Judges 9:26-33: a reflection

The intrigue at Shechem, with its boastful challenger and its crafty plotting, shows the strife and instability that self-serving ambition breeds. Gaal came, and the men of Shechem put their trust in him; and he boasted, who is Abimelech, that we should serve him? Increase your army and come out. Gaal's grasping ambition set him against Abimelech; Zebul, in turn, plotted craftily against Gaal; and the whole scene is one of boasting, scheming, and treachery, each grasping for power over the others. Self-serving ambition set them at odds and bred strife and instability, each seeking to rise by pulling down the rest. This shows the strife and instability that self-serving ambition breeds. Self-serving ambition breeds strife and instability. Grasping for power sets people at odds with one another. Boastful, scheming ambition comes to no good end. Beware the ambition that seeks to rise by pulling others down.

Notice the picture this scene paints. Gaal comes with boastful, grasping ambition, challenging Abimelech, stirring up the men of Shechem, seeking power for himself. Zebul, in turn, plots craftily against Gaal, sending secret word to Abimelech to ambush him. The whole scene is one of boasting, scheming, treachery, and shifting loyalties, each man grasping for power and position, setting himself against the others. And the result is strife and instability: a tangle of plots and counter-plots, heading toward violence and ruin. This is a picture of what self-serving ambition breeds. When people grasp for power and position for themselves, seeking to rise by pulling others down, boasting and scheming to get ahead, the result is not peace or good, but strife and instability: rivalry, plotting, broken trust, and eventually ruin. Such ambition sets people at odds with one another and breeds a restless, unstable strife. This is a warning against the grasping, self-serving ambition that seeks its own rise at others' expense. We do well not to be caught up in such ambition, boasting and scheming to grasp power and position for ourselves, but to seek a different way, one not of grasping self-advancement but of humble faithfulness, which does not breed the strife that ambition does. We do well to beware the self-serving ambition that breeds strife, and to seek humble faithfulness instead. Beware the self-serving ambition that breeds strife and instability. Grasping to rise by pulling others down sets people at odds. Boastful, scheming ambition comes to no good end. Seek humble faithfulness, not grasping self-advancement.

That is worth taking to heart, for self-serving ambition breeds strife and instability, and we do well to seek humble faithfulness instead, as the grasping ambition at Shechem bred plots and ruin. We can be caught up in grasping for power and position, boasting and scheming to get ahead; but the scene at Shechem shows such ambition breeding strife, treachery, and ruin. Ambition breeds strife. Do not be caught up in the self-serving ambition that grasps for power at others' expense; seek humble faithfulness instead, which does not breed such strife. Beware the self-serving ambition that breeds strife and instability, seeking humble faithfulness rather than grasping for power and position at others' expense, as the intrigue at Shechem, with its boastful challenger Gaal and its crafty plotting, showed the strife and instability that self-serving ambition breeds, since Gaal's grasping ambition set him against Abimelech and Zebul in turn plotted craftily against Gaal, the whole scene one of boasting, scheming, and treachery, each grasping for power over the others; for self-serving ambition set them at odds and bred strife and instability, each seeking to rise by pulling down the rest, which is a picture of what such ambition breeds, since when people grasp for power and position for themselves, seeking to rise by pulling others down and boasting and scheming to get ahead, the result is not peace or good but strife and instability, rivalry, plotting, broken trust, and eventually ruin, such ambition setting people at odds and breeding a restless, unstable strife, which is a warning against the grasping ambition that seeks its own rise at others' expense, so that we do well not to be caught up in such ambition but to seek a different way, not of grasping self-advancement but of humble faithfulness, which does not breed the strife that ambition does.