Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

Now the famine was still severe in the land.  So when they had eaten all the grain they had brought from Egypt, their father said to them, “Go back and buy us a little more food.”
But Judah said to him, “The man warned us solemnly, ‘You will not see my face again unless your brother is with you.’  If you will send our brother along with us, we will go down and buy food for you.  But if you will not send him, we will not go down, because the man said to us, ‘You will not see my face again unless your brother is with you.’”
Israel asked, “Why did you bring this trouble on me by telling the man you had another brother?”
They replied, “The man questioned us closely about ourselves and our family. ‘Is your father still living?’ he asked us. ‘Do you have another brother?’ We simply answered his questions. How were we to know he would say, ‘Bring your brother down here’?”
Then Judah said to Israel his father, “Send the boy along with me and we will go at once, so that we and you and our children may live and not die.  I myself will guarantee his safety; you can hold me personally responsible for him.  If I do not bring him back to you and set him here before you, I will bear the blame before you all my life.  As it is, if we had not delayed, we could have gone and returned twice.”

• Genesis 43:1-10

Of course, “another brother” in this case is Benjamin.  The “man” in Egypt is their brother Joseph who the older brothers had sold into slavery.  They just don’t know it yet.  Joseph and Benjamin were the only children born of Israel’s (Jacob’s) favorite wife, Rachel.  Benjamin was born as Rachel died in the town that became Bethlehem, or Ephrath.

This quiz is copied completely from J. Stephen Lang’ s book, The Whimsical Quizzical Bible Trivia Book.

Disclaimer:  Whenever I quote something from this book, I will include this disclaimer.  The Apostle Paul told Timothy in 2 Timothy 3:16 that all Scripture is useful for instruction.  Thus, none of Scripture could be considered “Trivia.”  And if this quiz causes people to look up the answers, that is not trivial at all.

Why did I include this short quiz in this collection?  Other than having a son named, Benjamin, I have no idea.

The Questions:

“A good many names in the Bible being or end with ben – the Hebrew word for ‘son.’.  Test your knowledge of the ben men in the Bible.”

1. Who was the youngest of Jacob’s twelve sons?
2. What Bible character has a famous Charlton Heston movie with the same name?
3. When Rachel gave birth to Benjamin, she did not name him Benjamin but gave him a name meaning “son of my sorrow.”  What was the name?
4. What king of Syria was smothered to death, fulfilling a prophecy of the prophet Elisha?
5. What child of an incestuous union was ancestor of the Ammonite tribe?
6. What gory place near Jerusalem was connected with child sacrifice and sorcery?
7. Who was Jacob’s oldest son?

As for the second question, the movie was based upon a book written by Lew Wallace.  Lew Wallace was the 11^th governor of the New Mexico territory, but he also served as a major general under U. S. Grant’s command.  He is infamous in taking the “wrong road” in support of Grant during the battle of Shiloh, although Grant never specified which road, but Grant stated the best road choice was the other road in his memoires.  You know what they say about “hindsight,” even with generals who became president.

The Bible References:

Some of these may be obscure so, here are the Bible references.

1. Genesis 35:18
2. One of Solomon’s twelve food commissioners (1 Kings 4:8); he was not an important person, but his name certainly lives on.
3. (Genesis 35:8); Rachel died, and Jacob immediately gave the son a more pleasant name.
4. He was smothered by Hazael, who succeeded him as king (2 Kings 8:7-15).  The name refers to the son of the Syrian storm god.
5. The name means “son of my people” (Genesis 19:38); he was the child of Abraham’s nephew Lot and Lot’s younger daughter.
6. Since ‘ben’ means ‘son’, no one knows the origin of the father in this case, but the valley was mentioned many times in connection with horrible rituals.  For example: By King Ahaz, 2 Chronicles 28:3 and by King Manasseh, 2 Chronicles 33:6.  Special Note:  Jeremiah 7:31-32
7. Name means “see, a son” (Genesis 29:32)

To make a little more space between the questions and the answers, our son has a little heartburn regarding the shortening of the name to “Ben.”  In the South, a storage “bin” or a garbage “bin” is pronounced the same way.  Even in less informal English, it is a subtle difference in pronunciation.  He doesn’t mind his mother calling him Benji.

The Answers:

1. Benjamin
2. Ben Hur
3. Ben-Oni
4. Ben-Hadad
5. Ben-Ammi
6. Ben-Hinnom
7. Reuben

And now for the treat for doing so well on the quiz…  Have you ever been so lonely that you befriended a rat?  There was once a horror film by the name of Ben, featuring a hit theme song, sung by a young man that most people have never heard of (haha).

And if one Ben wasn’t scary enough, there was once a cartoon show about “Ben-10.”  And in the age of “cancelling” quality classic cartoons for depictions of unrealistic violence, why does this modern cartoon theme song give me the creeps?  Bring back Looney Tunes!

And if you prefer Benji, here’s another movie theme song.

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.