Execution

We later decided to address the two prisoners we had.  I could see the fear that they had in their eyes.  These men who were originally so haughty and so full of arrogance and had an air of invincibility about them, they thought nothing could touch them and nobody could defeat them.  Now these men were carefully choosing their words doing what they could to avoid death that surely awaited them from the men of the nation they were oppressing.  I asked Zebah and Zalmunna, “What kind of men did you kill at Tabor?”  They responded, “Men like you, each one with the bearing on a prince.”  I replied to them, “Those men were my brothers, the sons of my own mother!  As surely as the Lord lives, if you had spared their lives, I would not kill you.” I looked to Jether, my oldest son and told him to kill them!  But Jether was only a boy and did not draw his sword, because he was only a boy and was afraid.  Zebah and Zalmunna said, “Come, do it yourself.  ‘As a man, so is his strength.’”  So I stepped forward and killed them, and took the ornaments off their camels’ necks.