4. So the Levite, the husband of the murdered woman, answered, “My concubine and I came to Gibeah, in Benjamin, to spend the night.
5. Then the leaders of Gibeah rose up against me. At night they surrounded the house where I was staying. They wanted to kill me; instead they ravished my concubine so that she died.
6. I seized my concubine, cut her into pieces, and sent her throughout all the territory of Israel, because they committed an infamous and disgraceful act in Israel.
7. Now, all of you are children of Israel. Give your advice and counsel here.”
8. All the people arose as one man and said, “Not a man among us will go to his tent, and no one will turn aside to his house.
9. Now this is what we will do to Gibeah. We will go against it by lot.
10. We will take ten men out of every hundred, from every tribe of Israel, a hundred from every thousand, and a thousand from every ten thousand, to bring provisions for the troops. Then when they come to Gibeah in Benjamin, they may repay them for all the evil that they committed in Israel.”
11. So all the men of Israel gathered at the city, united like one man.
12. The tribes of Israel sent men throughout the whole tribe of Benjamin, saying, “What is this evil that has been committed among you?
13. Now hand over the wicked men in Gibeah, so that we can kill them and purge the evil from Israel.”Yet the Benjamites were not willing to listen to their fellow children of Israel.
14. The Benjamites gathered from their cities at Gibeah in order to go out and wage war against the children of Israel.
15. That day, the Benjamites mustered twenty-six thousand armed men from the cities and seven hundred specially chosen men from Gibeah.
16. Out of all these people there were seven hundred specially chosen men who were left-handed, all of whom could sling a stone at a hair and not miss.
17. The men of Israel, apart from Benjamin, gathered four hundred thousand armed men who drew the sword; all of them were men of war.
18. The children of Israel arose, went up to Bethel, and asked God, “Who should go up first to wage war against the Benjamites?”The Lord said, “Judah first.”
19. The children of Israel got up in the morning and camped against Gibeah.