Judges 6:15

15. My family is poor in Manasseh. Literally, my thousand. For convenience in government Israel was divided into thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens. Exodus 18:21; Exodus 18:25. A thousand in this technical sense might become greater or smaller in the course of time. Its numbers, like those of a regiment of an army, might become much diminished, and yet the old title of thousand remain. That thousand in Manasseh to which Gideon belonged had become feeble, though its exact numerical strength might not have been known.