Judges 10

1After Abimelech, Tola son of Puah, son of Dodo, a man of Issachar, rose up to save Israel. He lived in Shamir in the hill country of Ephraim.

2He judged Israel for twenty-three years. Then he died and was buried in Shamir.

3After him Jair the Gileadite rose up and judged Israel for twenty-two years.

4He had thirty sons who rode on thirty donkeys, and they had thirty towns, which are called Havvoth-jair to this day; they are in the land of Gilead.

5Jair died and was buried in Kamon.

6Once again the Israelites did what was evil in the sight of Yahweh. They served the Baals and the Ashtoreths, the gods of Aram, the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the Ammonites, and the gods of the Philistines. They abandoned Yahweh and did not serve him.

7So Yahweh’s anger burned against Israel, and he sold them into the hand of the Philistines and into the hand of the Ammonites.

8That year they shattered and crushed the Israelites, and for eighteen years they oppressed all the Israelites who were on the other side of the Jordan in the land of the Amorites, in Gilead.

9The Ammonites also crossed the Jordan to fight against Judah, Benjamin, and the house of Ephraim, so that Israel was in great distress.

10Then the Israelites cried out to Yahweh, “We have sinned against you, for we have abandoned our God and served the Baals.”

11Yahweh said to the Israelites, “Did I not save you from the Egyptians, from the Amorites, from the Ammonites, and from the Philistines?

12When the Sidonians, the Amalekites, and the Maonites oppressed you, and you cried out to me, I saved you from their hand.

13Yet you have abandoned me and served other gods. So I will not save you again.

14Go and cry out to the gods you have chosen. Let them save you in your time of distress.”

15But the Israelites said to Yahweh, “We have sinned. Do to us whatever seems good to you, only please rescue us today.”

16So they got rid of the foreign gods among them and served Yahweh, and he could no longer bear the misery of Israel.

17Then the Ammonites were called to arms and camped in Gilead, and the Israelites gathered and camped at Mizpah.

18The people, the leaders of Gilead, said to one another, “Who is the man who will begin the fight against the Ammonites? He will be the head of all the inhabitants of Gilead.”