At the end of two months, she returned to her father, who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed. She was a virgin. It became a custom in Israel
Parallel Translations
-
At the end of two months, she returned to her father, who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed. She was a virgin. It became a custom in Israel
-
And it came to pass at the end of two months, that she returned unto her father, who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed: and she knew no man. And it was a custom in Israel,
-
And it came to pass at the end of two months, that she returned unto her father, who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed; and she had not known man. And it was a custom in Israel,
Cross-references (9)
Passages linked to Judges 11:39 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge, ordered by reader-vote popularity; verse text shown in World English Bible.
- Judges 11:31 then it shall be, that whatever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the children of Ammon, it shall be Yahweh’s, and I will offer it up for a burnt offering.”
- Isaiah 66:3 He who kills an ox is as he who kills a man; he who sacrifices a lamb, as he who breaks a dog’s neck; he who offers an offering, as he who offers pig’s blood; he who burns frankincense, as he who blesses an idol. Yes, they have chosen their own ways, and their soul delights in their abominations:
- Leviticus 27:28-29 “ ‘Notwithstanding, no devoted thing that a man devotes to Yahweh of all that he has, whether of man or animal, or of the field of his possession, shall be sold or redeemed. Everything that is permanently devoted is most holy to Yahweh. “ ‘No one devoted to destruction, who shall be devoted from among men, shall be ransomed. He shall surely be put to death.
- 1 Samuel 2:18 But Samuel ministered before Yahweh, being a child, clothed with a linen ephod.
- Deuteronomy 12:31 You shall not do so to Yahweh your God; for every abomination to Yahweh, which he hates, they have done to their gods; for they even burn their sons and their daughters in the fire to their gods.
- 1 Samuel 1:11 She vowed a vow, and said, “Yahweh of Armies, if you will indeed look at the affliction of your servant and remember me, and not forget your servant, but will give to your servant a boy, then I will give him to Yahweh all the days of his life, and no razor shall come on his head.”
- 1 Samuel 1:24 When she had weaned him, she took him up with her, with three bulls, and one ephah of meal, and a container of wine, and brought him to Yahweh’s house in Shiloh. The child was young.
- 1 Samuel 1:28 Therefore I have also given him to Yahweh. As long as he lives he is given to Yahweh.” He worshiped Yahweh there.
- 1 Samuel 1:22 But Hannah didn’t go up, for she said to her husband, “Not until the child is weaned; then I will bring him, that he may appear before Yahweh, and stay there forever.”
Cross-references from openbible.info (CC BY 4.0)
Explain this verse (10 sources)
Historical commentary, presented as a primary source — not an endorsement.
Private notes
Saved on this device only — never synced or sent anywhere.
John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Jdg 11:39 And it came to pass at the…
Jdg 11:39 And it came to pass at the end of two months, that she returned unto her father, who did with her [according] to his vow which he had vowed: and she knew no man. And it was a custom in Israel,
Ver. 39. That she returned unto her father.] As Damon did to Dionysius; as Regulus the Roman did to the Carthaginians, though it were to receive punishment; they would not break their words, but die rather than lie.
Read full note →
Who did with her according to his vow.] {See Trapp on "Jdg 11:30"}
And it was a custom in Israel.] Or, An ordinance; and that for two reasons, saith Augustine: first, That parents might be admonished not to vow so rashly; secondly, That this noble virgin’s obedience to her father might be eternised.
John Trapp, A Commentary or Exposition upon All the Books of the Old and New Testament (1647–1656) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Matthew Poole 1685 · Public Domain Quest. What was it which Jephthah vowed and performed…
Quest. What was it which Jephthah vowed and performed concerning his daughter?
Answ. Many, especially of modern writers, conceive that Jephthah’s daughter was not sacrificed, but only devoted to perpetual virginity, which then was esteemed a great curse and reproach. This they gather,
Read full note →
1. From Jdg 11:37,38, where we read that she bewailed not her death, which had been the chief cause of lamentation, if that had been vowed, but her virginity.
2. From Jdg 11:39, where, after he had said that
he did with her according to his vow, he adds, by way of declaration of the matter of that vow,
and she knew no man. But for the first, there may be a fair reason given, That she could not with honour bewail her death, which she had so generously and cheerfully accepted of, because it was attended with and occasioned by the public good, and her father’s honour and happiness, Jdg 11:36, and was a kind of martyrdom; and moreover, an act of religion, the payment of a vow, which ought to be done cheerfully; but only bewailed the circumstance of her death, that it was in some sort accursed and opprobrious; she having had no husband to take away her reproach, as they speak, Isa 4:1, and leaving no posterity to her father’s comfort, and the increase of God’s people. And for the second, that clause, and she knew no man, is plainly distinguished from the execution of his vow, which is here mentioned before; and this is added, not as an explication of the vow, but as an aggravating circumstance, that this was executed when she had not yet known any man. Besides, this opinion seems liable to weighty objections:
1. There is no example in all the Scripture of any woman that was obliged to perpetual virginity by any vow of her own, much less by the vow of her parents; nor have parents any such power over their children, either by the law of nature, or by the Holy Scripture.
