Tribe of Benjamin

“ But as if to render his personality more marked, and his partisanship more striking, the champion of legitimacy was none of these things. Instead of being a noble, he was a baker; instead of a solitary, a busy man of the world—even a deputy in the French Assembly in 1840. Who would have dreamt this? Yet when God chose a king for Israel, he did not call a man of exalted family to the throne, but "a son of Jemini of the least tribe of Israel, and his kindred the last among all the families of the tribe of Benjamin." ”

“ The Jews wander here and there, shepherds and brigands, victorious when they maintain the covenants of the Law, defeated when they forget them.
A giant with unshorn hair kills, single-handed, thousands of Philistines and Amalekites, but a woman betrays him; enemies blind him and set him to turn a mill. Heroes alone are not enough. Kings are needed. A young man of the tribe of Benjamin, tall and well-grown, while looking for his father’s strayed asses, is met by a Prophet who anoints him with the sacred oil, and makes him king of all the people. ”

“ Addressing his servants, before the slaughter of Abimelech and the priests, he asked, "Hear now, ye Benjamites; will the son of Jesse give you fields and vineyards, that all of you have conspired against me?" Evidently he had rewarded his favourites, especially those of his own tribe, with fields and vineyards. But how had he got these to bestow? Very probably by dispossessing the Gibeonites. Their cities, as we have seen, were in the tribe of Benjamin. But to prevent jealousy, others, both of Judah and of Israel, would get a share of the spoil. ”

“ It is important to keep in view the fact that the relative numbers furnished by the narrative in the Book of Judges do not suggest that the tribe of Benjamin differed in the above respect from other tribes. Of twenty-six thousand Benjamites that drew the sword, there were the seven hundred left-handed slingers, or barely 2·7 per cent, which does not greatly differ from the proportion noted at the present time. ”

“ The tribe of Benjamin is saved from being utterly extinct, by providing wives for the six hundred that remained.
21:1. Now the children of Israel had also sworn in Maspha, saying: None of us shall give of his daughters to the children of Benjamin to wife.
21:2. And they all came to the house of God in Silo, and sitting before him till the evening, lifted up their voices, and began to lament and weep, saying:
21:3. O Lord God of Israel, why is so great an evil come to pass in thy people, that this day one tribe should be taken away from among us? ”

“ The Israelites were zealous against the wickedness that was committed, yet they were discreet in their zeal, and did not think it would justify them in falling upon the whole tribe of Benjamin unless they, by refusing to give up the criminals, and protecting them against justice, should make themselves guilty, ex post facto— as accessaries after the fact. ”

“ The country for ten miles north of Jerusalem was the exposed and highly debatable district ascribed to the young tribe of Benjamin (the favourite “brother” of both Judah and Joseph; Gen. xxxvii., xxxix. sqq.) ; the border-line between the rival kingdoms oscillated, and consequently the political position of the smaller and half-desert Judaean state depended upon the attitude of its neighbours. It is possible that tradition is right in supposing that “Judah went down from his brethren” (Gen. xxxviii. 1; cf. Judg. i. 3) . ”

“ What shall we do with the rest, that have not received wives? for all the women in Benjamin are dead.
17 And we must use all care, and provide with great diligence, that one tribe be not destroyed out of Israel.
18 For as to our own daughters we cannot give them, being bound with an oath and a curse, whereby we said: Cursed be he that shall give Benjamin any of his daughters to wife. ”

“ Of the tribe of Benjamin were sealed twelve thousand.
9 After this I beheld, and, lo, [212] a great multitude, which no man could number, [213] of all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues, stood before the throne, and before the Lamb, [214] clothed with white robes, and palms in their hands ”

“ An Israelite tribe should not be destroyed. 18 But we cannot give them wives of our daughters, because the Israelites swore, 'Cursed be whoever gives a wife to Benjamin.'" 19 And they said, "Look -- there is a feast of Yahweh at Shiloh annually along the north of Bethel, east of the highway which goes up from Bethel to Shechem, and south of Lebonah.
20 And they commanded the Benjamites, saying, "Go and set an ambush in the vineyards. ”

“ BENJAMIN, a tribe of Israel, named after the youngest son of Jacob and Rachel. As distinct from the others Benjamin was born not beyond the Jordan but in Palestine, between Bethel and Ephrath. His mother, dying in childbed, gave him the name Ben-ōnī, “Son of my sorrow,” which was changed by his father to Ben-jāmīn, meaning probably “Son of the right hand” (i.e. “of prosperity,” or, perhaps, “son of the south”; Gen. xxxv. 16-18) . ”

“ We have seen how the heart of this son of Anathoth-in-Benjamin was early drawn to the exiles from that province on which the northward windows of his village looked out.627 Now once more he was in Benjamin's territory, at Ramah and at Miṣpah, with the same northward prospect. Naturally his heart went out again to Ephraim and its banished folk. Of the priestly tribe as Jeremiah's family were, their long residence in the land of Benjamin [pg 298] must have infected them with Benjamin's sense of a closer kinship to Ephraim, the son of Joseph, the son of Rachel, than to Judah, the son of Leah. ”

