1And the men of Ephraim said to him, “What is this thing you have done to us, not to call us when you went to do battle with Midian?” And they contended vehemently with him. 2And he said to them, “What have I done now to you? Are not the gleanings of Ephraim’s grapes better than the vintage of Abiezer? 3Into your hand God gave the commanders of Midian, Oreb and Zeeb, and what could I have done like you?” Then their anger against him abated when he spoke this thing. 4And Gideon came to the Jordan, about to cross over, he and the three hundred men who were with him, famished and in pursuit. 5And he said to the men of Succoth, “Give, pray, some loaves of bread to the troops that are at my heels, for they are famished, and I am pursuing Zebah and Zalmunna, the Midianite kings.” 6And the notables of Succoth said, “Is the palm of Zebah and Zalmunna already in your hand that we should give bread to your army?” 7And Gideon said, “Then when the LORD gives Zebah and Zalmunna into my hand, I will harrow your flesh with the thorns and thistles of the wilderness!” 8And he went up from there to Penuel, and he spoke to them in the same fashion, and the men of Penuel answered him as the men of Succoth had answered. 9And he said as well to the men of Penuel, saying, “When I come back safe and sound, I will smash this tower!” 10And Zebah and Zalmunna were in Karkor and their camps with them, about fifteen thousand, all who remained from all the Easterners, and their fallen were a hundred fifty thousand sword-wielding men. 11And Gideon went up on the road of the tent dwellers east of Nobah and Jogbahah, and he struck the camp when the camp thought itself secure. 12And Zebah and Zalmunna fled, and he pursued them and took the two Midianite kings, Zebah and Zalmunna, and he made all the camp tremble. 13And Gideon son of Joash came back from the battle at Heres Ascent. 14And he caught a lad from the men of Succoth, and questioned him and the lad wrote down for him the notables and the elders of Succoth, seventy-seven men. 15And he came to the men of Succoth and said, “Here are Zebah and Zalmunna about whom you insulted me saying, ‘Is the palm of Zebah and Zalmunna already in your hand that we should give bread to your famished men?’” 16And he took the elders of the town and the thorns and the thistles of the wilderness and harrowed with them the men of Succoth. 17And the tower of Penuel he smashed, and he killed the men of the town. 18And he said to Zebah and Zalmunna, “Who are the men whom you killed in Tabor?” And they said, “They were just like you, like princes in their features.” 19And he said, “They were my brothers, my mother’s sons. By the LORD, had you let them live, I would not kill you.” 20And he said to Jether his firstborn, “Rise, kill them!” And the lad did not draw his sword, for he was afraid, for he was still a lad. 21And Zebah and Zalmunna said, “You rise and stab us, for as the man, so is his valor.” And Gideon rose and killed Zebah and Zalmunna, and he took the crescent ornaments that were on the necks of their camels. 22And the men of Israel said, “Rule over us, you and also your son and also your son’s son, for you have rescued us from the hand of Midian.” 23And Gideon said to them, “I will not rule over you nor will my son rule over you. The LORD will rule over you.” 24And Gideon said to them, “Let me ask something of you—give me, every man of you, his ring taken as booty,” for they had golden rings, as they were Ishmaelites. 25And they said, “We will certainly give.” And they spread out a cloak, and each man flung there his ring taken as booty. 26And the weight of the golden rings for which he had asked came to seventeen hundred shekels of gold, besides the pendants and the garments of purple that had been on the Midianite kings and besides the collars that were on the necks of their camels. 27And Gideon made them into an ephod and set it out in his town, in Ophrah, and all Israel went whoring after it there, and it became a snare for Gideon and for his household. 28And Midian was laid low before Israel, and they no longer lifted their heads, and the land was quiet forty years. 29And Jerubaal son of Joash went and returned to his house. 30And Gideon had seventy sons, issue of his loins, for he had many wives. 31And his concubine who was in Shechem also bore him a son, and he named him Abimelech. 32And Gideon son of Joash died in ripe old age and was buried in the grave of Joash his father the Abiezerite in Ophrah. 33And it happened when Gideon died that the Israelites again went whoring after the Baalim, and they made Baal-Berith their god. 34And the Israelites did not recall the LORD their God Who had saved them from the hand of all their enemies round about. 35And they did not do kindness with the house of Jerubaal-Gideon as all the good he had done for Israel.
CHAPTER 8 NOTES
Click here to advance to the next section of the text.
2. What have I done now to you? The received text says “like you,” but many manuscripts show “to” (literally, “in” or “against”). An error in copying may have been triggered by “what could I have done like you” in verse 3.
