Too graphic to give a title!

²² While they were enjoying themselves, a crowd of troublemakers from the town surrounded the house. They began beating at the door and shouting to the old man, “Bring out the man who is staying with you so we can have sex with him.”

²³ The old man stepped outside to talk to them. “No, my brothers, don’t do such an evil thing. For this man is a guest in my house, and such a thing would be shameful. ²⁴ Here, take my virgin daughter and this man’s concubine. I will bring them out to you, and you can abuse them and do whatever you like. But don’t do such a shameful thing to this man.”

²⁵ But they wouldn’t listen to him. So the Levite took hold of his concubine and pushed her out the door. The men of the town abused her all night, taking turns raping her until morning. Finally, at dawn they let her go. ²⁶ At daybreak the woman returned to the house where her husband was staying. She collapsed at the door of the house and lay there until it was light.

²⁷ When her husband opened the door to leave, there lay his concubine with her hands on the threshold. ²⁸ He said, “Get up! Let’s go!” But there was no answer.^[d] So he put her body on his donkey and took her home.

²⁹ When he got home, he took a knife and cut his concubine’s body into twelve pieces. Then he sent one piece to each tribe throughout all the territory of Israel.

³⁰ Everyone who saw it said, “Such a horrible crime has not been committed in all the time since Israel left Egypt. Think about it! What are we going to do? Who’s going to speak up?”  Judges 19:22-30

I really did not wish to post all of this but since there are global readers who may not have a bible I put it up.
You can also find the daily readings at the following link:



One Year Bible Readings <--------------------


First, of course, when reading this a feel angry even after all these years. I thought about it for a long time this time and decided that hopefully when this woman, probably a young woman, died God erased that dreadful memory and she is experiencing eternal bliss in the presence of Jesus.


I have daughters and I can’t imagine for a moment this happening to them.


Next thing that came to mind was justice.

⁴⁶ So that day the tribe of Benjamin lost 25,000 strong warriors armed with swords, ⁴⁷ leaving only 600 men who escaped to the rock of Rimmon, where they lived for four months. ⁴⁸ And the Israelites returned and slaughtered every living thing in all the towns—the people, the livestock, and everything they found. They also burned down all the towns they came to.  Judges 20:46-48

A lot of people died over that event but I think that justice would have been that the Levite that shoved the woman out died too.



But justice belongs to God and I know we are thankful that we do not get what we deserve. 

What are your thoughts on what we have read today?

 

Today’s reading:
JUDGES 19:1-21:25
Tomorrow’s reading:
RUTH 1:1-4:12