Study Desk

and build an altar to Yahweh your God on the top of this stronghold in the proper arrangement, and take a second bull and offer it as a burnt offering with the wood of the Asherah that you will cut down.

But Jehoash said to all who stood against him, "Will you contend for Baal? Will you rescue him? Whoever contends for him will be put to death by the morning. If he is a god, let him contend for himself because his altar has been pulled down."

Then Gideon said to God, "In order to see that you will deliver Israel by my hand, just as you have said,

And Gideon said to God, "Do not let your anger burn against me; let me speak once more. Please let me test once more with the fleece; let the fleece be dry, and let there be dew on the ground."

And God did so that night; only the fleece was dry, and dew was on all the ground.

His friend answered him and said, "This cannot be anything except the sword of Gideon son of Jehoash, a man of Israel; God has given Midian and the entire camp into his hand."

God has given into your hand the commanders of Midian, Oreb, and Zeeb. What have I been able to do in comparison with you?" And their anger against him subsided when he said that.

And it happened, as soon as Gideon died, the Israelites returned and prostituted themselves after the Baals, and they made for themselves Baal-Berith as god.

The Israelites did not remember Yahweh their God, who had delivered them from the hand of their enemies from all around,

And they told Jotham, and he went up and stood on the top of Mount Gerizim, and he cried out loud and said to them, "Listen to me, lords of Shechem, so that God may listen to you.

And God sent an evil spirit between Abimelech and the lords of Shechem, and the lords of Shechem dealt treacherously with Abimelech,

They went out into the field and harvested their vineyards and trod them, and they held a festival. And they went into the temple of their god, and they ate and drank and cursed Abimelech.

So God repaid the wickedness that Abimelech committed against his father by killing his seventy brothers.

And God also repaid all the wickedness of the men of Shechem on their heads, and the curse of Jotham son of Jerub-Baal fell on them.

Then the Israelites cried out to Yahweh, saying, "We have sinned against you; we have abandoned our God and served the Baals."

And Yahweh, the God of Israel, gave Sihon and all his people into the hand of Israel, and they defeated them; and Israel occupied all the land of the Amorites inhabiting that land.

So then Yahweh, the God of Israel, has driven out the Amorites from before his people Israel, and you want to possess it?

Do you not possess what Chemosh your god gave you to possess? Whoever Yahweh our God has driven out before us, we will possess it.

because you will conceive and bear a son. No razor will touch his head, because the boy will be a Nazirite of God from birth. And it is he who will begin to deliver Israel from the hand of the Philistines."

And the woman came and told her husband, saying, "A man of God came to me, and his appearance was like the appearance of an angel of God, very awesome. I did not ask him from where he came, and he did not tell me his name.