Picture of a Shofar made from the horn of a Greater Kudu By Olve Utne. This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license.CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=208940

Judges 7

Then Jerubbaal (that is, Gideon) and all the troops that were with him rose early and encamped beside the spring of Harod; and the camp of Midian was north of them, below the hill of Moreh, in the valley.

² The LORD said to Gideon, “The troops with you are too many for me to give the Midianites into their hand. Israel would only take the credit away from me, saying, ‘My own hand has delivered me.’ ³ Now therefore proclaim this in the hearing of the troops, ‘Whoever is fearful and trembling, let him return home.'” Thus Gideon sifted them out; twenty-two thousand returned, and ten thousand remained.

⁴ Then the LORD said to Gideon, “The troops are still too many; take them down to the water and I will sift them out for you there. When I say, ‘This one shall go with you,’ he shall go with you; and when I say, ‘This one shall not go with you,’ he shall not go.” ⁵ So he brought the troops down to the water; and the LORD said to Gideon, “All those who lap the water with their tongues, as a dog laps, you shall put to one side; all those who kneel down to drink, putting their hands to their mouths, you shall put to the other side.” ⁶ The number of those that lapped was three hundred; but all the rest of the troops knelt down to drink water. ⁷ Then the LORD said to Gideon, “With the three hundred that lapped I will deliver you, and give the Midianites into your hand. Let all the others go to their homes.” ⁸ So he took the jars of the troops from their hands, and their trumpets; and he sent all the rest of Israel back to their own tents, but retained the three hundred. The camp of Midian was below him in the valley.

⁹ That same night the LORD said to him, “Get up, attack the camp; for I have given it into your hand. ¹⁰ But if you fear to attack, go down to the camp with your servant Purah; ¹¹ and you shall hear what they say, and afterward your hands shall be strengthened to attack the camp.” Then he went down with his servant Purah to the outposts of the armed men that were in the camp. ¹² The Midianites and the Amalekites and all the people of the east lay along the valley as thick as locusts; and their camels were without number, countless as the sand on the seashore. ¹³ When Gideon arrived, there was a man telling a dream to his comrade; and he said, “I had a dream, and in it a cake of barley bread tumbled into the camp of Midian, and came to the tent, and struck it so that it fell; it turned upside down, and the tent collapsed.” ¹⁴ And his comrade answered, “This is no other than the sword of Gideon son of Joash, a man of Israel; into his hand God has given Midian and all the army.”

¹⁵ When Gideon heard the telling of the dream and its interpretation, he worshiped; and he returned to the camp of Israel, and said, “Get up; for the LORD has given the army of Midian into your hand.” ¹⁶ After he divided the three hundred men into three companies, and put trumpets into the hands of all of them, and empty jars, with torches inside the jars, ¹⁷ he said to them, “Look at me, and do the same; when I come to the outskirts of the camp, do as I do. ¹⁸ When I blow the trumpet, I and all who are with me, then you also blow the trumpets around the whole camp, and shout, ‘For the LORD and for Gideon!'”

¹⁹ So Gideon and the hundred who were with him came to the outskirts of the camp at the beginning of the middle watch, when they had just set the watch; and they blew the trumpets and smashed the jars that were in their hands. ²⁰ So the three companies blew the trumpets and broke the jars, holding in their left hands the torches, and in their right hands the trumpets to blow; and they cried, “A sword for the LORD and for Gideon!” ²¹ Every man stood in his place all around the camp, and all the men in camp ran; they cried out and fled. ²² When they blew the three hundred trumpets, the LORD set every man’s sword against his fellow and against all the army; and the army fled as far as Beth-shittah toward Zererah, as far as the border of Abel-meholah, by Tabbath. ²³ And the men of Israel were called out from Naphtali and from Asher and from all Manasseh, and they pursued after the Midianites.

²⁴ Then Gideon sent messengers throughout all the hill country of Ephraim, saying, “Come down against the Midianites and seize the waters against them, as far as Beth-barah, and also the Jordan.” So all the men of Ephraim were called out, and they seized the waters as far as Beth-barah, and also the Jordan. ²⁵ They captured the two captains of Midian, Oreb and Zeeb; they killed Oreb at the rock of Oreb, and Zeeb they killed at the wine press of Zeeb, as they pursued the Midianites. They brought the heads of Oreb and Zeeb to Gideon beyond the Jordan.

