A Levite from the mountains of Ephraim had a concubine, who left him and returned to the house of her father in Bethlehem in Judah.

[5] Rabbinical interpretations say that the woman was both fearful and angry with her husband and left because he was selfish, putting his comfort before his wife and their relationship,[6] and the Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges argues that the translation as 'angry' "suits the context, which implies a quarrel, but not unfaithfulness, on the woman’s part".

[4] The Levite travelled to Bethlehem to retrieve her, and for five days her father managed to persuade him to delay their departure.

As they approached Jebus (Jerusalem), the servant suggested they stop for the night, but the Levite refused to stay in a Jebusite city, and they continued on to Gibeah.

J. P. Fokkelman argues that Judges 19:11–14 is a chiasm, which hinges on the Levite referring to Jebus as "a town of aliens who are not of Israel".

Such an attitude reflects both the social subordination of women and the fact that homosexual rape was viewed as a particularly severe attack on male honor.

Anticipating another victory, they were unaware of the trap that had been set as the confederated Israelites appeared to retreat and the Benjaminites were drawn away from the city to the highways in pursuit, one of which goes up to Bethel and the other to Gibeah.

Those besieging the city sent up a great cloud of smoke as a signal, and the Israelite main force wheeled around to attack.

When the Benjaminites saw their city in flames, and that the retreat had been a ruse, they panicked and routed toward the desert, pursued by the confederated Israelites.

[12] According to the Hebrew Bible, the men of Israel had sworn an oath at Mizpah, saying, "None of us shall give his daughter to Benjamin as a wife.

So the congregation sent out there twelve thousand of their most valiant men, and commanded them, saying, "Go and strike the inhabitants of Jabesh Gilead with the edge of the sword, including the women and children.

So they found among the inhabitants of Jabesh Gilead four hundred young virgins who had not known a man intimately; and they brought them to the camp at Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan.

Then it shall be, when their fathers or their brothers come to us to complain, that we will say to them, 'Be kind to them for our sakes, because we did not take a wife for any of them in the war; for it is not as though you have given the women to them at this time, making yourselves guilty of your oath.'"

[14] R. Ebiathar and R. Yonatan explained that this incident shows that a person should never abuse his household, for in this narrative it resulted in the death of tens of thousands of Israelites in the ensuing warfare.

[6] According to some rabbinical commentators, Phinehas sinned due to his not availing his servitude of Torah instruction to the masses at the time leading up to the battle of Gibeah.

Traditionally the story of the Concubine of a Levite and the preceding story of Micah's Shrine have been seen as supplemental material appended to the Book of Judges in order to describe the chaos and depravity to which Israel had sunk by the end of the period of the Judges, and thereby justify the establishment of the monarchy.

[3] Yairah Amit in The Book of Judges: The Art of Editing (2007), concluded that chapters 19–21 were written by a post-exilic author whose intent was to make the political statement that Israel works together.

[3] According to some scholars, the biblical text describing the battle and the events surrounding it is considerably late in date, originating close to the time of the Deuteronomist's compilation of Judges from its source material, and clearly has several exaggerations of both numbers and modes of warfare.

[17][18] Many Biblical scholars concluded that the account was a piece of political spin, which had been intended to disguise atrocities carried out by the tribe of Judah against Benjamin, probably in the time of David, as an act of revenge or spite by David against the associates of Saul, by casting them further back in time, and adding a more justifiable motive.

(...) Like Num 25, the story recounted in Judges 19–21 centers on the danger of apostasy, but its tale of civil war and escalating violence also emphasizes the tragedy that can result from the indiscriminate application of חרם [herem, meaning 'devotion to Yahweh, usually for complete destruction'].

In addition, the pilegesh's father is referred to as 'hatoh' or 'hatan', which literally means, 'he who has a son-in-law', that is, a father-in-law in relation to the 'pilegesh's husband, the Levite.

At a time when there was no king or ruler in Israel, the old man uses the concubine in order to protect the Levite, thinking this was the right thing to do.

[20]In 1875, the Palestine Exploration Quarterly published an account of a similar tale that was related by an elderly Arab fellah from Jaba'.

According to this tale, a Christian from Bethlehem who was traveling to Taybeh with his wife or daughter stopped in Jaba' as night was falling.

Local men entered the house while they were fast asleep and raped the woman, who was discovered dead in the morning.

The fellah claimed that wheat continues to grow to high heights on this cursed plain, but does not yield grain.