tribe of Gad, near Jordan, not far from the lake of Gennesareth, where it discharges itself into that river,) they inhospitably refused him, adding insult to the refusal: "Is the palm of Zeba and Zalmunna yet in thine hand, that we should give bread to thine army?" ridiculing his attempt to reduce the Midianites with so small a force; and he received a like refusal, in his progress, from the men of Penuel; instead of chastizing their rebellious spirit on the spot, he coolly told both, that he would do so on his return: which he did as he had promised: he scourged to death the princes and elders of Succoth; coming upon them by surprise, before the sun was up; and he beat down the tower of Penuel, and slew the men of the city, by a severe punishment, but a wholesome example, viii. 4-17.

When the men of Israel unanimously offered to make him king, and to continue the crown in his family, for this great deliverance, thus setting aside the Theocracy; he nobly and religiously refused the tempting offer: "I will not rule over you, neither shall my son rule over you: THE LORD shall rule over you." viii. 22, 23.

Though Gideon refused to violate the civil constitution of the government, yet he made a material innovation in the religious establishment. He was probably induced, by the altar which the LORD required him to build at Ophrah, on the rock where he had accepted his sacrifice, to think that this might be the place which THE LORD so often declared in the law, that "He would choose for his name," or his worship; and who often styled himself "THE ROCK;" especially after he had commissioned Gideon to throw down the altar of Baal there. And the ephod which Gideon made out of the golden ear-rings of the spoils of the Ishmaelites, willingly given him by his army, on his request; (not unlike Aaron, Exod. xxxii. 2,) seems to have included not only "the priests' dress," as the word signifies, but also a sacerdotal establishment in his own town, where sacrifices might be regularly performed, and for which purpose a considerable sum of money would be requisite, such as the amount of the offerings, 1700 shekels of gold; which at the rate of £1 16s. 6d. a piece, according to Arbuthnot's Tables, amounted to £3102 10s. sterling *.-And such establishments

* See the excellent tables of the weights, measures, and coins of Scripture, prefixed to the book of Exodus, in the second volume of Bible de Chais.

had been made elsewhere during the anarchy, by Micah, in Mount Ephraim, Judges xvii. 5-13; and by the Danites at Laish, or Dan, xviii. 29–31. This establishment, however, infringing on that at Shiloh, Josh. xviii. 1, proved a “snare to Gideon and his family," or a seduction to idolatry, in worshipping the true God in an improper manner; and "all Israel went thither a whoring after it;" as they did after Gideon's death, relapsing into the worship of false gods; when "they went a whoring after Baalim," the celestial luminaries; " and made Baal Berith their god," or, rather, "their goddess;" for the moon was worshipped in Phoenicia, under the title of Bnpour, Beruth, at Berytus, as we learn from Sanchoniatho.

There is, indeed, reason to think, that Gideon himself acted as a priest of this establishment; as he had formerly done, by the divine direction, when he sacrificed his father's second bullock of seven years old, (coeval with the Midianite servitude,) upon the altar to THE LORD HIS GOD, built in the appointed place. For the title of Jerubbaal, given him by his father, (or by the people, in consequence of his father's vindication,) signifying, "Let Baal plead [against him,] because he had thrown down his altar," is afterwards in Scripture contemptuously parodied into Jerubbeseth; Beseth signifying "shame," 2 Sam. xi. 21; as if Gideon had been the promoter of that "shameful" idolatry of Baal, which prevailed among the Ephraimites; censured by Hosea, ix. 10; and among the Jews, censured by Jeremiah, xi. 13. In both these passages Beseth is synonymous with, or set in apposition to Baal.

And this seems to be supported by Heathen testimony: for Sanchoniatho, the Phoenician historian, (who is said by Eusebius to have lived before the Trojan war, and who, therefore, might have been contemporary with Gideon, whose administration began 166 years before it,) is said by Porphyry to have drawn some of his materials "from the commentaries furnished by Jerombal, the priest of the god, IAO." But Jerombal is easily formed from Jerubbaal, by changing the first B into M †; and

most

Among the Phoenicians there is a god called Extovy, (phy,) ikitos, high," and a goddess called Bnpour, (,) who lived about Byblus," namely, at Berytus, which is midway between Byblus and Sidon. Bochart, Vol. I. p. 775.

Thus, the name of the hornet, zimb, in Arabic, is evidently formed from the Hebrew zebub, zebbub, or zemb-ub; the various readings, Raiphan, or Rephan, gave Remphan, the dog-star, Acts vii. 43. Sambuca, a musical instrument, from the Syriac Sabuca, or the Chaidee, Dan. iii. 7, &c.

the commentaries in question might be the books of Moses, especially Genesis; which Sanchoniatho might have obtained from Gideon, his neighbour; and from which, he evidently borrowed, and metamorphosed his cosmogony. This is the ingenious conjecture of Bochart, Vol. I. p. 171, &c. De Sanchoniathone. Gideon's administration lasted forty years.

ABIMELECH.

By his numerous wives, Gideon left seventy sons, and by his concubine of Sichem, (a city of Ephraim,) a spurious son, Abimelech, who artfully seduced his townsmen from their allegiance, and slew all his brethren, except the youngest, Jotham; having hired assassins, with money given him by the favourers of idolatry, out of the treasury of the temple of Baal berith :-" the Sechemites thus shewing no kindness to the house of Gideon, in return for all his goodness and his services to Israel," Judges viii. 35, ix. 1-6.

