Gidon
d. c. 1100 BCE · Biblical era · Jezreel Valley
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Gidon son of Yoash, of the Abiezrite clan of Menashe, led Israel against the Midianites, who for seven years had swept in after the sowing and stripped the land of its produce and livestock (Judges 6:1-6). An angel found him threshing wheat in a winepress to hide it and called him a 'valiant warrior'. Gidon protested that his clan was the humblest in Menashe and he the youngest in his family (Judges 6:11-15). At God's command he tore down his father's altar to Baal by night. When the townspeople demanded his death, his father answered, 'If he is a god, let him fight his own battles', and Gidon was nicknamed Jerubbaal (Judges 6:25-32). He asked for signs with a fleece, wet and then dry (Judges 6:36-40). God reduced his army from thousands to three hundred men. These men surprised the Midianite camp at night with horns, jars and torches, and the camp fled in panic (Judges 7:2-22). Afterwards he refused to become king, saying 'GOD alone shall rule over you'. But the gold ephod he made from the spoil became 'a snare' to Israel (Judges 8:22-27). He died at a ripe old age (Judges 8:32).
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Jezreel ValleyNorthern Israel
What they did here
Midian and its allies camped in the Valley of Jezreel (Judges 6:33). Gidon camped above the spring of Harod, with Midian to the north by the hill of Moreh (Judges 7:1). The spring's traditional identification at the foot of Gilboa is disputed, so the pin marks the valley. His home town, Ophrah of the Abiezrites (Judges 6:11, 24; 8:32), is unidentified and not pinned.
The world in their lifetime
Thinkers, teachers, and rulers whose lives overlapped with Gidon’s — a glimpse of the wider world they lived in. Drawn from recorded birth and death years (reign years for rulers whose lives are undated); where only one end of a life is known, a span of about 70 years is assumed.
Jewish world
- Devorah (the Judge-Prophetess)· 1200 BCE–1124 BCE
- Naomi (of Megillat Rus)· b. 1190 BCE
- Boaz of Beit Lechem· b. 1180 BCE
- Barak ben Avinoam· b. 1160 BCE
- Yael eshet Chever HaKeini (Jael)· b. 1160 BCE
- Rut HaMoaviah (Ruth the Moabite)· b. 1155 BCE
- Shimshon ben Manoach (Samson)· 1110 BCE–1070 BCE
- Eli HaKohen· 1108 BCE–1028 BCE
- Chana (mother of Shmuel)· b. 1100 BCE
- Yiftach HaGiladi (Jephthah the Gileadite)· d. 1090 BCE
- Ehud ben Gera (the left-handed Judge)· d. 1150 BCE
Egyptian world
Works
No works attributed in the corpus yet.