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Judges 21:6-25 King James Version with Strong's Concordance (STRONG)

6 And the children H1121 of Israel H3478 repented H5162 them for Benjamin H1144 their brother, H251 and said, H559 There is one H259 tribe H7626 cut off H1438 from Israel H3478 this day. H3117

7 How shall we do H6213 for wives H802 for them that remain, H3498 seeing we have sworn H7650 by the LORD H3068 that we will not give H5414 them of our daughters H1323 to wives? H802

8 And they said, H559 What one H259 is there of the tribes H7626 of Israel H3478 that came not up H5927 to Mizpeh H4709 to the LORD? H3068 And, behold, there came H935 none H376 to the camp H4264 from Jabeshgilead H3003 H1568 to the assembly. H6951

9 For the people H5971 were numbered, H6485 and, behold, there were none H376 of the inhabitants H3427 of Jabeshgilead H3003 H1568 there.

10 And the congregation H5712 sent H7971 thither twelve H8147 H6240 thousand H505 men H376 of the valiantest, H1121 H2428 and commanded H6680 them, saying, H559 Go H3212 and smite H5221 the inhabitants H3427 of Jabeshgilead H3003 H1568 with the edge H6310 of the sword, H2719 with the women H802 and the children. H2945

11 And this is the thing H1697 that ye shall do, H6213 Ye shall utterly destroy H2763 every male, H2145 and every woman H802 that hath lain H4904 by man. H3045

12 And they found H4672 among the inhabitants H3427 of Jabeshgilead H3003 H1568 four H702 hundred H3967 young H5291 virgins, H1330 that had known H3045 no man H376 by lying H4904 with any male: H2145 and they brought H935 them unto the camp H4264 to Shiloh, H7887 which is in the land H776 of Canaan. H3667

13 And the whole congregation H5712 sent H7971 some to speak H1696 to the children H1121 of Benjamin H1144 that were in the rock H5553 Rimmon, H7417 and to call H7121 peaceably H7965 unto them.

14 And Benjamin H1144 came again H7725 at that time; H6256 and they gave H5414 them wives H802 which they had saved alive H2421 of the women H802 of Jabeshgilead: H3003 H1568 and yet so they sufficed H4672 them not.

15 And the people H5971 repented H5162 them for Benjamin, H1144 because that the LORD H3068 had made H6213 a breach H6556 in the tribes H7626 of Israel. H3478

16 Then the elders H2205 of the congregation H5712 said, H559 How shall we do H6213 for wives H802 for them that remain, H3498 seeing the women H802 are destroyed H8045 out of Benjamin? H1144

17 And they said, H559 There must be an inheritance H3425 for them that be escaped H6413 of Benjamin, H1144 that a tribe H7626 be not destroyed H4229 out of Israel. H3478

18 Howbeit we may H3201 not give H5414 them wives H802 of our daughters: H1323 for the children H1121 of Israel H3478 have sworn, H7650 saying, H559 Cursed H779 be he that giveth H5414 a wife H802 to Benjamin. H1144

19 Then they said, H559 Behold, there is a feast H2282 of the LORD H3068 in Shiloh H7887 yearly H3117 H3117 in a place which is on the north side H6828 of Bethel, H1008 on the east side H4217 H8121 of the highway H4546 that goeth up H5927 from Bethel H1008 to Shechem, H7927 and on the south H5045 of Lebonah. H3829

20 Therefore they commanded H6680 the children H1121 of Benjamin, H1144 saying, H559 Go H3212 and lie in wait H693 in the vineyards; H3754

21 And see, H7200 and, behold, if the daughters H1323 of Shiloh H7887 come out H3318 to dance H2342 in dances, H4246 then come ye out H3318 of the vineyards, H3754 and catch H2414 you every man H376 his wife H802 of the daughters H1323 of Shiloh, H7887 and go H1980 to the land H776 of Benjamin. H1144

22 And it shall be, when their fathers H1 or their brethren H251 come H935 unto us to complain, H7378 that we will say H559 unto them, Be favourable H2603 unto them for our sakes: because we reserved H3947 not to each man H376 his wife H802 in the war: H4421 for ye did not give H5414 unto them at this time, H6256 that ye should be guilty. H816

23 And the children H1121 of Benjamin H1144 did so, H6213 and took H5375 them wives, H802 according to their number, H4557 of them that danced, H2342 whom they caught: H1497 and they went H3212 and returned H7725 unto their inheritance, H5159 and repaired H1129 the cities, H5892 and dwelt H3427 in them.

