Judges 6:1-24

Midian Oppresses Israel

1 ¹The people of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the LORD, and the LORD gave them into the hand of ²Midian seven years.

2 And the hand of Midian overpowered Israel, and because of Midian the people of Israel made for themselves the dens that are in the mountains and ³the caves and the strongholds.

3 For whenever the Israelites planted crops, the Midianites and ⁴the Amalekites and ⁵the people of the East would come up against them.

4 They would encamp against them ⁶and devour the produce of the land, as far as Gaza, and leave no sustenance in Israel and no sheep or ox or donkey.

5 For they would come up with their livestock and their tents; they would come ⁷like locusts in number--both they and their camels could not be counted--so that they laid waste the land as they came in.

6 And Israel was brought very low because of Midian. And the people of Israel ⁸cried out for help to the LORD.

7 When the people of Israel cried out to the LORD on account of the Midianites,

8 the LORD sent a prophet to the people of Israel. And he said to them, "Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel: ⁹I led you up from Egypt and brought you out of the house of bondage.

9 And I delivered you from the hand of the Egyptians and from the hand of all who oppressed you, and ¹⁰drove them out before you and gave you their land.

10 And I said to you, 'I am the LORD your God; ¹¹you shall not fear the gods of the Amorites in whose land you dwell.' But you have not obeyed my voice."

The Call of Gideon

11 Now the angel of the LORD came and sat under the terebinth at Ophrah, which belonged to Joash ¹²the Abiezrite, while his son ¹³Gideon was beating out wheat in the winepress to hide it from the Midianites.

12 And ¹⁴the angel of the LORD appeared to him and said to him, ¹⁵"The LORD is with you, O mighty man of valor."

13 And Gideon said to him, "Please, sir,^[a] if the LORD is with us, why then has all this happened to us? And where are ¹⁶all his wonderful deeds ¹⁷that our fathers recounted to us, saying, 'Did not the LORD bring us up from Egypt?' But now the LORD has forsaken us and given us into the hand of Midian."

14 And the LORD ^[b] turned to him and said, "Go in this might of yours and save Israel from the hand of Midian; ¹⁸do not I send you?"

15 And he said to him, ¹⁹"Please, Lord, how can I save Israel? Behold, ²⁰my clan is the weakest in Manasseh, and I am the least in my father's house."

16 And the LORD said to him, ²¹"But I will be with you, and you shall strike the Midianites as one man."

17 And he said to him, ²²"If now I have found favor in your eyes, then ²³show me a sign that it is you who speak with me.

18 Please ²⁴do not depart from here until I come to you and bring out my present and set it before you." And he said, "I will stay till you return."

19 So Gideon went into his house ²⁵and prepared a young goat and unleavened cakes from an ephah^[c] of flour. The meat he put in a basket, and the broth he put in a pot, and brought them to him under the terebinth and presented them.

20 And the angel of God said to him, "Take the meat and the unleavened cakes, and put them ²⁶on this rock, and ²⁷pour the broth over them." And he did so.

21 Then the angel of the LORD reached out the tip of the staff that was in his hand and touched the meat and the unleavened cakes. ²⁸And fire sprang up from the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened cakes. And the angel of the LORD vanished from his sight.

22 Then Gideon perceived that he was the angel of the LORD. And Gideon said, ²⁹"Alas, O Lord GOD! For now I have seen the angel of the LORD face to face."

23 But the LORD said to him, ³⁰"Peace be to you. Do not fear; you shall not die."

24 Then Gideon built an altar there to the LORD and called it, ³¹The LORD Is Peace. To this day it still stands at ³²Ophrah, which belongs to the Abiezrites.

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Judges 6:1-24 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO JUDGES 6

In this chapter we have an account of the distressed condition Israel was in through the Midianites, Jud 6:1-6, of a prophet being sent unto them to reprieve them for their sins, Jud 6:7-10 of an angel appearing to Gideon, with an order to him to go and save Israel out of the hands of the Midianites, Jud 6:11-16 and of a sign given him by the angel, whereby he knew this order was of God, Jud 6:17-24, and of the reformation from idolatry in his father's family he made upon this, throwing down the altar of Baal, and building one for the Lord, Jud 6:25-32, and of the preparation he made to fight the Midianites and others, Jud 6:33-35, but first desired a sign of the Lord, that Israel would be saved by his hand, which was granted and repeated, Jud 6:36-40.

Taken from John Gill's Exposition of the Bible

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Cross References 32

1. See Judges 2:19
2. Genesis 25:2; Numbers 25:17, 18; Habakkuk 3:7
3. 1 Samuel 13:6; Hebrews 11:38
4. Judges 3:13
5. ver. 33; Judges 7:12; Judges 8:10; Genesis 29:1; 1 Kings 4:30; Job 1:3
6. [Leviticus 26:16]; See Deut. 28:30-33, 51; Micah 6:15
7. Judges 7:12
8. See Judges 3:9
9. 1 Samuel 10:18
10. Psalms 44:2, 3
11. Joshua 24:15; See 2 Kings 17:35-38
12. Judges 8:2; Joshua 17:2
13. Hebrews 11:32
14. Judges 13:3; Luke 1:11; [Acts 10:3]
15. Joshua 1:5
16. Psalms 89:49; Isaiah 63:15
17. Psalms 44:1
18. 1 Samuel 12:11; [Joshua 1:9]
19. [Exodus 3:11]
20. 1 Samuel 9:21; 1 Samuel 18:18
21. Exodus 3:12; Joshua 1:5
22. Exodus 33:13
23. 2 Kings 20:8, 9; Isaiah 7:11; [ver. 36, 37]; See Exodus 4:1-8
24. Judges 13:15; Genesis 18:3-5
25. Genesis 18:6-8
26. Judges 13:19
27. [1 Kings 18:33, 34]
28. Leviticus 9:24; 1 Kings 18:38; 2 Chronicles 7:1
29. Judges 13:21, 22; [Genesis 32:30; Exodus 33:20; Deuteronomy 5:26]
30. Daniel 10:19
31. [Genesis 22:14; Exodus 17:15; Ezekiel 48:35]
32. ver. 11; Judges 8:27, 32

Footnotes 3

[a]. Or Please, my Lord
[b]. Septuagint the angel of the Lord; also verse 16
[c]. An ephah was about 3/5 bushel or 22 liters

The English Standard Version is published with the permission of Good News Publishers.