Jephthah
11Now Jephthah the Gileadite, the son of a prostitute, was a mighty warrior. Gilead was the father of Jephthah.
2Gilead’s wife also bore him sons; and when his wife’s sons grew up, they drove Jephthah away, saying to him, ‘You shall not inherit anything in our father’s house; for you are the son of another woman.’
3Then Jephthah fled from his brothers and lived in the land of Tob. Outlaws collected around Jephthah and went raiding with him.
4 After a time the Ammonites made war against Israel.
5And when the Ammonites made war against Israel, the elders of Gilead went to bring Jephthah from the land of Tob.
6They said to Jephthah, ‘Come and be our commander, so that we may fight with the Ammonites.’
7But Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, ‘Are you not the very ones who rejected me and drove me out of my father’s house? So why do you come to me now when you are in trouble?’
11So Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead, and the people made him head and commander over them; and Jephthah spoke all his words before the
Lord at Mizpah.
27It is not I who have sinned against you, but you are the one who does me wrong by making war on me. Let the
Lord, who is judge, decide today for the Israelites or for the Ammonites.’
Jephthah’s Vow
29 Then the spirit of the
Lord came upon Jephthah, and he passed through Gilead and Manasseh. He passed on to Mizpah of Gilead, and from Mizpah of Gilead he passed on to the Ammonites.
30And Jephthah made a vow to the
Lord, and said, ‘If you will give the Ammonites into my hand,
31then whoever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return victorious from the Ammonites, shall be the
Lord’s, to be offered up by me as a burnt-offering.’
32So Jephthah crossed over to the Ammonites to fight against them; and the
Lord gave them into his hand.
33He inflicted a massive defeat on them from Aroer to the neighbourhood of Minnith, twenty towns, and as far as Abel-keramim. So the Ammonites were subdued before the people of Israel.
Jephthah’s Daughter
34 Then Jephthah came to his home at Mizpah; and there was his daughter coming out to meet him with timbrels and with dancing. She was his only child; he had no son or daughter except her.
35When he saw her, he tore his clothes, and said, ‘Alas, my daughter! You have brought me very low; you have become the cause of great trouble to me. For I have opened my mouth to the
Lord, and I cannot take back my vow.’
36She said to him, ‘My father, if you have opened your mouth to the
Lord, do to me according to what has gone out of your mouth, now that the
Lord has given you vengeance against your enemies, the Ammonites.’
37And she said to her father, ‘Let this thing be done for me: Grant me two months, so that I may go and wander
* on the mountains, and bewail my virginity, my companions and I.’
38‘Go,’ he said and sent her away for two months. So she departed, she and her companions, and bewailed her virginity on the mountains.
39At the end of two months, she returned to her father, who did with her according to the vow he had made. She had never slept with a man. So there arose an Israelite custom that
40for four days every year the daughters of Israel would go out to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite.
