that the daughters of Israel went yearly to celebrate the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite four days in a year.
Parallel Translations
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that the daughters of Israel went yearly to celebrate the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite four days in a year.
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That the daughters of Israel went yearly to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite four days in a year.
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that the daughters of Israel went yearly to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite four days in a year.
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John Trapp 1656 · Public Domain Jdg 11:40 [That] the daughters of Israel went yearly…
Jdg 11:40 [That] the daughters of Israel went yearly to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite four days in a year.
Ver. 40. To lament.] Or, To talk with her, as Jdg 5:11.
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 Went yearly, to a place appointed for their meeting…
Went yearly, to a place appointed for their meeting to this end, possibly to the place where she was sacrificed.
To lament the daughter of Jephthah; to express their sorrow for her loss, according to thee manner. Or, to discourse of (so the Hebrew lamed is sometimes used)
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the daughter of Jephthah, to celebrate her praises, who had so willingly yielded up herself for a sacrifice.
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 The daughter of Jephthah - It is really astonishing,…
The daughter of Jephthah - It is really astonishing, that the general stream of commentators, should take it for granted, that Jephthah murdered his daughter! But, says Mr. Henry, "We do not find any law, usage or custom, in all the Old Testament, which doth in the least intimate, that a single life was any branch or article of religion." And do we find any law, usage or custom there, which doth in the least intimate, that cutting the throat of an only child, was any branch or article of religion? If only a dog had met Jephthah, would he have offered up that for a burnt-offering? No: because God had expressly forbidden this. And had he not expressly forbidden murder? But Mr. Poole thinks the story of Agamemnon's offering up Iphigenia took its rise from this. Probably it did. But then let it be observed, Iphigenia was not murdered. Tradition said, that Diana sent an hind in her stead, and took the maid to live in the woods with her.
John Wesley, Explanatory Notes Upon the Whole Bible (1754–1765) — public domain. Text via the GEBible commentary corpus.
Adam Clarke 1810 · Public Domain Verse 40. To lament the daughter of Jephthah] I…
Verse 40. To lament the daughter of Jephthah] I am satisfied that this is not a correct translation of the original לתנות לבת יפתח lethannoth lebath yiphtach. Houbigant translates the whole verse thus: Sed iste mos apud Israel invaluit, ut virgines Israel, temporibus diversis, irent ad filiam Jepthe-ut eam quotannis dies quatuor consolarentur; "But this custom prevailed in Israel that the virgins of Israel went at different times, four days in the year, to the daughter of Jephthah, that they might comfort her." This verse also gives evidence that the daughter of Jephthah was not sacrificed: nor does it appear that the custom or statute referred to here lasted after the death of Jephthah's daughter.
THE following is Dr. Hales' exposition of Jephthah's vow: -
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"When Jephthah went forth to battle against the Ammonites, he vowed a vow unto the Lord, and said, 'If thou wilt surely give the children of Ammon into my hand, then it shall be that whatsoever cometh out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the children of Ammon, shall either be the Lord's, or I will offer it up (for) a burnt-offering,' Jdg 11:30-31. According to this rendering of the two conjunctions, vau in the last clause 'either,' 'or,' (which is justified by the Hebrew idiom thus, 'He that curseth his father and his mother,' Ex 21:17, is necessarily rendered disjunctively, 'His father or his mother,' by the Septuagint, Vulgate, Chaldee, and English, confirmed by Mt 15:4, the paucity of connecting particles in that language making it necessary that this conjunction should often be understood disjunctively,) the vow consisted of two parts:
1. That what person soever met him should be the Lord's or be dedicated to his service; and,
2. That what beast soever met him, if clean, should be offered up for a burnt-offering unto the Lord.
"This rendering and this interpretation is warranted by the Levitical law about vows.
"The נדר neder, or vow, in general, included either persons, beasts, or things dedicated to the Lord for pious uses; which, if it was a simple vow, was redeemable at certain prices, if the person repented of his vow, and wished to commute it for money, according to the age or sex of the person, Le 27:1-8: this was a wise regulation to remedy rash vows. But if the vow was accompanied with חרם cherem, devotement, it was irredeemable, as in the following case, Le 27:28.
