Judges 7:3

7:3 Now, announce to the men, ¹  ‘Whoever is shaking with fear ²  may turn around and leave Mount Gilead.’” ³  Twenty-two thousand men ⁴  went home; ⁵  ten thousand remained.

Judges 9:2-3

9:2 “Tell ⁶  all the leaders of Shechem this: ‘Why would you want ⁷  to have seventy men, all Jerub-Baal’s sons, ruling over you, when you can have just one ruler? Recall that I am your own flesh and blood.’” ⁸  9:3 His mother’s relatives ⁹  spoke on his behalf to ¹⁰  all the leaders of Shechem and reported his proposal. ¹¹  The leaders were drawn to Abimelech; ¹²  they said, “He is our close relative.” ¹³ 

Judges 17:2

17:2 He said to his mother, “You know ¹⁴  the eleven hundred pieces of silver which were stolen ¹⁵  from you, about which I heard you pronounce a curse? Look here, I have the silver. I stole ¹⁶  it, but now I am giving it back to you.” ¹⁷  His mother said, “May the Lord reward ¹⁸  you, my son!”

¹ tn Heb “call into the ears of the people.”

² tn Heb “afraid and shaking.”

³ tc Many interpreters reject the MT reading “and leave Mount Gilead” for geographical reasons. A possible alternative, involving rather radical emendation of the Hebrew text, would be, “So Gideon tested them” (i.e., thinned the ranks in this manner).

⁴ tn Heb “people.” The translation uses “men” because warriors are in view, and in ancient Israelite culture these would be only males. (This is also the case in vv. 4, 5, 6, 7, 8.)

⁵ tn Or “turned around, back.”

⁶ tn Heb “Speak into the ears of.”

⁷ tn Heb “What good is it to you?”

⁸ tn Heb “your bone and your flesh.”

¹¹ tn Heb “brothers.”

¹² tn Heb “into the ears of.”

¹³ tn Heb “and all these words.”

¹⁴ tn Heb “Their heart was inclined after Abimelech.”

¹⁵ tn Heb “our brother.”

¹⁶ tn The words “You know” are supplied in the translation for clarification.

¹⁷ tn Heb “taken.”

¹⁸ tn Heb “took.”

¹⁹ tn In the Hebrew text the statement, “but now I am giving it back to you,” appears at the end of v. 3 and is spoken by the mother. But v. 4 indicates that she did not give the money back to her son. Unless the statement is spoken by the woman to the LORD, it appears to be misplaced and fits much better in v. 2. It may have been accidentally omitted from a manuscript, written in the margin, and then later inserted in the wrong place in another manuscript.

²⁰ tn Traditionally, “bless.”