The Lord's messenger touched the meat and the unleavened bread with the tip of his staff. Fire flared up from the rock and consumed the meat and unleavened bread. The Lord's messenger then disappeared.

That night the Lord said to him, "Take the bull from your father's herd, as well as a second bull, one that is seven years old. Pull down your father's Baal altar and cut down the nearby Asherah pole.

Then build an altar for the Lord your God on the top of this stronghold according to the proper pattern. Take the second bull and offer it as a burnt sacrifice on the wood from the Asherah pole that you cut down."

All the Midianites, Amalekites, and the people from the east assembled. They crossed the Jordan River and camped in the Jezreel Valley.

The Lord did as he asked. When he got up the next morning, he squeezed the fleece, and enough dew dripped from it to fill a bowl.

So he brought the men down to the water. Then the Lord said to Gideon, "Separate those who lap the water as a dog laps from those who kneel to drink."

Now the Midianites, Amalekites, and the people from the east covered the valley like a swarm of locusts. Their camels could not be counted; they were as innumerable as the sand on the seashore.

Israelites from Naphtali, Asher, and Manasseh answered the call and chased the Midianites.

He went up from there to Penuel and made the same request. The men of Penuel responded the same way the men of Succoth had.

Now Zebah and Zalmunna were in Karkor with their armies. There were about fifteen thousand survivors from the army of the eastern peoples; a hundred and twenty thousand sword-wielding soldiers had been killed.

Gideon son of Joash returned from the battle by the pass of Heres.

He captured a young man from Succoth and interrogated him. The young man wrote down for him the names of Succoth's officials and city leaders -- seventy-seven men in all.

The men of Israel said to Gideon, "Rule over us -- you, your son, and your grandson. For you have delivered us from Midian's power."

Gideon continued, "I would like to make one request. Each of you give me an earring from the plunder you have taken." (The Midianites had gold earrings because they were Ishmaelites.)

They said, "We are happy to give you earrings." So they spread out a garment, and each one threw an earring from his plunder onto it.

The Israelites did not remain true to the Lord their God, who had delivered them from all the enemies who lived around them.

The thornbush said to the trees, 'If you really want to choose me as your king, then come along, find safety under my branches! Otherwise may fire blaze from the thornbush and consume the cedars of Lebanon!'

my father fought for you; he risked his life and delivered you from Midian's power.

But if not, may fire blaze from Abimelech and consume the leaders of Shechem and Beth Millo! May fire also blaze from the leaders of Shechem and Beth Millo and consume Abimelech!"

Then Jotham ran away to Beer and lived there to escape from Abimelech his half-brother.

When Gaal son of Ebed came out and stood at the entrance to the city's gate, Abimelech and his men got up from their hiding places.

Gaal saw the men and said to Zebul, "Look, men are coming down from the tops of the hills." But Zebul said to him, "You are seeing the shadows on the hills -- it just looks like men."

Gaal again said, "Look, men are coming down from the very center of the land. A unit is coming by way of the Oak Tree of the Diviners."

Abimelech chased him, and Gaal ran from him. Many Shechemites fell wounded at the entrance of the gate.

After Abimelech's death, Tola son of Puah, grandson of Dodo, from the tribe of Issachar, rose up to deliver Israel. He lived in Shamir in the Ephraimite hill country.

The Lord said to the Israelites, "Did I not deliver you from Egypt, the Amorites, the Ammonites, the Philistines,

the Sidonians, Amalek, and Midian when they oppressed you? You cried out for help to me, and I delivered you from their power.

Go and cry for help to the gods you have chosen! Let them deliver you from trouble!"

When the Ammonites attacked, the leaders of Gilead asked Jephthah to come back from the land of Tob.

The Ammonite king said to Jephthah's messengers, "Because Israel stole my land when they came up from Egypt -- from the Arnon River in the south to the Jabbok River in the north, and as far west as the Jordan. Now return it peaceably!"

They took all the Amorite territory from the Arnon River on the south to the Jabbok River on the north, from the desert in the east to the Jordan in the west.

Since the Lord God of Israel has driven out the Amorites before his people Israel, do you think you can just take it from them?

The Lord's spirit empowered Jephthah. He passed through Gilead and Manasseh and went to Mizpah in Gilead. From there he approached the Ammonites.

then whoever is the first to come through the doors of my house to meet me when I return safely from fighting the Ammonites -- he will belong to the Lord and I will offer him up as a burnt sacrifice."

He defeated them from Aroer all the way to Minnith -- twenty cities in all, even as far as Abel Keramim! He wiped them out! The Israelites humiliated the Ammonites.