24 And the children H1121 of Israel H3478 departed H1980 thence at that time, H6256 every man H376 to his tribe H7626 and to his family, H4940 and they went out H3318 from thence every man H376 to his inheritance. H5159

25 In those days H3117 there was no king H4428 in Israel: H3478 every man H376 did H6213 that which was right H3477 in his own eyes. H5869

Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Keil & Delitzsch Commentary » Commentary on Judges 21

Commentary on Judges 21 Keil & Delitzsch Commentary


Introduction

Preservation of the Tribe of Benjamin - The Remnant Provided with Wives - Judges 21

Through the extraordinary severity with which the tribes of Israel had carried on the war against Benjamin, this tribe had been reduced to 600 men, and thus brought very near to extermination. Such a conclusion to the sanguinary conflict went to the heart of the congregation. For although, when forming the resolution to punish the unparalleled wickedness of the inhabitants of Gibeah with all the severity of the law, they had been urged on by nothing else than the sacred duty that was binding upon them to root out the evil from their midst, and although the war against the whole tribe of Benjamin was justified by the fact that they had taken the side of the culprits, and had even received the approval of the Lord; there is no doubt that in the performance of this resolution, and the war that was actually carried on, feelings of personal revenge had disturbed the righteous cause in consequence of the defeat which they had twice sustained at the hands of the Benjaminites, and had carried away the warriors into a war of extermination which was neither commanded by the law nor justified by the circumstances, and had brought about the destruction of a whole tribe from the twelve tribes of the covenant nation with the exception of a small vanishing remnant. When the rash deed was done, the congregation began most bitterly to repent. And with repentance there was awakened the feeling of brotherly love, and also a sense of duty to provide for the continuance of the tribe, which had been brought so near to destruction, by finding wives for those who remained, in order that the small remnant might grow into a vigorous tribe again.


Verses 1-14

The proposal to find wives for the six hundred Benjaminites who remained was exposed to this difficulty, that the congregation had sworn at Mizpeh (as is supplemented in Judges 21:1 to the account in Judges 20:1-9) that no one should give his daughter to a Benjaminite as a wife.

Judges 21:2-4

After the termination of the war, the people, i.e., the people who had assembled together for the war (see Judges 21:9), went again to Bethel (see at Judges 20:18, Judges 20:26), to weep there for a day before God at the serious loss which the war had brought upon the congregation. Then they uttered this lamentation: “ Why, O Lord God of Israel, is this come to pass in Israel, that a tribe is missing to-day from Israel? ” This lamentation involved the wish that God might show them the way to avert the threatened destruction of the missing tribe, and build up the six hundred who remained. To give a practical expression to this wish, they built an altar the next morning, and offered burnt-offerings and supplicatory offerings upon it (see at Judges 20:26), knowing as they did that their proposal would not succeed without reconciliation to the Lord, and a return to the fellowship of His grace. There is something apparently strange in the erection of an altar at Bethel, since sacrifices had already been offered there during the war itself (Judges 20:26), and this could not have taken place without an altar. Why it was erected again, or another one built, is a question which cannot be answered with any certainty. It is possible, however, that the first was not large enough for the number of sacrifices that had to be offered now.

