Ammonites (see at Num 22:4), had shown hostility to Israel even in the time of Moses, and had been defeated in a war of retaliation on the part of the Israelites (Num 31). But they had afterwards recovered their strength, so that now, after an interval of 200 years, the Lord used them as a rod of chastisement for His rebellious people. In Jdg 6:1, Jdg 6:2, Jdg 6:6, they alone are mentioned as oppressors of Israel; but in Jdg 6:3, Jdg 6:33, and Jdg 7:12, the Amalekites and children of the east are mentioned in connection with them, from which we may see that the Midianites were the principal enemies, but had allied themselves with other predatory Bedouin tribes, to make war upon the Israelites and devastate their land. On the Amalekites, those leading enemies of the people of God who had sprung from Esau, see the notes on Gen 36:12 and Exo 17:8. “Children of the east” (see Job 1:3) is the general name for the tribes that lived in the desert on the east of Palestine, “like the name of Arabs in the time of Josephus (in Ant. v. 6, 1, he calls the children of the east mentioned here by the name of Arabs), or in later times the names of the Nabataeans and Kedarenes” (Bertheau). Hence we find in Jdg 8:10, that all the enemies who oppressed the Israelites are called “children of the east.”
Verses 2-5
Jdg 6:2-5The Oppression of Israel by Midian and Its Allies. Their power pressed so severely upon the Israelites, that before (or because of) them the latter “made them the ravines which are in the mountains, and the caves, and the strongholds,” sc., which were to be met with all over the land in after times (viz., at the time when our book was written), and were safe places of refuge in time of war. This is implied in the definite article before מנהרות and the following substantives. The words “they made them” are not at variance with the fact that there are many natural caves to be found in the limestone mountains of Palestine. For, on the one hand, they do not affirm that all the caves to be found in the land were made by the Israelites at that time; and, on the other hand, עשׂה does not preclude the use of natural caves as places of refuge, since it not only denotes the digging and making of caves, but also the adaptation of natural caves to the purpose referred to, i.e., the enlargement of them, or whatever was required to make them habitable. The ἁπ. λεγ. מנהרות does not mean “light holes” (Bertheau), or “holes with openings to the light,” from נהר, in the sense of to stream, to enlighten (Rashi, Kimchi, etc.), but is to be taken in the sense of “mountain ravines,” hollowed out by torrents (from נהר, to pour), which the Israelites made into hiding-
