Open English Translation JDG Chapter 21

21 Now back in Mitspah, the Israeli men had promised never to allow their daughters to marry a Benyamite man. 2 But now the Israelis went to Bethel and sat there before God until evening—calling out and crying loudly, 3 asking, “Oh Yahweh, God of Israel, why has this happened to Israel—for one tribe to be missing from Israel now?”

4 The next day, the people got up early and built an altar there, and they offered up burnt offerings and peace offerings. 5 Then the Israelis asked, “Among all the Israeli tribes serving Yahweh, was there any group who didn’t join the battle?” (They asked that because they had previously decided that anyone who didn’t go to Mitspah to fight for Yahweh would be put to death.) 6 Now the Israelis felt sorry for their Benyamite cousins, saying, “An entire tribe has been hacked off Israel today. 7 How can we find wives for any Benyamite men that are left because we’ve promised to Yahweh not to give our daughters to them to marry?

8 So they asked, “Is there any from our tribes who didn’t show up for Yahweh at Mitspah?” Then listen, no one from Yabesh-Gilead had joined their assembly there. 9 (When the people had checked around themselves, they’d realised that no one from Yabesh-Gilead was there.) 10 So the Israelis sent twelve thousand warriors there, commanding them to use their swords to kill the inhabitants of Yabesh-Gilead, including married women and children— 11 specifically they had to kill every male, and every woman who’s slept with a male. 12 That way they discovered four hundred young virgin women among the inhabitants of Yabesh-Gilead, and brought them back to their camp at Shiloh (in the Canaan region).

13 Then the entire assembly sent a message to the Benyamites at Rimmon rock, saying that they were now ready for peace. 14 So the Benyamites returned and were given the young women from Yabesh-Gilead, but there wasn’t enough of them.

15 The people still felt sorry for the Benyamites, because Yahweh had caused a gap among Israel’s tribes, 16 so the leaders asked, “How can we provide wives for the remaining Benyamite men since the other Benyamite women were wiped out?” 17 Because they said, “They must be able to procreate so that an entire Israeli tribe isn’t blotted out. 18 But we can’t be the ones to give our daughters to them to marry because we made an oath that anyone who did that would be cursed.”

19 They said, “Listen, there’s a celebration for Yahweh from time to time at Shiloh, which is on the north of Bethel, east of the road that goes from Bethel uphill to Shechem, and on the south of Lebonah.” 20 So they told the Benyamites, “Go and hide in those vineyards 21 and watch. When the Shiloh girls come out to perform in the dances, come out of the vineyards and you can each catch a wife for yourselves, then go back home to Benyamin. 22 When their fathers or brothers complain to us, we’ll tell them, “Let them have them since we didn’t find you for them. And you all won’t be guilty of giving them to the Benyamites because they stole them.

23 So that’s what the Benyamites did—they grabbed enough dancing girls to be their wives, then they returned to their allocated land and rebuilt their cities and lived in them. 24 The other Israelis went back to their tribes and their families in the areas that had been allocated to them.

25 In those days, there was no king in Israel—everyone would just do what seemed right to them.[ref]