Musar sobre Jueces 6:11

And in Tanchuma, on the verse (Devarim 16:18): "And they shall judge the people [with] a righteous judgment": R. Yehuda b. R. Shalom said: 'They should "incline" [judgment] and impute merit to them before the Holy One Blessed be He. From whom do we learn this? From Gideon the son of Yoash, in whose days Israel was [steeped] in suffering, and the Holy One Blessed be He sought a man who would impute merit to them and could not find one, the generation being poor in mitzvoth and in [virtuous] deeds. When merit was found in Gideon, who imputed merit to them, immediately the angels appeared to him, as it is written (Judges 6:11): 'And an angel of the L-rd came' [to Gideon] … and (Ibid. 14): '…and He said: "Go, with this your strength and save Israel, etc."', with this strength of your having imputed merit to My children, this being the thrust of 'And they shall judge the people [with] a righteous judgment, that they shall impute merit to the generation.'" From all of this, we can understand the eminence of one who "imputes merit," before the Holy One Blessed be He. And he [Gideon] afterwards became the chariot for the light of the holy sanctuary, which was called "the sanctuary of merit," where the merits of Israel were brought to remembrance, as we find in Sefer Charedim.