2. The express words of the vow, Jdg 11:31, mention nothing of her virginity. but only that she should surely be the Lord’s, i.e. devoted to the service of the Lord, which might be without any obligation to perpetual virginity; for even Samuel, who was as fully devoted to the Lord by his parents as she could be, 1Sa 1:11; and Samson, who was devoted not only by his parents, but by God himself, and that in the highest degree, even to be a perpetual Nazarite, Jdg 13:5,7; yet were not prohibited marriage; nor were any of the most sacred persons, Levites, or priests, or high priests, though they were the Lord’s in a singular manner, obliged to perpetual virginity: and therefore if she was not offered up for a burnt-offering, as the authors of this opinion say, but only was consecrated to God, there was no occasion to bewail her virginity, which, for any thing that appears, she was not tied to.
3. If this were all, here was no sufficient cause why so wise and valiant a man as Jephthah should so bitterly and passionately lament over himself or his daughter. And therefore it may seem most probable that Jephthah did indeed sacrifice his daughter, as he had vowed to do; which was the opinion of Josephus the Jew, and of the Chaldee Paraphrast, and of divers of the Jewish doctors, and almost all the ancient fathers, and many eminent writers; and this best agrees with the words of the vow, delivered Jdg 11:31,
Whatsoever cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me—shall surely be the Lord’s, and I will offer it for a burnt-offering. Nor is there one word in all the following verses which denies that she was thus offered; only the execution of the vow is delivered in more ambiguous and general terms, Jdg 11:39, which in all reason, and by the laws of good interpretation, ought to be limited and explained by the more plain and particular description of it. It is true, those words may seem capable of another interpretation; the conjunctive particle and may be here put for the disjunctive or, as it often is, as Exo 21:16-17; Le 6:3,5; 2Sa 2:19, &c.; and so the meaning is, That what I first meet shall surely be the Lord’s, or, I will offer it up for a burnt-offering, to wit if it be a creature fit to be offered; otherwise, say they, if a dog or an ass should have met him first, he should have been obliged to offer them, which was against the law. But it is sufficiently evident that he speaks of a human person, from the very phrase of
coming forth. to meet him at his return; which plainly argues a design to meet him, purposely to congratulate his return; this phrase of going to meet a person coming being very oft used in Scripture, and constantly of one person meeting another, as Gen 14:17; Gen 17:2; 24:17, &c., and never of any brute creature. And although and is sometimes put for or, yet it is not to be so used without necessity, which seems not to be in this place; nor is it very proper to distinguish two sentences in this manner, where the one is more general, and the other being more special, is comprehended within it, which is the case here; for it shall surely be the Lord’s, is the general; and its being offered up for a burnt-offering is the particular way or manner how it was to be the Lord’s; as it were very improper to say, this is either a man, or it is my servant John; because the latter branch is contained in the former; and therefore in all the alleged instances where and is put for or, they are two distinct persons or things, and not one comprehended within another, as Exo 21:17, father or mother; 2Sa 2:19, right hand or left. But the great objection against this opinion is this, that it seems a most horrid act, directly contrary to the law of nature, and to plain Scripture, thus to sacrifice his own daughter; and that it seems altogether incredible, either that such a man as Jephthah, so eminent for piety, and wisdom, and zeal, and faith, should either make so barbarous a vow, or pursue it for above two months’ space; and that none of the priests of that time should inform him of the unlawfulness of executing so wicked a vow, and of the liberty he had to redeem such a vow, by virtue of Lev 27:2,3, &c.; or that Jephthah would not willingly receive information, especially where it was so agreeable to his own interest and natural affection; or that the priests and people would suffer him to execute his own daughter, and not rather hinder him by force, as they afterwards did Saul which he had sworn the death of Jonathan. These and other such difficulties I confess there are in the case; but something may be truly and fairly said to allay the seeming monstrousness of this act.
