Hurlbut's Story of the Bible  by Jesse Lyman Hurlbut

Gideon and His Brave Three Hundred

Judges vi: 1, to viii: 28.

Part 1 of 2


dropcap image GAIN the people of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord in worshipping Baal; and the Lord left them again to suffer for their sins. This time it was the Midianites, living near the desert on the east of Israel, who came against the tribes in the middle of the country. The two tribes that suffered the hardest fate were Ephraim, and the part of Manasseh on the west of Jordan. For seven years the Midianites swept over their land every year, just at the time of harvest, and carried away all the crops of grain, until the Israelites had no food for themselves and none for their sheep and cattle. The Midianites brought also their own flocks, and camels without number, which ate all the grass of the field. These Midianites were the wild Arabs, living on the border of the desert, and from their land they made sudden and swift attacks upon the people of Israel.

The people of Israel were driven away from their villages and their farms; and were compelled to hide in the caves of the mountains. And if any Israelite could raise any grain, he buried it in pits covered with earth, or in empty wine-presses, where the Midianites could not find it.

One day a man named Gideon was threshing out wheat in a hidden place, when suddenly he saw an angel sitting under an oak-tree. The angel said to him, "You are a brave man, Gideon; and the Lord is with you. Go out boldly, and save your people from the power of the Midianites."


[Illustration]

The angel speaking to Gideon on the threshing floor

Gideon answered the angel, "O Lord, how can I save Israel? Mine is a poor family in Manasseh, and I am the least of my father's house."

And the Lord said to him, "Surely I will be with you, and I will help you drive out the Midianites."

Gideon felt that it was the Lord who was talking with him, in the form of an angel. He brought an offering, and laid it on a rock before the angel. Then the angel touched the offering with his staff. At once a fire leaped up and burned the offering; and then the angel vanished from his sight. Gideon was afraid when he saw this; but the Lord said to him, "Peace be unto you, Gideon; do not fear, for I am with you."


[Illustration]

The angel touched Gideon's offering

On the spot where the Lord appeared to Gideon, under an oak-tree near the village of Ophrah, in the tribe-land of Manasseh, Gideon built an altar, and called it by a name which means "The Lord is peace." This altar was standing long afterward in that place.

Then the Lord told Gideon that before setting his people free from the Midianites, he must first set them free from the service of Baal and Asherah, the two idols most worshipped among them. Near the house of Gideon's own father stood an altar to Baal, and the image of Asherah.

On that night Gideon went out with ten men, and threw down the image of Baal, and cut in pieces the wooden image of Asherah, and destroyed the altar before these idols. And in place he built an altar to the God of Israel, and on it laid the broken pieces of the idols for wood, and with them offered a young ox as a burnt-offering.

On the next morning, when the people of the village went out to worship their idols, they found them cut in pieces, the altar taken away; in its place stood an altar of the Lord, and on it the pieces of the Asherah were burning as wood under a sacrifice to the Lord. The people looked at the broken and burning idols, and they said, "Who has done this?"

Some one said, "Gideon, the son of Joash, did this last night." Then they came to Joash, Gideon's father, and said, "We are going to kill your son because he has destroyed the image of Baal, who is our god."

And Joash, Gideon's father, said, "If Baal is a god, he can take care of himself; and he will punish the man who has destroyed his image. Why should you help Baal? Let Baal help himself."

And when they saw that Baal could not harm the man who had broken down his altar and his image, the people turned from Baal back to their own Lord God.

Gideon sent men through all his own tribe of Manasseh and the other tribes in that part of the land, to say, "Come and help us drive out the Midianites." The men came, and gathered around Gideon. Very few of them had swords and spears, for the Israelites were not a fighting people, and were not trained for war. They met beside a great spring on Mount Gilboa, called "the fountain of Harod." Mount Gilboa is one of the three mountains on the east of the plain of Esdraelon, or the plain of Jezreel, of which we read in the last story. On the plain, stretching up the side of another of these mountains, called "the Hill of Moreh," was the camp of a vast Midianite army. For as soon as the Midianites heard that Gideon had undertaken to set his people free, they came against him with a mighty host. Just as Deborah and her little army had looked down from Mount Tabor on the great army of the Canaanites (see Story 44), so now, on Mount Gilboa, Gideon looked down on the host of the Midianites in their camp on the same plain.

Gideon was a man of faith. He wished to be sure that God was leading him; and he prayed to God, and said, "O Lord God, give me some sign that thou wilt save Israel through me. Here is a fleece of wool on this threshing-floor. If to-morrow morning the fleece is wet with dew, while the grass around it is dry, then I shall know that thou art with me, and that thou wilt give me victory over the Midianites."

Very early the next morning Gideon came to look at the fleece. He found it wringing wet with dew, while all around the grass was dry. But Gideon was not yet satisfied. He said to the Lord, "O Lord, be not angry with me; but give me just one more sign. To-morrow morning, let the fleece be dry, and let the dew fall all around it; and then I will doubt no more."

The next morning Gideon found the grass and the bushes and the trees wet with dew, while the fleece of wool was dry. And Gideon was now sure that God had called him, and that God would give him victory over the enemies of Israel.

The Lord said to Gideon, "Your army is too large. If Israel should win the victory, they would say, 'We won it by our own might.' Send home all those who are afraid to fight." For many of the people were frightened as they looked at the host of their enemies; and the Lord knew that these men in the battle would only hinder the rest.

So Gideon sent word through the camp, "Whoever is afraid of the enemy may go home," and twenty-two thousand people went away, leaving only ten thousand in Gideon's army. But the army was stronger though it was smaller, for the cowards had gone and only the brave men were left.

But the Lord said to Gideon, "The people are yet too many. You need only a few of the bravest and best men to fight in this battle. Bring the men down the mountain, beside the water, and I will show you there how to find the men whom you need."