The Priest of War Who Never Dies

Judges 20:28

Some stories defy sense and logic to become mythic milestones, foundational building blocks of a culture. Some timeless archetypes are moulded of this mythic lava, evolving over time to address new needs. Santa Claus, in his modern mode as St. Capitalism is one example in modern Christian/Western culture. Today’s his day. Elijah the Prophet, another white bearded elder, also seemingly immortal and with specific visitation rights, is another.  Sometimes the making of a mythic hero over time tells us volumes about the human needs for stories that defy reality and offer us a glimpse, if only through the eyes of children, of what’s beyond the often brutal here and now. 

Chapter 20 of Judges continues the previous brutal chapter in which this poor woman’s corpse is cut up into twelve parts, each sent to another of the twelve tribes of Israel throughout the land with a wordless protest - her barbaric rape and killing must be avenged.

What is it about the patriarchal mythologies that inspire men to kill each other over the fate of a single woman who becomes their unified cause for war? Helen of Troy, or Sita whose beauty is the cause for the endless  war in the epic Mahabharata - just two among many heroines who meet our nameless woman, a lesser wife from the tribe of Judah whose awful fate is cause enough for civil war in Canaan? 

In a rare show of unity not yet displayed throughout this book and during the century + of their settling in the land, the tribesmen of Israel gather “united as one in solidarity” - - but not all of them. The tribe of Benjamin, some of whose men are responsible for the crime, do not show up. War is declared, at first through diplomacy and with attempts to only punish those responsible, but it quickly escalates to full on war between 11 tribes vs. the 12th. Benjamin’s army consists of 26,000 men, among them 700 left handed sharpshooters, the elite commando. 

The rest of the tribes boast 400,000 armed men, each carrying  a sword. They decide, with the oracle’s suggestion,  that Judah will lead the fight. 

The first battle ends badly for Israel. Benjamin’s men defeat them and kill 22,000. 

The second battle ends just as badly, Benjamin again has the upper hand killing 18,000 of the other tribes. 

And at this point the bewildered Israelites go back to YHWH for assistance, fasting, praying and arriving at the tabernacle in Shiloh for further instructions. 

And here enters a mysterious character who should be at least a few hundred years old. Pinchas, grandson of Aaron the High Priest, first appearing  in the Sinai desert, mid Book of Wilderness,  as a spear-bearing zealot, is now an old man, serving as the priest in charge in the holy shrine of Shiloh, speaking for their God. His advice, per the oracle he consults, no surprise, is to keep fighting: 

וּ֠פִֽינְחָ֠ס בֶּן־אֶלְעָזָ֨ר בֶּֽן־אַהֲרֹ֜ן עֹמֵ֣ד ׀ לְפָנָ֗יו בַּיָּמִ֣ים הָהֵם֮ לֵאמֹר֒ הַאוֹסִ֨ף ע֜וֹד לָצֵ֧את לַמִּלְחָמָ֛ה עִם־בְּנֵֽי־בִנְיָמִ֥ן אָחִ֖י אִם־אֶחְדָּ֑ל וַיֹּ֤אמֶר יְהֹוָה֙ עֲל֔וּ כִּ֥י מָחָ֖ר אֶתְּנֶ֥נּוּ בְיָדֶֽךָ׃ 

Phinehas son of Eleazar son of Aaron the priest ministered before YHWH  in those days, “Shall we again take the field against our kinsmen the Benjaminites, or shall we not?” The YHWH answered, “Go up, for tomorrow I will deliver them into your hands.”

Judges 20:28

We pause the battle scene for just a moment to ponder his existence here - ageless, with a purpose and specific role in history that makes us wonder whether he was really there and/or what’s the authors’ choice in adding this man’s presence in the midst of this bloodshed. 

