Commentaria in Judices
It could also be rendered more forcefully from the Hebrew thus: The boyish efforts of Ephraim are perhaps greater than the onset of Abiezer, that is, than mine. For the Hebrew oleloth signifies boyish thoughts, efforts, and works, from oleb, that is, a boy. Moreover, Gedeon was sprung from the family of Abiezer, who was the great-grandson of Manasses.
4. AND WHEN GEDEON WAS COME TO THE JORDAN, HE PASSED OVER IT WITH THE THREE HUNDRED MEN.—This is a hysterologia, for Gedeon had already crossed the Jordan before, since the heads of Oreb and Zeb were brought to him there, as was said in the last verse of the preceding chapter. Here, however, he narrates his crossing of the Jordan in order to recount where and in what manner he pursued the fugitives and slew them, namely beyond the Jordan.
5. AND HE SAID TO THE MEN OF SOCCOTH.—The place or city was so called because Jacob, coming from Mesopotamia, had pitched his tents there. For this is what Soccoth means in Hebrew, Gen. 33:17. Hence it is clear that Gedeon crossed the Jordan near the Sea of Galilee, at the place where the Jordan comes out of that sea, and it is therefore larger than it was before, where it first flows into this sea; for at the Jordan’s exit from the sea lies Soccoth, in the tribe of Gad.
6. PERHAPS THE PALMS OF THE HANDS OF ZEBEE AND SALMANA ARE IN THY HANDS, AND THEREFORE THOU DEMANDEST THAT WE SHOULD GIVE BREAD TO THY ARMY.—“Palms,” that is, the hollows of the hands, that is, the hands themselves. It is sarcasm, as if to say: You seem, O Gedeon, to speak imperiously to us, as though you had already conquered Zebee and Salmana and were leading them captive before you with their hands bound behind their backs; but you have not yet conquered them, that you should dare to ask bread of us. Plainly you presume in vain that with three hundred only you will defeat fifteen thousand, which they themselves lead.
7. I WILL TEAR (in Hebrew, that is, I will thresh) YOUR FLESH WITH THORNS AND BRIERS.—For “briers” the Hebrew is barkanim, which signifies the sharpest thorns or briers, which, like lightning, pierce and hurt the eyes, as these do the body; for barac signifies lightning. Again, barkanim by metathesis alludes to accrabim, that is, scorpions. Thus large, sharp thorns were so called, which tore and lacerated the flesh of martyrs like scorpions, venomous animals. Hear Isidore, book 6 of the Etymologies, last chapter: “Rods are the extremities of leaves and trees: if smooth, it is a rod; but if knotted or barbed, it is most rightly called a scorpion, because it wounds with a curved stroke”
With these briers or scorpions, then, they struck offenders even to death, and therefore often laid them on the ground and threshed them there by scourging, as grain is threshed. Some think this threshing was done by driving iron-shod wagons over them (with these also they threshed and shook out the grains), as David did to the Ammonites, 2 Kings 12, last verse; but no mention is made here of these wagons. For it is said only that he threshed them with briers, as the Belgians thresh wheat with flails.
8. AND HE WENT UP TO PHANUEL.—A place near Soccoth, so called by Jacob, because there, wrestling with the Angel, he said: “I have seen the Lord face to face, and my soul hath been saved,” Gen. 32:30. For Phanuel in Hebrew is the same as the face of the strong one, that is, of God.
9. I WILL BREAK DOWN THIS TOWER,—which the men of Phanuel had built, that they might flee to it when an enemy attacked, thinking themselves safe in it, and therefore answering Gedeon proudly, they refused him bread for the support of the army. Abulensis adds, Question 11, that the men of Phanuel, when Gedeon threatened them with death, answered that they made nothing of his threats, that this tower stood for them against them; and Gedeon then added that he would destroy not only them but the tower as well.