Judges 21:5-8

The congregation then resolved upon a plan, through the execution of which a number of virgins were secured for the Benjaminites. They determined that they would carry out the great oath, which had been uttered when the national assembly was called against such as did not appear, upon that one of the tribes of Israel which had not come to the meeting of the congregation at Mizpeh. The deliberations upon this point were opened (Judges 21:5) with the question, “ Who is he who did not come up to the meeting of all the tribes of Israel, to Jehovah? ” In explanation of this question, it is observed at Judges 21:5, “ For the great oath was uttered upon him that came not up to Jehovah to Mizpeh: he shall be put to death. ” We learn from this supplementary remark, that when important meetings of the congregation were called, all the members were bound by an oath to appear. The meeting at Mizpeh is the one mentioned in Judges 20:1. The “great oath” consisted in the threat of death in the case of any that were disobedient. To this explanation of the question in Judges 20:5 , the further explanation is added in Judges 21:6, Judges 21:7, that the Israelites felt compassion for Benjamin, and wished to avert its entire destruction by procuring wives for such as remained. The word ויּנּחמוּ in Judges 21:6 is attached to the explanatory clause in Judges 21:5 , and is to be rendered as a pluperfect: “ And the children of Israel had shown themselves compassionate towards their brother Benjamin, and said, A tribe is cut off from Israel to-day; what shall we do to them, to those that remain with regard to wives, as we have sworn? ” etc. (compare Judges 21:1). The two thoughts, - (1) the oath that those who had not come to Mizpeh should be punished with death ( Judges 21:5 ), and (2) anxiety for the preservation of this tribe which sprang from compassion towards Benjamin, and was shown in their endeavour to provide such as remained with wives, without violating the oath that none of them would give them their own daughters as wives, - formed the two factors which determined the course to be adopted by the congregation. After the statement of these two circumstances, the question of Judges 21:5 , “ Who is the one (only one) of the tribes of Israel which, ” etc., is resumed and answered: “ Behold, there came no one into the camp from Jabesh in Gilead, into the assembly. ” שׁבטי is used in Judges 21:8, Judges 21:5, in a more general sense, as denoting not merely the tribes as such, but the several subdivisions of the tribes.

Judges 21:9

In order, however, to confirm the correctness of this answer, which might possibly have been founded upon a superficial and erroneous observation, the whole of the (assembled) people were mustered, and not one of the inhabitants of Jabesh was found there (in the national assembly at Bethel). The situation of Jabesh in Gilead has not yet been ascertained. This town was closely besieged by the Ammonite Nahash , and was relieved by Saul (1 Samuel 11:1.), on which account the inhabitants afterwards showed themselves grateful to Saul (1 Samuel 31:8.). Josephus calls Jabesh the metropolis of Gilead (Ant. vi. 5, 1). According to the Onom . ( s. v. Jabis ), it was six Roman miles from Pella, upon the top of a mountain towards Gerasa. Robinson (Bibl. Res. p. 320) supposes it to be the ruins of ed Deir in the Wady Jabes .

Judges 21:10-12

To punish this unlawful conduct, the congregation sent 12,000 brave fighting men against Jabesh, with orders to smite the inhabitants of the town with the edge of the sword, together with their wives, and children, but also with the more precise instructions (Judges 21:11), “to ban all the men, and women who had known the lying with man” (i.e., to slay them as exposed to death, which implied, on the other hand, that virgins who had not lain with any man should be spared). The fighting men found 400 such virgins in Jabesh, and brought them to the camp at Shiloh in the land of Canaan. אותם (Judges 21:12) refers to the virgins, the masculine being used as the more common genus in the place of the feminine. Shiloh , with the additional clause “in the land of Canaan,” which was occasioned by the antithesis Jabesh in Gilead , as in Joshua 21:2; Joshua 22:9, was the usual meeting-place of the congregation, on account of its being the seat of the tabernacle. The representatives of the congregation had moved thither, after the deliberations concerning Jabesh, which were still connected with the war against Benjamin, were concluded.

Judges 21:13-14

The congregation then sent to call the Benjaminites, who had taken refuge upon the rock Rimmon, and gave them as wives, when they returned (sc., into their own possessions), the 400 virgins of Jabesh who had been preserved alive. “ But so they sufficed them not ” ( כּן , so, i.e., in their existing number, 400: Bertheau ). In this remark there is an allusion to what follows.