Biblical scholar Dr.Moshe Lavee explores the priest's seeming immortality: 

“Pinchas first appears in the book of Numbers 25:7-8, as a (young?) man who kills two people for fornication before the Tent of Meeting. He then appears on Josh 22:13, 30-32, ostensibly almost 40 years later, to speak with the Transjordanian tribes about the sin of their building an altar. He then appears in Judges 20:28, as a priest with power to predict the future, during the battle with Benjamin after the rape and death of the concubine at Gibeah. Since this is the final story in Judges, and the book of Judges spans hundreds of years, this would suggest longevity worthy of primordial times. In addition, as James Kugel points out, Pinchas, unlike his fellow wilderness and conquest period heroes, has no burial notice.”

Pinchas only shows up where there is dispute. In the first and third cases in which he stars he is the proponent and instigator of fatal violence. In the second case, surprisingly, he oversees a peaceful negotiation and prevents the first civil war between the tribes.  His character has puzzled many, and at some point in Jewish literary history the lack of information about his death and burial has him morph into another character famous for his zeal and immortality - Elijah the Prophet. 

This fascinating tradition is mentioned in several rabbinic traditions, and already evident in the 1st century CE, recorded in the Biblical Antiquities of Pseudo-Philo, a Greek book that retells the biblical narrative from Adam to Saul, presumably composed by and for the Greek reading Jews of the Roman empire.  In the middle of this scene, as the people recover from two battles and prepare for the third, Biblical Antiquities has Pinchas, apparently about to die, receive this message from Adonai:

“At that time, Pinchas was near death, and Adonai said to him, “Behold you have passed the 120 years that have been established for every man. Now rise up and go from here and dwell in the desert on the mountain and dwell there many years. I will command my eagle, and he will nourish you there, and you will not come down again to mankind until the appointed time arrives and you will be tested at the appropriate time; and then you will shut up the heaven from rain, and by your mouth it will be opened up. Afterward you will be raised up to the place where those who were before you were raised up, and you will be there until I remember the world. Then I will bring you, and you will get a taste of death.”

This sounds a lot like what would befall Elijah. Some rabbinic traditions go as far as to mention the link between Pinchas and Elijah, while Biblical Antiquities ties the two characters together with no mention of names. The two main attributes that unite them are immortality and zealotry. They are the only two men in the Bible to whose names is attached the root word

ק-נ-א, “to be zealous.”  

We’ll get to Elijah as the pages turn towards his deeds in the Book of Kings, but for now suffice to say that in our chapter, below the bible belt,  hide forgotten or alluded to traditions about some forces and faces that stand up for ideologies and narratives that defy or deny the status quo, emerging at times of crisis to evoke the most mysterious or murderous instincts that often lay dormant within us - persisting, despite death. 

Pinchas will become Elijah, a zealot prophet who will never quite die, keep showing up at circumcision as an honored guest, and later on - at your Passover Seder. He likes the liminal. He will also undergo a transformation over time - from bloody man of war to immortal kindly grandpa, something like Santa Claus, with a big bushy beard and a sackful of gifts. Myths have this way of evolving, despite their origins or precisely as a way to emasculate their wrath and keep em around, lesser violent? 

Back to our battle. Inspired by the word of Adonai and the counsel of Pinchas, Israel returns to Gibeah and defeats its brother Benjamin, slaughtering every man, woman and child. Only 600 men survive, hiding in the desert for the next four months. 

The cities of Benjamin are set on fire, as this awful chapter ends, just one chapter away before the book’s unhappy ending.  Why is this chosen as the finale? 

On a historical level some of the symbols here are obvious: Coming next are the battles between the first few kings of Israel, representing the Northern vs. Southern kingdoms. Saul is born of Benjamin in the north, David of Judah in the south. The latter authors of this book are from the Judean camp. How best to depict the low status of Saul than this lowly origin saga, step by step? 

The  finale, coming tomorrow,  is worthy of all epics, chilling to the bone. Fact or fiction, myth or memory, this tale, like so many others about miracle births and gift bearing grandpas from beyond, continues to serve immensely important purpose - using story to guide our lives beyond the basic facts of survival, to get a glimpse of the grand big picture that we are part of, full of brotherly love that can turn to hate, beauty that brings bloodshed, despair that still clings on to hope. Again, and again. History’s long dance continues. Tomorrow’s sacred dance will be interrupted and it, too, will be transformed from trauma and loss to a reimagined circle of the triumph of love.

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