Verse 7 of Judges Chapter 21 well sums up Israel’s current problem.
“How are we going to obtain wives for those who remain alive, since we’ve sworn by ADONAI that we won’t let our daughters marry them?”
The victorious 11 tribes of Israel realized the end of the tribe of Benjamin was a very real probability and they were heart-broken over it.
They returned to Beit-El and got down on their knees before the Lord crying and begging for forgiveness.
And they offered up sacrifices with the hopes the Lord would show them a way solve this horrific problem.
Again, keep in mind, there was no way they were going to break their vow that they would not give their daughters to Benjamin in marriage…no matter what.
But what to do?
Well, an unexpected solution suddenly surfaced and it began with one simple question.
Who failed to show up in the war against Benjamin?
The answer was the people who lived in the city of JABESH in the territory of Gilead.
This was territory located on the east side of the Jordan River.
Not showing up to assist one’s Hebrew brothers in battle was a HUGE no-no!
And when I say a “huge no-no”, I mean this was a big-time violation against the laws of Moses.
In fact, during the war council held at Mitzpah, a vow was made that whoever failed to contribute to the war effort would be punished by death.
Israel had just found the convenient solution she wanted.
So an army of 12,000 men was formed to take vengeance on the men of Jabesh-Gilead…
BUT all the girls of child-bearing age were to be left alive to be brought back to Shiloh.
This was the perfect kill 2 birds with 1 stone situation!
By killing the citizens of Jabesh, it would satisfy the oath Israel had made to punish by death those who refused to participate in the battle…
And the virgin girls would become the wives of the surviving Benjamites and thus prevent the tribe from going extinct.
There was still a small problem however.
There were only 400 virgin girls at Jabesh-Gilead.
Not quite enough to provide wives for 600 Benjamites.
But for the time being, that didn’t matter.
Because these 400 virgins would be a good start to remedying a sticky situation.
Ah, such is a day in the life of a tribal society.
In terms of our takeaway for today, understand that none of this chaos and craziness would have happened had Israel been obedient to the Lord’s Torah from the very beginning.
What began with a group of homosexual gangbangers escalated into a full-scale war that almost resulted in the termination of an entire tribe of Israel…
And this situation is now going to lead to the execution of another entire people group (the citizens of Jabeth-Gilead).
Isn’t it amazing how sin compounds and just gets worse and worse if it’s not nipped in the bud early?
To be continued…
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