Judges 21

Israel has nearly wiped out the tribe of Benjamin, and now grieves that a whole tribe may vanish. Bound by rash oaths, the people try to fix one wrong by committing others: the destruction of Jabesh-gilead and the seizing of the dancers at Shiloh. The chapter ends with the book’s sad verdict that without a king, everyone did what seemed right to himself.

Judges 21:1

Before the war with Benjamin, Israel had vowed at Mizpah never to give a daughter to a Benjamite. In anger they spoke quickly, and now the vow stands in the way of saving the tribe. Rash words can bind us longer than we expect.

BSA: oath (“a solemn promise”): This was no passing remark. It was a sacred pledge made before God, which is why it troubles them so much.

Hebrew: נִשְׁבַּע (nishba’, H7650) — “swore, bound himself by oath.” The Hebrew word is linked to the word for seven, the number of completeness. An oath was a binding seal, a promise made with God as witness.

See also: Numbers 30:2; Ecclesiastes 5:4-5.

Judges 21:2-3

The people gather at Bethel, where they had sought God during the war, and weep until evening. Their question is sincere but blind. They ask why a tribe is missing, though their own fierce actions and vow helped bring it about.

BSA: weeping (“with great lamentation”): Their grief is deep and loud, not polite sorrow.

Hebrew: בֵּית־אֵל (Beth-el, H1008) — “house of God.” The name means ‘house of God.’ They come to the right place to mourn, but grief alone does not turn them from their own schemes.

See also: Judges 20:26-27.

Judges 21:4

Next morning they rise early and build an altar, offering burnt offerings and peace offerings. Burnt offerings sought God’s favor, and peace offerings expressed fellowship with him. They are trying to approach God rightly, yet their next plans show how little they ask what he wants.

BSA: burnt offerings (“steps to the altar, olot”): The word carries the idea of something going up, a whole gift rising to God.

Hebrew: עֹלוֹת (‘olot, H5930) — “offerings that go up.” The root means ’to go up.’ The whole animal ascended in smoke, a picture of complete surrender to God.

Judges 21:5

They discover a second oath, made at Mizpah, that anyone who skipped the assembly must die. This oath is the doorway to the next tragedy. Both vows are rash, and now the people use one to get around the other.

BSA: solemn (“great, sacred”): The oath was treated as weighty and holy, which is why they feel bound to carry it out.

See also: Judges 20:1.

Judges 21:6-7

Israel’s anger has turned to sorrow. They call the Benjamites brothers and see that a tribe has been cut off. But their solution is stuck: the survivors need wives, and the oath forbids giving them any. The problem is of their own making.

BSA: grieved (“repented, felt sorry”): The word suggests real regret over what they have done, though it does not yet lead to true repentance. cut off (“hacked off, destroyed”): The picture is of a branch hacked from a tree, a violent and painful loss.

Judges 21:8-9

A roll call shows that nobody from Jabesh-gilead, a town east of the Jordan, came to the assembly. The people now have someone to blame, and a loophole in their reasoning. Their search is for a way out of their vows, not for what is right.

BSA: counted (“to reckon, to oversee”): A careful census is made, so the absence of Jabesh-gilead is certain and official.

Judges 21:10-11

The assembly sends twelve thousand warriors to kill everyone in Jabesh-gilead except young women who have never been with a man. Israel is turning on its own people to repair what its own rashness broke. The story reports this without approval.

BSA: Devote (“utterly destroy, dedicate to God”): The word is the language of total devotion to destruction, usually for pagan cities, here wrongly turned on an Israelite town.

Hebrew: תַּחֲרִימוּ (taḥarimu, H2763) — “put under the ban, devote to destruction.” This is the language of holy war, set aside for Canaanite cities. Applying it to an Israelite town shows how far Israel had drifted from God’s own way.

See also: Deuteronomy 13:12-16.

Judges 21:12

The soldiers find four hundred young women who are untouched and bring them to the camp at Shiloh, where the tabernacle stood. The cost is a whole town’s destruction. Even so, it is not enough, and the plan has already gone badly wrong.

Judges 21:13-14

Israel offers peace to the Benjamites hiding at the rock of Rimmon, where six hundred had fled. They return and receive the women. But there are not enough for all of them, so the problem remains unsolved.

BSA: peace (“shalom, completeness and wellness”): Shalom means wholeness, and here it signals an end to the war between brothers.

