BEDAN

(Beʹdan).

1. Listed with Gideon (Jerubbaal), Jephthah and Samuel as delivering Israel from enemies. (1 Sam. 12:11) However, nowhere else in the Bible nor in secular history is mention made of such a Bedan. C. F. Keil and F. Delitzsch, in their Biblical Commentary on the Books of Samuel, p. 118, remark: “It is extremely improbable that Samuel should have mentioned a judge here, who had been passed over in the book of Judges on account of his comparative insignificance.”

Bedan is by some understood to refer to Barak. The context of 1 Samuel 12:11 denotes a major deliverer and recalls the oppression by Sisera and the deliverance that followed, a deliverance in which Jehovah used Barak. Barak is named along with Gideon and Jephthah in Hebrews 11:32. The Septuagint and Syriac Peshitta read “Barak” at 1 Samuel 12:11. Nevertheless, others believe Bedan refers to Judge Abdon. Both names, Barak and Abdon, bear certain similarities to “Bedan” in Hebrew.—See BARAK.

2. A descendant of Manasseh.—1 Chron. 7:17.