Lives of Scripture

Zebah was one of two Midianite kings, alongside Zalmunna, whom Gideon pursued and defeated after routing Midian's main army with a mere three hundred men (Judges 7:19-25). Fleeing east of the Jordan with the remnant of their forces -- fifteen thousand men, all that remained of an army of a hundred and twenty thousand -- Zebah and Zalmunna were caught off guard and captured by Gideon at Karkor (8:10-12). Along the pursuit, exhausted and hungry, Gideon had asked the towns of Succoth and Penuel for bread for his men, but their leaders mocked him, doubting he would ever actually capture the two kings; Gideon vowed to return and punish them, which he later did (8:4-9, 13-17). Gideon then confronted Zebah and Zalmunna directly, asking about men they had killed at Tabor, and learned they were his own brothers; he declared that if the kings had spared his brothers' lives, he would have spared theirs (8:18-19). He ordered his young son Jether to execute them, but the boy, too frightened, could not draw his sword -- so Zebah and Zalmunna themselves urged Gideon to kill them personally, saying, "As the man is, so is his strength," unwilling to die at a boy's hand (8:20-21). Gideon killed them both and took the crescent ornaments from their camels' necks. Psalm 83:11 later recalls Zebah and Zalmunna together as examples of decisive divine judgment on Israel's enemies.