Who had seen the great works of God in Judges 2:7?

Question:

I would like to ask a question about the who's who of a biblical passage. Regarding the "who" in Judges 2:7, who are they in this passage? Are they the same people who served the Lord in the days of Joshua and in the days of the elders who outlived Joshua? Or are they the people who did not serve the Lord?

If the “who” I'm questioning are the followers of the Lord (which would make them the believers), is that why they could see the great works of the Lord?

Could a non-follower of the Lord (which would make them non-believers) also be able to see the great works of the Lord, or, as they are non-believers, they would not recognize and, therefore, not see the great works of the Lord?

Thanking you.

Answer:

"And when Joshua had dismissed the people, the children of Israel went each to his own inheritance to possess the land. So the people served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlived Joshua, who had seen all the great works of the LORD which He had done for Israel" (Judges 2:6-7).

The "who" refers to the elders of Israel who outlived Joshua. They were old enough to have seen the miracles God had done, such as the crossing of the river Jordan, the falling of Jericho's walls, and other miracles that occurred during the conquering of Canaan.

The passage is saying that the people who had first-hand knowledge of God's power, and those who knew people who had seen God's miracles, stayed faithful to God. But in the third generation that remembrance was not kept and the people began to drift. "When all that generation had been gathered to their fathers, another generation arose after them who did not know the LORD nor the work which He had done for Israel. Then the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and served the Baals" (Judges 2:10-11).

This is not about people who could not see miracles. Miracles do not require faith in order to be seen. This is about people who no longer believed in the miracles of the past because they did not see them for themselves. Likely, they had never been taught the stories.

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