1. These were times of great and general ignorance and corruption of religion, wherein the Israelites had apostatized from God, and learnt and followed the practices and worships of the heathen nations, Jdg 10:6, whereof this was one, to offer up human sacrifices to Moloch; and although they seem now to have repented and forsaken their idols, Jdg 10:16, yet they seem still to have retained part of the old leaven, and this among the rest, that they might offer human sacrifices, not to Moloch, as they had done, but unto the Lord. And whereas some of the Jewish writers pretend that Phinehas was alive at this time; and tell a fine story concerning him and Jephthah, that both stood upon their terms, and neither would go to the other to advise about the matter; yet it is more than probable that Phinehas was dead long before this time, and whosoever was the high priest then, he seems to be guilty either of gross ignorance or negligence; so that a late learned writer conceives that this was the reason why the priesthood was taken from him, and from that line, and translated to the line of Ithamar, which was done in the time of the judges, as may be gathered from 1Sa 2:35,36. Moreover Jephthah, though now a good man, may seem to have had but a rude and barbarous education; having been banished from his father’s house, and forced to wander and dispose himself in the utmost borders of the land of Gilead, beyond Jordan, at a great distance from the place of worship and instruction: nor is it strange that the priests and people did not resist Jephthah in this enterprise; partly because many of them might be under the same ignorance and mistake that Jephthah did; and partly because they knew Jephthah to be a stout, and resolute, and boisterous man, and were afraid to oppose him in a matter wherein he seemed to be so peremptory, and their persons and families were not much concerned.
2. This mistake of Jephthah’s, and of the rest of that age, was not without some plausible appearance of warrant from the holy text, even from Lev 27:28,29, wherein it is expressly provided, that no devoted thing, whether man or beast, should be redeemed, but should surely be put to death; a place which it is not strange that a soldier in so ignorant an age should mistake, seeing even some learned divines, in this knowing age, and Capellus, amongst the rest, have fallen into the same error, and justified Jephthah’s action from that place; and though I doubt not they run into the other extreme, as men commonly do, those words being to be otherwise understood than they take them, (of which see my notes on that place,) yet it must be granted that place gave Jephthah a very colourable pretext for the action; and being pushed on by zeal for God, and the conscience of his vow, he might easily be induced to it; and though this was a sin in him, yet it was but a sin of ignorance; which therefore was overlooked by a gracious God, and not reproved by any holy men of God. It is probably conceived, that the Greeks, who used to steal sacred histories, and turn them into fables, had from this history their relation of Iphigenia, (which may be put for Jephtigenia,) sacrificed by her father Agamemnon, which is described by many of the same circumstances wherewith this is accompanied.
She knew no man, to wit, carnally; she, died a virgin.
Matthew Poole's English Annotations on the Holy Bible (1683–1685) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
John Wesley 1765 · Public Domain Did with her - Jephthah's daughter was not sacrificed,…
Did with her - Jephthah's daughter was not sacrificed, but only devoted to perpetual virginity. This appears,
1. From ver. 37, 38, where we read, that she bewailed not her death, which had been the chief cause of lamentation, if that had been vowed, but her virginity:
Read full note →
2. From this ver. 39, where, after he had said, that he did with her according to his vow; he adds, by way of declaration of the matter of that vow, and she knew no man. It is probably conceived, that the Greeks, who used to steal sacred histories, and turn them into fables, had from this history their relation of Iphigenia (which may be put for Jephtigenia) sacrificed by her father Agamemnon, which is described by many of the same circumstances wherewith this is accompanied.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 39. And she knew no man] She continued…
Verse 39. And she knew no man] She continued a virgin all the days of her life.
Adam Clarke's Commentary on the Bible (1810–1826) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Joseph Benson 1811 · Public Domain Jdg 11:39. Did with her — That Jephthah’s daughter…
Jdg 11:39. Did with her — That Jephthah’s daughter was not sacrificed, but only devoted to perpetual virginity, appears, 1st, From Jdg 11:37-38, where we read that she bewailed, not her death, which had been the chief cause of lamentation, if that had been vowed, but her virginity; 2d, From this verse, where, after the sacred writer had said, that he did with her according to his vow; he adds, by way of declaration of the matter of that vow, and she knew no man.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain Father. Her fortitude is commended by St. Ambrose (Off.…
Father. Her fortitude is commended by St. Ambrose (Off. iii. 12,) as more worthy of admiration than that of the two Pythagorean friends, one of whom, being sentenced to die, procured the other to stand bond for his return; and, at the time appointed, came freely to deliver himself up; an instance of generosity which made the tyrant who had sentenced him to die, beg that they would admit him into the society of their friendship. (Haydock) --- Whatever we may think of Jephte, "we cannot sufficiently admire the dutiful behaviour, and amiable simplicity of the daughter, who voluntarily submitted to her parent’s will, and exhorted him to do as he had vowed. To die to sin, to resign the pomps of a licentious world, to renounce those pleasures and incentives to vice, which are inconsistent with a clean heart, is a sacrifice truly meritorious, and acceptable to God; it is a sacrifice which was solemnly begun at the font of baptism." (Reeves, in the year of the world 2817.) --- No man. It is remarked by those who believe that she was not slain, that this observation would be very unnecessary in the contrary opinion. No mention of death is made. The virgin only deplores, with pious resignation, that she cannot be the happy mother of the Messias.
