Judges 21 - Clarke's commentary and critical notes on the Bible

Bible Comments
  • Judges 21:1 open_in_new

    Now the men of Israel had sworn in Mizpeh, saying, There shall not any of us give his daughter unto Benjamin to wife. Now the men of Israel had sworn - Of this oath we had not heard before; but it appears they had commenced this war with a determination to destroy the Benjamites utterly, and that if any of them escaped the sword no man should be permitted to give him his daughter to wife. By these means the remnant of the tribe must soon have been annihilated.

  • Judges 21:2 open_in_new

    And the people came to the house of God, and abode there till even before God, and lifted up their voices, and wept sore; The people came to the house of God - Literally, the people came בית־אל to Bethel; this is considered as the name of a place by the Chaldee, Syriac, Arabic, and Septuagint.

    And wept sore - Their revenge was satisfied, and now reflection brings them to contrition for what they had done.

  • Judges 21:3 open_in_new

    And said, O LORD God of Israel, why is this come to pass in Israel, that there should be to day one tribe lacking in Israel? Why is this come to pass - This was a very impertinent question. They knew well enough how it came to pass. It was right that the men of Gibeah should be punished, and it was right that they who vindicated them should share in that punishment; but they carried their revenge too far, they endeavored to exterminate both man and beast, Judges 20:48.

  • Judges 21:4 open_in_new

    And it came to pass on the morrow, that the people rose early, and built there an altar, and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings. Built there an altar - This affords some evidence that this was not a regular place of worship, else an altar would have been found in the place; and their act was not according to the law, as may be seen in several places of the Pentateuch. But there was neither king nor law among them, and they did whatever appeared right in their own eyes.

  • Judges 21:5 open_in_new

    And the children of Israel said, Who is there among all the tribes of Israel that came not up with the congregation unto the LORD? For they had made a great oath concerning him that came not up to the LORD to Mizpeh, saying, He shall surely be put to death.

  • Judges 21:6 open_in_new

    And the children of Israel repented them for Benjamin their brother, and said, There is one tribe cut off from Israel this day.

  • Judges 21:7 open_in_new

    How shall we do for wives for them that remain, seeing we have sworn by the LORD that we will not give them of our daughters to wives? How shall we do for wives for them - From this it appears that they had destroyed all the Benjamitish women and children! They had set out with the purpose of exterminating the whole tribe, and therefore they massacred the women, that if any of the men escaped, they might neither find wife nor daughter; and they bound themselves under an oath not to give any of their females to any of the remnant of this tribe, that thus the whole tribe might utterly perish.

  • Judges 21:8 open_in_new

    And they said, What one is there of the tribes of Israel that came not up to Mizpeh to the LORD? And, behold, there came none to the camp from Jabeshgilead to the assembly. There came none to the camp from Jabesh-gilead - As they had sworn to destroy those who would not assist in this war, Judges 21:5, they determined to destroy the men of Jabesh, and to leave none alive except the virgins, and to give these to the six hundred Benjamites that had escaped to the rock Rimmon. So twelve thousand men went, smote the city, and killed all the males and all the married women. The whole account is dreadful; and none could have been guilty of all these enormities but those who were abandoned of God. The crime of the men of Gibeah was of the deepest die; the punishment, involving both the guilty and innocent, was extended to the most criminal excess; and their mode or redressing the evil which they had occasioned was equally abominable.

  • Judges 21:9 open_in_new

    For the people were numbered, and, behold, there were none of the inhabitants of Jabeshgilead there.

  • Judges 21:10 open_in_new

    And the congregation sent thither twelve thousand men of the valiantest, and commanded them, saying, Go and smite the inhabitants of Jabeshgilead with the edge of the sword, with the women and the children.

  • Judges 21:11 open_in_new

    And this is the thing that ye shall do, Ye shall utterly destroy every male, and every woman that hath lain by man.

  • Judges 21:12 open_in_new

    And they found among the inhabitants of Jabeshgilead four hundred young virgins, that had known no man by lying with any male: and they brought them unto the camp to Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan.

