Judges 20:7-18

⁷So now, all you Israeli people, speak, and tell me what you think should be done!”

⁸All the people stood up, and in unison said, “None of us will go home! Not one of us will return to his house!

⁹This is what we must do to the people of Gibeah. First, we will ◄cast lots/throw marked stones► to determine which group should attack them.

¹⁰We will choose ◄one tenth/one from every ten► of the men from all the Israeli tribes. Those men will go and find food for the men who will go to attack the people of Gibeah. Then the other men will go to Gibeah to ◄pay the people back/punish them► for this terrible thing that they have done here in Israel.”

¹¹And all the Israeli people agreed that the people of Gibeah should be punished.

¹²Then the Israeli men sent messengers throughout the tribe of Benjamin. They demanded, “Do you realize that some of your men have done a very evil thing?

¹³Bring those wicked men to us, in order that we can execute them. By doing that, we will be doing what should be done because of this evil thing that has happened in Israel.” But the people of the tribe of Benjamin did not pay attention to their fellow Israelis.

¹⁴The men of the tribe of Benjamin left their cities and gathered at Gibeah to fight the other Israelis.

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.”