Jg. 9: Abimelech: Rise and Fall

Judges 9:53 "A woman dropped an upper millstone on his head and cracked his skull."

Gideon's son by his concubine, Abimelech takes power because he is a son of Gideon. Albeit illegitimately. Instead of power being conferred on him, he just takes it.

If that name, Abimelech sounds familiar, it is. It is the name of the person both Abraham and Isaac duped into thinking their wives were their sisters.

To ensure that no one would take it from him, he has his 69 brothers killed on a single stone. The 70th, Jotham, escaped by hiding. Can you imagine lining up to be killed with all your brothers? Yeesh. What kind of goons did Abimelech hire? Anyway, Abimelech is crowned king, and the escaped brother, Jotham climbs up on Mount Gerezim, the mountain of blessing, and tells a parable about trees that basically means that something generally useless, as a thornbush would take power and be destructive, while useful people would be too busy being useful to pursue power. Abimelech had power because he took it...not because he offered Israel any kind of hope or good. Jotham caps it off by implying that supporting Abimelech would be denigrating Gideon.

Then he ran, because this probably upset the majority of the people.

For three years, Abimelech rules Israel, and then God sends an evil spirit (first biblical mention) between Abimelech and the people of Shechem. This evil spirit was used by God to avenge the deaths of the brothers Abimelech had killed. It's another example of God using evil to accomplish his justice. So Shechem rebels and their people go to war against Abimelech. This results in Abimelech crushing the rebellion and pursuing the Shechemites to some tower in Thebez where a woman drops an upper millstone on his head. Abimelech has his sword-bearer run him through to avoid the dishonor of being killed by a chick. Which would have been devastating. Thus ends Abimelech.

The curse Jotham pronounced came true on Shechem as well, because they were not exactly smelling like a rose, either.