Juízes 8:21

21 Mas Zeba e Zalmuna disseram: “Venha, mate-nos você mesmo. Isso exige coragem de homem”. Então Gideão avançou e os matou, e tirou os enfeites do pescoço dos camelos deles.

Juízes 8:21 Meaning and Commentary

Judges 8:21

Then Zebah and Zalmunna said, rise thou and fall upon us
Since they must die, they chose rather to die by the hand of so great a man and valiant a commander as Gideon, which was more honourable than to die by the hand of a youth:

for as the man is, so is his strength;
signifying, that as he was a stout able man, he had strength sufficient to dispatch them at once, which his son had not, and therefore they must have died a lingering and painful death: wherefore as they consulted their honour, so their ease, in desiring to die by the hand of Gideon:

and Gideon arose, and slew Zebah and Zalmunna;
nor was it unusual in those early times for great personages, as judges and generals, to be executioners of others, as were Samuel and Benaiah, ( 1 Samuel 15:33 ) ( 1 Kings 2:25 1 Kings 2:34 )

and took away the ornaments that were on their camels' necks;
the Targum calls them chains, as in ( Judges 8:26 ) no doubt of gold; so the horses of King Latinus ^F2 had golden poitrels or collars hanging down their breasts. They were, according to Jarchi, Kimchi, and Ben Gersom, in the form of the moon; see ( Isaiah 3:18 ) some have thought that these were worn in honour of Astarte, or the moon, the goddess of the Phoenicians, from whom these people had borrowed that idolatry.

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FOOTNOTES:

F2 Virg. Aeneid. l. 7. v. 278.

Juízes 8:21 In-Context

19 Gideão prosseguiu: “Aqueles homens eram meus irmãos, filhos de minha própria mãe. Juro pelo nome do SENHOR que, se vocês tivessem poupado a vida deles, eu não mataria vocês”.

20 E Gideão voltou-se para Jéter, seu filho mais velho, e lhe disse: “Mate-os!” Jéter, porém, teve medo e não desembainhou a espada, pois era muito jovem.

21 Mas Zeba e Zalmuna disseram: “Venha, mate-nos você mesmo. Isso exige coragem de homem”. Então Gideão avançou e os matou, e tirou os enfeites do pescoço dos camelos deles.

22 Os israelitas disseram a Gideão: “Reine sobre nós, você, seu filho e seu neto, pois você nos libertou das mãos de Midiã”.

23 “Não reinarei sobre vocês”, respondeu-lhes Gideão, “nem meu filho reinará sobre vocês. O SENHOR reinará sobre vocês”.