"Notwithstanding, no devotement which a man shall devote unto the Lord, (either) of man, or beast, or of land of his own property, shall be sold or redeemed. Every thing devoted is most holy to the Lord.
"Here the three ו vaus in the original should necessarily be rendered disjunctively, or as the last actually is in our translation, because there are three distinct subjects of devotement to be applied to distinct uses, the man to be dedicated to the service of the Lord, as Samuel by his mother Hannah, 1Sa 1:11; the cattle, if clean, such as oxen, sheep, goats, turtle-doves, or pigeons, to be sacrificed; and if unclean, as camels, horses, asses, to be employed for carrying burdens in the service of the tabernacle or temple; and the lands, to be sacred property.
"This law therefore expressly applied in its first branch to Jephthah's case, who had devoted his daughter to the Lord, or opened his mouth to the Lord, and therefore could not go back, as he declared in his grief at seeing his daughter and only child coming to meet him with timbrels and dances: she was, therefore necessarily devoted, but with her own consent to perpetual virginity in the service of the tabernacle, Jdg 11:36-37; and such service was customary, for in the division of the spoils taken in the first Midianitish war, of the whole number of captive virgins the Lord's tribute was thirty-two persons, Nu 31:15-40. This instance appears to be decisive of the nature of her devotement.
"Her father's extreme grief on the occasion and her requisition of a respite for two months to bewail her virginity, are both perfectly natural. Having no other issue, he could only look forward to the extinction of his name or family; and a state of celibacy, which is reproachful among women everywhere, was peculiarly so among the Israelites, and was therefore no ordinary sacrifice on her part; who, though she generously gave up, could not but regret the loss of, becoming 'a mother in Israel.' And he did with her according to his vow which he had vowed, and she knew no man, or remained a virgin, all her life, Jdg 11:34-39.
"There was also another case of devotement which was irredeemable, and follows the former, Le 27:29. This case differs materially from the former.
"1. It is confined to PERSONS devoted, omitting beasts and lands.
2. It does not relate to private property, as in the foregoing. And,
3. The subject of it was to be utterly destroyed, instead of being most holy unto the Lord. This law, therefore, related to aliens, or public enemies devoted to destruction either by GOD, the people, or by the magistrate. Of all these we have instances in Scripture.
"1. The Amalekites and Canaanites were devoted by God himself. Saul was, therefore, guilty of a breach of the law for sparing Agag the king of the Amalekites, as Samuel reproached him, 1Sa 15:33: 'And Samuel hewed Agag in pieces before the Lord;' not as a sacrifice, according to Voltaire, but as a criminal, whose sword had made many women childless. By this law the Midianitish women who had been spared in battle were slain, Nu 31:14-17.
"2. In Mount Hor, when the Israelites were attacked by Arad, king of the southern Canaanites, who took some of them prisoners, they vowed a vow unto the Lord that they would utterly destroy the Canaanites and their cities, if the Lord should deliver them into their hand, which the Lord ratified; whence the place was called Hormah, because the vow was accompanied by cherem, or devotement to destruction, Nu 21:1-3; and the vow was accomplished, Jdg 1:17.
"3. In the Philistine war Saul adjured the people, and cursed any one who should taste food till the evening. His own son Jonathan inadvertently ate a honey-comb, not knowing his father's oath, for which Saul sentenced him to die. But the people interposed, and rescued him for his public services; thus assuming the power of dispensing, in their collective capacity, with an unreasonable oath. This latter case, therefore, is utterly irrelative to Jephthah's vow, which did not regard a foreign enemy or a domestic transgressor devoted to destruction, but on the contrary was a vow of thanksgiving, and therefore properly came under the former case. And that Jephthah could not possibly have sacrificed his daughter, (according to the vulgar opinion,) may appear from the following considerations: -
"1. The sacrifice of children to Molech was an abomination to the Lord, of which in numberless passages he expresses his detestation, and it was prohibited by an express law, under pain of death, as a defilement of God's sanctuary, and a profanation of his holy name, Le 20:2-3. Such a sacrifice, therefore, unto the Lord himself, must be a still higher abomination, and there is no precedent of any such under the law in the OLD TESTAMENT.
