Judges 20:16

Jdg 20:16 Among all this people [there were] seven hundred chosen men lefthanded; every one could sling stones at an hair [breadth], and not miss.

Ver. 16. Lefthanded; every one could sling stones, &c.] See Jdg 3:15. David had an excellency in slinging: so had Domitian and Commodus the Emperors. The Indians are much commended for their faculty herein by Philostratus and Plutarch. The Boeotians and the Baleares in Spain were bred up to it of children, their mothers allowing them no more meat than they could hit with a sling stone. We have musketeers amongst us that are notable marksmen, as they call them.

John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Jdg 20:16. Could sling stones at a hair’s breadth, and not miss — A hyperbolical expression, signifying that they could do this with great exactness. This extraordinary skill in their arms (for it is likely they handled other weapons with the like dexterity) and their natural courage, imboldened the Benjamites with such a small number to undertake a war against such a vast multitude of their brethren, the other Israelites; which warlike disposition of theirs was foretold by Jacob, for he said of them, when he spake of the character and fortune of each tribe, (Gen 49:27,) Benjamin shall raven as a wolf, which is an undaunted, fearless creature.

Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

left-handed; every one could sling stones at an hair-breadth, and not miss--The sling was one of the earliest weapons used in war. The Hebrew sling was probably similar to that of the Egyptian, consisting of a leather thong, broad in the middle, with a loop at one end, by which it was firmly held with the hand; the other end terminated in a lash, which was let slip when the stone was thrown. Those skilled in the use of it, as the Benjamites were, could hit the mark with unerring certainty. A good sling could carry its full force to the distance of two hundred yards.

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown — Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Verse 16. Left-handed] They were ambidexters - could use the right hand and the left with equal ease and effect. See Clarke on Jud 3:15.

Could sling stones at a hair - and not miss] ולא יחטא velo yachati, and not sin: και ουκ εξαμαρτανοντες; Sept. Here we have the true import of the term sin; it signifies simply to miss the mark, and is well translated in the New Testament by αμαρτανω, from α, negative, and μαρπτω, to hit the mark. Men miss the mark of true happiness in aiming at sensual gratifications; which happiness is to be found only in the possession and enjoyment of the favour of God, from whom their passions continually lead them. He alone hits the mark, and ceases from sin, who attains to God through Christ Jesus.

It is worthy of remark that the Persian [Persian] khuta kerden, which literally signifies to sin or mistake, is used by the Mohammedans to express to miss the mark.

The sling was a very ancient warlike instrument, and, in the hands of those who were skilled in the use of it, it produced astonishing effects. The inhabitants of the isles called Baleares, now Majorca and Minorca, were the most celebrated slingers of antiquity. They did not permit their children to break their fast till they had struck down the bread they were to eat from the top of a pole, or some distant eminence. They had their name Baleares from the Greek word βαλλειν to dart, cast, or throw.

Concerning the velocity of the ball out of the sling, there are strange and almost incredible things told by the ancients. The leaden ball, when thus projected, is said to have melted in its course. So OVID, Met. lib. ii.. ver. 726.

Obstupuit forma Jove natus: et aethere pendens

Non secus exarsit, quam cum balearica plumbum

Funda jacit; volat illud, et incandescit eundo;

Et, quos non habuit, sub nubibus invenit ignes.

Hermes was fired as in the clouds he hung;

So the cold bullet that, with fury slung

From Balearic engines, mounts on high,

Glows in the whirl, and burns along the sky.

DRYDEN.

This is not a poetic fiction; SENECA, the philosopher, in lib. iii. Quaest. Natural., c. 57, says the same thing: Sic liquescit excussa glans funda, et adtritu aeris velut igne distillat; "Thus the ball projected from the sling melts, and is liquefied by the friction of the air, as if it were exposed to the action of fire." I have often, by the sudden and violent compression of the air, produced fire; and by this alone inflamed tinder, and lighted a match.

Vegetius de Re Militari, lib. ii., cap. 23, tells us that slingers could in general hit the mark at six hundred feet distance. Funditores scopas-pro signo ponebant; ita ut SEXCENTOS PEDES removerentur a signo-signum saepius tangerent. These things render credible what is spoken here of the Benjamite slingers.

Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

(16) Seven hundred chosen men.—These words are omitted in the LXX. and Vulg.

Left handed.—The same phrase as that employed in Jdg_3:15.

Could sling stones at an hair breadth, and not miss.—The expression is perfectly simple, and merely implies extreme accuracy of aim. Bochart’s attempt (Hieroz. Ii. 162) to explain it by a passage in Quintus Smyrnœus, which says that archers used to contend which should be able to shoot off the horsehair crest of a helmet, is a mere specimen of learning fantastically misapplied. Skill with the sling was not confined to the Benjamites, as we see from the case of David (1Sa_17:49). The sling is the natural weapon of a people which is poor and imperfectly armed. Cyrus valued his force of 400 slingers (Xen. Anab. iii. 3-6). The inhabitants of the Balearic Isles were as skilful as the Benjamites, and children were trained to sling their breakfasts down from the top of high poles. They once prevented the Carthaginian fleet from coming to anchor by showers of stones (liv. xxviii. 37, solo eo telo utebantur). Practice made them so expert that the stones they slung came with as much force as though hurled by a catapult, and pierced shields and helmets (Diod. Sic. Bibl. v. 18). Exactly similar tales are told of the trained skill of our English archers. The advantage of slinging with the left hand was very obvious, for it enabled the slinger to strike his enemy on the right, i.e., the undefended side.

A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

16. Then, keeping the text of this v. as it stands, we are told that the Benjamite host included a company of 700 left-handed and exceptionally skilful warriors, just as David’s army was strengthened by a similar band, 1Ch_12:2. Josephus understood the narrative in this way, Ant. Jdg_20:2; Jdg_20:10. The alternative is to omit the first half of this verse, and make the 700 chosen men refer to the inhabitants of Gibeah, and every one (rather, all this army) could sling … and not miss refer to the entire host. But this does not seem natural, and to cut out left-handed as merely borrowed from Jdg_3:15 is to remove a feature which has the appearance of originality.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Among all this people there were seven hundred chosen men lefthanded,.... According to Ben Gersom, these were the seven hundred men of Gibeah; but this does not appear from the text, but, on the contrary, that these were among all the people; or there were so many to be selected out of them all, who were lefthanded men; nor is it likely that all the inhabitants of one place should be such. Benjamin signifies a son of the right hand, yet this tribe had a great number of lefthanded men in it, see Jdg 3:15. Josephus (h) wrongly reduces the number to five hundred:

everyone could sling stones at an hair's breadth, and not miss: the mark they slung the stone at, so very expert were they at it; and perhaps their having such a number of skilful men in this art made them more confident of success, and emboldened them in this daring undertaking, to point to which this circumstance seems to be mentioned. There were a people that inhabited the islands, now called Majorca and Minorca, anciently Baleares, from their skilfulness in slinging stones, to which they brought up from their childhood, as it is related various writers, Strabo (i), Diodorus Siculus (k), Floras (l) and others (m); that their mothers used to set their breakfast on a beam or post, or some such thing, at a distance, which they were not to have, unless they could strike it off; and the first of these writers says, that they exercised this art from the time that the Phoenicians held these islands; and, according to Pliny (n), the Phoenicians, the old inhabitants of Canaan, were the first inventors of slings, and from these the Benjaminites might learn it. The Indians are said (o) to be very expert in slinging stones to an hair's breadth.

(h) Antiqu. l. 5. c. 2. sect. 10. (i) Geograph l. 3. p. 116. (k) Bibliothec. l. 5. p. 298. (l) Roman Cost. l. 3. c. 8. (m) Vid. Barthii Ammadv. ad Claudian. in 3 Consul. Honor. ver. 50. (n) Nat. Hist. l. 7. c. 56. (o) Philoetrat. Vit. Apollon. l. 2. c. 12.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

