Judges 6:2

Jdg 6:2 And the hand of Midian prevailed against Israel: [and] because of the Midianites the children of Israel made them the dens which [are] in the mountains, and caves, and strong holds.

Ver. 2. Made them the dens which are in the mountains.] These served for shelters, places of refuge and strength, until the last desolation of the Jews. See 1Sa 13:6.

And caves, and strongholds.] They sought not to God till needs must; till these coverings were too short. {Jdg 6:6}

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

For fear of the Midianites, they fled into the dens of the mountains.

Geneva Bible (1599) marginal notes — public domain. Text via Bolls.life.

made . . . dens . . . in the mountains and caves--not, of course, excavating them, for they were already, but making them fit for habitation.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 2. Made them the dens which are in the mountains] Nothing can give a more distressing description of the state of the Israelites than what is here related. They durst not reside in the plain country, but were obliged to betake themselves to dens and caves of the mountains, and live like wild beasts, and were hunted like them by their adversaries.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

(2) The hand of Midian prevailed.—See Jdg_3:10. This oppression is wholly different from that with which we have been dealing in the last chapter. That was the last great attempt of the old inhabitants to recover their lost country; this is a foreign invasion.

The dens which are in the mountains.—The word mineharoth, rendered dens (LXX., mandrai), occurs here only. Rashi and Kimchi render it, “caves lighted from above,” deriving it from neharah, “light” (Job_3:4). They were probably thinking of the subterranean galleries like those found by Wetzstein in the Hauran (p. 45). R. Tanchum and others take it to mean fire-signals. But the more probable derivation is nahar, “a river,” and then the meaning is “torrent-gullies,” which they easily converted into places of concealment, since the limestone hills of Palestine abound in caves. Josephus understood it to mean mines and caverns (Antt. v. 6. § 1). (Comp. 1Sa_13:6 : “When the men of Israel saw that they were in a strait, then the people did hide themselves in caves, and in thickets, and in rocks, and in high places, and in pits.” Heb_11:38 : “in dens and caves of the earth.”) Three places of hiding are mentioned: (1) The mineharoth, perhaps catacombs and galleries in the rocks, which, as the article shows, were pointed out long afterwards. (2) Craggy peaks, like Rimmon, Magada, &c. (3) “Limestone caves, here first mentioned, and afterwards often used, like the Corycian cave in Greece during the Persian invasion, and the caves of the Asturias in Spain during the occupation of the Moors. It was returning to the old troglodyte habits of the Horites and Phoenicians” (Stanley, i. 340). These caves were used, long afterwards, by the brigands whom Herod and the Romans found it so hard to extirpate.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

2. the hand … prevailed] A formula of Rd; cf. Jdg_3:10.

dens] This translation is a guess from the context. The mention of caves prepares the way for 11b; for strong holds cf. 1Sa_23:14; 1Sa_23:19; 1Sa_23:29 etc. Under pressure from the Philistines at a later time similar refuges were used, 1Sa_13:6.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

And the hand of Midian prevailed against Israel,.... They were too strong for them, and overcame them, and brought them into subjection to them, and no wonder, when the Lord delivered them into their hand:

and because of the Midianites; because of their usage of them, their manner of coming upon them yearly, and pillaging and plundering their substance, as after related:

the children of Israel made them dens which are in the mountains; the word for "dens" has the signification of light in it, and are so called either by an antiphrasis, because they were dark, or, as Kimchi thinks, because they had a window at the top of them, which let in the light (a) but Ben Gersom conjectures they were torches, which gave a great light, and when they that held them saw from the mountains the Midianites, by these torches they made a signal to the Israelites to take care and hide themselves and their substance:

and caves, and strong holds; the caves were for the poorer sort, and the strong holds for the richer to retire to with their goods; though, according to Jarchi, the latter were no other than fences they made in woods, by cutting down trees, and setting them round about them, perhaps much the same as the thickets, Sa1 13:6.

(a) So David de Pomis Lexic. fol. 90. 3. or "because men flowed and flocked to them for safety"; so Buxtorf.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

The word rendered “dens” is only found in this passage. It is best explained of ravines hollowed out by torrents, which the Israelites made into hiding-places.

Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

Resist is not expressed in Hebrew; neither did Israel dare to encounter the enemy. They retreated into the strongest holds, to rescue their goods and persons from the depredations of the Madianites. (Haydock)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

In which they might secure their persons and provisions from the hands of the Midianites.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

2. The dens which are in the mountains — The recesses, fissures, and hollow places which had been worn by the water-courses in the mountain sides.

Caves — Such as abound all through the hill country of Palestine.

Strong holds — Mountain fastnesses not easily accessible to the foe. It seems that the Midianites cared not to exterminate the Israelites, but to occupy their rich pastures.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

The dens... and caves. In the writer"s time certain hiding-places called by the above names were traditionally known as the places where the Israelites took refuge during the terrible Midianite invasion. The limestone hills of Palestine abounded in such caves.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Retreats. Hidden places. In old French, "voutes". Because a slight bit of illumination is positioned in them in some inconspicuous spot, they are referred to as מִנְהׇרוֹת, lit. "glimmerings", "lucerno" in old French.

Caves. "Grotte" in old French

Stockades. "Palliser" in old French, "pales", as it is constructed in the forest by felling trees around its perimeter.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.