"2. The case of Isaac before the law is irrelevant, for Isaac was not sacrificed, and it was only proposed for a trial of Abraham's faith.
"3. No father, merely by his own authority, could put an offending, much less an innocent, child to death upon any account, without the sentence of the magistrate, (De 21:18-21), and the consent of the people, as in Jonathan's case.
"4. The Mischna, or traditional law of the Jews is pointedly against it; ver. 212. 'If a Jew should devote his son or daughter, his man or maid servant, who are Hebrews, the devotement would be void, because no man can devote what is not his own, or whose life he has not the absolute disposal of.' These arguments appear to be decisive against the sacrifice; and that Jephthah could not have devoted his daughter to celibacy against her will is evident from the history, and from the high estimation in which she was always held by the daughters of Israel for her filial duty and her hapless fate, which they celebrated by a regular anniversary commemoration four days in the year; Jdg 11:40." - New Analysis of Chronology, vol. iii., p. 319.
The celebrated sacrifice of Iphigenia has been supposed by many learned men to be a fable founded on this account of Jephthah's daughter; and M. De Lavaur, Conference de la Fable avec l' Histoire Sainte, has thus traced the parallel: -
"The fable of Iphigenia, offered in sacrifice by Agamemnon her father, sung by so many poets, related after them by so many historians, and celebrated in the Greek and French theatres, has been acknowledged by all those who knew the sacred writings, and who have paid a particular attention to them, as a changed copy of the history of the daughter of Jephthah, offered in sacrifice by her father. Let us consider the several parts particularly, and begin with an exposition of the original, taken from the eleventh chapter of the book of Judges.
"The sacred historian informs us that Jephthah, the son of Gilead, was a great and valiant captain. The Israelites, against whom God was irritated, being forced to go to war with the Ammonites, (nearly about the time of the siege of Troy,) assembled themselves together to oblige Jephthah to come to their succour, and chose him for their captain against the Ammonites. He accepted the command on conditions that, if God should give him the victory, they would acknowledge him for their prince. This they promised by oath; and all the people elected him in the city of Mizpeh, in the tribe of Judah. He first sent ambassadors to the king of the Ammonites to know the reason why he had committed so many acts of injustice, and so many ravages on the coast of Israel. The other made a pretext of some ancient damages his people had suffered by the primitive Israelites, to countenance the ravages he committed, and would not accord with the reasonable propositions made by the ambassadors of Jephthah. Having now supplicated the Lord and being filled with his Spirit, he marched against the Ammonites, and being zealously desirous to acquit himself nobly, and to ensure the success of so important a war, he made a vow to the Lord to offer in sacrifice or as a burnt-offering the first thing that should come out of the house to meet him at his return from victory.
"He then fought with and utterly discomfited the Ammonites; and returning victorious to his house, God so permitted it that his only daughter was the first who met him. Jephthah was struck with terror at the sight of her, and tearing his garments, he exclaimed, Alas! alas! my daughter, thou dost exceedingly trouble me; for I have opened my mouth against thee, unto the Lord, and I cannot go back. His daughter, full of courage and piety, understanding the purport of his vow, exhorted him to accomplish what he had vowed to the Lord, which to her would be exceedingly agreeable, seeing the Lord had avenged him of his and his country's enemies; desiring liberty only to go on the mountains with her companions, and to bewail the dishonour with which sterility was accompanied in Israel, because each hoped to see the Messiah born of his or her family. Jephthah could not deny her this request. She accordingly went, and at the end of two months returned, and put herself into the hands of her father, who did with her according to his vow.
