I was a concubine. A Levite man kept me for his sexual pleasure without giving me the rights that a wife would have. I was treated as nothing more than a body.
So, I ran away. I went back to my father’s house to escape sexual abuse. But the Levite stalked me. He came to my father’s house and forced me to come with him, to return to his home in Ephraim.
On the way, we had to stop for a night in Gibeah in the tribe of Benjamin. A kind man allowed us to stay in his home until morning, but some men of the town saw him take us in. They pounded on the door, demanding that they be given the Levite to do whatever they wanted to him. The old man refused to allow such dishonor be shown to his guest. So, in his place, they gave them me.
I was pushed out of the door into the night, into an unfamiliar town, into the hands of violent strangers. They had their way with me, once again treating me as nothing more than a body. Then they left that body to die.
When the Levite found me dead the next morning, he was furious that he had been wronged. In his outrage, he cut my body into twelve pieces, sending them throughout the territories of Israel with the message, “Has such a thing ever happened since the day that the Israelites came up from the land of Egypt until this day? Consider it, take counsel, and speak out.”
The people were outraged. They asked the Levite what had happened, and after he told them, they said, “now this is what we will do to Gibeah: we will go up against it by lot. We will take ten men of a hundred throughout all the tribes of Israel, and a hundred of a thousand, and a thousand of then thousand, to bring provisions for the troops, who are going to repay Gibeah of Benjamin for all the disgrace that they have done in Israel.”
And so, thousands of Israelite soldiers went up against the tribe of Benjamin. There was a bloody battle. More than twenty five thousand Benjaminites were killed, and more than forty thousand Israelites besides. The towns of Benjamin were burnt, and the civilians and animals of those cities all put to the sword.
The Israelites had all agreed that they would not give their daughters to the Benjaminites in marriage, but they did not want their own tribe to be cut off forever. “One tribe is cut off from Israel this day,” they said. “What shall we do for wives for those who are left, since we have sword by the LORD that we will not give them any of our daughters as wives?”
When they realized that Jabesh-gilead was not represented at the assembly that day, they devised a plan. “Go, put the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead to the sword, including the women and the little ones. This is what you shall do; every male and every woman that has lain with a male you shall devote to destruction.” And they found four hundred virgins to give to the remaining men of Benjamin.
When they realized there were still men left wanting, they devised another plan. “Look, they yearly festival of the LORD is taking place at Shiloh,” they said. “Go and lie in wait in the vineyards, and watch; when the young women of Shiloh come out to dance in the dances, then come out of the vineyards and each of you carry off a wife for himself from the young women of Shiloh, and go to the land of Benjamin.” This is what the men of Benjamin did. The took wives for themselves from the dancers whom they abducted.
What began with one man abusing one woman, me, led to gang rape, war, slaughter, kidnapping, and hundreds of men abusing hundreds of women. Will each of these stories of abuse begin another cycle? Will each of those cycles of violence lead to hundreds more until the whole world is consumed with abuse and violence?
Where does it end?
Judges 19-21
Neglected Word 