Judges 5-8

Judges 5

¹At that time Deborah and Barak, the son of Abinoam, made this song, saying:

²Because of the flowing hair of the fighters in Israel, because the people gave themselves freely, give praise to the Lord.

³Give attention, O kings; give ear, O rulers; I, even I, will make a song to the Lord; I will make melody to the Lord, the God of Israel.

⁴Lord, when you went out from Seir, moving like an army from the field of Edom, the earth was shaking and the heavens were troubled, and the clouds were dropping water.

⁵The mountains were shaking before the Lord, before the Lord, the God of Israel.

⁶In the days of Shamgar, the son of Anath, in the days of Jael, the highways were not used, and travellers went by side roads.

⁷Country towns were no more in Israel, …were no more, till you, Deborah, came up, till you came up as a mother in Israel.

⁸They had no one to make arms, there were no more armed men in the towns; was there a body-cover or a spear to be seen among forty thousand in Israel?

⁹Come, you rulers of Israel, you who gave yourselves freely among the people: give praise to the Lord.

¹⁰Let them give thought to it, who go on white asses, and those who are walking on the road.

¹¹Give ear to the women laughing by the water-springs; there they will give again the story of the upright acts of the Lord, all the upright acts of his arm in Israel.

¹²Awake! awake! Deborah: awake! awake! give a song: Up! Barak, and take prisoner those who took you prisoner, O son of Abinoam.

¹³Then the chiefs went down to the doors; the Lord's people went down among the strong ones.

¹⁴Out of Ephraim they came down into the valley; after you, Benjamin, among your tribesmen; from Machir came down the captains, and from Zebulun those in whose hand is the ruler's rod.

¹⁵Your chiefs, Issachar, were with Deborah; and Naphtali was true to Barak; into the valley they went rushing out at his feet. In Reuben there were divisions, and great searchings of heart.

¹⁶Why did you keep quiet among the sheep, hearing nothing but the watchers piping to the flocks?

¹⁷Gilead was living over Jordan; and Dan was waiting in his ships; Asher kept in his place by the sea's edge, living by his inlets.

¹⁸It was the people of Zebulun who put their lives in danger, even to death, with Naphtali on the high places of the field.

¹⁹The kings came on to the fight, the kings of Canaan were warring; in Taanach by the waters of Megiddo: they took no profit in money.

²⁰The stars from heaven were fighting; from their highways they were fighting against Sisera.

²¹The river Kishon took them violently away, stopping their flight, the river Kishon. Give praise, O my soul, to the strength of the Lord!

²²Then loudly the feet of the horses were sounding with the stamping, the stamping of their war-horses.

²³A curse, a curse on Meroz! said the angel of the Lord. A bitter curse on her townspeople! Because they came not to the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord among the strong ones.

²⁴Blessings be on Jael, more than on all women! Blessings greater than on any in the tents!

²⁵His request was for water, she gave him milk; she put butter before him on a fair plate.

²⁶She put out her hand to the tent-pin, and her right hand to the workman's hammer; and she gave Sisera a blow, crushing his head, wounding and driving through his brow.

²⁷Bent at her feet he went down, he was stretched out; bent at her feet he went down; where he was bent down, there he went down in death.

²⁸Looking out from the window she gave a cry, the mother of Sisera was crying out through the window, Why is his carriage so long in coming? When will the noise of his wheels be sounding?

²⁹Her wise women gave answer to her, yes, she made answer again to herself,

³⁰Are they not getting, are they not parting the goods among them: a young girl or two to every man; and to Sisera robes of coloured needlework, worked in fair colours on this side and on that, for the neck of the queen?

³¹So may destruction come on all your haters, O Lord; but let your lovers be like the sun going out in his strength. And for forty years the land had peace.

Judges 6

¹And the children of Israel did evil in the eyes of the Lord; and the Lord gave them up into the hand of Midian for seven years.

²And Midian was stronger than Israel; and because of the Midianites, the children of Israel made holes for themselves in the mountains, and hollows in the rocks, and strong places.

³And whenever Israel's grain was planted, the Midianites and the Amalekites and the people of the east came up against them;

⁴And put their army in position against them; and they took all the produce of the earth as far as Gaza, till there was no food in Israel, or any sheep or oxen or asses.

⁵For they came up regularly with their oxen and their tents; they came like the locusts in number; they and their camels were without number; and they came into the land for its destruction.

⁶And Israel was in great need because of Midian; and the cry of the children of Israel went up to the Lord.

