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So they carried him alive as
far as Jerusalem; and when he was dead, they buried him in the earth, and went
on still in taking the cities: and when they had taken the greatest part of
them, they besieged Jerusalem; and when they had taken the lower city, which
was not under a considerable time, they slew all the inhabitants; but the upper
city was not to be taken without great difficulty, through the strength of its
walls, and the nature of the place.
3. For which reason
they removed their camp to Hebron; and when they had taken it, they slew all
the inhabitants. There were till then left the race of giants, who had bodies
so large, and countenances so entirely different from other men, that they were
surprising to the sight, and terrible to the hearing. The bones of these men
are still shown to this very day, unlike to any credible relations of other
men. Now they gave this city to the Levites as an extraordinary reward, with
the suburbs of two thousand cities; but the land thereto belonging they gave as
a free gift to Caleb, according to the injunctions of Moses. This Caleb was one
of the spies which Moses sent into the land of Canaan. They also gave land for
habitation to the posterity of Jethro, the Midianite, who was the father-in-law
to Moses; for they had left their own country, and followed them, and
accompanied them in the wilderness.
4. Now the tribes of
Judah and Simeon took the cities which were in the mountainous part of Canaan,
as also Askelon and Ashdod, of those that lay near the sea; but Gaza and Ekron
escaped them, for they, lying in a flat country, and having a great number of
chariots, sorely galled those that attacked them. So these tribes, when they
were grown very rich by this war, retired to their own cities, and laid aside
their weapons of war.
5. But the Benjamites,
to whom belonged Jerusalem, permitted its inhabitants to pay tribute. So they
all left off, the one to kill, and the other to expose themselves to danger,
and had time to cultivate the ground. The rest of the tribes imitated that of
Benjamin, and did the same; and, contenting themselves with the tributes that
were paid them, permitted the Canaanites to live in peace.
6. However, the tribe
of Ephraim, when they besieged Bethel, made no advance, nor performed any thing
worthy of the time they spent, and of the pains they took about that siege; yet
did they persist in it, still sitting down before the city, though they endured
great trouble thereby: but, after some time, they caught one of the citizens
that came to them to get necessaries, and they gave him some assurances that,
if he would deliver up the city to them, they would preserve him and his
kindred; so he aware that, upon those terms, he would put the city into their
hands. Accordingly, he that, thus betrayed the city was preserved with his
family; and the Israelites slew all the inhabitants, and retained the city for
themselves.
7. After this, the
Israelites grew effeminate as to fighting any more against their enemies, but
applied themselves to the cultivation of the land, which producing them great
plenty and riches, they neglected the regular disposition of their settlement,
and indulged themselves in luxury and pleasures; nor were they any longer
careful to hear the laws that belonged to their political government: whereupon
God was provoked to anger, and put them in mind, first, how, contrary to his
directions, they had spared the Canaanites; and, after that, how those
Canaanites, as opportunity served, used them very barbarously.
But the Israelites, though
they were in heaviness at these admonitions from God, yet were they still very
unwilling to go to war; and since they got large tributes from the Canaanites,
and were indisposed for taking pains by their luxury, they suffered their
aristocracy to be corrupted also, and did not ordain themselves a senate, nor
any other such magistrates as their laws had formerly required, but they were
very much given to cultivating their fields, in order to get wealth; which
great indolence of theirs brought a terrible sedition upon them, and they
proceeded so far as to fight one against another, from the following occasion:
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8. There was a Levite
(12) a man of a vulgar family, that
belonged to the tribe of Ephraim, and dwelt therein: this man married a wife
from Bethlehem, which is a place belonging to the tribe of Judah. Now he was
very fond of his wife, and overcome with her beauty; but he was unhappy in
this, that he did not meet with the like return of affection from her, for she
was averse to him, which did more inflame his passion for her, so that they
quarreled one with another perpetually; and at last the woman was so disgusted
at these quarrels, that she left her husband, and went to her parents in the
fourth month. The husband being very uneasy at this her departure, and that out
of his fondness for her, came to his father and mother-in-law, and made up
their quarrels, and was reconciled to her, and lived with them there four days,
as being kindly treated by her parents.
On the fifth day he resolved
to go home, and went away in the evening; for his wife's parents were loath to
part with their daughter, and delayed the time till the day was gone. Now they
had one servant that followed them, and an ass on which the woman rode; and
when they were near Jerusalem, having gone already thirty furlongs, the servant
advised them to take up their lodgings some where, lest some misfortune should
befall them if they traveled in the night, especially since they were not far
off enemies, that season often giving reason for suspicion of dangers from even
such as are friends; but the husband was not pleased with this advice, nor was
he willing to take up his lodging among strangers, for the city belonged to the
Canaanites, but desired rather to go twenty furlongs farther, and so to take
their lodgings in some Israelite city.