"Several of the rabbins, and many very learned Christian expositors, believe that Jephthah's daughter was not really sacrificed, but that her virginity was consecrated to God, and that she separated from all connection with the world; which indeed seems to be implied in the sacred historian's account: And she knew no man. This was a kind of mysterious death, because it caused her to lose all hope of the glory of a posterity from which the Messiah might descend. From this originated the custom, observed afterwards in Israel, that on a certain season in the year the virgins assembled themselves on the mountains to bewail the daughter of Jephthah for the space of four days. Let us now consider the leading characters of the fable of Iphigenia. According to good chronological reckonings, the time of the one and of the other very nearly agree. The opinion that the name of Iphigenia is taken from the daughter of Jephthah, appears well founded; yea, the conformity is palpable. By a very inconsiderable change Iphigenia makes Iphthygenia, which signifies literally, the daughter of Jephthah. Agamemnon, who is described as a valiant warrior and admirable captain, was chosen by the Greeks for their prince and general against the Trojans, by the united consent of all Greece, assembled together at Aulis in Baeotia.
"As soon as he had accepted the command, he sent ambassadors to Priam, king of Troy, to demand satisfaction for the rape of Helen, of which the Greeks complained. The Trojans refusing to grant this, Agamemnon, to gain over to his side the gods, who appeared irritated against the Greeks and opposed to the success of their enterprise, after having sacrificed to them went to consult their interpreter, Chalchas, who declared that the gods, and particularly Diana, would not be appeased but by the sacrifice of Iphigenia, the daughter of Agamemnon.
"Cicero, in his Offices, says that Agamemnon, in order to engage the protection of the gods in his war against the Trojans, vowed to sacrifice to them the most beautiful of all that should be born in his kingdom; and as it was found that his daughter Iphigenia surpassed all the rest in beauty, he believed himself bound by his vow to sacrifice her. Cicero condemns this, rightly judging that it would have been a less evil to have falsified his vow than to have committed parricide. This account of Cicero renders the fable entirely conformable to the history.
"Agamemnon was at first struck with and troubled at this order, nevertheless consented to it: but he afterwards regretted the loss of his daughter. He is represented by the poets as deliberating, and being in doubt whether the gods could require such a parricide; but at last a sense of his duty and honour overcame his paternal affection, and his daughter, who had warmly exhorted him to fulfil his vow to the gods, was led to the altar amidst the lamentations of her companions; as Ovid and Euripides relate, see Met., lib. 13.
"Some authors have thought she really was sacrificed; but others, more humane, say she was caught up in a cloud by the gods, who, contented with the intended sacrifice, substituted a hind in her place, with which the sacrifice was completed. Dictys Cretensis says that this animal was substituted to save Iphigenia.
"The chronology of times so remote cannot, in many respects, but be uncertain. Both the Greeks and Romans grant that there was nothing else than fables before the first Olympiad, the beginning of which was at least four hundred and fifty years after the destruction of Troy, and two hundred and forty years after Solomon. As to the time of Solomon, nothing can be more certain than what is related in the sixth chapter of the first book of Kings, that from the going out of Egypt, under Moses, till the time in which he began to build the temple, was four hundred and eighty years.
"According to the common opinion, the taking of Troy is placed one hundred and eighty years before the reign of Solomon; but his reign preceded Homer three centuries, according to some learned men, and always at least one century by those who related it lowest. Indeed, there is much uncertainty in fixing the express time in which Homer flourished.
"Pausanias found so much difference concerning this in authors, that he was at a loss how to judge of it. However, it is sufficient for us that it was granted that Solomon was at least a century before Homer, who wrote more than two centuries after the taking of Troy and who is the most ancient historian of this famous siege."
