‘And they turned and fled toward the wilderness towards the rock of Rimmon.'
This would be a rocky cliff with caves, possibly modern Rammon, eight miles east of Bethel. They knew that if they reached that rocky fortress they would be able to hide and defend themselves against any who tried to encroach. Rimmon means ‘pomegranate'. Perhaps that was what it looked like.
‘And they gleaned of them in the highways five eleph men, and pursued hard after them to Gidom, and smote two eleph men of them.'
The picture is dreadful, but vivid. One by one the men of Benjamin were picked off as they used the highways to try to reach Rimmon, a whole five units of men. The gleanings were the bits that were left over when the harvest was reaped, to be picked up a little at a time, and they were the gleanings.
“And pursued hard after them to Gidom, and smote two eleph men of them.” Two units managed to reach Gidom, but there they had to make a stand and were defeated. The name means ‘a cutting down, a breaking in pieces'.