  • Judges 21:13 open_in_new

    And the whole congregation sent some to speak to the children of Benjamin that were in the rock Rimmon, and to call peaceably unto them. And to call peaceably unto them - To proclaim peace to them; to assure them that the enmity was all over, and that they might with safety leave their strong hold.

  • Judges 21:14 open_in_new

    And Benjamin came again at that time; and they gave them wives which they had saved alive of the women of Jabeshgilead: and yet so they sufficed them not. Yet so they sufficed them not - There were six hundred men at Rimmon, and all the young women they saved from Jabesh were only four hundred; therefore, there were two hundred still wanting.

  • Judges 21:15 open_in_new

    And the people repented them for Benjamin, because that the LORD had made a breach in the tribes of Israel.

  • Judges 21:16 open_in_new

    Then the elders of the congregation said, How shall we do for wives for them that remain, seeing the women are destroyed out of Benjamin?

  • Judges 21:17 open_in_new

    And they said, There must be an inheritance for them that be escaped of Benjamin, that a tribe be not destroyed out of Israel.

  • Judges 21:18 open_in_new

    Howbeit we may not give them wives of our daughters: for the children of Israel have sworn, saying, Cursed be he that giveth a wife to Benjamin.

  • Judges 21:19 open_in_new

    Then they said, Behold, there is a feast of the LORD in Shiloh yearly in a place which is on the north side of Bethel, on the east side of the highway that goeth up from Bethel to Shechem, and on the south of Lebonah. There is a feast of the Lord - What this feast was is not known: it might be either the passover, pentecost, or the feast of tabernacles, or indeed some other peculiar to this place. All the above feasts were celebrated at that time of the year when the vines were in full leaf; therefore the Benjamites might easily conceal themselves in the vineyards; and the circumstances will answer to any of those feasts.

    On the east side of the highway, etc. - I can see no reason for this minute description, unless it intimates that this feast was to be held this year in rather a different place to that which was usual: and, as the Benjamites had been shut up in their strong hold in Rimmon, they might not have heard of this alteration; and it was necessary, in such a case, to give them the most circumstantial information, that they might succeed in their enterprise without being discovered.

  • Judges 21:21 open_in_new

    And see, and, behold, if the daughters of Shiloh come out to dance in dances, then come ye out of the vineyards, and catch you every man his wife of the daughters of Shiloh, and go to the land of Benjamin. And catch you every man his wife - That is, Let each man of the two hundred Benjamites seize and carry off a woman, whom he is, from that hour, to consider as his wife.

  • Judges 21:22 open_in_new

    And it shall be, when their fathers or their brethren come unto us to complain, that we will say unto them, Be favourable unto them for our sakes: because we reserved not to each man his wife in the war: for ye did not give unto them at this time, that ye should be guilty. Be favorable unto them - They promise to use their influence with the men of Shiloh to induce them to consent to a connection thus fraudulently obtained, and which the necessity of the case appeared to them to justify.

    We reserved not to each man his wife in the war - The reading of the Vulgate is very remarkable: Miseremini eorum, non enim rapuerunt eas jure bellantium atque victorum, sed rogantibus ut acciperent non dedistis, et a vestra parte peccatum est. - "Pardon them, for they have not taken them as victors take captives in war; but when they requested you to give them you did not; therefore the fault is your own." Here it is intimated that application had been made to the people of Shiloh to furnish these two hundred Benjamites with wives, and that they had refused; and it was this refusal that induced the Benjamites to seize and carry them off. Does not St. Jerome, the translator, refer to the history of the rape of the Sabine virgins? See below. Houbigant translates the Hebrew thus: Veniam quaeso illis date; non enim ad bellum duxerant suam quisque uxorem; et nisi eas illis nunc concedetis, delicti rei eritis. - "Pardon them, I beseech you, for they have not each taken his wife to the war; and unless you now give these to them, you will sin." This intimates that, as the Benjamites had not taken their wives with them to the war, where some, if not all, of them might have escaped; and the Israelites found them in the cities, and put them all to the sword; therefore the people of Shiloh should give up those two hundred young women to them for wives; and if they did not, it would be a sin, the circumstances of the case being considered.

