Der Levit und seine Nebenfrau in Gibea

The story is in the Book of Judges, chapter 19, and it is among the ugliest in the Bible. A Levite and his concubine, travelling, find nobody in the town of Gibeah willing to take them in, until an old farmer coming back from his fields offers them his house. What happens that night ends in her death and a war between the tribes of Israel. Victors painted the offer of shelter, the moment before. Amsterdam around 1650 was full of painters working through the Old Testament for subjects, partly because Reformed preachers went through those books week by week and their congregations knew the details. Victors was a strict Calvinist and stayed inside that world. Over a long career he painted no nudes and no classical gods, only scripture and plain Dutch scenes of markets and tooth-pullers.