Judges 6:1

1 And the sons of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and the LORD delivered them into the hands of Midian for seven years.

Judges 6:1 Meaning and Commentary

Judges 6:1

And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord,
&c.] After the death of Deborah and Barak, during whose life they kept to the pure worship of God, and who, perhaps, lived pretty near the close of the forty years' rest, or of the twenty years from their victory over Jabin; but they dying, the children of Israel fell into idolatry, for that that was the evil they did appears from ( Judges 6:10 ) , even worshipping the gods of the Amorites:

and the Lord delivered them into the hand of Midian seven years:
this was not the Midian where Jethro, the father-in-law of Moses, lived, which lay more southward, but that which joined to Moab, and was more eastward. This people had been destroyed by the Israelites in the times of Moses, in their way to the land of Canaan, ( Numbers 31:1 ) wherefore they might bear them a grudge, and now took the opportunity to revenge themselves on them, God permitting them so to do for their sins; and though the destruction of this people by Israel was very general, yet as some of them might make their escape, and afterwards return to their own land, and this being about two hundred years ago, might, with others joining them, repeople their country by this time, and become strong and powerful.

Judges 6:1 In-Context

1 And the sons of Israel did evil in the sight of the LORD, and the LORD delivered them into the hands of Midian for seven years.

2 And the hand of Midian prevailed against Israel, and because of the Midianites the sons of Israel made dens in the mountains and caves and strongholds.

3 For when those of Israel had sown, the Midianites would come up and the Amalekites and the sons of the east. They would come up against them

4 and encamp against them and destroy the fruits of the earth as far as Gaza, and they would leave nothing to eat in Israel neither sheep nor ox nor ass.

5 For they would come up with their livestock and their tents in a great multitude like locusts, for there was no number in them nor in their camels, and they would enter into the land destroying it.