Hebrew: שָׁלוֹם (shalom, H7965) — “peace, wholeness, well-being.” The word means more than quiet. It means restored wholeness between parties, which is what Israel is trying, clumsily, to regain.

See also: Judges 20:47.

Judges 21:15

The people feel sorrow again. They say the LORD has made a gap among the tribes, though they themselves had brought it about by their war. Even here, there is a measure of truth. God is the one who judged the tribe, and they hold both thoughts together uneasily.

BSA: void (“breach, gap”): The picture is of a broken wall, an opening where Israel’s tribes no longer stand together.

Hebrew: פֶּרֶץ (pereṣ, H6556) — “breach, break.” The word is used for a gap in a wall. Israel is a wall with a stone missing, and they feel the weakness.

Judges 21:16-17

The elders ask again how to find wives for the rest. They want Benjamin to have heirs so that the tribe will not be erased. Their concern for the tribe and its inheritance is good. The means they will choose are not.

BSA: wiped out (“erased, blotted out, destroyed”): The word is the same as blotting a name from a record, which is what they fear for Benjamin.

Hebrew: יִמָּחֶה (yimmaḥeh, H4229) — “be blotted out.” The image is of a name wiped from a scroll. For Israel, to lose a tribe was to lose a name and an inheritance in the land.

Judges 21:18

The elders restate the difficulty: the people have called a curse on anyone who gives a wife to a Benjamite. They treat the oath as unbreakable, so they look for a technical way around it rather than admit the oath itself was hasty.

BSA: Cursed (“to be under a divine curse, execrated”): The oath puts any giver under God’s curse, which makes the people afraid to break it.

Hebrew: אָרוּר (arur, H779) — “cursed.” This is the strong word of a curse, a person set apart under God’s judgment. The Israelites bind their own households with it.

Judges 21:19

They remember the yearly feast of the LORD at Shiloh and describe its location carefully. A feast that should have been joyful worship becomes a setting for their scheme.

BSA: feast (“festival, celebration”): The gathering is a holy celebration, which makes the plan made for it all the more troubling.

Judges 21:20-21

The Benjamites are told to hide in the vineyards and, when the young women come out to dance, to grab a wife each and flee home. Worship is turned into an ambush, and the dancers are treated as prizes.

BSA: catch (“seize, take quickly”): The verb has the feeling of a sudden grab, with no consent given.

Hebrew: וַחֲטַפְתֶּם (waḥaṭaftem, H2414) — “and you shall seize, snatch.” The verb means to snatch quickly, as a hunter grabs prey. It makes plain that this is violence, not courtship.

Judges 21:22

The elders have a speech ready for angry fathers and brothers: you did not give your daughters, so you are not guilty. It is a clever excuse. They hide behind the wording of their oath while ignoring its purpose and the harm done to families.

BSA: favor (“be gracious, show kindness”): They ask the families to show mercy, though they have just planned a wrong against them.

Hebrew: חָנּוּנוּ (ḥannunu, H2603) — “be gracious to us.” The word is usually used of grace shown to those in need. It sounds noble here, but it covers over a plan that denies the families any real choice.

Judges 21:23

The Benjamites do as told, take their wives, return to their inheritance, and rebuild. So the tribe survives. But the survival has been bought by violence and trickery, and the writer offers no praise for it.

BSA: inheritance (“possession, heritage”): Each tribe’s land was God’s gift, and the aim is to keep Benjamin’s portion from being lost.

Judges 21:24

Everyone goes back to his own tribe, clan, and inheritance. Order of a sort is restored, and the land is divided again as God had assigned it. Yet it is a quiet end after a very painful episode.

BSA: inheritance (“property, family heirloom, divine gift”): The land was seen as a gift from God, to be held and passed down in each family.

Judges 21:25

The book ends with its sad summary. With no king and no one leading them in God’s ways, each person decided for himself. The whole story shows where that leads, and it points the reader to the need for a faithful ruler under God.

BSA: right (“just, straight, convenient”): What each man called right was often only what was convenient for him. eyes (“from his own perspective, as seemed best to him”): The standard was personal judgment rather than God’s word.

Hebrew: בְּעֵינָיו (be’einav, H5869) — “in his own eyes.” The measure of right and wrong was one’s own sight. The book shows how clouded that sight can become when God’s law is set aside.

See also: Judges 17:6; Proverbs 14:12; 1 Samuel 11:1-11.