Jephthah said to them, "My people and I were entangled in controversy with the Ammonites. I asked for your help, but you did not deliver me from their power.

He had thirty sons. He arranged for thirty of his daughters to be married outside his extended family, and he arranged for thirty young women to be brought from outside as wives for his sons. Ibzan led Israel for seven years;

There was a man named Manoah from Zorah, from the Danite tribe. His wife was infertile and childless.

Look, you will conceive and have a son. You must never cut his hair, for the child will be dedicated to God from birth. He will begin to deliver Israel from the power of the Philistines."

The woman went and said to her husband, "A man sent from God came to me! He looked like God's angelic messenger -- he was very awesome. I did not ask him where he came from, and he did not tell me his name.

He said to me, 'Look, you will conceive and have a son. So now, do not drink wine or beer and do not eat any food that will make you ritually unclean. For the child will be dedicated to God from birth till the day he dies.'"

Manoah prayed to the Lord, "Please, Lord, allow the man sent from God to visit us again, so he can teach us how we should raise the child who will be born."

As the flame went up from the altar toward the sky, the Lord's messenger went up in it while Manoah and his wife watched. They fell facedown to the ground.

But his wife said to him, "If the Lord wanted to kill us, he would not have accepted the burnt offering and the grain offering from us. He would not have shown us all these things, or have spoken to us like this just now."

But his father and mother said to him, "Certainly you can find a wife among your relatives or among all our people! You should not have to go and get a wife from the uncircumcised Philistines." But Samson said to his father, "Get her for me, because she is the right one for me."

They said to him, "We promise! We will only take you prisoner and hand you over to them. We promise not to kill you." They tied him up with two brand new ropes and led him up from the cliff.

When he arrived in Lehi, the Philistines shouted as they approached him. But the Lord's spirit empowered him. The ropes around his arms were like flax dissolving in fire, and they melted away from his hands.

So God split open the basin at Lehi and water flowed out from it. When he took a drink, his strength was restored and he revived. For this reason he named the spring En Hakkore. It remains in Lehi to this very day.

So Delilah took new ropes and tied him with them and said to him, "The Philistines are here, Samson!" (The Philistines were hiding in the bedroom.) But he tore the ropes from his arms as if they were a piece of thread.

Finally he told her his secret. He said to her, "My hair has never been cut, for I have been dedicated to God from the time I was conceived. If my head were shaved, my strength would leave me; I would become weak, and be just like all other men."

When they really started celebrating, they said, "Call for Samson so he can entertain us!" So they summoned Samson from the prison and he entertained them. They made him stand between two pillars.

There was a man named Micah from the Ephraimite hill country.

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

There was a young man from Bethlehem in Judah. He was a Levite who had been temporarily residing among the tribe of Judah.

Micah said to him, "Where do you come from?" He replied, "I am a Levite from Bethlehem in Judah. I am looking for a new place to live."

The Danites sent out from their whole tribe five representatives, capable men from Zorah and Eshtaol, to spy out the land and explore it. They said to them, "Go, explore the land." They came to the Ephraimite hill country and spent the night at Micah's house.

So the five men journeyed on and arrived in Laish. They noticed that the people there were living securely, like the Sidonians do, undisturbed and unsuspecting. No conqueror was troubling them in any way. They lived far from the Sidonians and had no dealings with anyone.

So six hundred Danites, fully armed, set out from Zorah and Eshtaol.

From there they traveled through the Ephraimite hill country and arrived at Micah's house.

After they had gone a good distance from Micah's house, Micah's neighbors gathered together and caught up with the Danites.

No one came to the rescue because the city was far from Sidon and they had no dealings with anyone. The city was in a valley near Beth Rehob. The Danites rebuilt the city and occupied it.

In those days Israel had no king. There was a Levite living temporarily in the remote region of the Ephraimite hill country. He acquired a concubine from Bethlehem in Judah.

But then an old man passed by, returning at the end of the day from his work in the field. The man was from the Ephraimite hill country; he was living temporarily in Gibeah. (The residents of the town were Benjaminites.)

When he looked up and saw the traveler in the town square, the old man said, "Where are you heading? Where do you come from?"

The Levite said to him, "We are traveling from Bethlehem in Judah to the remote region of the Ephraimite hill country. That's where I'm from. I had business in Bethlehem in Judah, but now I'm heading home. But no one has invited me into their home.

All the Israelites from Dan to Beer Sheba and from the land of Gilead left their homes and assembled together before the Lord at Mizpah.

The leaders of all the people from all the tribes of Israel took their places in the assembly of God's people, which numbered four hundred thousand sword-wielding foot soldiers.

