Judges 20:36–48

³⁶Then the Benjamites saw that they were beaten.

Now the men of Israel had given way^p before Benjamin, because they relied on the ambush^q they had set near Gibeah. ³⁷Those who had been in ambush made a sudden dash into Gibeah, spread out and put the whole city to the sword.^{r 38}The Israelites had arranged with the ambush that they should send up a great cloud of smoke^s from the city,^{t 39}and then the Israelites would counterattack.

The Benjamites had begun to inflict casualties on the Israelites (about thirty), and they said, “We are defeating them as in the first battle.”^{u 40}But when the column of smoke began to rise from the city, the Benjamites turned and saw the whole city going up in smoke.^{v 41}Then the Israelites counterattacked,^w and the Benjamites were terrified, because they realized that disaster had come^x on them. ⁴²So they fled before the Israelites in the direction of the wilderness, but they could not escape the battle. And the Israelites who came out of the towns cut them down there. ⁴³They surrounded the Benjamites, chased them and easily^e overran them in the vicinity of Gibeah on the east. ⁴⁴Eighteen thousand Benjamites fell, all of them valiant fighters.^{y 45}As they turned and fled toward the wilderness to the rock of Rimmon,^z the Israelites cut down five thousand men along the roads. They kept pressing after the Benjamites as far as Gidom and struck down two thousand more.

⁴⁶On that day twenty-five thousand Benjamite^a swordsmen fell, all of them valiant fighters. ⁴⁷But six hundred of them turned and fled into the wilderness to the rock of Rimmon, where they stayed four months. ⁴⁸The men of Israel went back to Benjamin and put all the towns to the sword, including the animals and everything else they found. All the towns they came across they set on fire.^b