⁷And when the cry of the children of Israel, because of Midian, came before the Lord,

⁸The Lord sent a prophet to the children of Israel, who said to them, The Lord the God of Israel, has said, I took you up from Egypt, out of the prison-house;

⁹And I took you out of the hands of the Egyptians and out of the hands of all who were cruel to you, and I sent them out by force from before you and gave you their land;

¹⁰And I said to you, I am the Lord your God; you are not to give worship to the gods of the Amorites in whose land you are living, but you did not give ear to my voice.

¹¹Now the angel of the Lord came and took his seat under the oak-tree in Ophrah, in the field of Joash the Abiezrite; and his son Gideon was crushing grain in the place where the grapes were crushed, so that the Midianites might not see it.

¹²And the angel of the Lord came before his eyes, and said to him, The Lord is with you, O man of war.

¹³Then Gideon said to him, O my lord, if the Lord is with us why has all this come on us? And where are all his works of power, of which our fathers have given us word, saying, Did not the Lord take us out of Egypt? But now he has given us up, handing us over to the power of Midian.

¹⁴And the Lord, turning to him, said, Go in the strength you have and be Israel's saviour from Midian: have I not sent you?

¹⁵And he said to him, O Lord, how may I be the saviour of Israel? See, my family is the poorest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father's house.

¹⁶Then the Lord said to him, Truly, I will be with you, and you will overcome the Midianites as if they were one man.

¹⁷So he said to him, If now I have grace in your eyes, then give me a sign that it is you who are talking to me.

¹⁸Do not go away till I come with my offering and put it before you. And he said, I will not go away before you come back.

¹⁹Then Gideon went in and made ready a young goat, and with an ephah of meal he made unleavened cakes: he put the meat in a basket and the soup in which it had been cooked he put in a pot, and he took it out to him under the oak-tree and gave it to him there.

²⁰And the angel of God said to him, Take the meat and the unleavened cakes and put them down on the rock over there, draining out the soup over them. And he did so.

²¹Then the angel of the Lord put out the stick which was in his hand, touching the meat and the cakes with the end of it; and a flame came up out of the rock, burning up the meat and the cakes: and the angel of the Lord was seen no longer.

²²Then Gideon was certain that he was the angel of the Lord; and Gideon said, I am in fear, O Lord God! for I have seen the angel of the Lord face to face.

²³But the Lord said to him, Peace be with you; have no fear: you are in no danger of death.

²⁴Then Gideon made an altar there to the Lord, and gave it the name Yahweh-shalom; to this day it is in Ophrah of the Abiezrites.

²⁵The same night the Lord said to him, Take ten men of your servants and an ox seven years old, and after pulling down the altar of Baal which is your father's, and cutting down the holy tree by its side,

²⁶Make an altar to the Lord your God on the top of this rock, in the ordered way and take the ox and make a burned offering with the wood of the holy tree which has been cut down.

²⁷Then Gideon took ten of his servants and did as the Lord had said to him; but fearing to do it by day, because of his father's people and the men of the town, he did it by night.

²⁸And the men of the town got up early in the morning, and they saw the altar of Baal broken down, and the holy tree which was by it cut down, and the ox offered on the altar which had been put up there.

²⁹And they said to one another, Who has done this thing? And after searching with care, they said, Gideon, the son of Joash, has done this thing.

³⁰Then the men of the town said to Joash, Make your son come out to be put to death, for pulling down the altar of Baal and cutting down the holy tree which was by it.

³¹But Joash said to all those who were attacking him, Will you take up the cause of Baal? will you be his saviour? Let anyone who will take up his cause be put to death while it is still morning: if he is a god, let him take up his cause himself because of the pulling down of his altar.

³²So that day he gave him the name of Jerubbaal, saying, Let Baal take up his cause against him because his altar has been broken down.

³³Then all the Midianites and the Amalekites and the people of the east, banding themselves together, went over and put up their tents in the valley of Jezreel.

³⁴But the spirit of the Lord came on Gideon; and at the sound of his horn all Abiezer came together after him.

³⁵And he sent through all Manasseh, and they came after him; and he sent to Asher and Zebulun and Naphtali, and they came up and were joined to the others.

³⁶Then Gideon said to God, If you are going to give Israel salvation by my hand, as you have said,

³⁷See, I will put the wool of a sheep on the grain-floor; if there is dew on the wool only, while all the earth is dry, then I will be certain that it is your purpose to give Israel salvation by my hand as you have said.

³⁸And it was so: for he got up early on the morning after, and twisting the wool in his hands, he got a basin full of water from the dew on the wool.

