Reading through the book of Judges in my daily Bible reading I once again read with interest the story of Jephthah and his vow. This is found in chapter 11. Over the years this account has created a great deal of controversy. Did Jephthah offer his daughter as a burnt offering or did he not? There has been a lot of discussion among Bible scholars and students. Let us look at this account and see if we can’t clear the muddied waters.
In verse 1 we find that Jephthah was a “mighty man of valour.” We find that due to circumstances he was shunned by his family and fled from them. In verse 4 we are told that after a period of time “the children of Ammon made war against Israel.” The “elders of Gilead” went to “fetch Jephthah, verse 5. They appealed to him to become their captain in their fight with the children of Ammon, verse 6. After a bit of negotiation between Jephthah and the elders and he being assured that he would become their “head” if “the Lord deliver them” before him, verses 7-11, Jephthah went with them.
You can read the subsequent events outlined in verses 12-28. Now, coming to verse 29 we read that “the Spirit of Lord came upon Jephthah”. Then in verse 30 and 31 we read the vow that Jephthah made. “And Jephthah vowed a vow unto the “LORD”, and said, If thou shalt without fail deliver the children of Ammon into mine hands, Then it shall be, that whatsoever cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the children of Ammon, shall surely be the LORD’s, and I will offer it up for a burnt offering.”
Verses 32 and 33 tells us that the God delivered the children of Ammon into Jephthah’s hands and they were subdued.
Now we come to the interesting part of the story, verse 34. Jephthah returns home and notice what happens! His daughter, his only child, came out to meet him with “timbrels and dances.” When he saw her, verse 35, Jephthah was devastated. It says he “rent his clothes” and exclaimed “Alas, my daughter!” He proceeded to tell her that he had “opened my mouth unto the LORD, and I cannot go back.” He knew that his vow to God was very binding. His daughter told him that IF he had made such a vow then he must go ahead and do to her has he had vowed, verse 36.
She did ask her father one favor, verse 37, and that was to let her have two months that “I may go up and down upon the mountains, and bewail my virginity,...” Verse 38 states that he told her to go and do as she had asked. At the end of the two months we are told, verse 39, “she returned unto her father, who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed: and she knew no man.”
In conclusion, verse 40 tells us that each year the “daughters of Israel” went to “lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite four days in a year.”
In this brief reading we see the vow that Jephthah made, that it was his daughter that met him and that after her two months of “bewailing her virginity” Jephthah “did with her according to his vow which he had vowed.” It would sure seem that he offered her as a burnt offering to the LORD.
But, let us consider a little further.
Leviticus 22:18-19 tells us a bit about burnt offerings. “...Whatsoever he be of the house of Israel, or of the strangers in Israel, that will offer his oblation for all his vows, and for all his freewill offerings, which they will offer unto the LORD for a burnt offering; Ye shall offer at your own will a male without blemish, of the beeves, of the sheep, or of the goats.” Notice that a burnt offering could ONLY be a male animal and it could only be of the three species, cattle, sheep or goats.
God very clearly states that He does NOT want a human sacrifice. Let us read Deuteronomy 12:31, “Thou shalt not do so unto the LORD thy God: for every abomination to the LORD, which he hateth, have they done unto their gods; for even their sons and their daughters they have burnt in the fire to their gods.” God states very clearly that He hates what these people had been doing, in offering their children as burnt offerings. He says it is an abomination to Him.
IF Jephthah, in direct opposition to God’s clear instructions about burnt offerings and His definite hatred of human sacrifice, had offered his daughter as a human sacrifice, it is unlikely the he would have been included in the list of those of great faith found in Hebrews 11. And, yet his name is there in verse 32.
How then do we understand this story of Jephthah and his daughter?
Let us look again at Jephthah’s vow in Judges 11:31. “Then it shall be, that whatsoever cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the children of Ammon, shall surely be the LORD’s...” The vow continues with the word “and.” “and I will offer it up for a burnt offering.” The key to understanding is that little word “and.” The word “and” is a connective particle. A connective particle can be used conjunctively or disjunctively. IF the connective particle here were to be understood disjunctively, which it often is in the biblical text, then the phrase would be translated, “whatever comes out of the doors of my house...shall be the LORD’s, OR I will offer it up as a burnt offering.”
