Discovery BoxJudges 2:18 
Context2:18 When the Lord raised up leaders for them, the Lord was with each leader and delivered the people 1 from their enemies while the leader remained alive. The Lord felt sorry for them 2 when they cried out in agony because of what their harsh oppressors did to them. 3
Judges 4:21
Context4:21 Then Jael wife of Heber took a tent peg in one hand and a hammer in the other. 4 She crept up on him, drove the tent peg through his temple into the ground 5 while he was asleep from exhaustion, 6 and he died.
Judges 6:11
Context6:11 The Lord’s angelic messenger 7 came and sat down under the oak tree in Ophrah owned by Joash the Abiezrite. He arrived while Joash’s son Gideon 8 was threshing 9 wheat in a winepress 10 so he could hide it from the Midianites. 11
Judges 6:39
Context6:39 Gideon said to God, “Please do not get angry at me, when I ask for just one more sign. 12 Please allow me one more test with the fleece. This time make only the fleece dry, while the ground around it is covered with dew.” 13
Judges 18:17
Context18:17 The five men who had gone to spy out the land broke in and stole 14 the carved image, the ephod, the personal idols, and the metal image, while the priest was standing at the entrance to the gate with the six hundred fully armed men. 15
1 tn Heb “them”; the referent (the people) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
2 tn The phrase “for them” is supplied in the translation for clarity.
3 tn Heb “the ones oppressing them and afflicting them.” The synonyms “oppressing” and “afflicting” are joined together in the translation as “harsh oppressors” to emphasize the cruel character of their enemies.
4 tn Heb “took a tent peg and put a hammer in her hand.”
5 tn Heb “and it went into the ground.”
6 tn Heb “and exhausted.” Another option is to understand this as a reference to the result of the fatal blow. In this case, the phrase could be translated, “and he breathed his last.”
7 tn The adjective “angelic” is interpretive.
sn The
8 tn Heb “Now Gideon his son…” The Hebrew circumstantial clause (note the pattern vav [ו] + subject + predicate) breaks the narrative sequence and indicates that the angel’s arrival coincided with Gideon’s threshing.
9 tn Heb “beating out.”
10 sn Threshing wheat in a winepress. One would normally thresh wheat at the threshing floor outside the city. Animals and a threshing sledge would be employed. Because of the Midianite threat, Gideon was forced to thresh with a stick in a winepress inside the city. For further discussion see O. Borowski, Agriculture in Iron Age Israel, 63.
11 tn Heb “Midian.”
12 tn Heb “Let your anger not rage at me, so that I might speak only this once.”
13 tn Heb “let the fleece alone be dry, while dew is on all the ground.”
14 tn Heb “went up, went in there, took.”
15 tn Heb “six hundred men, equipped with the weapons of war.”