    Our translation seems to give as a reason to the men of Shiloh why they should pardon this rape, that as they had not permitted the women to live in their war with Benjamin, therefore these men are now destitute; and the concession which they wish them to make may be considered as more of an obligation to the Israelites than to the Benjamites. It is an obscure sentence; and the reader, if not pleased with what is laid down, may endeavor to satisfy himself with others which he may find in different versions and commentators. The Vulgate gives a good sense to the passage; but probably Houbigant comes nearest to the meaning.

  • Judges 21:23 open_in_new

    And the children of Benjamin did so, and took them wives, according to their number, of them that danced, whom they caught: and they went and returned unto their inheritance, and repaired the cities, and dwelt in them. They went and returned unto their inheritance - It appears that the Benjamites acted in the most honorable way by the women whom they had thus violently carried off; and we may rest assured they took them to an inheritance at least equal to their own, for it does not appear that any part of the lands of the Benjamites was alienated from them, and the six hundred men in question shared, for the present, the inheritance of many thousands.

  • Judges 21:24 open_in_new

    And the children of Israel departed thence at that time, every man to his tribe and to his family, and they went out from thence every man to his inheritance. Every man to his tribe - Though this must have been four months after the war with Benjamin, Judges 20:47; yet it appears the armies did not disband till they had got the remnant of Benjamin settled, as is here related.

  • Judges 21:25 open_in_new

    In those days there was no king in Israel: every man did that which was right in his own eyes. In those days there was no king in Israel - Let no one suppose that the sacred writer, by relating the atrocities in this and the preceding Chapter s, justifies the actions themselves; by no means. Indeed, they cannot be justified; and the writer by relating them gives the strongest proof of the authenticity of the whole, by such an impartial relation of facts that were highly to be discredit of his country.

    I Have already referred to the rape of the Sabine virgins. The story is told by Livy, Hist. lib. i., cap. 9, the substance of which is as follows: Romulus having opened an asylum at his new-built city of Rome for all kinds of persons, the number of men who flocked to his standard was soon very considerable; but as they had few women, or, as Livy says, penuria mulierum, a dearth of women, he sent to all the neighboring states to invite them to make inter-marriages with his people. Not one of the tribes around him received the proposal; and some of them insulted his ambassador, and said, Ecquod feminis quoque asylum aperuissent? Id enim demum compar connubium fore? "Why have you not also opened an asylum for Women, which would have afforded you suitable matches?" This exasperated Romulus, but he concealed his resentment, and, having published that he intended a great feast to Neptune Equester, invited all the neighboring tribes to come to it: they did so, and were received by the Romans with the greatest cordiality and friendship. The Sabines, with their wives and children, came in great numbers, and each Roman citizen entertained a stranger. When the games began, and each was intent on the spectacle before them, at a signal given, the young Romans rushed in among the Sabine women, and each carried off one, whom however they used in the kindest manner, marrying them according to their own rites with due solemnity, and admitting them to all the rights and privileges of the new commonwealth. The number carried off on this occasion amounted to near seven hundred; but this act of violence produced disastrous wars between the Romans and the Sabines, which were at last happily terminated by the mediation of the very women whose rape had been the cause of their commencement. The story may be seen at large in Livy, Plutarch, and others.

    Thus ends the book of Judges; a work which, while it introduces the history of Samuel and that of the kings of Judah and Israel, forms in some sort a supplement to the book of Joshua, and furnishes the only account we have of those times of anarchy and confusion, which extended nearly from the times of the elders who survived Joshua, to the establishment of the Jewish monarchy under Saul, David, and their successors. For other uses of this book, see the preface.

    Masoretic Notes on the Book of Judges

    The number of verses in this book is six hundred and eighteen.

    Its Masoretic Chapter s are fourteen.

    And its middle verse is Judges 10:8 : And that year they vexed and oppressed the children of Israel, etc.

    Corrected for a new edition, December 1, 1827. - A. C.

    Commentary on the Bible, by Adam Clarke [1831].