Are not the gleanings of Ephraim’s grapes better than the vintage of Abiezer? Gideon now exhibits a new skill as a leader—the shrewd use of persuasive rhetoric. The Ephraimites had been resentful because Gideon did not summon them to fight in the first stage of the conflict with Midian. He responds with a pointed aphorism that would have spoken to any viticulturist: Ephraim, having been responsible for the capture and execution of Oreb and Zeeb, is so much superior to Gideon’s clan, Abiezer, that the stray grapes it leaves behind in the harvest are better than what Abiezer actually harvests in the vineyard.
5. the Midianite kings. It is improbable that Midian would have more than one king, so the term appears to be used loosely here to mean “leader.”
6. Is the palm of Zebah and Zalmunna already in your hand. Given the extended period during which the Israelites were painfully vulnerable to the Midianites, the town elders don’t really believe that Gideon will subdue this enemy, and so, in fear of Midianite retribution, they do not want to offer him aid. Amit proposes that the palm is mentioned because of a practice, attested among the Egyptians, of slicing off the palms of a defeated enemy.
7. I will harrow your flesh with the thorns. This fierce declaration—the literal sense of the Hebrew verb used is “thresh”—and of the matching one to the elders of Penuel is less a matter of personal vengeance than of military justice: the failure to give provisions to an army that is in desperate need is an act of treason and will be punished as such.
11. the road of the tent dwellers. These would be encampments of nomads (still evident in the Jordan Valley)—Gideon is heading into desert country.
thought itself secure. “Thought itself” is merely implied in the Hebrew.
14. the lad wrote down for him the notables and the elders of Succoth. The captive boy is constrained to be an informer. Though it is likely that literacy at this moment in the history of Israel was limited to a privileged elite, the writer evidently assumed that it was sufficiently widespread that he could attribute the skill of writing to a random lad seized by Gideon.
15. give bread to your famished men. Gideon, in his verbatim repetition of the words of the notables, adds a single telling word, “famished,” which was used by the narrator but not by them, and changes “army” to “men.” That is to say: to famished fighting men you were brazen enough to deny food.
16. harrowed with them the men of Succoth. Given that he goes on to kill the elders of Penuel, we may infer that the same fatal result is achieved at Succoth by the harrowing—a slow and painful death. In the Masoretic Text, the verb used appears to mean “cause to know” (hence the bizarre King James Version, in which Gideon “taught” the elders with thorns and thistle). The Septuagint shows “harrowed” (a difference of one consonant in the Hebrew), which is the likely reading.
18. They were just like you, like princes in their features. The Midianite kings imagine that they are flattering Gideon, but in divulging the family resemblance, they pronounce their own death sentence. By the ethic of family blood vengeance, he now feels obliged to kill them.
19. my mother’s sons. And not the sons of any other of my father’s wives. The connection, then, with Gideon is a strong one because these were not merely half brothers.
20. Jether his firstborn. Blood vengeance is a family affair, and so Gideon wants his firstborn to carry out the sentence. He may also want to toughen him to killing, which is, in a sense, the family business.
he was afraid. He was afraid, of course, not of the captive (and probably fettered) kings but of the act of stabbing them.
21. You rise and stab us, for as the man, so is his valor. Killing is a grown man’s business for both sides in the martial code of this story. They also may assume that a proven warrior like Gideon will finish them off with one swift blow.
the crescent ornaments. This detail is proleptic of the agreement to which he comes with his men.
23. I will not rule over you nor will my son rule over you. The LORD will rule over you. This emphatic repetition of their proposal that he establish a dynasty reflects an ideology circulating in premonarchic Israel, and which will still be maintained by the prophet Samuel. The vehicle of the LORD’s rule is the spirit, or charisma, with which He invests the ad hoc leaders of Israel.
24. And Gideon said to them. This repetition of the formula for introducing dialogue without an intervening response from the second party in the dialogue indicates that they are baffled, or perhaps even angered, by his refusal to accept their offer of kingship. Gideon realizes that he now has to propose something to placate or reassure them, but what he proposes proves to be disastrous.
rings. These are earrings or nose-rings, not rings worn on the finger.
as they were Ishmaelites. Ishmaelite and Midianite are often interchangeable terms. These semi-nomadic folk were evidently known for wearing golden ornaments.
27. Gideon made them into an ephod. The clear allusion in this episode is to Aaron’s fashioning the Golden Calf from the golden ornaments that he collects from the Israelites. In other contexts, the ephod is a priestly breastplate or an oracular device. The latter function may come into play here. In any case, the declaration that Israel “went whoring after it” clearly indicates it was treated as a sacred icon to be worshipped instead of God.
31. Abimelech. This name, which had some general currency (see Genesis 20), incorporates the element melekh, “king,” the very role that Gideon rejected when it was offered but that this reprobate son will try to arrogate for himself. Although Gideon himself dies in ripe old age, retribution, perhaps for making the ephod, overtakes his offspring through the malefic agency of Abimelech.