Israel’s war with the tribe of Benjamin

The events of the previous chapter carry over into the last two chapters of the book of Judges, this one and the final one. The overall content of this chapter is about the division between Israel and the tribe of Benjamin (where the town of Gibeah was situated) and the eventual long war in which thousands on both sides died.

All Israel gathered together at Mizpah, four hundred thousand foot soldiers with swords, from every tribe, except the tribe of Benjamin who heard about the gathering. The reason for coming together, prompted by the dismembered parts of the concubine, was to decide what to do. The Levite told the story of the events. The men of Israel heard and decided that they would all immediately go up against the tribe of Benjamin, for them to hand over the perverted men of Gibeah for justice to be done and for Israel to be redeemed. They agreed to take one man out of every ten to go and, if necessary, to fight.

The spiritual meaning in this opening and gathering of Israel at Mizpah is mostly about its incompleteness. The tribe of Benjamin was not present even though Mizpah was in Benjamin’s territory. Spiritual incompleteness in us is to leave something out of our love and faithfulness to the Lord which makes each one of us a whole being. The twelve tribes of Israel stand for all the qualities which come together to form our spiritual life and purpose. (True Christian Religion 38)

The men of Israel go up and ask the Lord who should go to fight first. The reply is that Judah go first. The men of Benjamin refuse to hand the men of Gibeah over and they form an army to fight Israel. In the fighting, the men of Benjamin cut down twenty-two thousand men of Israel. Israel goes and weeps to the Lord and asks if they should go up again against their brother Benjamin. The Lord says they are to go up again.

The spiritual meaning of the tribe of Benjamin is that it stands for the ‘medium’ or the vital connection between what is internal or celestial and what is external or natural. If this connection is absent there is no passage or mutual link between these two and they are separated. This removes the completeness of our spiritual life as a whole. (See Arcana Caelestia 5822.)

Israel goes up against Benjamin on the second day and eighteen thousand men of Israel are cut down by the army of Benjamin. Israel goes to the house of the Lord and weeps, and asks if they should yet go out to fight their brother Benjamin. The Lord says that they are to fight a third time, and the He will deliver them into their hand.

Israel weeps. Weeping or crying stands for mourning the loss of something which is no longer present. In a good sense ‘weeping’ can be for the sense of loss of what is loved and what is part of us, here represented by ‘to battle the children of my brother Benjamin’.

The Lord wept over Jerusalem (Luke 19:41-44). (Arcana Caelestia 4293.3)

Israel fights on three consecutive day, and on the third day they defeat the tribe of Benjamin. ‘On the third day’ (see verse 30) stands for the need for conflict and personal states in our spiritual temptations and battles to be worked through until they are brought to an end and we can be brought out of temptation, into a new state. (Arcana Caelestia 5159)

The men of Israel laid an ambush and then went as before to fight the men of Benjamin. They moved away from them and Benjamin followed them and killed some men of Israel. The men in ambush arose and went to Gibeah and by arrangement made a great column of smoke after killing the men of the city. (Arcana Caelestia 9144) The men of Benjamin saw this and panicked, and twenty three thousand of them were slain. Six hundred men escaped and hid, and Israel went all around and destroyed men of Benjamin wherever they were found.

The spiritual meaning of this final battle is in the extent of the numbers killed and the aftermath of the victory with further killing. To ‘kill’ (or destroy) when it is used in the Word is to work completely towards the full expulsion of states, thoughts and intentions in us which are in opposition to the way of the Word and its wholeness and healing. (Arcana Caelestia 9320) This is the meaning of the term ‘vastation’ in which things which are opposed to the Lord need to be worked through and brought to an end so that a new state can come.

4818. 'And there Judah saw the daughter of a man, a Canaanite' means the affection for evil begotten by falsity springing from evil. This is clear from the meaning of 'the daughter' as the affection for good, dealt with in 2362, and in the contrary sense as the affection for evil, 3024; from the meaning of 'a man' as one who has intelligence and, in the abstract sense, as truth, but in the contrary sense as one who has no intelligence and as falsity, dealt with just above in 4816; and from the meaning of 'a Canaanite' as evil, dealt with in 1573, 1574. From these meanings it is evident that 'the daughter of a man, a Canaanite' means evil begotten by falsity springing from evil. What evil begotten by falsity springing from evil is will be stated below.

[2] Here the origins of the tribe of Judah must be stated first, since these are the subject in this chapter. That tribe, or the Jewish nation, has three origins, the first being Shelah, Judah's son by his Canaanite wife, the second and third being Perez and Zerah, Judah's sons by his daughter-in-law. The descent of the whole Jewish nation from these three sons of Judah is evident from the list of Jacob's sons and grandsons who accompanied him into Egypt, Genesis 46:12, and also from the grouping of them into families, referred to in Moses,

The sons of Judah according to their families were: of Shelah, the family of the Shelanites; of Perez, the family of the Parzites; of Zerah, the family of the Zarhites. Numbers 26:20; 1 Chronicles 4:21.