Right. Septuagint, "ambidextrous." Moderns generally translate the Hebrew, "left-handed." But we have seen that such a meaning is improbable, chap. iii. 15. --- Side. The inhabitants of Palestine formerly applied themselves very much to this exercise, and by them it was propagated over other parts of the world. (Pliny, [Natural History?] vii. 56.) Strabo (iii.) observes that eh people of the Balearic islands became famous for slinging, only after the Phœnicians had taken possession of their country, which is the present Majorca and Minorca. They could hit the mark without failing, and penetrate every sort of armour. (Florus iii.) Their bullets of lead were sent with such violence, as sometimes to melt in the air, according to Ovid and Seneca, q. 2. 56. The slingers commonly stood 600 paces from the mark of white, which they seldom missed. (Veget. ii. 23.) The stones which they used weighted a pound among the Romans. The sling would frequently carry farther than a bow. (Xenophon, Anab. v.) Yet the exploits of bowmen are not less extraordinary than what is here recorded. Philostorgius (ii. 12,) assures us that the Indians, after they have been drinking, will shoot at a child, and only touch the ends of his hair. Domitian would shoot from a great distance, and make the arrow pass between the extended fingers of a child, and at other times would divest himself with piercing an animal with two arrows, so that they would stick out like horns. (Suetonius) Soranus could send an arrow into the air, and pierce it with another as it fell. The emperor Hadrian writes of him, "Emissumque arcu dum pendet in aere telum,

Ac redit ex alto, fixi fregique sagitta." (Calmet)

George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).

Left-handed, Heb. shut up on their right hand, i.e. using their left hand instead of their right.

Every one could sling stones at an hair breadth, and not miss; an hyperbolical expression, signifying that they could do this with great exactness. There are many parallel instances in historians of persons that could throw stones or shoot arrows with great certainty, so as seldom or never to miss; of which see my Latin Synopsis. And this was very considerable, and one ground of the Benjamites’ confidence, because in those times they had no guns.

Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.

16. Lefthanded — See on Jdg_3:15.

Sling stones at a hair breadth — Literally, to the hair. Seven hundred men thus disciplined argues that this lefthanded skill of Benjamin was acquired. “This is a region where such a mode of warfare would be cultivated in ancient times, and be very effective. The stones for the sling are everywhere at hand, and the country is cut up by deep gorges with impracticable banks; and before the invention of guns there was no other weapon that would carry across these profound depths, and reach the ranks of the enemy. David, while following his flocks over these rough mountains, practised other arts besides that of playing on the shepherd’s pipe, for he became as expert in the use of the sling as any of the chosen men of Benjamin.” — Thomson. This writer also states that he had seen boys fighting battles with slings among the gorges of Mount Hermon, and at times almost darkening the air with their whizzing pebbles. By similar practices, perhaps, the ancient youth of Benjamin and other tribes were disciplined for warfare.

Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Seven hundred... men left-handed. It is curious that the tribe of Benjamin, which means son of the right hand, should have this peculiar institution of a corps of left-handed men. Ehud the Benjamite was a man left-handed . (Jud_1:3:15; see also 1Ch_12:2) The Roman name Scaexola means left-handed. For the use of the sling see 1Sa_17:40, 1Sa_17:49. Diodorus Siculus (quoted by Rosenmuller) mentions the remarkable skill of the inhabitants of the Balearic Islands in the use of the sling, adding, in terms very similar to those of the text, that they seldom miss their aim.

The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

Not miss - An hyperbolical expression, signifying, that they could do this with great exactness. And this was very considerable and one ground of the Benjamites confidence.

John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.

With shriveled right arms. Their right arms were shrunken. They could not utilize them, as if they were closed, as in "Let not the well close its mouth over me."

Each of them These seven hundred men.

At a hair. A strand of hair.

And not miss. And not err.

Rashi on the Tanakh — English translations: “The Judaica Press complete Tanach with Rashi, translated by A. J. Rosenberg” (CC BY 4.0); “Pentateuch with Rashi's commentary by M. Rosenbaum and A.M. Silbermann, 1929-1934” (public domain); “The Metsudah Tanach series, Lakewood, N.J” (CC BY 4.0); and “The Book of Joshua, Metsudah Publications, 1997” (CC BY 4.0). Text via Sefaria.