“ Some of the tribes appear never to have had any political existence, as for example that of Levi,** or they were merged at an early date into some fellow-tribe, as in the case of Reuben with Gad;*** others, such as Ephraim, Manasseh, Benjamin, and Judah, apparently did not attain their normal development until a much later date. ”

“ Zebulun was divided into three families, Ephraim into four, Issachar into four, Naphtali into four, and Reuben into four; Judah, Simeon, and Asher, had five families apiece, Gad and Benjamin seven apiece, and Manasseh eight. Benjamin brought ten sons into Egypt (Gen. xlvi. 21) , but three of them, it seems either died childless or their families were extinct, for here we find seven only of those names preserved, and that whole tribe none of the most numerous; for Providence, in the building up of families and nations, does not tie itself to probabilities. ”

“ If the Indians had been in a nomadic instead of a hunter state, and in summer had driven their flocks to the Allegheny mountains—in winter to the banks of the Wabash and Tennessee rivers, it could scarcely be denied that each tribe would have had an interest in the whole region between, and as much right as any other tribe to be heard on a question of sale. ”

“ Neh. vi. 10. Benjamin, dwelling by the temple of God, dwelt in safety by him. Note, It is a happy thing to be in the neighbourhood of the temple. This situation of Benjamin, it is likely, was the only thing that kept that tribe in adherence with Judah to the divine institutions, when the other ten tribes apostatized. Those have corrupt and wicked hearts indeed who, the nearer they are to the church, are so much the further from God.
II. The blessing of Joseph, including both Manasseh and Ephraim. In Jacob's blessing (Gen. xlix.) that of Joseph is the largest, and so it is here ”

“ Binjamin, youngest son of Jacob; also the tribe descended from him, and its territory: Benjamin.
1145 בֶּן־יְמִינִי (ben-yem-ee-nee') : sometimes (with the article inserted) Ben-ha-yminiy; with אּישׁ inserted (1 Sam. 9:1) Ben-miysh Ymiyniy; son of a man of Jemini; or shortened (1 Sam. 9:4; Esth. 2:5) Iysh Ymiyniy; a man of Jemini, or (1 Sam. 20:1) simply Yminiy; a Jeminite; (plural Bniy Ymiyniy; patron from בִּנְיָמִן; a Benjaminite, or descendent of Benjamin: Benjamite, of Benjamin.
1146 בִּנְיָן (bin-yawn') : from בָּנָה; an edifice: building. ”

“ Notwithstanding the wandering and warlike character of this tribe, such was the success attending this effort of active benevolence, that the Friends composing the Yearly Meetings of Baltimore, Ohio and Indiana, still continue a similar agency among the Shawanoes, although they are now the occupants of the territory lying beyond the distant Arkansas.
Whether the new position west of the Mississippi, in which the Indian tribes have been placed, will tend to promote their civilization, arrest their deterioration in morals, or their decline in numbers, we think extremely problematical. ”

“ My children, you promised in that treaty to acknowledge no other father than the chief of the Seventeen Fires; and never to listen to the proposition of any foreign nation. You promised never to lift up the tomahawk against any of your father's children, and to give him notice of any other tribe that intended it: your father also promised to do something for you, particularly to deliver to you, every year, a certain quantity of goods; to prevent any white man from settling on your lands without your consent, or to do you any personal injury. ”

“ He has great enterprize and active impulses, with a freshness and enthusiasm of feeling, which might readily lead him astray, but for his quick perception of human character, his uncommon prudence and his calm, sound judgment. At an early period of his life he became the chief warrior of his tribe, and by his superior talents, eloquence, and intelligence, really directed the civil affairs of his nation for many years, while they were nominally conducted in the name of the hereditary peace chief. Such is Keokuk, the Watchful Fox, who prides himself upon being the friend of the whiteman. ”

“ As Ben-oni He was the suffering One because of whom a sword pierced His mother's heart Luke 2:35 as Benjamin, head of the warrior tribe Genesis 49:27 firmly joined to Judah the kingly tribe ; Genesis 49:8-12; 1 Kings 12:21 he becomes a type of the victorious One. It is noteworthy that Benjamin was especially honoured among the Gentiles Genesis 45:22.
So manifold are the distinctions of Christ that many personal types of Him are needed. Joseph is not complete, Benjamin standing only for Christ the sorrowful One Isaiah 53:3,4 yet have power on earth. ”

“ The fulfilling of this confirms our faith in the spirit of prophecy with which the patriarchs were endued. 5. When they came down into Egypt Dan had but one son (Gen. xlvi. 23) , and so his tribe was but one family, ch. xxvi. 42. Benjamin had then ten sons (Gen. xlvi. 21) , yet now the tribe of Dan is almost double in number to that of Benjamin. Note, The increasing and diminishing of families do not always go by probabilities. Some are multiplied greatly, and again are diminished, while others that were poor have families made them like a flock, Ps. ”

“ The Sioux are generally represented as a brave, generous and spirited people, with proud notions of their origin as a tribe, and their superiority as hunters and warriors, and with a predominant passion for war. ”