It shall come about, when their fathers or their brothers come to complain to us, that we shall say to them, 'Give them to us voluntarily, because we did not take for each man of Benjamin a wife in battle, nor did you give them to them, else you would now be guilty.'"How messed up can this situation get?
The people have decimated Benjamin. Now they can't repopulate, because the other tribes have sworn not to give their daughters in marriage. So the other tribes' elders come up with a scheme whereby the men of Benjamin kidnap themselves wives. Then when those girls' fathers come and complain, the elders talk them into letting it be?
I see the point they're trying to make. The fathers didn't give the girls in marriage, so they're not breaking their oaths. But to use such double-talk and legal hair-splitting to get around an oath is just disgusting to me. While I understand their concern, I don't see how this should be acceptable before God as not violating their oaths. If they went to fight for their girls and lost, then I might understand, but to basically get a wink and a nod, and let it go at that? No way.
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