From this the nature of that nation's origin is evident; that is to say, a third of them were descended from a Canaanite mother and two thirds from a daughter-in-law. They were all therefore the product of an illicit union, because marriages to daughters of the Canaanites were strictly forbidden - as may be seen in Genesis 24:3; Exodus 34:16; Deuteronomy 7:3; 1 Kings 11:2; and Chapters 9, 10 of Ezra - while lying with a daughter-in-law was a capital offence, as is evident in Moses,

As regards a man who has lain with his daughter-in-law, both of them shall be killed; they have committed perversion; ¹ their blood shall be upon them. Leviticus 20:12.

What Judah and his daughter-in-law had done together was linked by him to the law regarding leviratical marriages, which lays down the duty of a brother but never of a father, as is evident from verse 26 of the present chapter. Judah's linking of their deed together to this law implies that the sons of Tamar were to be recognized as the sons of Er the firstborn, who was born from the Canaanite mother, and who was evil in Jehovah's eyes and was therefore made to die, verse 7. For initially those born in a leviratical marriage did not belong to the one from whom they had been conceived but to him whose seed was being raised up, as is clear from Deuteronomy 25:5-6, and also from verses 8 and 9 of the present chapter. Furthermore, the sons whom Tamar bore were the result of whoredom, for when Judah went in to her he thought she was a prostitute, verses 15-16, 21. From all this one can see the origin of the Jewish nation and what kind of origin this was; and one can see that their words in John were founded on a lie,

The Jews said to Him, We were not born of whoredom. John 8:41.

[3] As regards what that origin implies and what it represents, this is evident from what follows. That is to say, those people's interiors were the same or had the same origin. Judah's marriage to a Canaanite implies and represents an origin that consisted in evil begotten by falsity springing from evil, for this is what is meant in the internal sense by 'the daughter of a man, a Canaanite'. And his lying through whoredom with his daughter-in-law implies and represents condemnation due to truth falsified by evil, for throughout the Word 'whoredom' means the falsification of truth, see 3703. ² Evil begotten by falsity springing from evil is an evil life resulting from a false teaching hatched by the evil of self-love - that is, by those governed by this evil - and backed up by a use of the sense of the letter of the Word. This is what the origin of the evil in the Jewish nation is like, and what the origin of the evil is like in the Christian world, especially among those meant in the Word by Babel. The nature of that evil is such that it closes every path leading into the internal man, closing every path so completely that no conscience at all can be formed there. For if any evil done by a person is due to a false teaching, he believes that this is good because he believes that it is true. He accordingly does it, because he has warrant to do so, with a sense of freedom and delight. All this being so, heaven is closed so completely against him that it cannot be opened.

[4] As an example to explain what this evil is like, take those who from the evil of self-love believe the following: One nation alone is Jehovah's chosen people, in comparison with whom all the rest of mankind are slaves. The rest, they believe, are so base that they may be killed at will and may be treated in a cruel fashion. Such ideas, likewise backed up by a use of the sense of the letter of the Word, were the beliefs of the Jewish nation, as they are also of the Babylonish ³ nation at the present day. Whatever kind of evil done by the latter that is the result of that false teaching, and of any other false teachings built on that one as their foundation, is evil begotten by falsity springing from evil. It destroys the internal man and shuts out even the possibility of any conscience being formed there. These people are referred to in the Word as those immersed in bloodshed; for they treat in savage ways the entire human race because it does not venerate what they believe and so themselves too, and because it does not present its gifts on their altars.

[5] Take another example - those who from the evil of self-love and love of the world believe in the necessity for someone to act as the Lord's vicar on earth. They believe that this person has power to open and close heaven, and so to control everyone's mind and conscience, and they back up this falsity by a use of the sense of the letter of the Word. In their case whatever kind of evil they perform as a result of these ideas is evil begotten by falsity springing from evil, which similarly destroys the internal man in those who are led by that evil to lay claim to that power and so control others. That evil destroys the internal man so completely that people cease to know any longer what the internal man is, or to know of the existence of conscience in anyone, with the result that they cease to believe any longer in a life after death, or in the existence of hell and of heaven, however much they talk about these.

[6] The nature of this evil is such that people in the world cannot tell it apart from other evils; but in the next life angels recognize it quite clearly. For in the next life the countless differences in the essential nature and the origin of evils and falsities are in full view; and it is also the genera and species to which these evils and falsities belong that mark off the hells from one another. Of these countless differences man knows scarcely anything. He believes in the existence of evil but has no knowledge of its essential nature, for the simple reason that he does not know what good is, and does not know what good is because he does not know what charity is. If he knew what the good of charity was he would also know its opposites, which are evils, and also their differences.

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