Judges 8

Gideon calms a quarrel with Ephraim, pursues the two Midianite kings, and punishes the towns that refused to help him. Israel offers him a throne and he refuses it, yet he makes an ephod that becomes a snare. When he dies, the people quickly forget the LORD and Gideon’s family.

Judges 8:1

Ephraim, a proud and leading tribe, was angry at being left out of the call to battle. Their complaint is about honor, not about God’s work. Pride can turn even a great victory into a quarrel.

BSA: contended (“argued, rebuked”): Their quarrel was sharp and nearly came to blows.

See also: Judges 7:24-25; Proverbs 15:1.

Judges 8:2-3

Gideon answers gently and gives the credit to Ephraim. Their capture of the two princes was worth more than his whole clan’s work, like leftover gleanings outweighing the main harvest. He also says plainly that God gave the victory. Their anger cooled.

BSA: subsided (“slackened, relaxed, abated”): Their anger loosened like a tight cord let go.

See also: Proverbs 15:1.

Judges 8:4

Gideon’s three hundred men crossed the Jordan tired but did not stop. The work God gave them was not finished, and they kept after the enemy even in weakness.

BSA: exhausted (“faint, weary, overcome with weariness”): They were running on the last of their strength.

See also: Galatians 6:9.

Judges 8:5-6

Gideon asks Succoth for bread, a simple kindness for Israelites fighting Israel’s enemy. The leaders refuse. They do not want to be marked as Midian’s enemies if Gideon fails, so they hold back their help until victory is certain.

BSA: bread (“food, sustenance”): He asked only for basic food, not for men or weapons.

Judges 8:7

Gideon vows to punish Succoth’s leaders once the LORD has given him the kings. He ties his vow to God’s help, but the threat is harsh and personal. It shows a man who feels the insult deeply.

BSA: tear (“tread, trample, or overpower”): The picture is of threshing, dragging thorns over the body.

Judges 8:8-9

Penuel, further up the road, gives the same cold answer. Gideon promises to pull down its tower, the town’s place of safety. Penuel’s name means ‘facing God’, yet its people would not help God’s army.

BSA: Penuel (“facing God, a place of divine encounter”): The name recalls Jacob meeting God there, which makes the town’s refusal sadder.

See also: Genesis 32:30.

Judges 8:10-12

Zebah and Zalmunna had about fifteen thousand men left, out of a hundred and twenty thousand who had fallen. Gideon went round by the desert caravan route and struck when they felt safe. The kings fled, but he captured them and threw the whole camp into panic.

BSA: surprise (“when they were secure, feeling safe and careless”): The enemy believed they were out of danger, and that is when Gideon struck.

Judges 8:13-14

Returning from the battle, Gideon catches a young man of Succoth and questions him. The youth writes down the names of the seventy-seven leaders and elders. Gideon now knows exactly who had refused him.

BSA: interrogated (“asked, inquired of”): Gideon questioned him closely to find out who the town’s leaders were.

Judges 8:15-17

Gideon shows the two captured kings and quotes the leaders’ own taunt back to them. He then punishes the elders of Succoth with thorns and tears down Penuel’s tower, killing its men. This is a hard scene. Those who refused to help God’s people were treated as enemies, and Gideon’s anger runs to great severity.

BSA: disciplined (“taught, chastised”): Gideon meant his punishment as a lesson they would not forget.

Judges 8:18-19

The kings admit they killed men at Tabor who looked like royalty. Gideon says they were his own brothers, sons of his mother. He swears by the LORD’s life that he would have spared the kings if they had spared his brothers. This was a blood-vengeance, as well as a war.

BSA: brothers (“brethren, close relatives”): Gideon’s grief shows this was a family loss, and not just a battle.

Judges 8:20-21

Gideon tells his young son Jether to kill the kings, but the boy is afraid. The kings, proud even now, say a warrior should do it himself. Gideon kills them and takes the crescent ornaments from their camels, the first of the spoil he will later use.

BSA: crescent ornaments (“round, moon-shaped necklaces”): They were costly decorations that hung on the camels’ necks.

Judges 8:22-23

Israel offers Gideon a throne for his family because he saved them. He refuses, saying the LORD alone is their ruler. It is a fine answer, since God was Israel’s true King. Yet his later actions do not fully match his words.

BSA: rule (“be our leader, have dominion”): The people were asking for a lasting dynasty, not only a leader for a season.

See also: 1 Samuel 8:7; Judges 8:27.

Judges 8:24-26

Gideon asks each man for a gold earring from the plunder. The people give gladly, and the gold alone weighs 1,700 shekels, plus other royal treasures. The Midianites were descended from Ishmael’s line, which is why they wore so much gold. It is a large sum, and a temptation too.

BSA: gladly (“willingly, gladly”): The people were generous, so the blame later lies in how the gold was used.

Judges 8:27

Gideon made an ephod out of the gold and placed it in his hometown. An ephod was a priestly garment, and this one became an object of worship. All Israel went after it like an unfaithful wife, and it trapped Gideon and his family. A good start can end in a snare.

BSA: snare (“a trap, a source of temptation”): What looked like a memorial of victory became a trap that caught the whole house.

See also: Exodus 28:6; Exodus 32:1-4.

Judges 8:28-29

Midian never recovered, and the land had rest for forty years. Gideon, also called Jerubbaal, went home and settled down. God’s gift of peace lasted for a whole generation.

BSA: rest (“peace, quietness”): The land enjoyed real quiet, a gift from God after years of raiding.

Judges 8:30-31

Gideon had seventy sons by many wives, and one more son, Abimelech, by a concubine in Shechem. The large household is a quiet warning. Chapter 9 shows what bitter trouble this one son would bring.

BSA: concubine (“a woman who lives with a man but is not his wife, a servant-wife”): Her lower standing in the household is part of the trouble that follows.

See also: Judges 9:1-6.

Judges 8:32

Gideon died at a good old age and was buried in his father’s tomb at Ophrah. His life ended in peace, though the ephod still stood in his town.

BSA: ripe (“greyheaded, advanced”): It points to a long life with grey hair, as God had promised the faithful.

Judges 8:33

As soon as Gideon was dead, Israel turned to the Baals and chose Baal-berith, ’lord of the covenant’, as a god. They took the very word covenant and gave it to an idol. The man who tore down Baal’s altar was hardly in his grave before Baal returned.

BSA: Baal-berith (“the Lord of the covenant, a false deity”): Israel gave a false god the title that belonged to the LORD, who had made a covenant with them.

See also: Judges 6:25-32.

Judges 8:34-35

The root problem was forgetting the LORD who had rescued them from every side. Forgetting God led to ingratitude toward Gideon’s family as well. When the people no longer remembered God’s goodness, they stopped showing kindness to others.

BSA: kindness (“mercy, loving actions, a covenant loyalty”): The word points to the faithful love owed to those who have done good for us.

See also: Deuteronomy 6:12.