Judges 6:1

1 Yet again the People of Israel went back to doing evil in God's sight. God put them under the domination 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 Yet again the People of Israel went back to doing evil in God's sight. God put them under the domination of Midian for seven years.

2 Midian overpowered Israel. Because of Midian, the People of Israel made for themselves hideouts in the mountains - caves and forts.

3 When Israel planted its crops, Midian and Amalek, the easterners, would invade them,

4 camp in their fields, and destroy their crops all the way down to Gaza. They left nothing for them to live on, neither sheep nor ox nor donkey.

5 Bringing their cattle and tents, they came in and took over, like an invasion of locusts. And their camels - past counting! They marched in and devastated the country.