This is an interesting chapter, and the first verse acts as a key to let us into the meaning of it. The Lord, we are told, left those nations to prove Israel. Hence we learn, that the trials of God's people are of God's appointment. I stay not to dwell much upon the historical part of it, for I think it quite enough to observe, that the five lords of the Philistines, which, in after ages of the days of the kings of Israel, made such a figure in history, were the lords of Ashdod, and Gaza, and Askelon, and Gath, and Ekron. 1 Samuel 6:17. And all the Canaanites, included the idolatrous inhabitants from the extreme point of Israel's territories. But I rather would call the Reader's attention to the spiritual sense of the history. There is a passage in the Psalms that serves to show how the Lord raiseth up scourges for his people in their enemies, where it is said, that the Lord turned the hearts of the Egyptians to hate his people. Psalms 105:25. Hence in all the afflictions for sin, the Lord's hand is in every appointment. And this, Reader, may serve to illustrate the whole of our eventful life. Love is at the bottom of all the Lord's dispensations. He is ever pursuing one invariable plan of mercy. But if the followers of Jesus transgress, and are led away by their idolatrous neighbors, God will visit their offences with the rod, and their sins with the scourge. So the promise runs. Psalms 89:30-32.
Related Commentaries of Judges 3:1
Judges 3:1-4
1 Now these are the nations which the LORD left, to prove Israel by them, even as many of Israel as had not known all the wars of Canaan;
2 Only that the generations of the children of Israel might know, to teach them war, at the least such as before knew nothing thereof;
3 Namely, five lords of the Philistines, and all the Canaanites, and the Sidonians, and the Hivites that dwelt in mount Lebanon, from mount Baalhermon unto the entering in of Hamath.
4 And they were to prove Israel by them, to know whether they would hearken unto the commandments of the LORD, which he commanded their fathers by the hand of Moses.