_Gideon delivers Israel from the Midianites_ For some years the Midianites had been the terror of Central Palestine. These nomad Arabs from the S.E. desert used to pour into the country during harvest time, and devastate the fertile neighbourhood of Shechem and the plain of Jezreel. At last Gideon,... [ Continue Reading ]
Judges 8:1-3. _Gideon appeases the men of Ephraim_ 1 _.the men of Ephraim … did chide with him sharply_ A similar outburst of jealousy is recorded in Judges 12:1 f., and in much the same language; but it need not follow that the one passage is merely a reproduction of the other; probably there were... [ Continue Reading ]
Gideon, like his father (Judges 6:31), had the ready wit to extricate himself from an awkward situation. For _the gleaning of the grapes_see Isaiah 17:6; Micah 7:1; the word is used of fruit, not of corn. Ephraim indeed arrived late upon the scene, but they had the glory of capturing the chiefs. Gid... [ Continue Reading ]
and _passed over_ To obtain this sense the text, which lit. = _passing over_, must be altered; the marg. may be disregarded. _the three hundred_ So in the other document Judges 7:2-8; the number was evidently a fixed element in the tradition. _faint_ AND _pursuing_ LXX. A and Luc. _faint and hungr... [ Continue Reading ]
_The pursuit on the east of Jordan_ This section is clearly not the continuation of the verses which immediately precede (see p. 68); if its antecedents are to be found in the foregoing narrative at all, we may suppose that after the panic and flight described in Judges 7:16-22, the main body of th... [ Continue Reading ]
_Succoth_ On the E. of Jordan, in the territory of Gad (Joshua 13:27), near Penuel (cf. Genesis 33:17), and below it (_went up Judges 8:8_); and Penuel, as we learn from Genesis 32:22; Genesis 32:30 f., lay not far from the ford of Jabbok (Nahr ez-Zerḳâ). The question is, were Succoth and Penuel nor... [ Continue Reading ]
_the princes of Succoth_ i.e. the executive officials of the community, responsible for its government, e.g. Judges 9:30 (-ruler," lit. -prince"), or for the conduct of its wars, e.g. Judges 7:25; Judges 8:3. See further on Judges 8:14.... [ Continue Reading ]
_I will tear_ THRESH as marg. In the East threshing is done by _treading_(e.g. Isaiah 28:28), which is what the verb here means; Gideon promises to trample their flesh TOGETHER WITH _thorns of the desert and briers_, i.e. to lay them naked on a bed of thorns and tread them down; so Targ. But the tex... [ Continue Reading ]
_Penuel_ See on Judges 8:5. A place of some importance, for it was fortified by Jeroboam, 1 Kings 12:25; its _tower_may have commanded the Jabbok ford. An explanation of the name is given in Genesis 32:30. A different explanation is suggested by the name of the promontory S. of Tripolis, on the Syri... [ Continue Reading ]
_Karkor_ Site unknown, probably near the edge of the Syrian desert. _all that were left … drew sword_ These words have the appearance of an attempt to bring the present narrative into harmony with the account of the panic and flight in Judges 7:22-25. The exaggerated numbers recall those of Numbers... [ Continue Reading ]
Describes Gideon's route going E. from Penuel. _by the way of them that dwelt in tents_is a doubtful rendering of a doubtful text. With slight corrections we may transl. _towards the way of the tent-dwellers_, i.e. the Bedouin route, such, for instance, as the present Haj road from Damascus to Mecca... [ Continue Reading ]
_discomfited_ Marg. TERRIFIED; the combination of careless security and terror occurs again in Ezekiel 30:9. The LXX. A and Lucian suggests a stronger word, such as _destroyed_, cf. Jos., _Ant_. Judges 8:6; Judges 8:5; but it is hardly necessary to alter the text. The two kings were the first to fly... [ Continue Reading ]
_from the ascent of Heres_ So LXX. A and Luc., with a slight correction of the text; or _upwards to Heres_, with further corrections. The word Ḥeres = -the sun" lends itself to various experiments, which are to be seen in the Versions. The general sense of the verse seems to be that Gideon returned... [ Continue Reading ]
_he described for him_ HE WROTE DOWN (and gave) UNTO HIM. The knowledge of writing must have been widely spread even at this early period. Cf. the similar incidents in Judges 1:24 f.; 1 Samuel 30:11-16. _the elders_ Cf. Judges 8:16; the leading inhabitants and representatives of a district or city,... [ Continue Reading ]
_and with them he taught_ Read, changing one letter, THRESHED as in Judges 8:7, with LXX. B ἠλόησεν, A κατέξανεν. The Vulgate gives a double rendering: et contrivit cum eis, atque comminuit viros Soccoth. Peshitto and Targ. paraphrase. The meaning seems to be that Gideon dragged thorns and teasels o... [ Continue Reading ]
