Story, characters, and themes : epic implications
Redaction history : voices
Texture : recurring language, orality, verbal art, and registers
1:1-36 : Introduction by means of explicit ambivalence
2:1-23 : From "weeping" to the death of Joshua
3:1-31 : A covenantal introduction and the judges Othniel, Ehud, and Shamgar
4:1-24 : Tales of Deborah and Jael, warrior women
5:1-31 : The song of Deborah
6:1-40 : The call of Gideon
7:1-25 : The battle with Midian
8:1-35 : Inner-group tensions, the rejection of kingship, and a hero's burial
9:1-57 : The rise and fall of Abimelech, the would-be king
10:1-18 : The judges Tola and Jair, and Israel's subsequent decline
11:1-40 : Jephthah, epic hero
12:1-15 : Internecine strife and brief annals of Ibzan, Elon, and Abdon
13:1-25 : The birth story of Samson, superhero
14:1-15:20 : Samson and marriage with the Philistines
16:1-31 : The female "other," Delilah, and death
17:1-18:31 : Micah's house shrine and the founding of Dan
19:1-30 : The rape and murder of the Levite's concubine
21:1-25 : The reconciliation of men through "the traffic in women"
Appendix: A literal translation of Judges.