Verse 15-16

Of the six hundred Benjaminites who had escaped, there still remained two hundred to be provided with wives. To these the congregation gave permission to take wives by force at a festival at Shiloh. The account of this is once more introduced, with a description of the anxiety felt by the congregation for the continuance of the tribe of Benjamin. Judges 21:15, Judges 21:16, and Judges 21:18 are only a repetition of Judges 21:6 and Judges 21:7, with a slight change of expression. The “ breach ( perez ) in the tribes of Israel ” had arisen from the almost complete extermination of Benjamin. “ For out of Benjamin is (every) woman destroyed ,” viz., by the ruthless slaughter of the whole of the people of that tribe (Judges 20:48). Consequently the Benjaminites who were still unmarried could not find any wives in their own tribe. The fact that four hundred of the Benjaminites who remained were already provided with wives is not noticed here, because it has been stated just before, and of course none of them could give up their own wives to others.


Verses 17-19

Still Benjamin must be preserved as a tribe. The elders therefore said, “ Possession of the saved shall be for Benjamin, ” i.e., the tribe-land of Benjamin shall remain an independent possession for the Benjaminites who have escaped the massacre, so that a tribe may not be destroyed out of Israel. It was necessary therefore, that they should take steps to help the remaining Benjaminites to wives. The other tribes could not give them their daughters, on account of the oath which has already been mentioned in Judges 21:1 and Judges 21:7 and is repeated here (Judges 21:18). Consequently there was hardly any other course open, than to let the Benjaminites seize upon wives for themselves. And the elders lent them a helping hand by offering them this advice, that at the next yearly festival at Shiloh, at which the daughters of Shiloh carried on dances in the open air (outside the town), they should seize upon wives for themselves from among these daughters, and promising them that when the thing was accomplished they would adjust it peaceably (Judges 21:19-22). The “ feast of Jehovah, ” which the Israelites kept from year to year, was one of the three great annual festivals, probably one which lasted seven days, either the passover or the feast of tabernacles-most likely the former, as the dances of the daughters of Shiloh were apparently an imitation of the dances of the Israelitish women at the Red Sea under the superintendence of Miriam (Exodus 15:20). The minute description of the situation of Shiloh (Judges 21:19), viz., “to the north of Bethel, on the east of the road which rises from Bethel to Shechem, and on the south of Lebonah ” (the present village of Lubban , on the north-west of Seilun: see Rob . Pal. iii. p. 89), serves to throw light upon the scene which follows, i.e., to show how the situation of Shiloh was peculiarly fitted for the carrying out of the advice given to the Benjaminites; since, as soon as they had issued from their hiding-places in the vineyards at Shiloh, and seized upon the dancing virgins, they could easily escape into their own land by the neighbouring high-road which led from Bethel to Shechem, without being arrested by the citizens of Shiloh.


Verse 20-21

The Kethibh ויצו in the singular may be explained on the ground that one of the elders spoke and gave the advice in the name of the others. חטף in Judges 21:21 and Psalms 10:9, to seize hold of, or carry off as prey = חתף .


Verse 22

And when the fathers or brethren of the virgins carried off, come to us to chide with us, we (the elders) will say to them (in your name), Present them to us ( אותם as in Judges 21:12); for we did not receive every one his wife through the war (with Jabesh); for ye have not given them to them; how would ye be guilty .” The words “Present them to us,” etc., are to be understood as spoken in the name of the Benjaminites, who were accused of the raid, to the relatives of the virgins who brought the complaint. This explains the use of the pronoun in the first person in חנּוּנוּ and לקחנוּ , which must not be altered therefore into the third person.

(Note: One circumstance which is decisive against this alteration of the text, is, that the Seventy had the Masoretic text before them, and founded their translation upon it ( ἐλεήσατε ἡμῖν αυτάς, ὅτι οὐκ ἐλάβομεν ἀνὴρ γυναῖκα αὐτοῦ ἐν τῷ πολέμῳ ). The different rendering of Jerome given in the Vulgate - miseremini eorum! non enim rapuerunt eas jure bellantium atque victorum - is nothing but an unfortunate and unsuccessful attempt to get rid of the difficulties connected with the readings in the text.)

