Judges 20:34

_AND THERE CAME AGAINST GIBEAH TEN THOUSAND CHOSEN MEN OUT OF ALL ISRAEL, AND THE BATTLE WAS SORE: BUT THEY KNEW NOT THAT EVIL WAS NEAR THEM._ Ten thousand chosen men. This was a third division, different both from the ambuscade and the army who were fighting at Baal-tamar. The general account stated in Judges 20:35 is followed by a detailed narrative of the battle, which is continued to the end of the chapter....

EXPOSITION JUDGES 20:18 THE HOUSE OF GOD. In this rendering the A.V. follows the Vulgate, which has _in domum Dei, hoc est, in Silo. _But the Septuagint has Βαιθὴλ, and all the ancient authorities, as well as modern commentators, generally agree in rendering it _Bethel. _The reason, which seems a conclusive one, for so doing is that the Hebrew בית אל invariably means Bethel, and that _the house of God _is always expressed in Hebrew by בית האלהים (_beth-ha-elohim_)_. _The conclusion is that at this time the ark of God, with the tabernacle, was at Bethel, which was only seven or eight miles from Shiloh. Bethel would be eight or ten miles from Gibeah, _i.e._ about half way between Shiloh and Gibeah. ASKED COUNSEL. The same phrase as...

AND THERE CAME AGAINST GIBEAH TEN THOUSAND CHOSEN MEN OUT OF ALL ISRAEL,.... Which, according to Ben Gersom, were the liers in wait; and came from the south, as the Targum says: AND THE BATTLE WAS SORE; not between those liers in wait, and the Benjaminites, but between those at Baaltamar, and them who set themselves in battle array against them, and they fought stoutly on both sides: BUT THEY KNEW NOT THAT EVIL WAS NEAR THEM; that there was an ambush laid, by which they were in great danger; they knew nothing of the 10,000 men that were now come out against Gibeah, and were between them and that....

CHAPTER 20 THE HORRIBLE WAR _ 1. The Levite's story (Judges 20:1)_ 2. The uprising (Judges 20:8) 3. The slaying of the Israelites (Judges 20:12) 4. Benjamin exterminated except six hundred men (Judges 20:26) This and the concluding chapter bring before us the awful harvest of what had been sown. “For whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap” (Galatians 6:7). They had sown the wind and now reaped the whirlwind. Violence and lawlessness result in the slaying of 40,000 Israelites and 23,000 of the tribe of Benj

JUDGES 20. THE OUTRAGE AVENGED.The congregation (LXX Synagô gç) is a post-exilic term. The words as one man suggest a unity of action such as was not secured till long after the time of the Judges. The assembly of the people of God was a phrase often heard in the second Temple, but not in the days of the Judges. Judges 20:2. Contrast the army mustered against Sisera, 40,000 men strong (Judges 5:8). Judges 20:10. Each of the three clauses means precisely the same thing. Judges 20:15. The figures are in some confusion, the size of the Benjamite force being indicated three times, and each time differently (15, 35, 4

_ten thousand chosen men_ Apparently the men who had formed the ambush: they now moved from their place of concealment, and posted themselves between the city and the Benjamites, who were chasing the men of Israel, so as to cut off the possibility of retreat. _evil was close upon them_ lit. _was about to touch them_; cf. Judges 20:41 _evil had touched them_. Cf. Joshua 8:14. The recurrence of the words in Judges 20:41 has led to the suggestion (made by Torrey) that Judges 20:35 a once stood after Judges 20:41, and that a scribe, glancing from

_The Defeat of the Benjamites Judges 20:24-48_ 24 And the children of Israel came near against the children of Benjamin the second day, 25 And Benjamin went forth against them out of Gibeah the second day, and destroyed down to the ground of the children of Israel again eighteen thousand men; all these drew the sword. 26 Then all the children of Israel, and all the people, went up, and came unto the house of God, and wept, and sat there before the Lord, and fasted that day until even, and offered burnt offerings and peace offerings before the Lord. 27 And the children of Israel inquired of the Lord, (for the ark of the covenant of God was there in those days, 28 And Phinehas, the son of Eleazar, the son of Aaron, stood before it in those days,) saying, Shall I yet again go out to battle against the children of Benjamin my brother, or shall I cease? And the Lord said,

THE SLAUGHTER OF THE BENJAMITES The Levite recounts his wrongs to a full assemblage of the tribes, who decree punishment upon Benjamin. Their first two attacks are unsuccessful, but the third results in the almost total extermination of the Benjamites. 1-11. The Israelites assemble at Gibeah....

LIFE WITHOUT LAW JUDGES _PHILIP SMITH_ CHAPTER 20 V1 Then all the *Israelites from Dan to Beersheba came to meet together. They also came from the area called Gilead. They all met at Mizpah, where the *Lord was. V2 This meeting of God’s people included the leaders of all *Israel’s *tribes. There were 400 000 people with swords. V3 (The people in Benjamin’s *tribe heard that *Israel’s people had gathered at Mizpah.) The *Israelites said, ‘Tell us how this awful crime happened.’ V4 The husband of the woman that the wicked men had murdered spoke. (He was the man from Levi’s *tribe.) He said, ‘I and my *concubine came to spend the night in Gibeah. It is in the area where Benjamin’s *tribe lives. V5 During the night, the men that lived in Gibeah came. And they surrounded the hou

TEN THOUSAND CHOSEN MEN. — Though the verse is obscurely expressed, the meaning probably is that this was the _number of the ambuscade of picked warriors._ If it means that this was the Israelite force left after the slaughter of 40,000, we are not told the number of the ambush. THE BATTLE WAS SORE. — It would be a battle in which the Benjamites were now attacked both in front and rear. BUT. — Rather, _and._ THEY KNEW NOT THAT EVIL WAS NEAR THEM — _i.e.,_ as we should say, “that the hour of their ruin had come,” or, as the Vulg. has it, _quod ex omni parte illis instaret interitus,_ “that destruction was threatening them on every side.” (Comp. Isaiah 47:10.)...