This same Hebrew particle is used in Exodus 21:17, for example, and is translated by some as: "He that curses his father AND his mother." Most versions of the Bible, however (including the Septuagint and the Latin Vulgate), employ the word "OR" here, and rightly so, because the particle is clearly to be understood disjunctively; that is: cursing of either father OR mother is unlawful. This disjunctive use of the connective particle is further confirmed in Matthew 15:4, which so understands that use with regard to the Exodus 21:17 passage.
A disjunctive use of this particle actually makes sense when one understands that in the Law the objects of vows could be either persons, animals or things. Thus when making a simple vow regarding "whatever" may come forth from the house, there must of necessity, in any rational vow, be a disjunctive aspect to that vow to allow for differences in what may come forth. This is cleared up when the particle is rendered disjunctively.
Let us look at some comments made by some leading Bible scholars. First from Adam Clarke’s commentary.
“Verse 31. Shall surely be the Lord’s, and I will offer it up for a burnt-offering.] The text is vehayah layhovah vehaalithihu olah, the translation of which, according to the most accurate Hebrew scholars, is this: I will consecrate it to the Lord, or I will offer it for a burnt-offering, that is, ‘If it be a thing fit for a burnt-offering, it shall be made one; if fit for the service of God, it shall be consecrated to him.’ That conditions of this kind must have been implied in the vow, is evident enough; to have been made without them, it must have been the vow of a heathen, or a madman. If a dog had met him, this could not have been made a burnt-offering, and if his neighbour or friends’ wife, son or daughter, visit to his family, his vow gave him no right over them. Besides, human sacrifices were ever an abomination to the Lord; and this was one of the grand reasons why God drove out the Canaanites.”
Bullinger’s “The Companion Bible” has this comment. “and = or. The Heb. vav is a connective particle, and is rendered in many different ways. It is also used as a disjunctive, and is often rendered ‘or’ (or with a negative, ‘nor’)...Here Jephthah’s vow consisted of two parts: (1) He would dedicate it to Jehovah (according to Lev. 27); or (2) if unsuitable for this, he would offer it as a burnt offering. He performed his vow, and dedicated his daughter to Jehovah by a perpetual virginity (vv. 36, 39, 40); but he did not offer her as a burnt offering, because it was forbidden by Jehovah, and could not be accepted by Him (Lev. 18:21; 20:2-5).”
The Jamieson, Fausset and Brown commentary makes this statement: “shall surely be the Lord’s; and [or] I will offer it up for a burnt offering–The adoption of the latter particle, which many interpreters suggest, introduces the important alternative, that if it were a person, the dedication would be made to the service of the sanctuary; if a proper animal or thing, it would be offered on the alter.”
Young’s Literal Bible translates verse 31 this way: “then it hath been, that which at all cometh out from the doors of my house to meet me in my turning back in peace from the Bene-Ammon–it hath been to Jehovah, or I have offered up for it–a burnt offering.”
In my KJV I have a marginal note for the word “and.” The note reads “Or, or I will offer it,”
With this understanding the rest of the story becomes more understandable. Jephthah’s daughter is “bewailing her virginity” NOT the fact she is about to be put to death. She was to be given to the service of God and was to remain a virgin, never to marry and raise sons to carry on her father’s linage. This was quite a sacrifice for her and her father. We can understand the custom of the young women of Israel that went each year for four days to “lament” Jephthah’s daughter. This word, lament, is Strong’s #08567, tanah. It is used only two times and it is translated “rehearse” in Judges 5:11. It is defined “to recount, rehearse, tell again.” The Darby and American Standard Version translate the word here in Judges 11:40 as “celebrate.” Green’s Literal says “to tell again.” However, Young’s Literal Translation perhaps gets the true essence of what is being said when it translates this word as “go to talk to.” It appears that as long as Jephthah’s daughter served the Lord she was encouraged by the women of Israel by their coming to see her and talk with her for four days each year.
I imagine Jephthah often regretted the vow he made. But, even though his daughter was lost to him and was given to the God and to His service Jephthah DID NOT offer her as a burnt offering!
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