Judges, Ruth: Revised Edition (The NIV Application Commentary)

by K. Lawson Younger

Contrary to popular interpretation, these fleecings have nothing to do with discovering or determining God’s will. The divine will is perfectly and absolutely clear in Gideon’s own mind (note the wording in v. 36). These “signs” reveal his lack of faith. As Exum rightly notes: “No character in the book receives more divine assurance than Gideon and none displays more doubt. Gideon is, significantly, the only judge to whom God speaks directly, though this privilege does not allay his faintheartedness.”55 Hence, “despite being clear about God’s will, being ‘clothed/empowered’ by the Spirit of God, and being confirmed as a divinely chosen leader by the overwhelming response of his countrymen to his own summons to battle, Gideon uses every means available to try to get out of the mission to which he has been called.”56 It is not insignificant that throughout the pericope concerning the fleecings the divine personal, covenantal name of Yahweh is missing. Instead, the rather generic designation Elohim (“God”) is used. “Apparently Gideon has difficulty distinguishing between Yahweh, the God of the Israelites, and God in a general sense.”57 This fleecing process is nothing short of a pagan divinatory test of the deity. In the ancient Near East, there were many different divination processes invoked to inquire of the deities. Gideon’s fleece incidents are examples of “impetrated divination”—divination by various techniques of asking a question and directly evoking a response.58 App...