³⁹Then Gideon said to God, Do not be moved to wrath against me if I say only this: let me make one more test with the wool; let the wool now be dry, while the earth is covered with dew.

⁴⁰And that night God did so; for the wool was dry, and there was dew on all the earth round it.

Judges 7

¹Then Jerubbaal, that is, Gideon, and all the people with him, got up early and put up their tents by the side of the water-spring of Harod; the tents of Midian were on the north side of him, under the hill of Moreh in the valley.

²And the Lord said to Gideon, So great is the number of your people, that if I give the Midianites into their hands they will be uplifted in pride over me and will say, I myself have been my saviour.

³So now, let it be given out to the people that anyone who is shaking with fear is to go back from Mount Galud. So twenty-two thousand of the people went back, but there were still ten thousand.

⁴Then the Lord said to Gideon, There are still more people than is necessary; take them down to the water so that I may put them to the test for you there; then whoever I say is to go with you will go, and whoever I say is not to go will not go.

⁵So he took the people down to the water; and the Lord said to Gideon, Put on one side by themselves all those drinking up the water with their tongues like a dog; and in the same way, all those who go down on their knees to the water while drinking.

⁶Now the number of those who took up the water with their tongues was three hundred; all the rest of the people went down on their knees to the water.

⁷And the Lord said to Gideon, By those three hundred who were drinking with their tongues I will give you salvation and give the Midianites into your hands; let the rest of the people go away, every man to his place.

⁸So they took the vessels of the people, and their horns from their hands, and he sent them away, every man to his tent, keeping only the three hundred; and the tents of Midian were lower down in the valley.

⁹The same night the Lord said to him, Up! go down now against their army, for I have given them into your hands.

¹⁰But if you have fear of going down, take your servant Purah with you and go down to the tents;

¹¹And after hearing what they are saying, you will get strength to go down against the army. So he went down with his servant Purah to the outer line of the tents of the armed men.

¹²Now the Midianites and the Amalekites and all the people of the east were covering the valley like locusts; and their camels were like the sand by the seaside, without number.

¹³When Gideon came there, a man was giving his friend an account of his dream, saying, See, I had a dream about a cake of barley bread which, falling into the tents of Midian, came on to the tent, overturning it so that it was stretched out flat on the earth.

¹⁴And his friend in answer said, This is certainly the sword of Gideon, the son of Joash, the men of Israel: into their hands God has given up all the army of Midian.

¹⁵Then Gideon, hearing the story of the dream and the sense in which they took it, gave worship; then he went back to the tents of Israel, and said, Up! for the Lord has given the army of Midian into your hands.

¹⁶Then separating the three hundred men into three bands, he gave every man a horn, and a vessel in which was a flaming branch.

¹⁷And he said to them, Keep your eyes on me, and do what I do; when I come to the outer line of tents, whatever I do, you are to do the same.

¹⁸At the sound of my horn, and the horns of those who are with me, let your horns be sounded all round the tents, and say, For the Lord and for Gideon.

¹⁹So Gideon and the three hundred men who were with him came to the outer line of tents, at the start of the middle watch, when the watchmen had only then taken their stations; and the horns were sounded and the vessels broken.

²⁰So the three bands all gave a loud note on their horns, and when the vessels had been broken, they took the flaming branches in their left hands, and the horns in their right hands ready for blowing, crying out, For the Lord and for Gideon.

²¹Then they made a line round the tents, every man in his place; and all the army, awaking from sleep, came running out, and with loud cries went in flight.

²²And the three hundred gave a loud note on their horns, and every man's sword was turned by the Lord against his brother all through the army; and the army went in flight as far as Beth-shittah in the direction of Zeredah, to the edge of Abel-meholah by Tabbath.

²³And the men of Israel came together from Naphtali and from Asher and all Manasseh, and went after Midian.

²⁴Then Gideon sent through all the hill-country of Ephraim saying, Come down against Midian, and keep the ways across Jordan before they come. So all the men of Ephraim, massing themselves together, kept the ways across Jordan.

²⁵And they took the two chiefs of Midian, Oreb and Zeeb; and they put Oreb to death at the rock of Oreb, and Zeeb they put to death at the place of the grape-crushing in Zeeb, and they went after Midian; but the heads of Oreb and Zeeb they took across Jordan to Gideon.

Judges 8

¹And the men of Ephraim came and said to him, Why did you not send for us when you went to war against Midian? And they said sharp and angry words to him.

²And he said to them, What have I done in comparison with you? Is not that which Ephraim took up after the grape-cutting better than all the grapes which Abiezer got in from the grape-cutting?