After a delay of two days while Gideon seeks signs to confirm God’s action on their behalf the portion of Israel that has assembled against the Midianite threat is ready for action. Yet, the primary goal of the LORD is not the removal of the Midianite threat but to retrain the Israelites to trust in the God of Israel rather than Baal, Asherah, or their own strength. This may be one of the reasons for the double naming of Gideon as Jerubbaal, to indicate that this is a struggle against Baal and the other gods. The assembled force of thirty-two thousand[1]men is an incredibly large force in the ancient world, even though those assembled are probably poorly equipped and untrained. The size of communities in the ancient world is much smaller and even though the Midianites are metaphorically as thick as locusts and their camels are without number a large, gathered force would be viewed as an impressive threat. The LORD’s concern that the assembled Israel would be tempted to view the victory as their own rather than an act of God leads to God commanding Gideon to refine[2] the force to a smaller group.

The first troops sent back are those fearful of the upcoming battle. There is a play on words in Hebrew between the name of the spring (Harod) and the trembling (hared in Hebrew) and the reality that two thirds of the assembled force leaves when given the opportunity reflects a gathered force of farmers rather than trained soldiers. As we will see later in the story the confusion of battle can lead to self-inflicted casualties by an undisciplined force, but the loss of twenty-two thousand men would probably have been disheartening to Gideon and the assembled forces. Yet, the refinement is not completed. There have been multiple suggestions why the ‘lappers’ were chosen instead of the ‘kneelers’ but the reality is that we are unable to determine why the ‘lappers’ were chosen to remain, and it may simply be a way to get down to the much smaller number of three hundred. Gideon is left with one percent of his original force which has taken supplies from the departing forces. If the victory is to come with only three hundred fighters against an overwhelming group of marauders the God of Israel must fight on their side.

One of the themes throughout the Gideon narrative is the way God deals with Gideon’s reluctance. Now the LORD proactively provides a sign for Gideon and Purah, his young man, in hearing the interpretation of a dream which indicates the fear that has come upon the Midianites. Like the ‘great fear’ that comes upon the city of Jericho in Joshua 2, now Gideon understands this overheard interpretation of the tent of Midian collapsing when a cake of barley bread tumbles into it as God’s indication of the handing over of the Midianites to his severely reduced force. The Midianites were likely aware of the massing of a large number of Israelites in proximity to the valley where they camped but were probably unaware of the majority of this large force departing.

Gideon’s strategy uses the element of surprise to make it appear that a much larger force has arrived at the camp of the Midianites in force. The movement of the three companies of a hundred into position around midnight and the sudden noise from the shofars (trumpets) and light from the torches throws the camp into confusion. Most of the casualties among the Midianites were self-inflicted in the panic. The Israelites cry out, ‘a sword for the LORD and for Gideon!” but it is the LORD who among the Midianites, “sets every man’s sword against his fellow and against all the army;” Yet, it is telling that the credit is given to both the LORD and to Gideon, and this foreshadows a future where the household of Gideon become the focus of devotion rather than God.

Now that the Midianite encampment is scattered the call is sent out first to the originally gathered forces and then to the Ephraimites to complete the removal of the Midianite threat. The two Midianite war leaders Oreb (Raven) and Zeeb (Wolf) are captured and killed. Yet, we will see in the next chapter that Israel is not unified and the threat on internal conflict still looms. Gideon is not done with the fight against Midian or within Israel, yet the decisive action of God has scattered the Midianite threat and made them a force that this portion of Israel can handle.

[1] As mentioned at the beginning of these reflections the translation of large numbers represented by the Hebrew ‘elep which is often translated thousands but can also mean unit. Barry G. Webb has a full discussion of this in his commentary (Webb 2012, 71-74)

[2] ‘sarap which is translated ‘sift’ by most English translations is a metallurgical term that normally refers to the refining of ore (Webb 2012, 240)