Judges 19:1-20:48;
John 3:22-4:3; Psalm 104:24-35; Proverbs 14:22-24
Sarah gave us a heads up yesterday that today’s Old
Testament reading was a doozy, and she was right! An Israelite, of the Levite clan, goes on a trip to fetch his wayward concubine, and, after some general
merrymaking with her family, begins his journey home. He stops in a
territory belonging to the tribe of Benjamin and ends up spending the night in
the home of an old man who finds him camping in the city square. In the night,
“worthless” men from the town charge the house and demand the Levite visitor. The
old man offers his maiden daughter and the Levite's concubine but the men don’t
want them; the Levite then throws his concubine to the mercy of the men. What
follows is truly terrifying – she is raped and abused to the point of death;
the Levite, upon finding her dead, tosses her over his donkey and carries her
home; then, when he gets home, he cuts her body into 12 pieces and sends 1 piece to
each tribe of Israel.
Bizarre, horrifying, mind-boggling – what is going on here?
Well, the first verse in our reading today is one clue: “In those days, when
there was no king in Israel…,” meaning that chaos and lawlessness was running
rampant. We just saw in chapters 17-18 that idolatry was sweeping the nation
and now this.
The Levite's motivation in his mutilation of the body of the
concubine can only be to incite retribution. He sends a piece to each tribe to
call the nation to action. Though do you wonder, as I do, how much was about
his concubine and how much was something else? He let months go before he even
went after her and when he’s getting ready to leave, he opens the door, not to
find her or see if she was okay after what he subjected her to, but rather to
“go on his way” (Judg. 19:27). Doesn’t seem like he’s all that great of a guy,
in my opinion. But I digress.
His plan works: the tribes rise up against Benjamin, and a
full-on civil war ensues between Benjamin and the other 11 tribes. And though
the 11 tribes have a much larger army (400,000 to Benjamin’s 26,000), and
though they had the instructions from God to go against Benjamin, they spend two
days in defeat. Why does God tell them to go up but not allow their victory?
One scholar suggests that it was to bring them back to repentance for their
idolatry (Bible Knowledge Commentary, pg.
412). On the third day, again assured by God to go into the battle, they
ambush the Benjaminites and find victory. The war is ended but the cost is
great – all that survives out of the tribe of Benjamin is 600 warriors who stay
in a cave for four months. We’ll see in tomorrow’s reading that they are
eventually offered peace by the rest of Israel. It's a very dark hour in
Israel’s history.
In John, we see new life and baptism, which bring a breath
of fresh air. And don’t you love this beautiful and clearcut verse at the end
of the New Testament reading? “Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life;
whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains
on him” (Jn. 3:36).
And what a reminder the psalm is, of God’s
abundant goodness to us in creation and the glory due his name. “May the glory
of the LORD endure forever; may the LORD rejoice in his works” (Ps. 104:31). When
things in Israel’s history are so bleak, it’s refreshing to have these words to
remind us of God’s greater plan at work.
- Esther McCurry
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Yes, all these stories we've been reading seem chaotic & a little bizarre! We are seeing the results in society when , as Judges 17:6 says, "all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes." Today, we see so many in our own culture running around choosing to live by what seems right in their own eyes, rather than relying on the Word of God!
ReplyDeleteYes, I've been challenged by those words as well. How closely (and uncomfortably) Biblical times sometimes mirror our own!
ReplyDelete