³God has given into your hands the chiefs of Midian, Oreb and Zeeb; what have I been able to do in comparison with you? And when he said this, their feeling about him became kinder.

⁴Then Gideon came to Jordan and went over it with his three hundred, overcome with weariness and in need of food.

⁵And he said to the men of Succoth, Give bread cakes to my people, for they are overcome with weariness, and I am going on after Zebah and Zalmunna, the kings of Midian.

⁶But the chiefs of Succoth said, Are the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna even now in your hand that we are to give bread to your army?

⁷Then Gideon said, Because of this, when the Lord has given Zebah and Zalmunna into my hands, I will have you stretched on a bed of thorns of the waste land and on sharp stems, and have you crushed as grain is crushed on a grain-floor.

⁸So he went up from there to Penuel and made the same request to the men of Penuel; but they gave him the same answer as the men of Succoth had given.

⁹So he said to the men of Penuel, When I come back in peace, I will have this tower broken down.

¹⁰Now Zebah and Zalmunna were in Karkor and their armies with them, about fifteen thousand men, those of all the army of the children of the east who were still living; for a hundred and twenty thousand of their swordsmen had been put to death.

¹¹And Gideon went up by the way used by the people living in tents on the east of Nobah and Jogbehah, and made an attack on the army when they had no thought of danger.

¹²And Zebah and Zalmunna went in flight; and he went after them, and took the two kings of Midian, Zebah and Zalmunna, and put all the army to the curse.

¹³Then Gideon, the son of Joash, went back from the fight:

¹⁴And taking prisoner a young man of the people of Succoth, he got from him, in answer to his questions, a list of the chiefs of Succoth and the responsible men, seventy-seven men.

¹⁵So he came to the men of Succoth and said, Here are Zebah and Zalmunna, on account of whom you made sport of me, saying, Are the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna even now in your hand, that we are to give bread to your army who are overcome with weariness?

¹⁶Then he took the responsible men of the town and had them crushed on a bed of thorns and sharp stems.

¹⁷And he had the tower of Penuel broken down and the men of the town put to death.

¹⁸Then he said to Zebah and Zalmunna, Where are the men whom you put to death at Tabor? And they gave answer, As you are, so were they; every one of them was like a king's son.

¹⁹And he said, They were my brothers, my mother's sons: by the life of the Lord, if you had kept them safe, I would not put you to death.

²⁰Then he said to Jether, his oldest son, Up! Put them to death. But the boy did not take out his sword, fearing because he was still a boy.

²¹Then Zebah and Zalmunna said, Up! Put an end to us yourself: for you have a man's strength. Then Gideon got up and put Zebah and Zalmunna to death and took the ornaments which were on their camels' necks.

²²Then the men of Israel said to Gideon, Be our ruler, you and your son and your son's son after him; for you have been our saviour from the hands of Midian.

²³But Gideon said to them, I will not be a ruler over you, and my son will not be a ruler over you: it is the Lord who will be ruler over you.

²⁴Then Gideon said to them, I have a request to make to you; let every man give me the ear-rings he has taken. (For they had gold ear-rings, because they were Ishmaelites.)

²⁵And they gave answer, We will gladly give them. So they put down a robe, every man dropping into it the ear-rings he had taken.

²⁶The weight of the gold ear-rings which he got from them was one thousand, seven hundred shekels of gold; in addition to the moon-ornaments and jewels and the purple robes which were on the kings of Midian, and the chains on their camels' necks.

²⁷And Gideon made an ephod from them and put it up in his town Ophrah; and all Israel went after it there and were false to the Lord; and it became a cause of sin to Gideon and his house.

²⁸So Midian was broken before the children of Israel and the Midianites never got back their strength. And the land had peace for forty years, in the days of Gideon.

²⁹And Jerubbaal, the son of Joash, went back to his house and was living there.

³⁰Gideon had seventy sons, the offspring of his body; for he had a number of wives.

³¹And the servant-wife he had in Shechem had a son by him, to whom he gave the name Abimelech.

³²And Gideon, the son of Joash, came to his end when he was very old, and his body was put in the resting-place of Joash his father, in Ophrah of the Abiezrites.

³³And after the death of Gideon, the children of Israel again went after the gods of Canaan and were false to the Lord, and made Baal-berith their god.

³⁴And the children of Israel did not keep in their minds the Lord their God, who had been their saviour from all their haters on every side;

³⁵And they were not kind to the house of Jerubbaal, that is, Gideon, in reward for all the good he had done to Israel.