Judith 13: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

Evening comes, the servants leave, Bagoas shuts the tent from outside, and Judith is left alone with Holofernes, who is full of wine. She prays, takes his sword from the bedpost, cuts off his head, pulls down the bed canopy, and gives the head to her maid, who puts it in the food bag; the two go out of the camp as they did each day for prayer and climb to Bethulia. At the gate Judith shows the head, says the Lord struck Holofernes by the hand of a woman and that he did not touch her, and the people bow and worship God while Ozias blesses her.

Claim by Claim

1. 13:1
   • Evening came.
   • Holofernes' servants hurried to leave.
   • Bagoas shut the tent from the outside.
   • Bagoas dismissed the attendants from the presence of his lord.
   • The attendants went away to their beds.
   • They were all weary.
   • They were weary because the drinking had gone on a long time.
2. 13:2
   • Judith was left alone in the tent.
   • Holofernes lay sprawled on his bed.
   • Holofernes was soaked with wine.
3. 13:3
   • Judith had told her maid to stand outside her bedchamber.
   • Judith had told her maid to wait for her to come out, as she did every day.
   • Judith said she would go out for her prayer.
   • Judith spoke to Bagoas to the same effect.
4. 13:4
   • All of them went away from her presence.
   • No one was left in the bedchamber, neither small nor great.
   • Judith stood beside Holofernes' bed.
   • Judith said in her heart: Lord God of all power, look in this hour on the works of my hands.
   • Judith asked that this be for the exaltation of Jerusalem.
5. 13:5
   • Judith said it was now the time to take hold of God's inheritance and help it.
   • Judith said it was the time to carry out the undertaking, which the King James calls God's enterprise and the Greek calls her own plan.
   • The undertaking was for the shattering of the enemies.
   • The enemies had risen up against them.
6. 13:6
   • Judith came to the post of the bed at Holofernes' head.
   • Judith took down his short sword from the post.
7. 13:7
   • Judith drew near to the bed.
   • Judith took hold of the hair of Holofernes' head.
   • Judith said: Strengthen me, God of Israel, this day.
8. 13:8
   • Judith struck Holofernes twice on the neck with all her strength.
   • Judith took his head off him.
9. 13:9
   • Judith rolled his body off the bed.
   • Judith pulled down the netted canopy from the posts.
   • A little afterward Judith went out.
   • Judith handed Holofernes' head to her maid.
10. 13:10
    • The maid put the head into Judith's bag of food.
    • The two of them went out together, as was their custom.
    • The King James says they went out to prayer.
    • They passed through the camp.
    • They went around that valley.
    • They went up the mountain of Bethulia.
    • They came to the gates of Bethulia.
11. 13:11
    • Judith called from a distance to the men guarding the gates.
    • Judith said: Open, open the gate.
    • Judith said God, their God, was with them.
    • Judith said God would yet show strength in Jerusalem, where the Greek says in Israel.
    • Judith said God would show might against their enemies.
    • Judith said God had done so this very day.
12. 13:12
    • The men of her city heard her voice.
    • They hurried down to the gate of their city.
    • They called together the elders of the city.
13. 13:13
    • They all ran together, from the least to the greatest.
    • It seemed unbelievable to them that she had come back.
    • They opened the gate.
    • They received the two women.
    • They lit a fire for light.
    • They stood around the two women.
14. 13:14
    • Judith said to them with a loud voice: Praise God, praise him.
    • Judith said God has not withdrawn his mercy from the house of Israel.
    • Judith said God has shattered our enemies by my hand this night.
15. 13:15
    • Judith took the head out of the bag.
    • Judith showed the head to them.
    • Judith said: this is the head of Holofernes.
    • Judith said Holofernes was chief captain of the army of Asshur.
    • Judith said: this is the canopy in which he lay in his drunkenness.
    • Judith said the Lord struck him down by the hand of a woman.
16. 13:16
    • Judith swore by the living Lord, who guarded her in the way she went.
    • Judith said her face deceived Holofernes to his destruction.
    • Judith said Holofernes committed no sin with her.
    • Judith said he did not defile or shame her.
17. 13:17
    • All the people were exceedingly astonished.
    • They bowed down and worshipped God.
    • They said with one accord: Blessed are you, our God.
    • They said God had this day brought the enemies of his people to nothing.
18. 13:18
    • Ozias said to her: Blessed are you, daughter, by the Most High God above all the women on the earth.
    • Ozias said: blessed be the Lord God who created the heavens and the earth.
    • Ozias said God directed her to wound the head of the chief of their enemies.
19. 13:19
    • Ozias said her hope will not depart from the heart of men forever.
    • Ozias said those men remember the strength of God.
20. 13:20
    • Ozias asked that God make these things a perpetual exaltation for her.
    • Ozias asked that God visit her with good things.
    • Ozias said she did not spare her own life because of the affliction of their race.
    • Ozias said she went out against their downfall and avenged their ruin.
    • Ozias said she walked a straight way before their God.
    • All the people said: So be it, so be it.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

