Judges 20:15-27

¹⁵In that one day the men of the tribe of Benjamin recruited 26,000 soldiers who knew how to fight using swords. They also chose/recruited 700 men from Gibeah.

¹⁶From all those soldiers there were 700 men who were left-handed, and each of them could sling a stone at a target that was very small and as narrow as a hair, and the stone always hit the target!

¹⁷There were 400,000 men from the other Israeli tribes who had swords.

¹⁸Those other Israelis went up to Bethel and asked God, “Which tribe should be the first to attack the men from the tribe of Benjamin?” Yahweh answered, “ The men from the tribe of Judah should go first.”

¹⁹The next morning, the Israeli men went and set up their tents near Gibeah.

²⁰Then they went to fight against the men from the tribe of Benjamin, and stood in their positions for fighting a battle, facing Gibeah.

²¹The men of the tribe of Benjamin came out of Gibeah and fought against them, and they killed 22,000 Israeli men on that day.

²²Late that afternoon, the remaining Israeli men went to the place of worship and cried until the sun set. Then they asked Yahweh, “Should we attack the men of the tribe of Benjamin again, even though they are our fellow Israelis?” Yahweh replied, “Yes, attack them again.” So the Israeli men encouraged each other.

²⁴The next day they again stood in their positions for fighting, just like they had done on the previous day.

²⁵The men of the tribe of Benjamin came out of Gibeah and attacked the Israelis, and killed 18,000 more of their men.

²⁶In the afternoon, all the people of Israel who had not been killed again went to Bethel. There they sat down and cried to Yahweh, and they ◄fasted/abstained from eating food► until it was evening. They brought some offerings which they burned completely on the altar, and they also brought some offerings to maintain fellowship with Yahweh.

²⁷At that time, the Sacred Chest that contained the stone tablets on which were written the Ten Commandments was there at Bethel. A priest named Phinehas, the son of Eleazar and grandson of Aaron, often stood in front of that chest and talked with Yahweh. While he stood there on that day, he asked Yahweh, “Shall we go again to fight against our fellow Israelis from the tribe of Benjamin, or shall we stop fighting against them?” Yahweh answered, “Go again tomorrow, because tomorrow I will enable you to defeat them.”