-20; Jer 5:27-29; Neh 9:25-26; Deut 32:15; see Isa 6:10 especially, which includes a “fattened” mind with other effects of idolatry (i.e., the inability to recognize the truth).