Judges 9:17

17 that fought for you, and gave his life for perils, that he should deliver you from the hand of Midian; (yea, he who fought for you, and gave, or risked, his life to perils, so that he could save you from the hands of the Midianites;)

Judges 9:17 Meaning and Commentary

Judges 9:17

For my father fought for you
In the valley of Jezreel, and at Karkor, where with three hundred men he routed and destroyed an army of 135,000:

and adventured his life far:
which, according to our version, may seem to have respect to his going over Jordan, and following the Midianites, fleeing into their country, and fighting them at Karkor, at a great distance from his native place; but the phrase in the original text is, "he cast away his life afar" ^F5, made no account of it, exposed it to the greatest danger; or, as the Targum,

``he delivered his life as it were to destruction:''

and delivered you out of the hand of Midian;
from the oppression and bondage of the Midianites, under which they had laboured seven years.

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FOOTNOTES:

F5 (dgnm wvpn ta Klvyw) "et projecit animam suam a louge", Pagninus; "vel eminus", Montanus; so Junius & Tremellius, Piscator.

Judges 9:17 In-Context

15 Which answered to them, If ye make me verily king to you, come, and rest ye under my shadow; and, if ye will not, fire go out of the rhamn, and devour the cedars of Lebanon. (Which answered to them, If ye truly shall make me king over you, come, and rest ye under my shadow; but if ye will not, then let fire go out of the rhamn, and devour Lebanon's cedars.)

16 Now therefore, if rightfully and without sin ye have made Abimelech king on you, and if ye have done well with Jerubbaal, and with his house, and if ye have yielded while to the benificences of him, (And so now, if rightfully and without sin ye have made Abimelech king over you, and if ye have done the right thing with Jerubbaal, and with his household, and if ye have yielded to him according to his good deeds,)

17 that fought for you, and gave his life for perils, that he should deliver you from the hand of Midian; (yea, he who fought for you, and gave, or risked, his life to perils, so that he could save you from the hands of the Midianites;)

18 and ye have risen now against the house of my father, and have slain his sons, seventy men, on one stone, and have made Abimelech, [the] son of his handmaid, king on the dwellers of Shechem, for he is your brother; (and ye have risen up now against my father's household, or his family, and have killed his sons, seventy men, on one stone, and have made Abimelech, the son of his slave-girl, king over the inhabitants of Shechem, for he is your kinsman;)

19 therefore if ye have done rightfully, and without sin with Jerubbaal and his house, today be ye glad in Abimelech, and be he glad in you; (and so if ye have done rightfully, and without sin with Jerubbaal and with his household, or his family, today, then be ye happy with Abimelech, and let him be happy with you;)