Study Desk

When the man got up to depart with his concubine and his servant, his father-in-law, the girl's father, said to him, "Look, the day is drawing late. Please spend the night. See, the day is almost over. Spend the night here, that your heart may be merry. Then you can get up early tomorrow for your journey and go home."

They stopped to go in and lodge in Gibeah. The Levite went in and sat down in the city square, but no one would take them into his home for the night.

even though there is both straw and feed for our donkeys, and bread and wine for me and the maidservant and young man with me. There is nothing that we, your servants, lack."

"Get up," he told her. "Let us go." But there was no response. So the man put her on his donkey and set out for home.

We will take ten men out of every hundred from all the tribes of Israel, and a hundred out of every thousand, and a thousand out of every ten thousand, to supply provisions for the army when they go to Gibeah in Benjamin to punish them the atrocity they have committed in Israel."

They went up and wept before the LORD until evening, inquiring of Him, "Should we again draw near for battle against our brothers the Benjamites?" And the LORD answered, "Go up against them."

and Phinehas son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, served before it.) The Israelites asked, "Should we again go out to battle against our brothers the Benjamites, or should we stop?" The LORD answered, "Fight, for tomorrow I will deliver them into your hands."

The Israelites asked, "Who among all the tribes of Israel did not come to the assembly before the LORD?" For they had taken a solemn oath that anyone who failed to come up before the LORD at Mizpah would surely be put to death.

And the Israelites grieved for their brothers, the Benjamites, and said, "Today a tribe is cut off from Israel.

What should we do about wives for the survivors, since we have sworn by the LORD not to give them our daughters in marriage?"

So they asked, "Which one of the tribes of Israel failed to come up before the LORD at Mizpah?" And in fact, no one from Jabesh-gilead had come to the camp for the assembly.

For when the people were counted, none of the residents of Jabesh-gilead were there.

And at that time the Benjamites returned and were given the women who were spared from Jabesh-gilead. But there were not enough women for all of them.

The people grieved for Benjamin, because the LORD had made a void in the tribes of Israel.

Then the elders of the congregation said, "What should we do about wives for those who remain, since the women of Benjamin have been destroyed?"

They added, "There must be heirs for the survivors of Benjamin, so that a tribe of Israel will not be wiped out.

But we cannot give them our daughters as wives." For the Israelites had sworn, "Cursed is he who gives a wife to a Benjamite."

and watch. When you see the daughters of Shiloh come out to perform their dances, each of you is to come out of the vineyards, catch for himself a wife from the daughters of Shiloh, and go to the land of Benjamin.

When their fathers or brothers come to us to complain, we will tell them, 'Do us a favor by helping them, since we did not get wives for each of them in the war. Since you did not actually give them your daughters, you have no guilt.'"

Return home, my daughters. Go on, for I am too old to have another husband. Even if I thought there was hope for me to have a husband tonight and to bear sons,