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 11:40. The daughters of Israel went yearly to…
Jdg 11:40. The daughters of Israel went yearly to lament the daughter of Jephthah — The Hebrew word לתנות, lethannoth, here rendered, to lament, occurs nowhere else in Scripture, but Jdg 5:11, where it is rendered rehearse, or celebrate, namely, There shall they rehearse, says Deborah, the righteous acts of the Lord, surely not lament them. And the word might certainly be much more properly rendered to celebrate, or talk with, here, than to lament. Buxtorf interprets it thus, on the authority of the Jewish rabbi, Kimchi, allowed to be the best Hebrew grammarian the Jews ever had, and famous as a commentator on the Old Testament. His words on the passage are — “Ad confabulandum juxta Kimchium, ut amicis colloquiis eam de virginitate et statu vitæ solitario consolarentur.” To converse with her, according to Kimchi, namely, that by friendly discourses they might comfort her concerning her virginity, and the solitary condition of her life. Houbigant translates the words, They went to the daughter of Jephthah to console her, four days in a year. If we render the clause thus, the matter is put beyond dispute; for they could neither converse with, nor console her, after she was sacrificed: but if we translate the expression, to celebrate, or even to lament, its being repeated four times every year, plainly indicates that she was alive, because we nowhere find that the Israelites ever had any custom of celebrating or lamenting the dead after the funeral obsequies were performed. Their law rather tended to prohibit every thing of the kind, and inspire them with an abhorrence of it, by representing the dead as unclean, and those who came near and touched them as defiled thereby. So that there is not the least reason to conclude that the daughters of Judah went yearly, much less four times every year, either to lament or praise the daughter of Jephthah after she was dead; but rather that they went while she lived, to visit and converse with her, and comfort her with their company and discourses. All, therefore, that Jephthah did with his daughter, according to his vow, was to devote her to a single state, as a Nazarite, or consecrated person, to be employed in the service of God in the tabernacle, under the care of the high-priests, probably in making the hangings and other ornaments of it, the habits of the priests, the show-bread, the cakes used in sacrifices, and other such like offices, and to continue in a virgin state till the day of her death. Thus Samuel was vowed to the Lord by his mother, 1Sa 1:11. That his daughter must live and die single was felt by Jephthah as the greater calamity, because she was his only child, Jdg 11:34, a circumstance which the sacred historian dwells upon, observing that besides her he had neither son nor daughter. But, says Mr. Henry, “we do not find any law, usage, or custom, in all the Old Testament, which doth in the least intimate that a single life was any branch or article of religion.” “And do we find,” replies Mr. Wesley, “any law, usage, or custom there, which does in the least intimate that cutting the throat of an only child was any branch or article of religion?” If only a dog had met Jephthah, would he have offered up that for a burnt-offering? No, because God had expressly forbidden this. And had he not expressly forbidden murder? But Mr. Pool thinks the story of Agamemnon’s offering up Iphigenia (put for Jephtigenia) took its rise from this. Probably it did, as the Greeks used, as he observes, “to steal sacred histories and turn them into fables.” But then let it be observed Iphigenia was not murdered. Tradition says that Diana sent a hind in her stead, and took the maid to live in the woods with her. Upon the whole, this one single circumstance, mentioned above, that, when the sacred writer had informed us, Jephthah did with his daughter according to his vow, he adds, and she knew no man, renders it as “clear as the light,” as Dr. Dodd observes, that her father’s vow was thus fulfilled; “for if she had been slain as a burnt-offering, it would have been absurd enough to have told us that she afterward knew no man. And indeed,” adds he, “the passage is so plain, that one would wonder it could ever have come into the heads of writers, to conceive that her father, who was a truly pious man, (Jdg 11:11,) could have thought of offering up his daughter as a sacrifice to that God who never allowed or admitted such horrid sacrifices, and whose great quarrel against the baneful idols of the heathen was, that they called for and accepted the sacrifices of sons and daughters:” see Lev 18:21; Lev 20:2; Deu 12:31; Deu 18:10.
Joseph Benson's Commentary on the Old and New Testaments (1811–1818) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.
Albert Barnes 1834 · Public Domain There is no allusion extant elsewhere to this annual…
There is no allusion extant elsewhere to this annual lamentation of the untimely fate of Jephthah’s daughter. But the poetical turn of the narrative suggests that it may be taken from some ancient song (compare the marginal note 4).
Albert Barnes' Notes on the Bible (1834–1885) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword/MySword module.
Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary 1859 · Public Domain Lament. Hebrew Lethanoth. On this term the solution of…
Lament. Hebrew Lethanoth. On this term the solution of this question greatly depends. (Haydock) --- Kimchi translates, "to talk with," or "to comfort the daughter of Jephte" as he supposes that the custom subsisted during her life, while she was shut up either near the tabernacle, or in her father’s house. (Calmet) --- Montanus renders "to speak to." Junius and the Tigurin version, "to discourse with." --- Thanan certainly is used for "he related," &c. Judges v. 11., yethannu narrentur, or rather narrent; and the construction here seems to require this sense. (Amama) --- If this be admitted, the bloody sacrifice is at an end, since the daughters of Israel could not meet to comfort the virgin every year, if she was immolated at the expiration of two months. But if we follow the translation of the Vulgate, Septuagint, and Chaldean, as the Protestants have done, the lamentation might still be viewed in the same light, as tending to condole with the lady, rather than bewail her untimely death, (Haydock) as, for the latter purpose, it would not have been necessary for them to assemble together. (Amama) --- They might well enter into her sentiments, when she mourned her virginity, (ver. 38,) and strive to yield her some comfort in her secluded state, by coming in such numbers, and with the permission of the priests of God, continuing with her four days. (Haydock) --- Some translate "to publish," or sound forth the praises (Calmet) of this heroic virgin, which may be true, whether she was slain, or only consecrated to the Lord. (Haydock) --- St. Epiphanius (hær. 55., and 78,) informs us that "at Sichem an annual sacrifice was still offered up in the name of the virgin, and that she was revered as a goddess by the people in the vicinity." The vow of Jephte seems to have given rise to what we read in profane authors, of that which Idomeneus, king of Crete, made in the midst of a storm at sea: "He vowed that he would sacrifice to the gods whatever met him first. It happened that his son was the person, whom, when he had immolated, or, as others say, had wished to do it, and afterwards a pestilence had ensued, his subjects drove him from his kingdom." (Servius in Æneid iii., and xi.) (Calmet) --- Aldrovandus (in Asino) relates a similar vow of Alexander the Great. Even the more sober pagans could not, it seems, approve of the unwarranted vows of parents to destroy the lives of their children. But of people consecrated to the Lord, by their parents, without first requiring their consent, we have many examples, in Samuel. (St. Bonaventure, July 14, &c.) --- If we explain the vow of Jephte in the same sense, every difficulty will be removed, and infidels will not allege this example to prove that human victims are pleasing to God. (Haydock)
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 40. Went yearly — Went, probably, into the solitudes…
40. Went yearly — Went, probably, into the solitudes of the mountains. Those that lived near Mizpeh would naturally go to the same mountains where Jephthah’s daughter had bewailed her virginity.
To lament the daughter of Jephthah — So all the ancient versions, but, doubtless, incorrectly. The word is better rendered rehearse, as in Jdg_5:11; that is, to commemorate, to celebrate, to praise. After her death they ceased to bewail her virginity, and only celebrated the sublime heroism which led her, as she and they conceived, to die for God, her country, and her sire. Before her death she and her friends went to the mountains and bewailed all that they thought lamentable in her lot; and two months were deemed enough to mourn the dark side of her history, and that mourning they would have before her death, so that afterwards they need speak only of the bright side, and commemorate her lofty devotion.
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It has been sometimes asked: “If she were really put to death, is it not strange that the fact of her death is not once spoken of?” The fact of her death, we answer, is sufficiently indicated in the statement, “He did to her his vow which he had vowed;” and as for the silence of the other parts of Scripture on this subject, that is no more strange than its silence on a hundred other things. With more show of reason may we ask, How is it, if she were not slain, that we have no mention of her subsequent life? The marginal reading, to talk with, is certainly untenable. It was natural for the daughters of Israel to go yearly and celebrate the sublime devotion and lofty heroism that haloed around the memory of the saintly maiden; but if she were still alive, it is inexplicably strange that no intimation of that fact is given.
Another exposition of Jephthah’s vow, at war with that presented in the foregoing notes, has largely prevailed among both Jews and Christians. It maintains that the maiden was not put to death at all, but was consecrated to a life of celibacy. Most of the arguments by which it is supported, and the objections and difficulties which it raises against our exposition, have been as fully met and answered in the foregoing notes as the limits of this work will allow. For more full and thorough discussion of the subject the reader is referred to the author’s article in the Methodist Quarterly Review for April, 1873. It remains for us to notice in this place the arguments; and objections which, for the sake of unity and clearness, we omitted to notice above.
