The War with Benjamin

A Levite traveling from Bethlehem stayed overnight in Gibeah, a city belonging to the tribe of Benjamin. During the night, men of the city surrounded the house and demanded to have relations with him. Instead, the Levite's concubine was sent out to them, where they abused her throughout the night until she died. The Levite then divided her body into twelve pieces and sent them to all the coasts of Israel to provoke a response (Judges 19:25-30).

The tribes of Israel assembled as one man at Mizpah to demand that the inhabitants of Gibeah be handed over for punishment. When the Benjamites refused and prepared for battle, the Israelites consulted God at Bethel. During this period, Phinehas son of Eleazar stood before the ark of the covenant to inquire whether the people should continue the fight (Judges 20:27-28). The Benjamites defeated the Israelite forces in the first two engagements, killing forty thousand men, though the text does not say why these initial losses occurred.

On the third day, the Israelites set an ambush around Gibeah and feigned a retreat to draw the Benjamite soldiers away from the city. The ambushers then rose up, captured Gibeah, and set it on fire. The Benjamites were trapped between two forces and suffered twenty-five thousand casualties (Judges 20:43-46). Only six hundred Benjamite men escaped to the rock of Rimmon, while the Israelites burned the remaining Benjamite cities and killed the inhabitants.

Realizing a tribe was missing from Israel, the assembly sought wives for the six hundred survivors because they had sworn not to give their own daughters to Benjamin. They destroyed the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead for failing to join the assembly, sparing only four hundred virgins for the Benjamites. To provide for the remaining two hundred men, the elders instructed them to catch women during a feast in Shiloh (Judges 21:20-23). The Benjamites ثم returned to their inheritance and rebuilt their cities.