For this ingratitude they were indignantly upbraided in these animated terms by Jotham :-"My father fought for you, and ventured his life far, and delivered you out of the hand of Midian: And ye have risen up against my father's house, this day, and have slain his sons, threescore and ten persons, upon one stone; and have made Abimelech the son of his concubine, king over the men of Sechem, because he is your brother."And in the oldest and most beautiful apologue of antiquity extant, the trees chusing a king; with the mild and unassuming dispositions of his pious and honourable brethren, declining, like their father, we may suppose, the crown, when offered to them, perhaps, successively; under the imagery of " the olive tree, the fig tree, and the vine;" he pointedly contrasts the upstart ambition and arrogance of the wicked and turbulent Abimelech, represented by the bramble; inviting his new and nobler subjects, the cedars of Lebanon, to put their trust in his pigmy shadow, which they did not want, and he was unable to afford them; but threatening them, imperiously, on their refusal, to send forth a fire from himself to devour those cedars: whereas the fire of the bramble was short and momentary, even to a proverb, Psalm lviii. 9, Eccl. vii. 6.

The application is thus given: "If ye have dealt truly and faithfully with Jerubbaal and his house, this day, then rejoice

ye in Abimelech," or enjoy the benefits of his government; and "let him also rejoice in you," and in your fidelity: but if notif ye have dealt ungratefully and unfaithfully with the house of Jerubbaal,-may fire come forth from Abimelech and devour the men of Sechem, and their abettors, and contrariwise; or let intestine war consume both parties!-The name Jerubbaal is well chosen here, to mark their deliverance from Pagan idolatry, by his means; for which he got the title; and the result verified the prophetic imprecation, in the total destruction, by Abimelech, of the city and tower, of Shechem, which had revolted from him; and in his own destruction at the siege of Thebez, in its neighbourhood, when his skull was fractured by the blow of a millstone, let fall on him by a woman from the walls *.-" Thus God retaliated the wickedness of Abimelech against his father, in slaying his seventy brethren; and all the wickedness of the men of Shechem did GOD retaliate upon their heads. And upon them [both] came the curse of Jotham the son of Jerubbaal."-It is remarkable, that a stone avenged the death of his brethren, slain upon "one stone," the rock, perhaps, whereon Gideon had erected the altar to THE LORD.-And his usurpation was short, only three years; "the LORD sending an eril spirit between Abimelech and the men of Shechem," for their mutual and speedier destruction, ix. 7--57.

TOLA AND JAIR.

Abimelech was succeeded by Tola, of the tribe of Issachar, who dwelt in Mount Ephraim; who judged Israel twenty-three years; and after him arose Jair, a Gileadite, [of eastern Manasseh,] who judged Israel twenty-two years, and was the first Transjordanite judge. His opulence is noticed, in having thirty sons who rode on young asses, Judges x. 1-5. The administration of these judges having been peaceable, is despatched in a few lines the sacred historian designing principally to record the calamities which the Israelites drew on themselves by their apostacies to the idolatries of the neighbouring nations, and their providential deliverances upon their repentance and return to the Lord their God. After the calm of these administrations,

"And a certain woman cast a piece of a milstone upon Abimelech's head, and allto, (i. e. altogether, or entirely,) brake his scull." Jud. ix. 53. The word al-to, is so used by Chaucer, Spenser, and Milton.

they multiplied their idolatries, which drew on them the Ammonite servitude, for eighteen years, which was particularly severe upon the Transjordanite tribes, x. 6-9.

The following admirable expostulation of THE LORD with his penitent people, and his tender compassion on their return to him, is conceived in the spirit of the DIVINE ODE, and furnishes the finest commentary thereon.

"Did not I deliver you from the Egyptians? and from the Amorites? and from the children of Ammon? and from the Philistines? the Sidonians also, and the Amalekites, and the Maonites, [perhaps Midianites,] oppressed you, and ye cried unto Me, and I delivered you out of their hand. Nevertheless, ye have forsaken ME, and served other gods: Wherefore I will deliver you no more.

"Go and cry unto the gods which ye have chosen: Let them deliver you, in the time of your tribulation!

"And the children of Israel said unto THE LORD, We have sinned: Do thou unto us whatsoever seemeth good in thine eyes: Only deliver us, we pray thee, this day:

"And they put away the strange gods from among them, and served THE LORD.

"And His soul was grieved for the misery of Israel," x.

10-16.

JEPHTHAH.

"This mighty man of valour," endued with "the spirit of THE LORD," like Gideon, was a Gileadite, raised up to be the deliverer of his country; who was elected captain in the war against Ammon, by the elders of Gilead.

After his election had been solemnly ratified before the Lord at Mizpeh of Gilead, he sent messengers to demand of the king of Ammon why he invaded his land? who answered, to recover the land taken from his ancestors by the Israelites, on their way from Egypt; of which, therefore, he required peaceable restitution. Jephthah, in his reply, refused to surrender them, upon the following grounds: 1. He denied the title of the Ammonites thereto; for that the Israelites took these lands

This was "Mizpeh of Moab," on the east side of Jordan, where probably there was an established altar of the Lord, 1 Sam. xxii. 3, as distinguished from the western Mixpeh of Benjamin, Josh. xviii. 26, Judg. xxi. 1, 1 Sam. vii. 5, x. 17, &c.