The two clauses commencing with כּי are co-ordinate, and contain two points serving to enforce the request, “Present them,” etc. The first is pleaded in the name of the Benjaminites; the second is adduced, as a general ground on the part of the elders of the congregation, to pacify the fathers and brothers making the complaint, on account of the oath which the Israelites had taken, that none of them would give their daughters as wives to the Benjaminites. The meaning is the following: Ye may have your daughters with the Benjaminites who have taken them by force, for ye have not given them voluntarily, so as to have broken your oath by so doing. In the last clause כּעת has an unusual meaning: “at the time” (or now ), i.e., in that case , ye would have been guilty, viz., if ye had given them voluntarily.


Verse 23

The Benjaminites adopted this advice. They took to themselves wives according to their number, i.e., two hundred (according to Judges 21:12, compared with Judges 20:47), whom they caught from the dancing daughters of Shiloh, and returned with them into their inheritance, where they rebuilt the towns that had been reduced to ashes, and dwelt therein.


Verse 24-25

In Judges 21:24 and Judges 21:25, the account of this event is brought to a close with a twofold remark: (1) that the children of Israel, i.e., the representatives of the congregation who were assembled at Shiloh, separated and returned every man into his inheritance to his tribe and family; (2) that at that time there was no king in Israel, and every man was accustomed to do what was right in his own eyes. Whether the fathers or brothers of the virgins who had been carried off brought any complaint before the congregation concerning the raid that had been committed, the writer does not state, simply because this was of no moment so far as the history was concerned, inasmuch as, according to Judges 21:22, the complaint made no difference in the facts themselves.

(Note: “No doubt the fathers and brothers of the virgins demanded them both from the Benjaminites themselves, and also from the elders of Israel, or at any rate petitioned that the Benjaminites might be punished: but the elders replied as they had said that they should; and the persons concerned were satisfied with the answer, and so the affair was brought to a peaceable termination.” - Seb. Schmidt .)

With the closing remark in Judges 21:25, however, with which the account returns to its commencement in Judges 19:1, the prophetic historian sums up his judgment upon the history in the words, “At that time every man did what was right in his own eyes, because there was no king in Israel,” in which the idea is implied, that under the government of a king, who administered right and justice in the kingdom, such things could not possibly have happened. This not only refers to the conduct of the Israelites towards Benjamin in the war, the severity of which was not to be justified, but also to their conduct towards the inhabitants of Jabesh, as described in Judges 21:5. The congregation had no doubt a perfect right, when all the people were summoned to deliberate upon important matters affecting the welfare of the whole nation, to utter the “great oath” against such as failed to appear, i.e., to threaten them with death and carry out this threat upon such as were obstinate; but such a punishment as this could only be justly inflicted upon persons who were really guilty, and had rebelled against the congregation as the supreme power, and could not be extended to women and children unless they had also committed a crime deserving of death. But even if there were peculiar circumstances in the case before us, which have been passed over by our author, who restricts himself simply to points bearing upon the main purpose of the history, but which rendered it necessary that the ban should be inflicted upon all the inhabitants of Jabesh, it was at any rate an arbitrary exemption to spare all the marriageable virgins, and one which could not be justified by the object contemplated, however laudable that object might be. This also applies to the oath taken by the people, that they would not give any of their daughters as wives to the Benjaminites, as well as to the advice given by the elders to the remaining two hundred, to carry off virgins from the festival at Shiloh. However just and laudable the moral indignation may have been, which was expressed in that oath by the nation generally at the scandalous crime of the Gibeites, a crime unparalleled in Israel, and at the favour shown to the culprits by the tribe of Benjamin, the oath itself was an act of rashness, in which there was not only an utter denial of brotherly love, but the bounds of justice were broken through. When the elders of the nation came to a better state of mind, they ought to have acknowledge their rashness openly, and freed themselves and the nation from an oath that had been taken in such sinful haste. “Wherefore they would have acted far more uprightly, if they had seriously confessed their fault and asked forgiveness of God, and given permission to the Benjaminites to marry freely. In this way there would have been no necessity to cut off the inhabitants of Jabesh from their midst by cruelty of another kind” ( Buddeus ). But if they felt themselves bound in their consciences to keep the oath inviolably, they ought to have commended the matter to the Lord in prayer, and left it to His decision; whereas, by the advice given to the Benjaminites, they had indeed kept the oath in the letter, but had treated it in deed and truth as having no validity whatever.