Bible Strands
Judges 6:3
Whenever the Israelites planted their crops, the Midianites, Amalekites, and other people of the east would come up and invade them,
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — The narrator describes the cyclical oppression occurring during the judges period, detailing how Israel's agricultural labor consistently triggered foreign invasion.
The words — זָרַ֣ע (za.Ra') = it sowed/planted, and מִדְיָ֧ן (mid.Yan) = Midian.
The thread — This recurring coalition appears again in Judges 6:33 and Judges 7:12, where the same groups gather and camp against Israel.
Why it lands — The text demands recognition of a systematic pattern where subsistence work provokes conquest, establishing the historical condition that necessitates divine intervention.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And so it was, when Israel had sown, that the Midianites came up, and the Amalekites, and the children of the east, even they came up against them;
Cross-references
- Judges 3:13 After enlisting the Ammonites and Amalekites to join forces with him, Eglon attacked and defeated Israel, taking possession of the City of Palms.
- Judges 6:33 Then all the Midianites, Amalekites, and other people of the east gathered together, crossed over the Jordan, and camped in the Valley of Jezreel.
- Judges 7:12 Now the Midianites, Amalekites, and all the other people of the east had settled in the valley like a swarm of locusts, and their camels were as countless as the sand on the seashore.
- Genesis 29:1 Jacob resumed his journey and came to the land of the people of the east.
- Judges 8:10 Now Zebah and Zalmunna were in Karkor with their army of about fifteen thousand men—all that were left of the armies of the people of the east. A hundred and twenty thousand swordsmen had already fallen.
- 1 Kings 4:30 Solomon’s wisdom was greater than that of all the men of the East, greater than all the wisdom of Egypt.
- Job 1:3 and he owned 7,000 sheep, 3,000 camels, 500 yoke of oxen, 500 female donkeys, and a very large number of servants. Job was the greatest man of all the people of the East.
- Isaiah 65:21 They will build houses and dwell in them; they will plant vineyards and eat their fruit.
- Leviticus 26:16 then this is what I will do to you: I will bring upon you sudden terror, wasting disease, and fever that will destroy your sight and drain your life. You will sow your seed in vain, because your enemies will eat it.
- Deuteronomy 28:30 You will be pledged in marriage to a woman, but another man will violate her. You will build a house but will not live in it. You will plant a vineyard but will not enjoy its fruit.