Judges 11:25

11:25 Are you really better than Balak son of Zippor, king of Moab? Did he dare to quarrel with Israel? Did he dare to fight with them? ¹ 

Judges 6:31-32

6:31 But Joash said to all those who confronted him, ²  “Must you fight Baal’s battles? ³  Must you rescue him? Whoever takes up his cause ⁴  will die by morning! ⁵  If he really is a god, let him fight his own battles! ⁶  After all, it was his altar that was pulled down.” ⁷  6:32 That very day Gideon’s father named him Jerub-Baal, ⁸  because he had said, “Let Baal fight with him, for it was his altar that was pulled down.”

Judges 8:1

8:1 The Ephraimites said to him, “Why have you done such a thing to us? You did not summon us ⁹  when you went to fight the Midianites!” They argued vehemently with him.

Judges 21:22

21:22 When their fathers or brothers come and protest to us, ¹⁰  we’ll say to them, “Do us a favor and let them be, ¹¹  for we could not get each one a wife through battle. ¹²  Don’t worry about breaking your oath! ¹³  You would only be guilty if you had voluntarily given them wives.’” ¹⁴ 

[11:25]  ¹ tn The Hebrew grammatical constructions of all three rhetorical questions indicate emphasis, which “really” and “dare to” are intended to express in the translation.

[6:31]  ² tn Heb “to all who stood against him.”

[6:31]  ³ tn Heb “Do you fight for Baal?”

[6:31]  ⁴ tn Heb “fights for him.”

[6:31]  ⁵ sn Whoever takes up his cause will die by morning. This may be a warning to the crowd that Joash intends to defend his son and to kill anyone who tries to execute Gideon. Then again, it may be a sarcastic statement about Baal’s apparent inability to defend his own honor. Anyone who takes up Baal’s cause may end up dead, perhaps by the same hand that pulled down the pagan god’s altar.

[6:31]  ⁶ tn Heb “fight for himself.”

[6:31]  ⁷ tn Heb “for he pulled down his altar.” The subject of the verb, if not Gideon, is indefinite (in which case a passive translation is permissible).

[6:32]  ³ tn Heb “He called him on that day Jerub-Baal.” The name means, at least by popular etymology, “Let Baal fight!”

[8:1]  ⁴ tn Heb “by not summoning us.”

[21:22]  ⁵ tc The (original) LXX and Vulgate read “to you.”

[21:22]  ⁶ tn The words “and let them be” are supplied in the translation for clarification.

[21:22]  ⁷ tn Heb “for we did not take each his wife in battle.”

[21:22]  ⁸ tn This sentence is not in the Hebrew text. It is supplied in the translation to clarify the logic of the statement.

[21:22]  ⁹ tc Heb “You did not give to them, now you are guilty.” The MT as it stands makes little sense. It is preferable to emend לֹא (lo’, “not”) to לוּא (lu’, “if”). This particle introduces a purely hypothetical condition, “If you had given to them [but you didn’t].” See G. F. Moore, Judges (ICC), 453-54.