Judges 20:35

Jdg 20:35 And the LORD smote Benjamin before Israel: and the children of Israel destroyed of the Benjamites that day twenty and five thousand and an hundred men: all these drew the sword.

Ver. 35. And the Lord smote Benjamin.] Not the Israelites by their stratagem, but the Lord smote them. Victory is his gift.

“ Vincere quisquis aves hostilem exereitum, age, ante,

Invictum vincas per tua vota Deum. ”

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.

Verse 35. Twenty and five thousand and a hundred] As the Benjamites consisted only of twenty-six thousand and seven hundred slingers; or, as the Vulgate, Septuagint, and others read, twenty-five thousand, which is most probably the true reading; then the whole of the Benjamites were cut to pieces, except six hundred men, who we are informed fled to the rock Rimmon, where they fortified themselves.

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

(35) Destroyed of the Benjamites . . .—Here again we have a summary of the final result, followed by details, in a manner which proves either that the narrative was compiled from various sources (one of which seems to have been a poem), or that it was penned before the “periodic style” of history (lexis katestrammene) had been invented. If written consecutively, and not compiled, the writer must have been one whose method bore the same resemblance to that of later writers, as the style of Hellanicus did to that of Herodotus and Thucydides. It is the style to which Roman writers would have applied the epithet inconditus—the style of the oldest annals. Jdg_20:36-46 are not, as has been conjectured by some writers, necessarily a different account of the battle, but contain a loose assemblage of details, which has been added to explain the general result.

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

35. As elsewhere the account of the battle is brought to an end with a summing up of the numbers slain, Jdg_20:21; Jdg_20:25; Jdg_20:46, Jdg_3:29, Jos_8:25. For the numbers see on Jdg_20:15. This later source B, it is to be noted, ascribes the victory to the direct interference of Jehovah; cf. 2Ch_13:15; 2Ch_14:12, where the same verb smote occurs.

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.

So the children of Benjamin saw that they were smitten,.... Their forces broken and worsted, many being killed:

for the men of Israel gave place to the Benjaminites; at first, and made as if they were afraid of them, and so fled before them, which was only to decoy them to a greater distance from the city Gibeah:

because they trusted unto the liers in wait, which they had set beside Gibeah; that these would not only enter the city, and burn it, but meet the Benjaminites fleeing back to it, when they should turn upon them and smite them, and so cut off all that remained of them.

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

The sword. It seems the slingers also used the sword, ver. 16.

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).

This is the total sum, whereof the particulars are related Jdg 20:11,45; and for the odd hundred not there mentioned, they were killed in other places not there expressed.

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

35. Twenty and five thousand and a hundred — The historian here gives the result of the battle, and then proceeds, in Jdg_20:36-46, to give more of the details. It appears that eighteen thousand fell in battle, (Jdg_20:44,) five thousand were gleaned along the highways, (Jdg_20:45,) and that two thousand more were killed as they fled to Gidom. This makes exactly twenty-five thousand; but no account is given in this latter part of the other one hundred. So also no account at all is given of the number of Benjamites who fell in the previous battles. According to Jdg_20:47 only six hundred men of Benjamin escaped; but before the first battle they numbered twenty-six thousand seven hundred. Jdg_20:15. Consequently twenty-six thousand one hundred were killed and missing in the war. The historian records twenty-five thousand one hundred killed on this last day of battle; the other one thousand, not accounted for, probably fell in the battles of the previous days, for it is not supposable that the Benjamites killed twenty-two thousand on one day (Jdg_20:21) and eighteen thousand on another without any loss to themselves.

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