Accordingly, he obtained his
purpose, and came to Gibeah, a city of the tribe of Benjamin, when it was just
dark; and while no one that lived in the market-place invited him to lodge with
him, there came an old man out of the field, one that was indeed of the tribe
of Ephraim, but resided in Gibeah, and met him, and asked him who he was, and
for what reason he came thither so late, and why he was looking out for
provisions for supper when it was dark? To which he replied, that he was a
Levite, and was bringing his wife from her parents, and was going home; but he
told him his habitation was in the tribe of Ephraim: so the old man, as well
because of their kindred as because they lived in the same tribe, and also
because they had thus accidentally met together, took him in to lodge with him.
Now certain young men of the
inhabitants of Gibeah, having seen the woman in the market-place, and admiring
her beauty, when they understood that she lodged with the old man, came to the
doors, as contemning the weakness and fewness of the old man's family; and when
the old man desired them to go away, and not to offer any violence or abuse
there, they desired him to yield them up the strange woman, and then he should
have no harm done to him: and when the old man alleged that the Levite was of
his kindred, and that they would be guilty of horrid wickedness if they
suffered themselves to be overcome by their pleasures, and so offend against
their laws, they despised his righteous admonition, and laughed him to scorn.
They also threatened to kill
him if he became an obstacle to their inclinations; whereupon, when he found
himself in great distress, and yet was not willing to overlook his guests, and
see them abused, he produced his own daughter to them; and told them that it
was a smaller breach of the law to satisfy their lust upon her, than to abuse
his guests, supposing that he himself should by this means prevent any injury
to be done to those guests. When they no way abated of their earnestness for
the strange woman, but insisted absolutely on their desires to have her, he
entreated them not to perpetrate any such act of injustice; but they proceeded
to take her away by force, and indulging still more the violence of their
inclinations, they took the woman away to their house, and when they had
satisfied their lust upon her the whole night, they let her go about daybreak.
So she came to the place where
she had been entertained, under great affliction at what had happened; and was
very sorrowful upon occasion of what she had suffered, and durst not look her
husband in the face for shame, for she concluded that he would never forgive
her for what she had done; so she fell down, and gave up the ghost: but her
husband supposed that his wife was only fast asleep, and, thinking nothing of a
more melancholy nature had happened, endeavored to raise her up, resolving to
speak comfortably to her, since she did not voluntarily expose herself to these
men's lust, but was forced away to their house; but as soon as he perceived she
was dead, he acted as prudently as the greatness of his misfortunes would
admit, and laid his dead wife upon the beast, and carried her home; and cutting
her, limb by limb, into twelve pieces, he sent them to every tribe, and gave it
in charge to those that carried them, to inform the tribes of those that were
the causes of his wife's death, and of the violence they had offered to her.
9. Upon this the people
were greatly disturbed at what they saw,and at what they heard, as never having
had the experience of such a thing before; so they gathered themselves to
Shiloh, out of a prodigious and a just anger, and assembling in a great
congregation before the tabernacle, they immediately resolved to take arms, and
to treat the inhabitants of Gibeah as enemies; but the senate restrained them
from doing so, and persuaded them, that they ought not so hastily to make war
upon people of the same nation with them, before they discoursed them by words
concerning the accusation laid against them; it being part of their law, that
they should not bring an army against foreigners themselves, when they appear
to have been injurious, without sending an ambassage first, and trying thereby
whether they will repent or not: and accordingly they exhorted them to do what
they ought to do in obedience to their laws, that is, to send to the
inhabitants of Gibeah, to know whether they would deliver up the offenders to
them, and if they deliver them up, to rest satisfied with the punishment of
those offenders; but if they despised the message that was sent them, to punish
them by taking, up arms against them.
Accordingly they sent to the
inhabitants of Gibeah, and accused the young men of the crimes committed in the
affair of the Levite's wife, and required of them those that had done what was
contrary to the law, that they might be punished, as having justly deserved to
die for what they had done; but the inhabitants of Gibeah would not deliver up
the young men, and thought it too reproachful to them, out of fear of war, to
submit to other men's demands upon them; vaunting themselves to be no way
inferior to any in war, neither in their number nor in courage. The rest of
their tribe were also making great preparation for war, for they were so
insolently mad as also to resolve to repel force by force.
