Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

BENJAMIN

(Heb. binyāmîn)

1. One of Jacob’s 12 sons; also the territory and tribe which bore his name. Benjamin was the youngest child of Jacob, one of two children (along with Joseph) born to Jacob and Rachel (Gen. 34:16-19). Rachel died during childbirth, naming the child Benoni, “son of my sorrow.” Jacob renamed him Benjamin, “son of the right/south” (or “son of my good fortune”: Rachel’s “sorrow” became Jacob’s “good fortune”?). Indeed, Benjamin was Jacob’s darling (Gen. 44:20), and Joseph counted on this in order to lure Jacob and clan to Egypt (ch. 42).

The territory of Benjamin was located in the southern Judean highlands. Its unstable northern border was near Bethel; its southern border, around Jerusalem. To the east Benjamin extended to the Jordan; to the west, to the Shephelah. Since Benjamin lay between Judah, the preeminent southern tribe, and Ephraim, the preeminent northern tribe, its location was strategic. The geographic orientation of its name (“son of the south”) probably results from Benjamin’s location S of the Joseph tribe, Ephraim. One expression of Benjamin’s strategic importance is that two different biblical books, Genesis on a family level and Judges on a tribal level, end with stories about restoring an estranged Benjamin to a larger group.

Related, perhaps, to the strategic location of Benjamin was the tribe’s violent history. Called a “rapacious wolf” (Gen. 49:27), Benjamin produced many warriors: the judge Ehud, assassin of Eglon, king of Moab (Judg. 3:15-23); the 700 elite troops mentioned in Judg. 20:20 (like Ehud, these warriors were “left-handed”); Saul; the assassins Baanah and Rechab (2 Sam. 4:2); and, among David’s warriors, Ittai (23:29). Benjaminites from Gibeah raped and brutalized the wife of a Levite (Judg. 19), sparking a civil war between Benjamin and the other tribes (ch. 20); the Benjaminites were decimated and the surviving males resorted to bride-capture in order to maintain their lineage (ch. 21). Another notable Benjaminite was Jeremiah (Jer. 1:1).

Despite ancient connections with the house of Joseph (Ps. 80:2[MT 3]) and support for a favorite son, Saul, earlier (2 Sam. 2:9; 16:5-8), Benjamin sided with Judah following the split of the monarchy (1 Kgs. 12:21). For the rest of the monarchic period and into the postexilic period, Benjamin, along with Judah, made up the nation of Judah and later the Persian province of Yehud (Neh. 11:4).

Paul (Saul) was a Benjaminite (Rom. 11:1), namesake of the tribal ancestor mentioned by the apostle in a sermon in Antioch (Acts 13:21).

Bibliography. B. Halpern, The First Historians: The Hebrew Bible and History (1988, repr. University Park, Pa., 1996), 40-43.

Gregory Mobley

2. A son of Bilhan, a Benjaminite (1 Chr. 7:10).

An Israelite of the family of Harim who had taken a foreign wife (Ezra 10:32). He may be the same person who worked on the restoration of the walls of Jerusalem and took part in their restoration (Neh. 3:23; 12:34).

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

BENJAMIN

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)