Judges 21

Notes on the verses

Chap. XXI. Ver. 1, Now the men of Israel had sworn.—This oath is not before mentioned, and adds much to the horror of the scene, as it shows that the Israelites had less pity for their brethren, the Benjamites, than they had for the Canaanites, whom, in some instances, they spared, contrary to the divine command. They had destroyed men, women, and children, except only a few hundred men, who had taken refuge in the rock of Rimmon; and even to these they had bound themselves not to give any of their family for wives. I now, however, repent their indiscriminate destruction, and commit another crime to repair the consequences of the former. Ver. 7. How shall we do?—Their first design seems to have been to exterminate the whole tribe, at which they are now shocked.

Ver. 8. Jabesh-gilead.—{This place, as its name imports, was situated in Gilead, east of Jordan. Eusebius and Jerome say it was Barca town in their time, standing upon a hill, six miles south from Pella, in the way to Gerasa, now Djerash. The Wady Yabes, mentioned by Burckhardt, which empties itself into the Jordan, in the neighbourhood of Bisan or Bethshan, (see (1 Samuel 31:11).) and upon which Pella was situated, (celebrated by Pliny, for its fine waters,) seems to have taken its name from Jabesh. Near this spot, we must therefore look for its site; and the place called Kalaat Rabbad, seems to correspond, very nearly, to the spot; though it probably still retains among the Arabs its ancient name.

]—Bagster. Ver. 10. Go and smite, &c.—They find the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead had furnished no assistance to the war, which perhaps they did not approve; therefore, without any inquiry, or giving them any opportunity of defence, they determine on putting them all to the sword, except their virgin daughters, which, to the number of four hundred, they affect to bestow generously upon their brother Benjamin; and as these were insufficient, they put them in the way to steal two hundred more! Ver. 19. Lebonah.—{Maundrell supposes, that either Khan Leban, which is situated on the eastern side of a “delicious vale,” four leagues south from Shechem, and two leagues north from Beth-el, or the village of Leban, which is on the opposite side, occupies the site of the ancient Lebonah.

It is eight hours, or about 24 miles from Jerusalem, according to Dr. Richardson. J—B. Ver. 22. Be favourable, &c.—The similarity of this history to that of the rape of the Sabine virgins, must strike every one who has read the Roman history, and in substance amounts to this: The early Romans being much in want of wives, Romulus proclaimed a great feast, in honour of Neptune, and invited all the neighbouring tribes to it; but nearly at the close of the games, the young Romans rushed in among them, and carried off seven hundred women, whom they honourably made their wives and fellow-citizens. Ver. 23. Went and returned.—(It appears that the Benjamites acted in the most honourable way to the women they had thus violently carried off, and we may rest assured, that they took them to an inheritance more than equal to their own.

But this transaction, as well as the indiscriminate massacre of the people of Jabesh-gilead, as Dr. Gray observes, was certainly stamped with injustice and cruelty; and must be condemned on those principles which the Scriptures elsewhere furnish. * Ver. 25. In those days there was no king in Israel.—These three chapters conclude with the same words with which they began; and inform us, that these events occurred in a time of complete anarchy, when “every man did that which was right in his own eyes:” the only apology for such events as they contain—events “on all sides brutal, cruel, and ferocious.”