Jacob Chanikuzhy

The story of the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah is well known. A similar story and its aftermaths are found in the last part of the book of Judges (Chapters 19-21). According to this story, a Levite (a man from the Tribe of Levi) and his concubine on their way to Ephraim reached Gibeah (a city in the tribe of Benjamin) and needed to stay there overnight. A man in that town offered them accommodation. But that night townspeople came to the house and demanded the householder to deliver the Levite to them so that they can have sex with him. Like Lot, the householder offered his daughter to the crowd. In the end we see that the crowd sexually assaulted the concubine of the Levite to death.
Upon reaching home, the Levite cut the dead body into twelve pieces and sent one piece each to all the tribes. All the tribes unanimously decided to punish the perpetrators and asked the tribe of Benjamin to hand over the culprits of this horrendous crime. The Benjaminites refused. Hence, all other tribes determined to wage war against the tribe of Benjamin. In the war, the common army of the eleven tribes nearly obliterated the tribe of Benjamin. The tribe of Benjamin was reduced to a group of just 600 men.
It appears that the anger felt by all other tribes against the tribe of Benjamin was reasonable and justified. Their anger was supposed to be the outcome of their loyalty to God and the zeal for his laws. However, the punishment they decided to inflict upon the Benjaminite, appears to have been out of proportion. In this they seemed to have been guided not by reason but by ego and emotion. What was it that prompted them to take such a devastating step against the tribe of Benjamin? First, they were proud of their majority. They knew that they were all united and had become an invincible alliance and there was only one minor tribe on the opposite side. Hence, they thought they could take any action to humiliate, isolate and bring the tribe of Benjamin to its knees. Secondly, they thought that they were fighting on the side of God and his laws. However, they forgot that God wants the conversion of the sinner and not his death. Besides, while eagerly and angrily punishing the Benjaminites the other tribes forgot that they were also sinners and there was outright idolatry going on in the tribe of Dan (Chapter 17-18).
Apart from waging against the tribe of Benjamine, other tribes also decided to not give their girls in marriage to the Benjaminite. Thus, the survival of the tribe of Benjamin was put in jeopardy unless they receive wives from the Canaanites – a recourse that would eventually make them idolaters. Ironically, the action taken by the rest of the tribes against the tribe of Benjamin for violating an ethical precept would eventually end up in making the whole tribe of Benjamin apostates and idolaters. It demonstrates that the real motive behind the actions taken against the tribe of Benjamin was neither love for God nor zeal for his precepts but their own sheer ego and anger. Nevertheless, later the other tribes regained their senses and realized that the ones they were fighting against were their own brothers. So, they made arrangements for the survival of the youngest tribe among them.
The Book of Judges reiterates that all these and tragedies occurred because there was no king in Israel that time. The entire problem started with the lack of proper leadership. Had the Benjaminte leadership punished the perpetrators instead of protecting them, the whole problem could have been avoided. The fact that all the tribes did not have a right common leadership aggravated the problem. The right leadership is not the one that divides the people into a majority and a minority and pitting the majority against the minority, but the one who unites all. A proper leadership is the one who can envisage the repercussions of its decisions and actions and avoid the ones that would damage the unity and fraternity of the community. A right religious leadership is the one that can take wise decisions that would eventually lead people closer to God rather than making them apostates and atheists.