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That night he and his band move forward. Divided into four companies, they occupy all
the heights around Shechem. Ignorant how near was danger, Gaal stands next morning
in the gate with his band, in the same spirit of boastfulness as at the festival of the
previous night. He is still, as it were, challenging imaginary foes. Zebul is also there. As
Abimelech's men are seen moving down towards the valley, Zebul first tries to lull
Gaal's suspicions. And now they are appearing in all directions - from the mountains,
"from the heights of the land," and one company "from the way of the terebinth of the
magicians."^288
Zebul now challenges Gaal to make good his boasting. A fight ensues in view of the
citizens of Shechem, in which Gaal and his band are discomfited, and he and his
adherents are finally expelled from the town. If the Shechemites had thought thus to
purchase immunity, they were speedily undeceived. Abimelech was hovering in the
neighborhood, and, when the unsuspecting people were busy in their fields, he surprised
and slaughtered them, at the same time occupying the city, which was razed to the
ground and sowed with salt. Upon this the citizens of the tower, or of Millo, sought
refuge in the sacred precincts of "the hall of the god Berith." But in vain. Abimelech set
it on fire, and 1000 persons perished in the flames. Even this did not satisfy his revenge.
He next turned his forces against the neighboring town of Thebez. Reduced to the
utmost straits, its inhabitants fled to the strong tower within the city. Thither Abimelech
pursued them. Almost had the people of Thebez shared the fate of the citizens of Millo,
when Abimelech's course was strangely arrested. From the top of the tower a woman
cast down upon him an "upper millstone."^289 As the Rabbis put it, he, that had
slaughtered his brothers upon a stone, was killed by a stone. Abimelech died as he had
lived. Feeling himself mortally wounded, ambitious warrior to the last, he had himself
run through by the sword of his armor-bearer, to avoid the disgrace of perishing by the
hand of a woman. But his epitaph, and that of the men of Shechem who had perished by
his hand, had been long before written in the curse of Jotham.
(^)