1. Judges 19:4 (ESV)
  2. Exposition

What does the text seem to imply about the concubine?

Judges 19:4 (ESV)

4 And his father-in-law, the girl’s father, made him stay, and he remained with him three days. So they ate and drank and spent the night there.

Though it is hard to be absolutely certain, the second half of the verse seems to suggest that while the daughter is present, she is on the margins. The notice that he [the Levite] remained with him [the girl’s father] three days suggests that the primary agents in the following verbs, they ate and drank and spent the night there, are the two men, even if the verb to spend the night usually means to lodge somewhere as guests and thus would include the concubine.1 The accent seems to be on the men, already at this stage in the narrative.