Judges 8:32

in a good old age Again in Genesis 15:15 JE, Genesis 25:8 P, 1 Chronicles 29:28.

Judges 8:33-35 originally followed Judges 8:28, according to the usual scheme. These verses are made up of the customary phrases of the Dtc. editor, with the addition of particulars derived from ch. 9; cf. Judges 2:14; Judges 2:18 f., Judges 3:7; Judges 3:12; Judges 4:1; Judges 6:9 and Judges 9:4; Judges 9:16; Judges 9:19. Most probably, then, these verses were intended to form not an introduction to ch. 9, but a substitute for it. Ch. 9 did not fit into Rd's scheme, so he laid it aside, and wrote Judges 8:33 to take its place. A later editor, however, thought fit to incorporate the discarded chapter, and by way of an introduction he wrote Judges 8:30, which, as noticed above, contain several expressions found elsewhere in writings later than the Dtc. age. Budde was the first to propose this explanation, and it has been generally accepted; Richt. u. Sam.(1890), p. 119 ff.