i. Thus solemnly called to be the Deliverer of his countrymen, Gideon

was first commissioned to testify against the idolatrous practices which had caused the present national degradation. The Lord appeared to him in a dream, and bade him throw down an altar which his father had erected in honour of Baal, and cut down a grove he had set up, and then to build in an orderly manner an altar to Jehovah on the rock where his meat-offering had been accepted, and sacrifice thereon his father’s second bullock of seven years old. With the assistance of his servants, Gideon during the night-time executed this commission, and on the morrow the townspeople were surprised to find that both altar and grove had disappeared. Enquiry led to the detection of the offender, and Joash was bidden to bring forth his son that he might be put to death for the sacrilege of which he had been guilty. But Joash replied with much irony that he was truly guilty of impiety who believed that Baal could not defend himself. _Will ye take upon yourselves_, said he, _to plead Baal’s cause? let him plead for himself_. A new name, which Gideon henceforth bore, JERUB-BAAL, or the _Tryer of Baal_, attested the national acquiescence in the wisdom of his father’s reply (Judg. vi. 32).