13:1

Bagoas is the eunuch in charge of Holofernes' household and personal affairs, named in chapter 12; a commander's chief steward controlled access to his tent. The "waiters" of the King James are not restaurant staff but the servants who attended the meal and waited on their master. To "shut his tent without" is to close it from the outside, leaving Holofernes and Judith inside.

13:2

"Filled with wine" is the Greek text's way of saying he was dead drunk. Chapter 12 notes that he had drunk more that day than on any day since he was born.

13:3

This routine was set up in chapter 12: Judith had obtained permission to leave the camp each night with her maid to wash and pray in the valley. The sentries were used to seeing the two women walk out in the dark, which is why nobody stops them in verse 10.

13:4

"Neither little nor great" is a set phrase meaning no one whatever, from the lowest-ranking servant to the highest. "Said in her heart" means said silently, to herself. "The exaltation of Jerusalem" means the raising up of Jerusalem again, its restoration to honor after humiliation.

13:5

Calling Israel God's "inheritance" is standard biblical language: the nation is the portion allotted to God as his own property, the way a plot of land is allotted to a family. It is not a statement about what God has received from someone else.

13:6

"Fauchion" is the older spelling of falchion, a short sword with a broad curved blade, heavy toward the tip and made for chopping strokes rather than thrusts. The "pillar of the bed" is the bedpost, one of the uprights that carried the canopy; a soldier hung his weapon there within reach of his head.

13:9

The canopy was a fine netted cloth hung over the bed on its four posts, partly a screen against insects and partly a display of luxury. Judith takes it deliberately: it is a recognizable piece of Holofernes' own furniture and so serves, along with the head, as proof of what she has done.

13:10

"Meat" in 1611 English means food of any kind, not flesh specifically. Judith had brought her own provisions in this bag so that she would not have to eat the general's food, and it is that same bag she now uses to carry the head out. "They twain" is simply the two of them. To "compass the valley" is to go around it rather than across. Bethulia is the hill town under siege in this story; no such place is known outside the book of Judith.

13:11

The King James has Judith say God will show his power "yet in Jerusalem"; the Greek manuscripts read "in Israel," which is what the rendering follows. The difference goes back to the Latin text the 1611 translators consulted alongside the Greek.

13:12

The elders were the older men who led the town and made its important decisions.

13:13

"Strange unto them" does not mean odd or eerie. In 1611 English it means unlooked for, hard to credit: they had given the two women up for lost. "Both small and great" again means everyone, of whatever rank.

13:14

"The house of Israel" means all the people of Israel, like one big family. Mercy means kindness, even when you do not have to give it.

13:15

Assur is the older form of Asshur, that is, Assyria; the army besieging the town is described throughout the book as Assyrian. The claim that a man was struck down "by the hand of a woman" carried a sharp sting in this culture: to die at a woman's hands was held to be a soldier's most shameful death, which is why Abimelech in Judges 9 begs to be run through rather than have it said of him.

13:16

"As the Lord liveth" is the standard oath formula, the equivalent of swearing on the most solemn thing available: as surely as God is alive, what I say is true. "Countenance" means face or appearance, so she is saying her looks, not her words, did the deceiving. The second half is a formal denial that she was raped; "defile" points to ritual uncleanness as well as to disgrace, and the point matters because her whole standing in the town depends on it.

13:17

"With one accord" means all together, with one voice. "Brought to nought" means reduced to nothing, wiped out.

13:18

Ozias, elsewhere spelled Uzziah, is the chief magistrate of Bethulia, the man who earlier agreed to surrender the town if no help came within five days. His words closely echo the song of Deborah in Judges 5:24, where Jael, another woman who killed an enemy commander in his sleep, is called blessed above women.

13:19

"Confidence" here means the trust in God that Judith acted on, and the nerve it gave her, not self-assurance in the modern sense. He is saying people will keep telling the story.

13:20

"Revenged our ruin" means avenged our downfall, paid back those who brought it about. "Walking a straight way before our God" is an idiom for conducting yourself with integrity, keeping to the path laid down rather than turning aside. "So be it, so be it" is the King James translation of the doubled Amen, the crowd's formal endorsement of what has just been said.