Gideon Gideon Gideon () or Gedeon, also named Jerubbaal, and Jerubbesheth, was a military leader, judge and prophet whose calling and victory over the Midianites are recounted in chapters 6 to 8 of the Book of Judges in the Hebrew Bible. Gideon was the son of Joash, from the Abiezrite clan in the tribe of Manasseh and lived in Ephra (Ophrah). As a leader of the Israelites, he won a decisive victory over a Midianite army despite a vast numerical disadvantage, leading a troop of 300 'valiant' men. The nineteenth-century Strong's Concordance derives the name "Jerubbaal" from "Baal will contend", in
Book of Judges recently, this view has been challenged, and there is an increasing willingness to see Judges as the work of a single individual, working by carefully selecting, reworking and positioning his source material to introduce and conclude his themes. A statement repeated throughout the book, "In those days there was no king in Israel" (, , , and ) implies a date in the monarchy for the redaction (editing) of Judges. Twice this statement is accompanied with the statement that "every man did that which was right in his own eyes", implying that the redactor is pro-monarchy, ( and ) and