16. Then the elders of the congregation said, “What should we do about wives for those who are left, since the women have been destroyed out of Benjamin?”
17. They said “The survivors of Benjamin must have heirs, so that a tribe would not be blotted out from Israel.
18. Yet we cannot give them wives of our daughters,” for Bnei-Yisrael had sworn saying, “Cursed is he who gives a wife to Benjamin!”
19. So they said, “Behold, there is the feast of Adonai from year to year at Shiloh” (which is to the north of Bethel, on the east side of the highway that goes up from Bethel to Shechem, and to the south of Lebonah).
20. So they commanded the children of Benjamin saying, “Go and hide in the vineyards,
21. and watch, and behold, if the daughters of Shiloh should come out to join in the dances, then come out of the vineyards, and let each of you catch his wife from among the daughters of Shiloh. Then go to the land of Benjamin.
22. So it will be, if their fathers or brothers come to complain to us, that we will say to them, ‘Grant them graciously for us, because we did not provide each one of them his wife in battle—nor did you give the girls to them, else you would now be guilty.’”
23. So the children of Benjamin did so, and took the number of wives from the dancers whom they carried off. Then they went and returned to their inheritance, and rebuilt the towns and settled in them.
24. So Bnei-Yisrael departed from there at that time, each man to his tribe and family. Everyone went out from there to his own inheritance.
25. In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes.