Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Judges · About this commentary
Wives for the Survivors
Judges 21:1-15
1 Now the men of Israel had sworn in Mizpah, saying, “None of us will give his daughter to Benjamin as a wife.” · WEB
Two rash oaths collide, and Israel repairs the first atrocity with a second — Jabesh Gilead destroyed to stock Benjamin with brides.
Now the men of Israel had sworn in Mizpah, saying, "None of us will give his daughter to Benjamin as a wife" Judges 21:1.
The chapter's machinery is two oaths sworn in hot blood at Mizpah — no daughters to Benjamin, and death for any town that failed to muster Judges 21:5 — now colliding with grief the assembly did not foresee: Yahweh, the God of Israel, why has this happened in Israel, that there should be one tribe lacking? Judges 21:3. The question is addressed to God about a disaster Israel itself inflicted Judges 20:48; the answer sits in their own mouths. Six hundred men without wives are now a tribe four months from extinction Judges 20:47, and the oath forbids the obvious remedy.
What the assembly never considers is repentance of the oath itself — Jephthah's shadow lies over the whole chapter Judges 11:35. Scripture knows that a rash vow is its own sin, with a lawful way back Leviticus 5:4–6; Israel instead treats the oath as more sacred than the lives it costs, and goes looking for loopholes.
"Go and strike the inhabitants of Jabesh Gilead with the edge of the sword, with the women and the little ones... and every woman who has lain with a man" Judges 21:10–11.
The first loophole is an atrocity. Jabesh Gilead sent no men to Mizpah, so the second oath condemns it — and its execution is shaped to harvest brides: every male and every married woman killed, four hundred virgins carried to the camp Judges 21:12. A town of Israel is destroyed by twelve thousand of the most valiant men to solve a problem created by an oath, in order to evade another oath. The women are then handed to the men of Rimmon with peace proclaimed Judges 21:13–14 — captives given as wives by the nation that just butchered their families.
The people grieved for Benjamin, because Yahweh had made a breach in the tribes of Israel Judges 21:15.
The sentence reports how it felt from inside — even their grief assigns the breach to God rather than to the two oaths and the burned cities. The narrator adds nothing; by now the method is trusted. There still weren't enough for them Judges 21:14 — two hundred men remain wifeless, and the assembly turns to its second scheme, at a feast of Yahweh.
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