The great objection against the literal interpretation is, that the offering of a human sacrifice was incompatible with Jephthah’s faith, piety, and knowledge of the law. But how is this to be shown? It is alleged that an inspired writer of the New Testament, in Heb_11:32, commends Jephthah’s faith. But be it noted that he does not commend Jephthah’s vow. Mark his words: “The time would fail me to tell of Gideon, and Barak, and Samson, and Jephthah; David also, and Samuel, and the prophets.” What parts or acts of their lives, now, shall we suppose this verse commends? All they ever did, or said, or were? Then must we include Barak’s cowardice, and Gideon’s idolatry and polygamy, and Samson’s lewdness with Delilah, and David’s lies, and adultery, and murder of Uriah! The six verses following, through which the writer to the Hebrews goes on to specify particular instances of faith, which distinguished those ancient worthies, contain no allusion which can with any rational probability be made to mean the consecration of one’s daughter to perpetual celibacy. Did it ever occur to the advocates of this consecration theory that for a father to doom his daughter, in the bloom of her youthful beauty, to a life of seclusion and celibacy, and thus rob her of the honour and joys of Hebrew womanhood, could scarcely be the ground of an apostle’s commendation? The faith which the inspired writer praises in the ancient worthies is not to be confounded with all the acts which, because of ignorance, may have sometimes sprung from their faith. It is well to observe that the faith of the harlot Rahab, ex-tolled by the same sacred writer, was compatible with what the ethics of the New Testament would pronounce a life of shame and an act of falsehood. Jephthah’s vow, as we view it, was an act at once of mighty faith and fearful ignorance. Our Christian instinct revolts both from the vow and the fulfilling of it. But we must not ignore and deny the spirit of exalted faith and piety from which his action sprang. The correctness of one’s doctrinal opinions is no sure criterion of his heart’s faith in God. The Lord Jesus found among the Gentiles a faith unparalleled in Israel.
But the main strength of the consecration hypothesis lies in the supposition that a judge in Israel must needs have been acquainted with the law against human sacrifices, (Lev_18:21; Lev_20:2; Deu_12:31; Deu_18:10.) But let it be observed that this is only a supposition; it has no positive evidence to support it, and may be opposed by considerations which make the very contrary supposition much more probable. First, the fact, which the Book of Judges makes no secret, that that was a lawless and degenerate period of Hebrew history. “Every man did that which was right in his own eyes.” Jdg_17:6; Jdg_21:25; Jdg_2:16-19. Then consider Jephthah’s early exile from his father’s house, and the fact that about the time of his expulsion the multiplied idolatry described in Jdg_10:6.
must have been at its height in Israel. They had even gone so far as to serve “the gods of Moab and the gods of the children of Am-mon.” To what extent they worshipped Chemosh and Moloch we are not told; but let the impartial student of history judge whether it is safe to affirm, that while they shamefully apostatized from the Lord and openly served those gods whose most signal honour was a human sacrifice, they could never, even in a single instance, be supposed to have shown them such signal honour.
And how natural for the youthful Gileadite, under all the circumstances of his lot, to suppose that the substance and methods of religion were about the same among all the nations; and, since human sacrifices were offered by some, and he had possibly known of instances even in Israel, they entered into and helped to form his notions of what would be most specially noble and pleasing in the sight of God. What supposable opportunities did his wild border life afford him for becoming acquainted with the law of Moses? It there was great ignorance of the law in the very heart of Israel, and near to Shiloh, the seat of the tabernacle, what greater ignorance must have prevailed far off on the border of Ammon! These considerations lead us to conclude that, so far from being absurd or impossible, it was both natural and probable that Jephthah’s knowledge of the law was exceedingly meagre and confused, and that the savage discipline of his border life, often in contact with the Ammonites, had led him to suppose that the sacrifice of a human being was the noblest possible offering to God.