10. When it was related
to the Israelites what the inhabitants of Gibeah had resolved upon, they took
their oath that no one of them would give his daughter in marriage to a
Benjamite, but make war with greater fury against them than we have learned our
forefathers made war against the Canaanites; and sent out presently an army of
four hundred thousand against them, while the Benjamites' army-was twenty-five
thousand and six hundred; five hundred of whom were excellent at slinging
stones with their left hands, insomuch that when the battle was joined at
Gibeah the Benjamites beat the Israelites, and of them there fell two thousand
men; and probably more had been destroyed had not the night came on and
prevented it, and broken off the fight; so the Benjamites returned to the city
with joy, and the Israelites returned to their camp in a great fright at what
had happened.
On the next day, when they
fought again, the Benjamites beat them; and eighteen thousand of the Israelites
were slain, and the rest deserted their camp out of fear of a greater
slaughter. So they came to Bethel, (13) a city that was near their camp, and fasted on the next
day; and besought God, by Phineas the high priest, that his wrath against them
might cease, and that he would be satisfied with these two defeats, and give
them the victory and power over their enemies. Accordingly God promised them so
to do, by the prophesying of Phineas.
11. When therefore they
had divided the army into two parts, they laid the one half of them in ambush
about the city Gibeah by night, while the other half attacked the Benjamites,
who retiring upon the assault, the Benjamites pursued them, while the Hebrews
retired by slow degrees, as very desirous to draw them entirely from the city;
and the other followed them as they retired, till both the old men and the
young men that were left in the city, as too weak to fight, came running out
together with them, as willing to bring their enemies under. However, when they
were a great way from the city the Hebrews ran away no longer, but turned back
to fight them, and lifted up the signal they had agreed on to those that lay in
ambush, who rose up, and with a great noise fell upon the enemy.
Now, as soon as ever they
perceived themselves to be deceived, they knew not what to do; and when they
were driven into a certain hollow place which was in a valley, they were shot
at by those that encompassed them, till they were all destroyed, excepting six
hundred, which formed themselves into a close body of men, and forced their
passage through the midst of their enemies, and fled to the neighboring
mountains, and, seizing upon them, remained there; but the rest of them, being
about twenty-five thousand, were slain. Then did the Israelites burn Gibeah,
and slew the women, and the males that were under age; and did the same also to
the other cities of the Benjamites; and, indeed, they were enraged to that
degree, that they sent twelve thousand men out of the army, and gave them
orders to destroy Jabesh Gilead, because it did not join with them in fighting
against the Benjamites. Accordingly, those that were sent slew the men of war,
with their children and wives, excepting four hundred virgins. To such a degree
had they proceeded in their anger, because they not only had the suffering of
the Levite's wife to avenge, but the slaughter of their own soldiers.
12. However, they afterward were sorry for the
calamity they had brought upon the Benjamites, and appointed a fast on that
account, although they supposed those men had suffered justly for their offense
against the laws; so they recalled by their ambassadors those six hundred which
had escaped. These had seated themselves on a certain rock called Rimmon,
which was in the wilderness. So the ambassadors lamented not only the
disaster that had befallen the Benjamites, but themselves also, by this
destruction of their kindred; and persuaded them to take it patiently; and to
come and unite with them, and not, so far as in them lay, to give their
suffrage to the utter destruction of the tribe of Benjamin; and said to
them,
"We give you leave to
take the whole land of Benjamin to yourselves, and as much prey as you are able
to carry away with you."
So these men with sorrow
confessed, that what had been done was according to the decree of God, and had
happened for their own wickedness; and assented to those that invited them, and
came down to their own tribe. The Israelites also gave them the four hundred
virgins of Jabesh Gilead for wives; but as to the remaining two hundred, they
deliberated about it how they might compass wives enough for them, and that
they might have children by them; and whereas they had, before the war began,
taken an oath, that no one would give his daughter to wife to a Benjamite, some
advised them to have no regard to what they had sworn, because the oath had not
been taken advisedly and judiciously, but in a passion, and thought that they
should do nothing against God, if they were able to save a whole tribe which
was in danger of perishing; and that perjury was then a sad and dangerous
thing, not when it is done out of necessity, but when it is done with a wicked
intention. But when the senate were affrighted at the very name of perjury, a
certain person told them that he could show them a way whereby they might
procure the Benjamites wives enough, and yet keep their oath. They asked him
what his proposal was. He said,
"That three times in
a year, when we meet in Shiloh, our wives and our daughters accompany us: let
then the Benjamites be allowed to steal away, and marry such women as they can
catch, while we will neither incite them nor forbid them; and when their
parents take it ill, and desire us to inflict punishment upon them, we will
tell them, that they were themselves the cause of what had happened, by
neglecting to guard their daughters, and that they ought not to be over angry
at the Benjamites, since that anger was permitted to rise too high already."
