¹ tn Or “served”; or “followed.”

² tn Or perhaps “elders,” which could be interpreted to mean “leaders.”

³ tn Heb “all the days of Joshua and all the days of the old men who outlived him, who had seen.”

⁴ tn Heb “the great work of the Lord which he had done for Israel.”

⁵ tn Or “fathers.”

⁶ tn Or “bowed before” (the same expression occurs in the following verse).

⁷ tn Heb “was on him.”

⁸ tn Heb “his hand was strong against Cushan-Rishathaim.”

⁹ tn Heb “Arise!”

¹⁰ tn The verb form (a Hebrew perfect, indicating completed action from the standpoint of the speaker) emphasizes the certainty of the event. Though it had not yet taken place, the Lord speaks of it as a “done deal.”

¹¹ tn Heb “Has the Lord not gone out before you?”

¹² tn Heb “extended the tip of the staff which was in his hand and touched the meat and unleavened bread.”

¹³ tn Heb “went from his eyes.”

¹⁴ tn Heb “The Lord is peace.” Gideon’s name for the altar plays on the Lord’s reassuring words to him, “Peace to you.”

¹⁵ tn The conjunction “since” is supplied in the translation for clarification.

¹⁶ tn Heb “you opened your mouth to the Lord, do to me according to [what] went out from your mouth.”

¹⁷ tn Or “has given you vengeance against.”

¹⁸ tn The Hebrew text adds “and said.” This has not been included in the translation for stylistic reasons.

¹⁹ tn Heb “the man of God.”

²⁰ tn Heb “come to.”

²¹ tc The LXX has “enlighten,” understanding the Hebrew to read וִיאִירֵנוּ (vi’irenu, “to give light”) rather than the reading of the MT, וְיוֹרֵנוּ (vÿyorenu, “to teach”).

²² tn Heb “what we should do for.”

²³ tc Heb “Doing an extraordinary deed while Manoah and his wife were watching.” The subject of the participle is missing. The translation assumes that the phrase “the Lord’s messenger” was lost by homoioteleuton. If the text originally read לַיהוָה מַלְאַךְ יְהוָה (layhavah mal’akh yÿhvah), the scribe’s eye could have jumped from the first יְהוָה to the second, accidentally omitting two of the three words. Later the conjunction וּ (shureq) would have been added to the following מַפְלִא (mafli’) for syntactical reasons. Another possibility is that a pronominal subject (הוּא, hu’) has been lost in the MT due to haplography.

²⁴ tn Heb “Then Manoah knew that he was the Lord’s messenger.”

²⁵ tn The Hebrew has אֲדֹנָי יֱהֹוִה (’adonay yehovih, “Lord Yahweh”).

²⁶ tn Heb “so I can get revenge with one act of vengeance.”

²⁷ tn Heb “and all the people.”

²⁸ tn Heb “went up and came [to].”

²⁹ map For location see Map4 G4; Map5 C1; Map6 E3; Map7 D1; Map8 G3.

³⁰ tn Traditionally, “fasted.”

³¹ tn Or “peace offerings.”

³² tn Heb “A great oath there was concerning the one who did not go up before the Lord at Mizpah, saying, ‘He must surely be put to death.’”