The hypothesis of Bush demands a passing notice. He supposes that during the two months’ mourning the affair became notorious throughout the land, and the subject of great lamentation and discussion. He imagines that when the vow passed Jephthah’s lips it had more of the character of a devotement (cherem, Lev_27:28) than of a vow, (neder,) but that he was subsequently instructed by the priests that a burnt offering was incompatible with the nature of a devoted thing, “and that the law having made no provision for the latter being substituted for the former, he was even, according to the very terms of his vow, rightly understood, not only released, but prohibited from performing it. Accordingly, he conceives that Jephthah executed his vow by devoting his daughter to perpetual celibacy — “a mode of execution which did not, in the first instance, enter his thoughts.” The one and all-sufficient answer to this hypothesis is that from beginning to end it is a tissue of conjectures, and can claim no support from the sacred narrative. It may do for poets and romancers to weave such fancies around the facts of Scripture, but not for a commentator sagely to give us such conjectures for exposition.
Some have been puzzled to know by whose hand Jephthah’s daughter could have been sacrificed. It would have been unlawful, they urge, for Jephthah to have done it, for he was not a priest, and the priests at Shiloh would surely have not polluted the tabernacle with a human sacrifice. This difficulty is all imaginary. A reference to Jdg_6:19-20; Jdg_6:26-27; Jdg_13:19, will show that in that age it was no uncommon thing for persons to offer sacrifices without the aid of priests, and at places far from the tabernacle. And a man who, like Jephthah, thought that a human sacrifice would be pleasing to God, would not be likely to scruple over forms; and to suppose that between the time he was made judge and the time he performed his vow he must have become acquainted with the regulations of the Levitical priesthood, is to suppose what has no evidence in Scripture. The same remarks will apply to the objection that none but a male victim could be offered in sacrifice, according to the law. Is it assumed, then, that Jephthah might have legally offered his son, if he had had one?
Finally, it is said that our exposition enables the oppugners of a divine revelation to urge a capital objection against the morality of the Bible. But how is this possible when the Bible nowhere approves or sanctions Jephthah’s vow? Must we accept as sanctioned of God every action in Bible history that is not specifically condemned by some sacred writer? Or will it be pretended that the Bible anywhere sanctions human sacrifices? Amazingly shallow are they who presume to oppugn divine revelation with such logic, or they who seriously fear the attacks of such objectors. We shudder at Jephthah’s ignorance and superstition, and revolt from his bloody deed: but with the daughters of Israel, who lived in that darkest of historic ages, we cannot but commemorate the mighty faith and zeal of Jephthah, and the sublime devotion of his daughter.
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 40. And it was] And it became, altering the…
40. And it was] And it became, altering the verb from fern, to masc. The verse is wrongly divided. For went render used to go (frequentative).
to celebrate] So translated to agree with Jdg_5:11 (rehearse), the only other place where the word occurs: the Versions give to lament. In both places the rendering is merely inferred from the context. There is no sufficient reason to doubt that Jephthah’s sacrifice was an actual incident in history; but the yearly festival which commemorated his daughter’s fate may have had a remoter origin. It is not unlikely that the incident was associated in the course of time with a primitive myth; for there are traces elsewhere of human sacrifices being connected with an annual mourning for the death of a god. In the parallel story of Iphigenia the heroine is really a form of an early goddess identified with Artemis. The present narrative suggests to some scholars reminiscences of Tammuz-Ishtar worship, which celebrated the annual death and revival of the divinity. In later times the daughter of Jephthah was worshipped by the Samaritans in Sichem as Korç, the heavenly virgin; Epiphanius, adv. Haeres. iii. 2, 1055. A. Jeremias, Das A. T. im Lichte d. Alten Orients2, p. 478.
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 (40) To lament.—Rabbi Tanchum makes it mean “to praise,”…
(40) To lament.—Rabbi Tanchum makes it mean “to praise,” or “celebrate.” The feelings of the Israelites towards Jephthah’s daughter would be much the same as that of the Romans towards Claelia, and of other nations towards heroines whose self-sacrifice has helped them to victory.
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 The daughters of Israel, etc. No other trace of…
The daughters of Israel, etc. No other trace of this custom, which was probably confined to Gilead, remains. To lament. The word rather means to praise, or celebrate, as in Jud_1:5:11 (rehearse ).
The Pulpit Commentary (1880–1919), ed. H.D.M. Spence-Jones & Joseph S. Exell — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.