‘ And when he was come into his house he took a knife and laid hold on his concubine, and divided her according to her bones, into twelve pieces, and sent her throughout all the borders of Israel.'
Determined to have justice the Levite decided on a dreadful thing. No doubt his mind was temporarily a little deranged from what had happened, although we must remember that as a Levite he was used to seeing carcasses carved up. And he divided up her body with a carving knife, using the lay out of the bones to determine the pieces, until he had produced twelve pieces. These were one for every tribe, including Benjamin. He could not believe that Benjamin could possibly justify what had been done.
Why did he do such a thing? It was so that the most gruesome indication of what had been done should be brought home to the tribes. He wanted to shock them into action. He was only an obscure Levite and he knew from his connections with the central sanctuary how easily such things could be forgotten. But he wanted to make sure that this case would not be forgotten. And coming from a Levite, a servant of the sanctuary, and one set apart as God's, such a ‘present' would have even more impact.
The message would be clear. The woman had met a violent death of a most obscene kind in breach of the covenant of Yahweh. He may also have intended to convey the message that it was the equivalent of human sacrifice, that she had been, as it were, sacrificed to Baal. For the behaviour of the men may well have resulted from their contact with the religion of Baal and with sacred prostitutes, and have been excused by them as in accordance with such practises. This, if anything would, should spur the confederate tribes into action.
We can, however, compare how Saul, when he wanted to stress the seriousness of the call to the tribes, took a yoke of oxen and cut them in pieces, and sent them throughout Israel as a sign that those who failed to respond would be put to death (1 Samuel 11:7). Saul may have got the idea from the Levite, or Saul's may have been a regular method of calling the tribes around that time, with the Levite taking it further for the sake of impact.
Thus the Levite may also have been stressing that God would require at their hands, by death, a failure to respond to his plea. But instead of the usual sacrifice of an animal he used a human being. Certainly he achieved what none of the judges were able to achieve, the uniting of the whole confederacy in action.
“And sent her throughout all the borders of Israel.” The ‘twelve' would appear to be intended to include Benjamin. The point is that the message was sent to every tribe in the confederation These, or at least a faithful proportion of them, would regularly meet to renew covenant at the central sanctuary. They were responsible to uphold the rights of Levites, and to uphold the law of Moses, and a most foul murder had been committed. The parts of his concubine's body were a call to the tribes to come together and observe the covenant by exacting justice for what had been done and dealing with this evil that was in their midst.