Gideon's revenge strikes us as vindictive. In return for some jeering words he treated these towns, which no doubt contained many of his own countrymen, with a barbarity which is altogether absent from his execution of the Midianite kings, who had murdered his brothers and plundered his home. We mus... [ Continue Reading ]
_at Tabor_ Mt Tabor is too far north if, as seems probable, Gideon's clan was settled near Shechem; see on Judges 6:11. There may have been another Tabor near Ophrah. _As thou art, so were they_ powerful men, cf. Judges 6:12. The chiefs do not hesitate to boast of victims so distinguished.... [ Continue Reading ]
_the sons of my mother_ and not only of the same father; they were therefore specially dear, cf. Genesis 43:29. On Gideon as next of kin fell the duty of avenging his brothers" blood; cf. 2 Samuel 3:27; 2 Samuel 3:30; 2Sa 14:7; 2 Samuel 21:5-6. The execution was a judicial act, even an act of religi... [ Continue Reading ]
_Jether his firstborn_ Did Gideon wish to bestow an honour upon his son, and humiliate these famous warriors? Or was the youth chosen for ceremonial reasons? Robertson Smith compares the choice of young men as sacrificers in Exodus 24:5, and illustrates from the custom of the Saracens who charged la... [ Continue Reading ]
The chiefs reply with undaunted spirit like true sons of the desert: _as the man is, so is his strength_, i.e. a man has a man's strength (Moore); but the word _so_is not expressed in the terse Hebrew. _crescents_ lit. _moons_, metal ornaments worn not only by the kings but by their camels, Judges... [ Continue Reading ]
_Gideon refuses the kingship: he sets up an ephod: conclusion_ 22 _.the men of Israel_ Not the 300 of Judges 8:4, but the men who formed the army Judges 7:14; Judges 9:55, the Israelites drawn from Ephraim, Manasseh, and the neighbouring tribes Judges 7:23. Thus Judges 8:22 are probably not the sequ... [ Continue Reading ]
_I will not rule over you_ But ch. 9 implies that Gideon did exercise some kind of supremacy, at any rate in his own district, and his sons claimed to inherit his position, Judges 9:2. These words, then, either mean that Gideon seized the power, but rejected the title, of king; or they represent the... [ Continue Reading ]
The making of the ephod and the manner in which it is spoken of belong to an early stage of religious thought; Judges 8:24 a may, therefore, belong to the early narrative Judges 8:4; they have been skilfully connected with Judges 8:22. The request shewed Gideon's disinterestedness and piety. As chie... [ Continue Reading ]
_And the weight_etc.] 1700 shekels of gold by the heavy standard = nearly 75 lbs. Troy = £3485, or by the light standard = nearly 37½ lbs. Troy = 742 10 _s_. A single ring might weigh half a shekel, Genesis 24:22. _beside the crescents … necks_ The sentence interrupts the account of the ephod, and l... [ Continue Reading ]
_made an ephod thereof_ i.e. out of a large amount of precious metal the gold of the earrings 26a, not of the ornaments in 26b. Gideon dedicated his spoil to Jehovah, cf. 2 Samuel 8:11; Micah 4:13, Moabite St. ll. 12 f., 17 f. (Mesha- dedicates his spoil from Israel to Kĕmôsh). The ephod we find as... [ Continue Reading ]
The Deuteronomic editor's conclusion of the story; cf. Judges 3:30 _n._and Judges 3:11 _n._... [ Continue Reading ]
Originally this verse closed the narrative in Judges 8:1, or that in Judges 8:4; Judges 8:30-32 form an introduction to the story of Abimelech in ch. 9; some such earlier mention of Abimelech is presupposed by Judges 9:1.... [ Continue Reading ]
_of his body begotten_ Only again in Genesis 46:26 (-which came out of his loins") and Exodus 1:5 P, cf. Genesis 35:11 P. The more sons a man had, the greater his importance, cf. Judges 10:4; Judges 12:9.... [ Continue Reading ]
_his concubine that was in Shechem_ A connexion of this kind is illustrated by early Arabian custom: the woman, or -female friend" (_ṣadâḳa_), did not leave her home, the union was of a temporary character (hence the term, _mot-a_marriage) and required no consent from parents or guardians, the child... [ Continue Reading ]
_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 2:1... [ Continue Reading ]
_made Baal-berith their god_ Baal-bĕrîth (Judges 9:4; Judges 9:46) was the Covenant-Baal, the god of the league between himself and his worshippers, or the god who presided over the league between the original Canaanite inhabitants of Shechem and the Israelite new-comers; see Genesis 34 The Dtc. edi... [ Continue Reading ]