So the Israelites were
persuaded to follow this advice, and decreed, That the Benjamites should be
allowed thus to steal themselves wives. So when the festival was coming on,
these two hundred Benjamites lay in ambush before the city,by two and three
together, and waited for the coming of the virgins, in the vineyards and other
places where they could lie concealed. Accordingly the virgins came along
playing, and suspected nothing of what was coming upon them, and walked after
an unguarded manner, so those that laid scattered in the road, rose up, and
caught hold of them: by this means these Benjamites got them wives, and fell to
agriculture, and took good care to recover their former happy state. And thus
was this tribe of the Benjamites, after they had been in danger of entirely
perishing, saved in the manner forementioned, by the wisdom of the Israelites;
and accordingly it presently flourished, and soon increased to be a multitude,
and came to enjoy all other degrees of happiness. And such was the conclusion
of this war.
Footnotes
(10) By prophesying, when spoken of a high priest, Josephus,
both here and frequently elsewhere, means no more than consulting God by Urim,
which the reader is still to bear in mind upon all occasions. And if St. John,
who was contemporary with Josephus, and of the same country, made use of this
style, when he says that
"Caiaphas being
high priest that year, prophesied that Jesus should die for that nation, and
not for that nation only, but that also he should gather together in one the
children of God that were scattered abroad, " (John
11:51-52)
he may possibly mean, that
this was revealed to the high priest by an extraordinary voice from between the
cherubims, when he had his breastplate, or Urim and Thummim, on before; or the
most holy place of the temple, which was no other than the oracle of Urim and
Thummim. Of which above, in the note on Antiq. B. III.
Ch. 8. Sect. 9.
(11) This great number of seventy-two reguli, or small kings,
over whom Adonibezek had tyrannized, and for which he was punished according to
the lex talionis, as well as the thirty-one kings of Canaan subdued by Joshua,
and named in one chapter, Joshua 12, and thirty-two kings, or royal auxiliaries
to Benhadad king of Syria, 1 Kings 20:1; Antiq. B.
VIII. Ch. 14. Sect. 1, intimate to us what was the ancient form of
government among several nations before the monarchies began, viz. that every
city or large town, with its neighboring villages, was a distinct government by
itself; which is the more remarkable, because this was certainly the form of
ecclesiastical government that was settled by the apostles, and preserved
throughout the Christian church in the first ages of Christianity. Mr. Addison
is of opinion, that
"it would certainly
be for the good of mankind to have all the mighty empires and monarchies of the
world cantoned out into petty states and principalities, which, like so many
large families, might lie under the observation of their proper governors, so
that the care of the prince might extend itself to every individual person
under his protection; though he despairs of such a scheme being brought about,
and thinks that if it were, it would quickly be destroyed."
Remarks on Italy, 4 to p. 151.
Nor is it unfit to be observed here, that the Armenian records, though they
give us the history of thirty-nine of their ancientest heroes or governors
after the Flood, before the days of Sardanapalus, had no proper king till the
fortieth, Parerus. See Moses Chorehensis, p. 55. And that Almighty God does not
approve of such absolute and tyrannical monarchies, any one may learn that
reads Deuteronomy 17:14-20, and 1 Samuel 8:1-22; although, if such kings are
set up as own him for their supreme King, and aim to govern according to his
laws, he hath admitted of them, and protected them and their subjects in all
generations.
(12) Josephus's early date of this history before the
beginning of the Judges, or when there was no king in Israel, Judges 19:1, is
strongly confirmed by the large number of Benjamites, both in the days of Asa
and Jehoshaphat, 2 Chronicles 14:8, and 16:17, who yet were here reduced to six
hundred men; nor can those numbers be at all supposed genuine, if they were
reduced so late as the end of the Judges, where our other copies place this
reduction.
(13) Josephus seems here to have made a small mistake, when
he took the Hebrew word Bethel, which denotes the house of God, or the
tabernacle, Judges 20:18, for the proper name of a place, Bethel, it no way
appearing that the tabernacle was ever at Bethel; only so far it is true, that
Shiloh, the place of the tabernacle in the days of the Judges, was not far from
Bethel.
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