The Spirit of the Lord came upon him. — Here the Targum has “the spirit of prophecy” (comp. Isaiah 61:1), perhaps with reference to Numbers 11:25. They render the same phrase in Judges 6:34, “spirit of courage from Jehovah.” This expression constantly recurs in this book (Judges 6:34; Judges 11:29; Judges 13:25). For “came upon him” (literally “was upon him”), a stronger phrase is “clothed him” (Judges 6:34; 1 Chronicles 12:18; 2 Chronicles 24:20). The Jews, however, placed Othniel highest among the judges, and applied to him the words of Song of Solomon 4:7, “Thou art all fair; there is no spot in thee,” because he alone of the judges is represented as irreproachable. Further than this, they followed some dim traditional data in identifying him with Jabez (1 Chronicles 4:10), and regarding him as a learned teacher of the law. (See Judges 1:13.)
He judged Israel. — Some of the Rabbis explain “judged” (yishhab) here to mean “avenged,” as in Psalms 43:1, “Avenge me, O God” (Shapetêni),possibly from disliking the notion of a Kenizzite, however distinguished, holding the office of a suffes, or judge. There is a difficulty about Othniel’s age; Caleb was eighty-five at the conquest, and, if Othniel was his brother, he could not have been less than fifty or sixty at that time. But even supposing him to have been Caleb’s nephew, and aged forty at his marriage, then, since Joshua lived to be 110, and Cushan-Rishathaim’s oppression did not begin till after the death of the elders who outlived Joshua, and lasted eight years, if Othniel was judge for forty years, this would make him quite 143 years old at his death. It is only another sign that the chronological data of the Book of Judges are not sufficiently definite to enable us to construct a system out of them.