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Bible Dictionaries
Gideon
People's Dictionary of the Bible
or Gideon (gĭd'e-on), he that cuts down. youngest son of Joash, whose family lived at Ophrah, Judges 6:15, in the territory of Manasseh, near Shechem. He was the fifth and greatest recorded judge of Israel. He had sons, Judges 6:11; Judges 8:22; and was called by an angel to be a deliverer of Israel. Judges 6:1-40. Clothed by the Spirit of God, Judges 6:34; comp. 1 Chronicles 12:18, he blew a trumpet and was joined by Zebulun, Naphtali and even the reluctant Asher. Strengthened by a double sign from God, he reduced his army by the usual proclamation. Deuteronomy 20:1; Deuteronomy 20:8. By a second test at "the spring of trembling" he further reduced the number of his followers to 300. Judges 7:5. ff, The midnight attack upon the Midianites, their panic, and the rout and slaughter that followed, are told in Judges 7:1-25. The memory of this splendid deliverance took deep root in the national traditions. 1 Samuel 12:11; Psalms 83:11; Isaiah 9:4; Isaiah 10:26; Hebrews 11:32. After this there was a peace of forty years, Judges 8:29-31. He refused the crown. Judges 8:23.
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Rice, Edwin Wilbur, DD. Entry for 'Gideon'. People's Dictionary of the Bible. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/rpd/g/gideon.html. 1893.