George Leo Haydock (1774–1849), Haydock's Catholic Family Bible and Commentary, 1859 edition — public domain. Excludes Psalms (Douay-Rheims chapter numbering differs from Protestant) and Deuterocanonical books (Catholic canon only).
Daniel D. Whedon 1874 · Public Domain 39. Did with her according to his vow —…
39. Did with her according to his vow — Literally, Did to her his vow which he had vowed. This plain and positive statement throws us back for the meaning of Jephthah’s act to Jdg_11:31, where the language of his vow is carefully recorded. Whatever act his vow contemplated, that certainly he did. Nothing more, nothing less. He devoutly kept his word. He had opened his mouth unto the Lord, and, notwithstanding all his anguish, he went not back from his solemn oath. So, according to the previous exposition of his language, we can understand nothing else than that he offered her for a burnt offering unto the Lord.
And she knew no man — This fact the sacred writer adds as that alone which, in the estimation of that age, was the sting of death to the heroic maiden. It is very natural that those expositors who seek to show that Jephthah’s daughter was not put to death at all, should regard these words as indicating the manner in which he fulfilled his vow. Why else, they ask, is this fact of her virginity again mentioned? If she was sacrificed, they affirm, the record would have been: “He did to her his vow which he had vowed, and offered her for a burnt offering.” Such an addition, we reply, was not necessary, and, after the full and careful statement of his vow in Jdg_11:31, would have been superfluous. But if, as we have shown above, and as most modern scholars are constrained to admit, he contemplated a human sacrifice, and if, instead of offering her as a burnt offering, he devoted her to a life of celibacy, then plainly he did NOT according to his vow which he had vowed, but contrary to it; and the mere addition, she knew no man, would be a most inexplicably strange way of informing us that Jephthah failed to keep his word. The sacred historian uses no needless word, nor does he attempt to picture the sad spectacle of the sacrifice; but he records, not as the manner in which Jephthah fulfilled his vow, but as the most fearful knell that, in the ears of her father and companions, sounded over that daughter’s funeral pile, and sent its lingering echo into the after-times — she knew no man.
Read full note →
It was a custom in Israel — What was a custom in Israel? For fathers to sacrifice daughters, after the example of Jephthah? This no one will pretend. To offer human sacrifices to Jehovah? No; for such a custom never prevailed to any considerable extent in Israel, and least of all was it occasioned by Jephthah’s example. To consecrate young maidens to perpetual virginity? There is not a particle of evidence that such a custom prevailed after this time more than before, and no certain evidence that it was ever a custom in Israel. On the contrary, the whole tendency of Hebrew laws and civilization was against a forced celibacy on the part of either sex. — What custom, then, sprang up in Israel on this occasion? Clearly, the custom described in the next verse, of the yearly celebration of Jephthah’s daughter. The Hebrew is, She became a custom in Israel; that is, her heroism and sublime submission to be sacrificed made such an impression on the daughters of Israel that they instituted a yearly celebration of her memory.
Daniel D. Whedon (gen. ed.), Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1874–1909) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges 1878 · Public Domain 39. who did with her according to his vow]…
39. who did with her according to his vow] The language is marked by a fine reserve, but the plain sense of it is that Jephthah offered the tragic sacrifice. Early Jewish interpretation took it to mean this; Talm. Ta‘anith 4 a (where the sacrifice is compared with that of Isaac and of Mesha’s son); Midrash Bereshith Rab. § 60; Jos., Ant. Jdg_11:7; Jdg_11:10. The same view was adopted by the Christian Fathers and Church writers (e.g. St Augustine, Opera, t. iii. 812 ‘procul dubio nihil aliud quam hominem cogitabit’; St Ambrose, Op. t. ii. 177, 178 and 281, 282; St Chrysostom, Op. t. ii. 147). In the Middle Ages, however, the natural meaning of the words was explained away, first by the Jewish commentators (e.g. by Ḳimḥi in loc. ‘he made a house for her and brought her into it, and she was there separated from mankind and from the ways of the world’), and following them by Christian interpreters. More recently it has been suggested that Jephthah dedicated the maiden to Jehovah as a virgin priestess or vestal in the local sanctuary; cf. Code of Ḫammurabi, § 181, which alleges the case of a father dedicating a votary to a god; Benzinger, Hebr. Arch.2 (1907), 360.
and she had not known man] she being a virgin (for the Hebr. idiom see Driver, Tenses, § 159). The sacrifice, therefore, was all the greater; her father’s race perished with her. Similarly in early Greek myths the human victim is nearly always a virgin; see Murray, Rise of the Gk. Epic, 121–123. Cf. Virgil, Aen. x. 518–520 (note juvenes).
