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Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadGreater Men and Women of the Bible by James Hastings: 239. Gideon
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Literature
Beecher, H. W., Bible Studies (1893), 367.
Brown, J. B., The Sunday Afternoon (1871), 202.
Chapman, J. W., And Judas Iscariot (1910), 113.
Cooke, G. A., The Book of Judges (Cambridge Bible) (1913), 68.
Cumming, J. E., Scripture Photographs, 154.
Dods, M., Israel's Iron Age (1875), 31.
Elmslie, W. G., Expository Lectures and Sermons (1892), 3.
Horne, C. S., The Rock of Ages (1901), 137.
Lang, J. M., Gideon and the Judges (1890), 81.
Leach, C., Old yet ever New (1893), 133, 191, 210.
Lewis, H. E., in Men of the Old Testament: Cain to David (1904), 197.
Lias, J. J., The Book of Judges (Cambridge Bible) (1882), 98.
Maclaren, A., Expositions: Deuteronomy, etc. (1906), 225.
Matheson, G., The Representative Men of the Bible, ii. (1903) 150.
Merson, D., Words of Life (1889), 242.
Milligan, G., Lamps and Pitchers (1896), 9.
Moore, G. F., Judges (International Critical Commentary) (1895), 173.
Morgan, R. C., The Cross in the Old Testament (1908), 50.
Morrison, G. H., The Footsteps of the Flock (1904), 113.
Murphy, J. B. C., The Service of the Master (1897), 136, 143.
Newbolt, W. C. E., Words of Exhortation (1900), 339.
Purves, P. C., The Jehovah Titles of the Old Testament (1911), 36.
Selby, T. G., The God of the Patriarchs (1904), 257.
Stanley, A. P., Lectures on the History of the Jewish Church, i. (1889) 300.
Talmage, T. de W., Fifty Sermons, ii. (1874) 159.
Thatcher, G. W., Judges and Ruth (Century Bible), 74.
Waller, C. H., The Names on the Gates of Pearl (1903), 238.
Wharton, M. B., Famous Men of the Old Testament (1903), 115.
Whyte, A., Bible Characters: Gideon to Absalom (1898), 9.
Windross, H., The Life Victorious (1905), 267.
Wright, W. B., The World to Come (1896), 88.
Christian Age, xliv. (1893) 402 (C. H. Parkhurst).
Christian World Pulpit, lxii. (1902) 217 (R. F. Horton); lxxii. (1907) 116 (J. H. Ward); lxxvi. (1909) 197 (A. Hearn); lxxvii. (1910) 301 (J. G. Bowran).
Preacher's Magazine, v. (1894) 513 (J. T. Hamly).
1. The writer of the Book of Judges has preserved scarcely any information regarding the life of Gideon, except that which belongs to one very brief period of it-the period of a few days during which he gathered an army, attacked the Midianites, and drove them out of the land. And the story is told in an extremely complicated narrative. Two main documents can be traced, but these have been so interwoven, both before and after the Deuteronomic redaction of Judges, that the analysis in detail must be regarded more as a critical experiment than as possessing any degree of certainty.
2. Gideon was evidently a man of great influence in Central Palestine. His own personal character is more clearly delineated than that of any other hero except Samson, whose life is of quite another character. Above even his simple straightforwardness and his courage stands his religious nature. He receives from Jehovah's angel the call to deliver his tribe. One of his earliest deeds is the destruction of the altar of Baal, after he has erected one to Jehovah. Four traditions are recorded as to his intercourse with Jehovah and desire to know His will (Jdg_6:36; Jdg_7:2; Jdg_7:4; Jdg_7:9); and when he had crushed the Midianites he devoted his share of the spoil to making an ephod by which Jehovah might be consulted. The traditions here, as in other cases, were doubtless collected from different quarters. Some of them were told of Jerubbaal, so that the collector in Jdg_7:1 feels it necessary to explain in one of those which he is using that Jerubbaal is Gideon. There are two distinct sets of traditions in Jdg_7:1-25; Jdg_8:1-35, the one telling how he led the Hebrews against the Midianites under Oreb and Zeeb, how he conquered them and saved his people; the other (Jdg_8:4) telling how he and the men of his family (Abiezer) pursued Zebah and Zalmunna to exact blood-revenge, because they had killed his brothers. Although in the story of Jdg_8:22. Gideon is said to have declined to rule over his people, it is evident from the story of Abimelech that he had exercised a recognized authority, of such a character that his family might be expected to continue it after him.