Judges 6:11

Gideon Meets Some Visitors

6:11 The Lord’s angelic messenger24 came and sat down under the oak tree in Ophrah owned by Joash the Abiezrite. He arrived while Joash’s son Gideon25 was threshing26 wheat in a winepress27 so he could hide it from the Midianites.28

24	tn The adjective “angelic” is interpretive. sn The Lord’s angelic messenger is also mentioned in Judg 2:1.
25	tn Heb “Now Gideon his son …” The Hebrew circumstantial clause (note the pattern vav [ו] + subject + predicate) breaks the narrative sequence and indicates that the angel’s arrival coincided with Gideon’s threshing.
26	tn Heb “beating out.”
27	sn Threshing wheat in a winepress. One would normally thresh wheat at the threshing floor outside the city. Animals and a threshing sledge would be employed. Because of the Midianite threat, Gideon was forced to thresh with a stick in a winepress inside the city. For further discussion see O. Borowski, Agriculture in Iron Age Israel, 63.
28	tn Heb “Midian.”