Judges 8 · a question people ask
Gideon punished Succoth and killed the men of Penuel (8:16-17). Was that just?
The chapter tells what happened and gives no verdict in its own words. Gideon asked Succoth for bread "for they are faint, and I am pursuing after Zebah and Zalmunna, the kings of Midian" (8:5); the princes answered, "Are the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna now in your hand, that we should give bread to your army?" (8:6), and Penuel answered the same way (8:8). He warned both towns before he went on (8:7, 8:9), and did what he had said when he came back (8:16-17). Both readings below agree on those verses, and that the text records no word from the LORD about these two towns. Christians read what Gideon did in two main ways.
How Christians read it
Where Christians differ, Favor sets out the main views side by side and doesn't pick one.
A just punishment
Those who hold this view note that Gideon was pursuing Israel's enemies, and that his warning named the LORD: "when the LORD has delivered Zebah and Zalmunna into my hand" (8:7). They read the towns' answer as refusing to help the LORD's deliverance and mocking it (8:6, 8:15, "concerning whom you taunted me"). They set it beside the song of chapter 5: "Curse Meroz," said the LORD's angel, "because they didn’t come to help the LORD" (5:23).
Judges 8:6-7 · Judges 8:15 · Judges 5:23
Recorded, not approved
Those who hold this view note that the chapter gives Gideon no command from the LORD for Succoth or Penuel, and that the same man who turned away Ephraim's anger with gentle words (8:1-3) answered these towns with threats (8:7, 8:9). At Penuel he had threatened the tower, "I will break down this tower" (8:9), and when he came back he broke down the tower "and killed the men of the city" (8:17).
Judges 8:1-3 · Judges 8:7 · Judges 8:9 · Judges 8:17
The verses
“He came to the men of Succoth, and said, “See Zebah and Zalmunna, concerning whom you taunted me, saying, ‘Are the hands of Zebah and Zalmunna now in your hand, that we should give bread to your men who are weary?’” He took the elders of the city, and thorns of the wilderness and briers, and with them he taught the men of Succoth. He broke down the tower of Penuel, and killed the men of the city.”