Autor: Voegelin, Eric

Buch: Israel and Revelation

Titel: Israel and Revelation

Stichwort: Debora; Jahwes heiliger Krieg; Unterschied zu Islam; eg. Zwei-Schwerter-Theorie bei Debora

Kurzinhalt: Kriterien des heiligen Krieges; kein Eroberungskrieg; zwei Richtungen des heiligen Krieges; Vorausnahme der Spannung im Königtum

Textausschnitt: 46/7 The beginning of the ritual is missing in the account; and some features that are known from other contexts are omitted. At the opening of the account the army stands ready to go into battle. But the moment when the am Yahweh stood ready for battle had to be preceded by a number of preparatory steps. There had to be a declaration, not of war against the enemy but of a state of emergency to the people, through prophetic authorities who issued a call for war. Then a charismatic leader had to be incited to action, as was Barak by Deborah; and the leader had to have sufficient authority to summon the people to action through messengers, ... After the defeat of the enemy in battle, the holy war came to a conclusion through the ritual of the cherem, the ban. Since Yahweh had won the war, the loot was his; all gold and silver went into the treasury of the god; all living beings, human and animal, were slaughtered in his honor. (207f; Fs)
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... For the holy war, as described in the Deborah Song, was an institution loaded with experiential difficulties and obscurities. The wars of Yahweh were fundamentally defensive wars-at least, there is not a single instance of an aggressive holy war recorded. The people were conceived as being at peace, politically in a passive condition, and not bent on using war as an instrument of national expansion and consolidation. Israel itself did not conduct these wars at all; Yahweh conducted them for his people. They had no implication of missionary violence being used for the expansion of Yahweh's territory or the mundane success of his people, as in the holy wars of Islam. Yahweh, as we have said, was not primarily a war god but came to the assistance of his people, as in the Sisera case, only when it was endangered by oppression and aggression. In particular, Yahweh did not fight against other gods; and in fact, no gods of other peoples are even mentioned in the song. This peculiar passivity, and the relegation of all military activity to Yahweh, was, however, at the time still quite compatible with a lusty participation in war when the occasion arose. In Judges 5:23, the town of Meroz, situated close to the battlefield, was roundly cursed for nonparticipation: (208f; Fs)
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49/7 In fact, the history of Israel has followed both of these courses. And we venture to say that the recognition of this double course is the key to the understanding of Israelite history. The improvised organization of defensive wars under charismatic leaders proved inadequate against the rising pressure of foreign powers after the Philistine invasion. The improvisations had to be replaced by the permanent kingship. But as soon as the monarchy was organized, the potential tensions that could be discerned in the Deborah Song became actual. In the situation described by the song, the prophetess and the war leader co-operated in the organization of the war. The prophetess mobilized and crystallized the sentiments of the people (today we should say, the public opinion) by her songs; and the war leader let himself be induced to assume his function. The prophetess ...