Posted by: Joe Yudin | March 08, 2010

As you might recall (sorry for the long delay) Jon and I set out to discover the ruined Jewish villages of the 1st century B.C to 7th centuries A.D. on the Golan Heights. After driving through the western Jezreel Valley, Jon and I got to its center, the modern city of Afula. Afula sits on a small hill at the base of the “mountain” Givat HaMoreh. This hill is actually at a crossroads of sorts. I asked Jon if he had ever been to the ruins of ancient Afula and he hadn’t so we made a quick stop.

The ruins of Afula, or what’s left of them, ranges from the time of the early Bronze Age through the crusader period, including Israelite ruins from the 11th century B.C. even a classic Israelite four room style house. On top of a small mound at the center of this sleepy town one can make out the outline of a fortress/tower built by the crusaders out of the remains of Byzantine, possibly Jewish, sarcophagi as well as other ruins that had been lying about. Afula was probably the ancient city of Ophrah as mentioned in the Bible in the Book of Judges. To the north lies the mountain of Givat HaMoreh, to the southwest lies Mount Gilboa and the Jezreel Valley between the two is the crossroads between Asia and Africa. It is a fertile land bridge, filled with fresh water springs, vast fields of wheat, sunflowers and orchards of olives, pomegranates and figs. Whoever controlled this flat valley in ancient times, controlled water, food, transport and taxes, and ancient Ophrah was its economic center. And we turn to the Book of Judges Chapter six.

And the hand of Midian prevailed against Israel. Because of Midian the children of Israel made for themselves the dens which are in the mountains and the caves, and the strongholds.
And it was, when Israel had sown, that Midian came up, and Amalek, and those of the east; and they came up upon it.
And they encamped against them, and they destroyed the produce of the earth... They would leave no sustenance in Israel...
And the angel of the Lord came, and sat under the oak which was in Ophrah, that belonged to Joash the Abiezrite; and his son Gideon was beating out wheat in the winepress, to be enabled to flee from Midian.
And the angel of the Lord appeared and said to him, "The Lord is with you, mighty man of valor."
And Gideon said to him, "Please my lord, if the Lord be with us, why then has all this befallen us? And where are all His wonders which our forefathers told us, saying, 'Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt?' But now the Lord has forsaken us, and He has delivered us into the hand of Midian."

And Gideon built an altar to the Lord there, and he called it, "Lord (who bestows upon us) peace." Until this day, it is still in Ophrah…

From here Jon and I decided to take a small detour and head up the mountain of Givat haMoreh on a dirt track. We maneuvered the jeep through a few mud puddles, boulders and around a family of turtles. On both sides of us wild fields of red anemones and yellow mustard, through eucalyptus groves to the top, parking under a watchtower built by the British in the 1930’s. We climbed to the top and spied out green fields of the Jezreel Valley below. To the east the Mountains of Moab in what is today Jordan, to the southeast Kibbutz Ein Harod at the foot of Mount Gilboa and the mountains of Samaria beyond, today the northern West Bank, to the east Tel Megiddo and Mt. Carmel and to the north the mountains of the Galilee, all in view with the battleground of hundreds of armies over the millennia just below us.

Gideon, being inspired by God, struck down the pagan idol that was over the winepress knowing full well that this would bring down the wrath of the idol worshiping Midianites on all Israel. We turn to the text, Judges 6:33-35:

And all the Midianites and the Amalekites and those of the east assembled together. And they crossed and encamped in the valley of Jezreel.
And a spirit of the Lord clothed Gideon, and he blew the trumpet, and Abiezer gathered following him.
And he sent messengers throughout all Menasseh, and they too gathered after him, and he sent messengers to Asher, and to Zebulun, and to Naphtali, and they came up towards them.
So the Israelites are getting ready for war against their oppressors from what is today Jordan, Iraq and the Sinai in Egypt. You would think that they would want as many soldiers as they could muster right? That’s not what happens. God tells Gideon to send home all those who reveled in their own strength and not the Lord’s and all those who were scared and did not trust in the Lord, only leaving 10,000 men. Meanwhile the pagan forces were “as numerous as locusts; their camels without numbers; as numerous as the sand which is upon the seashore. (Judges 7:12).”
Finally it seems that Gideon wants to whip his motley crew from the tribes of Israel into shape. “Gideon, arose early, and all the people that were with him (Judges 7:1). “ Anyone who has been in the army knows what this means: Time to go for a run. Apparently Gideon’s potential troops start to drop like flies during this run around the Jezreel Valley. “And the Lord said to Gideon, "The people are still too many; bring them down to the water, and I will purify them for you there. And it shall be, that of whom I say to you, 'This (one) shall go with you,' he shall go with you, and of whomsoever I shall say to you, 'This (one) shall not go with you,' he shall not go (Judges 7:4).”

To this day the Israeli army weeds out their combat troops by going on long runs. In my paratroop unit we started day one of basic training on a 6k run, for graduation of basic training we finished with a 90k run and no, we didn’t take long breaks. Orde Wingate, a British colonel stationed in Palestine during the Arab Revolt of 1936-39 molded a small group of Jewish soldiers after Gideon’s army, based right here in the valley at Kibbutz Ein Harod.

“…and they encamped beside Ein Harod, and the camp of Midian was on the north side of him by Givat HaMoreh, in the valley. (Judges 7:1)”
Gideon then seems to have marched his crew to the spring at the foot of Mount Gilboa (Judges 7:5-8:
And he brought down the people to the water. Then the Lord said to Gideon, "Everyone who laps with his tongue as the dog laps, him shall you set by himself, and (likewise) every one that kneels upon his knees to drink."

Now it was the number of those that lapped, putting their hand to their mouth, three hundred men, and all the rest of the people kneeled upon their knees to drink water.
And the Lord said to Gideon, "With the three hundred men who lapped I will save you, and I will give the Midianites into your hand. Let all the (other) people go each to his place."
And they took the provisions of the people in their hands, and their trumpets; and all the rest of the men of Israel he sent each to his tent, but the three hundred men he retained. Now the camp of Midian was beneath him in the valley.

Basically Gideon is left with 300, God fearing, mentally and physically tough soldiers who wouldn’t even put down their weapons in order to drink from the spring. 300 of the best Hebrew soldiers against an endless mass of an innumerable pagan force, and this happened almost a thousand years before the Greek-Persian wars as immortalized at the The Battle of Thermopylae (and in the Hollywood movie ‘300’). Orde Wingate organized his Hebrew soldiers the same way, three groups of one hundred men, as the IDF does to this day.

Gideon armed his men with some peculiar objects. Each received a ram’s horn, a jar and a torch. Now what were these for? We know from other sources that each group of soldiers in the ancient world, and today, has a signal man (or radio person). This soldier would be responsible for sending messages to other military units in the field by way of smoke signals, fire flashes or trumpet bursts in code. Here Gideon ingeniously gave each man the tools for the signals. When Gideon gave the order each man smashed his jar, lit his torch and blew his trumpet under cover of darkness only after they had snuck up to the Midianite camp and had encircled it. The enemy then awoke from their sleep thinking that they were encircled by almost 100,000 Israelite soldiers, panicked and fled. They were slaughtered all the way back to Midian as those Israelites who had been sent home came out of their villages and joined the fight. From this vantage point we can imagine the entire scene. Gideon was a genius of a military commander and Wingate knew it.

Back in the jeep, next stop Golani Falafel in Afula. Best falafel in Israel.