The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers 1878 · Public Domain (39) Who did with her according to his vow.—In…
(39) Who did with her according to his vow.—In this significant euphemism the narrator drops the veil—as though with a shudder—over the terrible sacrifice. Of course, “did with her according to his vow” can only mean “offered her up for a burnt offering” (Jdg_11:31). “Some,” says Luther, “affirm that he did not sacrifice her; but the text is clear enough.” The attempt, first started by Rabbi Kimchi, to make this mean “kept her unmarried until death”—i.e., shut her up in a sacred celibacy—is a mere sophistication of plain Scripture. That he did actually slay her in accordance with his cherem is clear, not only from the plain words, but also for the following reasons:—(1) The customs of that day knew nothing about treating women as “nuns.” If there had been any institution of vestals among the Jews we should without fail have heard of it, nor would the fate of Jephthah’s daughter been here regarded and represented as exceptionally tragic. (2) There are decisive Scriptural analogies to Jephthah’s vow, taken in its most literal sense—Abraham (Gen_23:3), Saul (1Sa_14:44), &c. (See on Jdg_11:31.) (3) There are decisive Pagan analogies, both Oriental (2Ki_3:27; Amo_2:1) and classical. Thus Idomeneus actually sacrificed his eldest son (Serv. ad Æn. iii. 331) in an exactly similar vow, and Agamemnon his daughter Iphigenia. (4) The ancient Jews, who were far better acquainted than we can be with the thoughts and customs of their race and the meaning of their own language, have always understood that Jephthah did literally offer his daughter as “a burnt offering.” The Targum of Jonathan adds to the words “it was a custom in Israel” the explanation, “in order that no one should make his son or his daughter a burnt offering, as Jephthah did, and did not consult Phinehas the priest. Had he done so, he would have redeemed her with money”—i.e., Phinehas would have decided that it was less crime to redeem such a cherem than to offer a human sacrifice. It is curious to find that another legend (hagadah) connects Phinehas with this event in a very different way. It says that Phinehas sanctioned, and even performed the sacrifice, and that for this very reason he was superseded by the indignation of the Israelites, which is the reason they offer for the fact that Eli was of the house, not of Phmehas, but of Ithamar (Lightfoot, Works, i. 12-18). In the same way Idomeneus, after sacrificing his eldest son, is punished by the gods with plague and by his citizens with banishment. Josephus agrees with these Jewish authorities, and says that Jephthah offered (holokautôsen) his daughter (see on Jdg_11:31); and so does Rabbi Tanchum. The opinion was undisputed till a thousand years after Christ, when Rabbi Kimchi invented the plausible hypothesis which has pleased so many commentators who carry their own notions to the Bible ready made, and then find them there. Ewald contents himself with saying that this “timid modern notion needs no refutation.” It is remarkable that we find a similar vow as late as the sixth century after Christ. Abd Almuttalib, grandfather of Mohammed, vows to kill his son Abd Allah if God will give him ten sons. He had twelve sons; but when he wishes to perform his vow the Koreish interfere, and Abd Almuttalib, at the bidding of a priestess, gives one hundred camels as a ransom (Weil, Mohammed, p. 8).
It was a custom.—Or, ordinance—namely, to lament Jephthah’s daughter. Probably the custom was local only, for we find no other allusion to it.
A Bible Commentary for English Readers, edited by Charles John Ellicott (1878–1897) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
The Pulpit Commentary 1880 · Public Domain Who did with her according to his vow. Nothing…
Who did with her according to his vow. Nothing can be more express than this statement. In fact, except the natural horror we feel at a human sacrifice, there is nothing to cast the least shade of doubt upon the fact that Jephthah"s daughter was offered up as a burnt offering, in accordance with heathen notions, but, as Josephus says, neither "conformably to the law, nor acceptably to God." Most of the early Jewish commentators and all the Christian Fathers for ten or eleven centuries (Origen, Chrysostom, Theo-doret, Jerome, Augustine, etc.) held this view. Luther"s comment is, "Some affirm that he did not sacrifice her, but the text is clear enough." She knew. Rather, she had known.
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.