This passage is often misinterpreted as divine endorsement of kidnapping or forced marriage as a legitimate biblical practice, ignoring its context as a tragic, human-devised expedient amid the consequences of Israel's collective sin, civil war, and rash vows that nearly eradicated Benjamin; critics wrongly portray it as promoting violence against women without recognizing the narrative's overall lament over Israel's chaotic cycle of idolatry, judgment, and flawed redemption, rather than prescribing it as a model for conduct.
Judges 21:23
King James Version (1769)
23 And the children of Benjamin did so, and took them wives, according to their number, of them that danced, whom they caught: and they went and returned unto their inheritance, and repaired the cities, and dwelt in them.
Judges 21:23 depicts the restoration of the tribe of Benjamin following a devastating civil war, as the surviving Benjamite men, lacking wives due to prior oaths by other tribes, seize women from the annual festival dances at Shiloh as instructed by the Israelite elders; they then return to their inheritance, rebuild their destroyed cities, and resettle, illustrating God's providential preservation of His covenant people despite their moral failings and desperate measures to fulfill the command to propagate.