이사야 9:3의 타나크

Yerubaal—Gidon, rose early, with all the people who accompanied him, and they camped at Ein Charod. The Midyonite camp was situated north of signal valley ridge. Adonoy said to Gidon, "There are too many people with you for me to deliver the Midyonites into their hands, lest the Yisroelites glorify themselves above me by saying, 'My hand has brought me salvation." Now, please announce in the ears of the people, saying: 'Anyone trembling with fear may return in the morning from Mount Gilod.'" Twenty two thousand of the people returned, ten thousand remained. Adonoy then said to Gidon, "There are still too many people. Lead them down to the water, where I shall purge them for you there. And it shall be; when I say to you this one goes with you, he will go with you. And when I say to you this one does not go with you, he will not go." He led the people down to the water. Adonoy said to Gidon, "Anyone who laps up the water with his tongue, the way dogs lap, set aside—anyone who bends forward while on his knees to drink [should also be set aside.]" The number of those who lapped from hand to mouth: were three hundred men. All the rest of the people bent forward while on their knees to drink water. Adonoy said to Gidon, "With the three hundred man who lap up I will save you, and deliver Midyon into your hand. All the people may go, each of them to his place." They took the people's provisions in hand, and their shofars. He sent all the rest of the men of Yisroel, each of them to his tent, and retained the three hundred men. The Midyonite camp was in the valley below. It happened that night: Adonoy commanded him, "Rise up, and swoop down on the camp, for I have delivered it into your hand. If you are too frightened to descend, go down alone with your page, Purah to the camp. Listen to what they are saying, and afterward, be firm handed, and swoop down on the camp." He went down alone, with his page, Purah, to the periphery of the armed men at the camp. Midyon, Amoleik, and all the Eastern peoples lay in the valley, as thick as locusts. Their camels were innumerable, as abundant as sand at the sea beach. Gidon came close, and behold a man was describing a dream to his friend. He said, "Look, I had a dream, and there was a toasted barley bread careening into the Midyonite camp; It reached a tent and hit it, and it collapsed. Then it overturned it, and the tent flattened." His friend replied, saying, "This can be nothing but the sword of Gidon ben Yoash, the man of Yisroel. Adonoy has delivered into his hand Midyon and the entire camp." Now, when Gidon heard the recounting of the dream and its interpretation, he prostrated himself. He returned to the Yisroelite camp, and said, "Rise up, for Adonoy has delivered into your hands the Midyonite camp." He deployed the three hundred men into three divisions, and placed shofars in the hands of all of them. Also, empty pitchers, and torches in the pitchers. He told them, "Watch me, and follow suit. See, when I reach the periphery of the camp; then, do exactly as I do. When I sound the shofar blast—I, and everyone with me—you sound the shofars as well, around the entire perimeter of the camp, and shout, 'For Adonoy, and for Gidon!" Gidon and the hundred men with him reached the periphery of the camp at the beginning of the middle guard, when they had just posted the sentries. They sounded the shofar blasts, and smashed the pitchers in their hands. The three divisions sounded the shofar blasts and smashed the pitchers. They grasped the torches with their left hands, and the shofars with their right hands to sound the shofar blasts, and they cried, "The sword for Adonoy and for Gidon!." Each of them stood his ground around the perimiter of the camp. The entire camp was put to rout—they sounded the alarm, and fled. They sounded three hundred shofar blasts. Adonoy impaled them on each other's swords throughout the camp. The camp fled to Beis Hashitah, at Tsereiras, until the periphery of Avel Mecholah, adjoining Tabas. The Yisroelites mobilized from Naftoli, Osher, and all of Menasheh, and pursued Midyon. Gidon dispatched couriers throughout Mount Ephraim, saying: "Descend toward Midyon, and capture the waters against them until Beis Barah, and the Yardein." And all the men of Ephraim gathered together and captured the waters until Beis Barah, and the Yardein. They captured two Midyonite warlords, Orev and Z'ev. They executed Orev at Tzur Orev, and executed Z'ev at Yekev Z'ev. The pursuit reached Midyon. They brought the skulls of Orev and Z'ev to Gidon, across the Yardein.

