Midian

Midian is a place in The Bible. The Book of Genesis says that Midian was the son of Abraham and Keturah. Midian’s descendants the Midianites buy Joseph from Judah and his brothers and then sell him in Egypt.

Book of Exodus

When Moses runs away from Egypt, he goes to the land of the Midianites. He sees male shepherds not let some girls get water from a well, so he makes the men leave and gives the girls the water. They go to their father Jethro and he tells them to invite Moses home so Moses becomes a shepherd for Jethro and marries Jethro’s daughter Zipporah. Zipporah then gives birth to a son and Moses names him Gershom because “I am a stranger in a strange land” and she also gives birth to a second son. After Moses leaves with Zipporah and his sons, The Lord sends an Angel to kill Moses so Zipporah circumcised their second son and the Angel let Moses live. After that Moses left Zipporah with his sons while he went to Egypt. Jethro later left the land of the Midianites with Zipporah and his grandsons who were named Gershom and Eliezer and met with Moses.

Book of Numbers

In the Book of Numbers, King Balak hires a Midianite named Balaam to curse the Israelites but Balaam accidentally blesses them instead. So Balaam decides to get the Israelites to sin so the the Almighty would get angry and punish them. So Balaam convinces the Midianites to send their women to have sex with the Israelites, get them to have an orgy and get them to worship the Midianite Idol Baal Peor. So Phineas, Aaron’s grandson, kills the Israelites who were sinning. The Israelites then attacked the Midianites and killed their men but not the women. Then Moses told the Israelites also to kill the Midianite women since they had done more than the men had. So they killed the Midianite women. Moses also had them kill Balaam since he was the person whose idea it was.

Book of Judges

In the Book of Judges, the Midianites attacked the Land of Israel so Hashem told Gideon to fight them.