Gideon's Place

Sed primo illud quod ex Epistola quae ad Hebraeos est, commemoravi, inter illos laudabiles viros qui ibidem recoluntur, non solum est Jephte, verum etiam Gedeon, de quo similiter Scriptura dicit, Spiritus Domini confortavit Gedeon: et tamen ejus factum, quod de illo auro praedae operatus est ephud, et fornicatus est post illud omnis Israel, et factum est domui Gedeon in scandalum, non solum laudare non possumus; verum etiam quia Scriptura hic apertissime judicavit, reprobare minime dubitamus: nec tamen ex hoc ulla fit injuria Spiritui Domini, qui cum confortavit, ut hostes populi ejus tanta facilitate superaret. Cur ergo inter illos commemoratur, qui per fidem vicerunt regna, operantes justitiam; nisi quia sancta Scriptura, quorum fidem atque justitiam veraciter laudat, non hinc impeditur eorum etiam peccata, si qua novit, et oportere judicat, notare veraciter? Nam et in eo quod idem Gedeon signum petens, sicut ipse locutus est, tentavit in vellere, nescio utrum non fuerit transgressus praeceptum quod scriptum est, Non tentabis Dominum Deum tuum: verumtamen etiam in ejus tentatione Dominus quod praenuntiare volebat ostendit; in compluto scilicet vellere et area tota circumquaque sicca, figurare primum populum Israel, ubi erant sancti cum gratia coelesti, tanquam pluvia spirituali; et postea compluta area sicco vellere, figurare Ecclesiam toto orbe diffusam, habentem non in vellere tanquam in velamine, sed in aperto coelestem gratiam, illo priore populo velut ab ejusdem gratiae rore aliento atque siccato. Nec tamen frustra inter fideles et operantes justitiam, propter bonam fidelemque vitam, in qua eum credendum est esse defunctum, tale in Epistola ad Hebraeos meruit testimonium. Sanctus Augustinus Hipponensi, Quaestionum In Heptateuchum, Liber VII Source: Migne PL 34.813-814

But first, that which is in the letter to the Hebrews, that I have mentioned, among those who are recounted as praiseworthy men, not only is Jephtah found but even Gideon, 1 concerning whom Scripture similarly says that the Spirit of the Lord strengthened Gideon, 2 and yet one of his deeds was the making of the gold ephod from spoil, which caused all Israel to fornicate after it and made the house of Gideon a scandal, 3 which we are not only not able to praise, but since Scripture openly condemns it, we must without doubt reprove. Not, however, that this is any injury to the Spirit of the Lord, who when He strengthened gave triumph with such ease to the hosts of his people. Why, then, is he among those who are recalled, who through faith conquered kingdoms, and worked righteousness, unless that Holy Scripture, the faith and justice of whom truly it praises, is not at all impeded by their errors, when that which it knows, and judges necessary, it note truly? For even in the act of that same Gideon seeking a sign, as it is said, he made trial with a fleece, I do not know whether it were not a transgression of that command written: 'You shall not test the Lord your God.' 4 But the Lord in his testing showed what He wished to be foretold. That is, the wetting of the fleece with the whole area around it dry, is a figure of the first people Israel, when they were holy with the grace of heaven, as with spiritual water; and then the later wetting of the dry area around the fleece, is a figure of the Church spread throughout the whole world, having not heaven's grace in the fleece, as a covering, but in the open, and with the former people by the same grace bedewed as the foreign dryness. 5 Not, then, among the faithful and workers of righteousness, on account of good faith and life, in which believing in Him he died, did such a man vainly merit testimony in the Letter to The Hebrews. Saint Augustine of Hippo, Questions on The Heptateuch, Book 7 1 Hebrews 11.32 2 Judges 6.23 3 Judges 8.27 4 Deut 6.16 5 Judges 6.36-40