The men of Ephraim said to him, "What have you done to us, not calling on us when you went to war with Midyon?" They argued with him vehemently. He replied to them, "Can any action of mine compare with yours? Do not Ephraim's underripened gleanings surpass Aviezer's harvest? Into your hands Adonoy delivered the Midyonite warlords, Orev and Z'ev, so what could I have done to compare with you?" Their fury towards him was then assuaged, by this rebuttal. Gidon reached the Yardein. He crossed, with the three hundred men accompanying him, exhausted in pursuit. He said to the people of Succos, "Please give some loaves of bread to the people at my heels, as they are exhausted, and I am pursuing Zevach and Tzalmuna, the Midyonite kings." The leaders of Succos said, "Are the palms of Zevach and of Tzalmuna presently in your hands, that we must give your forces bread?" Gidon retorted, "For this, when Adonoy delivers Zevach and Tzalmuna into my hand, I shall pummel your flesh with cactus spines and thorns." He ascended from there to Penueil, and made a similar appeal to them; the people of Penueil responded as the people of Succos had responded. He replied to the people of Penueil as well, saying, "Upon my peaceful return, I shall demolish this tower." Zevach and Tzalmuna were at Karkor, accompanied by their camps, approximately fifteen thousand men—all the survivors of the entire camp of the Eastern peoples. Those that fell numbered one hundred and twenty thousand swordsmen. Gidon ascended by way of the tent dwellers east of Novach and Yagbeha. He struck down the camp while the camp seemed secure. Zevach and Tzalmuna fled, and he pursued them. He captured the two Midyonite kings, Zevach and Tzalmuna, terrorizing the entire camp. Gidon ben Yoash returned from the wars, with the sun high. He arrested a youngster of the people of Succos, and interrogated him. He listed, for him, the leaders and elders of Succos, seventy seven men. He approached the people of Succos, and said, "Here are Zevach and Tzalmuna, concerning whom you mocked me, saying, 'Are the palms of Zevach and Tzalmuna presently in your hands, that we must give your exhausted men bread?'" He seized the city elders, and the cactus spines and thorns, and tore at the men of Succos with them. He demolished the tower of Penueil, and executed the people of the city. He then said to Zevach and Tzalmuna, "Does anyone here resemble the men you killed at Tavor?" They replied, "They were exactly like you, singular, of princely appearance." He exclaimed, "My brothers! They were my mother's children! By the living Adonoy, if you had spared them, I would not have executed you!" He said to his first born, Yeser, "Get up and kill them!" But the boy would not draw his sword, for he was frightened, as he was still a boy. Zevach and Tzalmuna declared, "You get up and execute us, for strength is determined by manliness." Gidon rose and executed Zevach and Tzalmona, and confiscated the crescent chains on their camels' necks. The Yisroelite constituency said to Gidon, "Govern us! You, your children, and your children's children, for you rescued us from the hand of Midyon." Gidon replied to them, "I shall not govern you, nor shall my children govern you. Let Adonoy govern you!" Gidon said to them, "I have a request to make of you. Give me, everyone, a nose ring from his pillage." They had golden nose rings, since they were Ishmaelites. They replied, "We will surely give." They spread a cloth, and everyone cast, into it, a nose ring from his pillage. The sum of the weight of the golden nose rings he had requested was one thousand seven hundred pieces of gold, besides the crescent chains, crowns, and purple robes worn by the Midyonite monarchs; and besides the chains adorning the necks of their camels. Gidon fashioned this into an apron, and exhibited it in his city, Ophrah. All of Yisroel were perverted towards it there. It became a pitfall, for Gidon and his household. The Midyonites were subjugated to Yisroel, and no longer held their heads high. The land was tranquil forty years, throughout the days of Gidon. Yerubaal ben Yoash proceeded to dwell at home. Gidon had seventy sons whom he fathered, as he had numerous wives. His concubine at Shechem bore him a son as well, and he named him Avimelech. Gidon ben Yoash died in fortunate old age. He was buried in the tomb of his father Yoash, in Ophrah of the Aviezrites. It happened that, when Gidon died, the Bnei Yisroel regressed, and were perverted toward the Baalim. They designated, for themselves, Baal Beris as a god. The Bnei Yisroel did not remember Adonoy their God, Who had rescued them from the hand of all of their surrounding enemies. They did not act benevolently toward the house of Yerubaal Gidon, commensurate with all of the benefits he had brought to Yisroel.

Adonoy said to Moshe, “Go in to Pharaoh for I have hardened his heart and [also] the hearts of his servants, so that I will be able to set [perform] these [miraculous] signs in their midst.