10. NOW ZEBEE AND SALMANA (the leaders of Madian) WERE RESTING WITH ALL THEIR ARMY BEYOND THE JORDAN,—and therefore, not fearing Gedeon, by whom they had been slain on this side of the Jordan, but being secure, Gedeon fell upon them unexpectedly, secure and unprepared as they were, and slew them. The Septuagint, the Hebrew, and the Chaldee add that they rested in Carcar, of which St. Jerome writes thus in Locis Hebr.: “Carcar, where the sons of Zebee and Salmana were, seems to have crept in, and therefore should be deleted; and to this day there is a fortress called Carcaria, a day’s journey distant from Petra.” Petra is a city of Arabia, from which Arabia Petraea was named, in the region of Moab, with which the tribe of Ruben bordered.
FOR FIFTEEN THOUSAND MEN WERE LEFT (who had escaped the slaughter of the Madianites carried out by Gedeon in the preceding chapter), ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY THOUSAND FIGHTING MEN HAVING BEEN SLAIN.—Hence it is clear that the camp of Madian had 135 thousand fighting men, besides camp servants, sutlers, slaves, and the rest of the unwarlike crowd, of whom 120 thousand were slain by Gedeon and his companions, while fifteen thousand escaped, who were here slain by the same. Josephus wrongly has eighteen thousand instead of fifteen.
11. AND GEDEON WENT UP BY THE WAY OF THEM THAT DWELT IN TENTS,—that is, of the Arabs, who from this are called Scenites; for scene is a tent, so called from the Hebrew sachan, that is, he dwelt; because these Arabs have no fixed houses, but wandering from one region which they have grazed, pass with their tents into another nearby, and graze that likewise; for they abound in camels, horses, and cattle. Hence they are also called Nomads (for nemein is to pasture), of whom Pliny, book 6, chap. 27, and Strabo, book 16. Hence Gedeon did not go by the direct way, but from behind attacked these Scenite Arabs, the camp of Zebee and Salmana, to fall on them suddenly and crush them while thinking nothing of the kind, since in this matter he showed himself eminently skilled in warfare and stratagems.
13. BEFORE THE SUN WAS UP.—In Hebrew the words literally are: from the ascent of the sun, as Pagninus renders it in his Lexicon, that is, before the ascent (that is, the rising) of the sun, as Vatablus renders it: wherefore Lyranus, Arias, Cajetan, and others less correctly render it, the sun being above, as though the sun had already risen, as Arias wishes, or as though it were midday, when the ascent of the sun is completed, as Cajetan thinks, or as though it were evening before sunset, as R. David and Lyranus conjecture. For although in Daniel 6:20 “the ascent of the sun” is called “the setting of the sun,” yet that is a Chaldaic phrase, the language in which the book of Daniel was written. For in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin phrase the ascent of the sun signifies the rising of the sun, when the sun ascends above the horizon, says Vatablus. Note here again the stratagem of Gedeon, by which at night, before sunrise, he attacks and slays the enemy buried in sleep and wine.
16. HE THRESHED.—In Hebrew it is yoda, that is, he made to know, namely by scourges and blows, that is, he chastised, he punished. So a master threatening a petulant pupil with the rod says: With these I will teach thee, that is, I will chastise thee, although Serarius thinks that instead of yoda we should read yadash, that is, he threshed. For so it is read in verse 7.
18. AND HE SAID (Gedeon) TO ZEBEE AND SALMANA: WHAT MANNER OF MEN WERE THEY WHOM YOU SLEW IN THABOR?—Gedeon had heard that his own brothers, born of the same mother, had fled to Mount Thabor, as was usual, when the Madianites threatened; he had heard likewise that some had been slain there by the Madianites; he therefore suspected that his brothers had been slain, and his suspicion was true, as is clear from verse 19.
THEY ANSWERED: THEY WERE LIKE THEE (for brothers are not seldom like their brothers, as well as their parents), AND ONE OF THEM LIKE THE SON OF A KING.—The sense is plain and clear, namely that one of them had a more distinguished, exceptional, and regal countenance. Some, however, explain it thus: “one,” that is, each “of them,” was of so elegant a form that he seemed to be the son of a king. Hence the Septuagint in the Roman Codex has: As thou, so they, in the likeness of the son of a king. The Complutensian and the Royal: As thou, so they, thou art like them, of such appearance as the sons of kings.