Judges 6:17-32
17And he said to him, a“If now I have found favor in your eyes, then bshow me a sign that it is you who speak with me. 18Please cdo not depart from here until I come to you and bring out my present and set it before you.” And he said, “I will stay till you return.”19So Gideon went into his house dand prepared a young goat and unleavened cakes from an ephah ▼
▼An ephah was about 3/5 bushel or 22 liters
of flour. The meat he put in a basket, and the broth he put in a pot, and brought them to him under the terebinth and presented them. 20And the angel of God said to him, “Take the meat and the unleavened cakes, and put them fon this rock, and gpour the broth over them.” And he did so. 21Then the angel of the Lord reached out the tip of the staff that was in his hand and touched the meat and the unleavened cakes. hAnd fire sprang up from the rock and consumed the meat and the unleavened cakes. And the angel of the Lord vanished from his sight. 22Then Gideon perceived that he was the angel of the Lord. And Gideon said, i“Alas, O Lord God! For now I have seen the angel of the Lord face to face.” 23But the Lord said to him, j“Peace be to you. Do not fear; you shall not die.” 24Then Gideon built an altar there to the Lord and called it, kThe Lord Is Peace. To this day it still stands at lOphrah, which belongs to the Abiezrites. 25That night the Lord said to him, “Take your father’s bull, and the second bull seven years old, and pull down the altar of Baal that your father has, and cut down mthe Asherah that is beside it 26and build an altar to the Lord your God on the top of the nstronghold here, with stones laid in due order. Then take the second bull and offer it as a burnt offering with the wood of the Asherah that you shall cut down.” 27So Gideon took ten men of his servants and did as the Lord had told him. But because he was too afraid of his family and the men of the town to do it by day, he did it by night.
Gideon Destroys the Altar of Baal
28When the men of the town rose early in the morning, behold, the altar of Baal was broken down, and the Asherah beside it was cut down, and the second bull was offered on the altar that had been built. 29And they said to one another, “Who has done this thing?” And after they had searched and inquired, they said, “Gideon the son of Joash has done this thing.” 30Then the men of the town said to Joash, “Bring out your son, that he may die, for he has broken down the altar of Baal and cut down the Asherah beside it.” 31But Joash said to all who stood against him, “Will you contend for Baal? Or will you save him? Whoever contends for him shall be put to death by morning. If he is a god, let him contend for himself, because his altar has been broken down.” 32Therefore on that day Gideon ▼▼Hebrew he
was called pJerubbaal, that is to say, “Let Baal contend against him,” because he broke down his altar.
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