Judges 21:5

21:5 The Israelites asked, “Who from all the Israelite tribes has not assembled before the Lord?” They had made a solemn oath that whoever did not assemble before the Lord at Mizpah must certainly be executed. ¹ 

Judges 21:11

21:11 Do this: ²  exterminate every male, as well as every woman who has had sexual relations with a male. ³  But spare the lives of any virgins.” So they did as instructed. ⁴ 

Judges 21:18

21:18 But we can’t allow our daughters to marry them, ⁵  for the Israelites took an oath, saying, ‘Whoever gives a woman to a Benjaminite will be destroyed!’ ⁶ 

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¹ tn Heb “A great oath there was concerning the one who did not go up before the Lord at Mizpah, saying, ‘He must surely be put to death.’”

² tn Heb “And this is the thing that you will do.”

³ tn Heb “every woman who is familiar with the bed of a male.”

⁴ tc Some Greek witnesses (notably Codex Vaticanus [B]) add the words, “‘But the virgins you should keep alive.’ And they did so.” These additional words, which probably represent the original Hebrew text, can be retroverted: וְאֶת־הַבְּתוּלוֹת תְּחַיּוּ וַיַּעֲשׂוּ כֵן (ve’et-habbÿtulot tÿkhayyu vayya’asu khen). It is likely that a scribe’s eye jumped from the vav (ו) on וְאֶת (vÿ’et) to the initial vav of v. 11, accidentally leaving out the intervening letters. The present translation is based on this reconstruction.

⁵ tn Heb “But we are not able to give to them wives from our daughters.”

⁶ tn Heb “is cursed.”