This describes the Biblical Judge Abimelech. See Abimelech for other people so named. In the Tanakh or Old Testament, Abimelech was a son of the great judge Gideon (Judges 9:1); thus his name אֲבִימֶלֶךְ / אֲבִימָלֶךְ can best be interpreted "my father, the king". "Abimelech", a name claiming the inherited right to rule, was also a common name of the Philistine kings. He was, however, merely the son of Gideon's concubine; and to make good his claim to rule over Ephraim, he resorted to force. Aided by his mother's relatives, he put to death all of his half-brothers, seventy in number, "on one stone," at Ophrah, only the youngest, Jotham, escaping. Abimelech ruled but three years in Shechem after the death of his father (Judges 8:33-9:6).

He was an unprincipled, ambitious ruler, often engaged in war with his own subjects. When engaged in reducing the town of Thebez , which had revolted, he was struck mortally on his head by a mill-stone, thrown by the hand of a woman from the wall above. Perceiving that the wound was mortal, he desired his armor-bearer to thrust him through with his sword, that it might not be said he had perished by the hand of a woman (Judges 9:50-57).