We will take ten of every group of a hundred men from all the tribes of Israel (and a hundred of every group of a thousand, and a thousand of every group of ten thousand) to get supplies for the army. When they arrive in Gibeah of Benjamin they will punish them for the atrocity which they committed in Israel."

The Benjaminites came from their cities and assembled at Gibeah to make war against the Israelites.

That day the Benjaminites mustered from their cities twenty-six thousand sword-wielding soldiers, besides seven hundred well-trained soldiers from Gibeah.

The Benjaminites attacked from Gibeah and struck down twenty-two thousand Israelites that day.

The Benjaminites again attacked them from Gibeah and struck down eighteen thousand sword-wielding Israelite soldiers.

Then the Benjaminites said, "They are defeated just as before." But the Israelites said, "Let's retreat and lure them away from the city into the main roads."

All the men of Israel got up from their places and took their positions at Baal Tamar, while the Israelites hiding in ambush jumped out of their places west of Gibeah.

Ten thousand men, well-trained soldiers from all Israel, then made a frontal assault against Gibeah -- the battle was fierce. But the Benjaminites did not realize that disaster was at their doorstep.

The Israelites and the men hiding in ambush had arranged a signal. When the men hiding in ambush sent up a smoke signal from the city,

But when the signal, a pillar of smoke, began to rise up from the city, the Benjaminites turned around and saw the whole city going up in a cloud of smoke that rose high into the sky.

They retreated before the Israelites, taking the road to the wilderness. But the battle overtook them as men from the surrounding cities struck them down.

They surrounded the Benjaminites, chased them from Nohah, and annihilated them all the way to a spot east of Geba.

They said, "Why, O Lord God of Israel, has this happened in Israel?" An entire tribe has disappeared from Israel today!"

The Israelites asked, "Who from all the Israelite tribes has not assembled before the Lord?" They had made a solemn oath that whoever did not assemble before the Lord at Mizpah must certainly be executed.

The Israelites regretted what had happened to their brother Benjamin. They said, "Today we cut off an entire tribe from Israel!

So they asked, "Who from all the Israelite tribes did not assemble before the Lord at Mizpah?" Now it just so happened no one from Jabesh Gilead had come to the gathering.

The Benjaminites returned at that time, and the Israelites gave to them the women they had spared from Jabesh Gilead. But there were not enough to go around.

However, there is an annual festival to the Lord in Shiloh, which is north of Bethel (east of the main road that goes up from Bethel to Shechem) and south of Lebonah."

and keep your eyes open. When you see the daughters of Shiloh coming out to dance in the celebration, jump out from the vineyards. Each one of you, catch yourself a wife from among the daughters of Shiloh and then go home to the land of Benjamin.

Then the Israelites dispersed from there to their respective tribal and clan territories. Each went from there to his own property.

During the time of the judges there was a famine in the land of Judah. So a man from Bethlehem in Judah went to live as a resident foreigner in the region of Moab, along with his wife and two sons.

(Now the man's name was Elimelech, his wife was Naomi, and his two sons were Mahlon and Kilion. They were of the clan of Ephrath from Bethlehem in Judah.) They entered the region of Moab and settled there.

So she decided to return home from the region of Moab, accompanied by her daughters-in-law, because while she was living in Moab she had heard that the Lord had shown concern for his people, reversing the famine by providing abundant crops.

Wherever you die, I will die -- and there I will be buried. May the Lord punish me severely if I do not keep my promise! Only death will be able to separate me from you!"

So Naomi returned, accompanied by her Moabite daughter-in-law Ruth, who came back with her from the region of Moab. (Now they arrived in Bethlehem at the beginning of the barley harvest.)

Now Naomi had a relative on her husband's side of the family named Boaz. He was a wealthy, prominent man from the clan of Elimelech.

So Ruth went and gathered grain in the fields behind the harvesters. Now she just happened to end up in the portion of the field belonging to Boaz, who was from the clan of Elimelech.

Now at that very moment, Boaz arrived from Bethlehem and greeted the harvesters, "May the Lord be with you!" They replied, "May the Lord bless you!"

The servant in charge of the harvesters replied, "She's the young Moabite woman who came back with Naomi from the region of Moab.

She asked, 'May I follow the harvesters and gather grain among the bundles?' Since she arrived she has been working hard from this morning until now -- except for sitting in the resting hut a short time."

May the Lord reward your efforts! May your acts of kindness be repaid fully by the Lord God of Israel, from whom you have sought protection!"

She carried it back to town, and her mother-in-law saw how much grain she had gathered. Then Ruth gave her the roasted grain she had saved from mealtime.

Then Boaz said to the guardian, "Naomi, who has returned from the region of Moab, is selling the portion of land that belongs to our relative Elimelech.