7. Now, all you men of Israel, speak up. Give your decision about what we should do.”
8. Then all the people stood up at the same time. They said together, “None of us will go home. No, not one of us will go back to his house.
9. Now this is what we will do to the city of Gibeah. We will throw lots to let God show us who will lead the attack.
10. We will choose ten men from every 100 from all the tribes of Israel. And we will choose 100 men from every 1000. We will choose 1000 men from every 10,000. These men we have chosen will get supplies for the army. Then the army will go to the city of Gibeah in the area of Benjamin. The army will punish those people for the terrible thing they did among the Israelites.”
11. So all the men of Israel gathered together at the city of Gibeah, united together and in agreement as to what they were doing.
12. The tribes of Israel sent men to the tribe of Benjamin with this message: “What about this terrible thing that some of your men have done?
13. Send the bad men from the city of Gibeah to us so that we can put them to death. We must remove the evil from among the Israelites.” But the people from the tribe of Benjamin would not listen to the messengers from their relatives, the other Israelites.
14. The people from the tribe of Benjamin left their cities and went to the city of Gibeah. They went to Gibeah to fight against the other tribes of Israel.
15. The people from the tribe of Benjamin got 26,000 soldiers together who were trained for war. They also had 700 trained soldiers from the city of Gibeah.
16. There were also 700 trained soldiers who were trained to fight with their left hand. Each one of them could use a sling with great skill. They all could use a sling to throw a stone at a hair and not miss!
17. All the tribes of Israel, except Benjamin, gathered together 400,000 fighting men with swords. Each one was a trained soldier.
18. The Israelites went up to the city of Bethel. At Bethel they asked God, “Which tribe will be first to attack the tribe of Benjamin?” The Lord answered, “The tribe of Judah will go first.”