The history of Jephthah appears to be an independent history inserted by the compiler of the Book of Judges. Judges 11:4 introduce the Ammonite war without any apparent reference to Judges 10:17. A genealogy of Manasseh 1 Chronicles 7:14 gives the families which sprang from Gilead, and among them me... [ Continue Reading ]
THE LAND OF TOB - To the north of Gilead, toward Damascus. The readiness with which Jephthah took to the freebooter’s life gives us a lively picture of the unsettled times in which he lived.... [ Continue Reading ]
This gives a wider signification to Judges 11:2, and shows that Jephthah’s “brethren” include his fellow tribesmen.... [ Continue Reading ]
Jephthah made his own aggrandisement the condition of his delivering; his country. The circumstances of his birth and long residence in a pagan land were little favorable to the formation of the highest type of character. Yet he has his record among the faithful Hebrews 11:32.... [ Continue Reading ]
JEPHTHAH UTTERED ALL HIS WORDS BEFORE THE LORD IN MIZPEH - This phrase designates the presence of the tabernacle, or the ark, or of the high priest with Urim and Thummim Judges 20:26; Judges 21:2; Jos 18:8; 1 Samuel 21:7. The high priest waited upon Jephthah with the ephod, and possibly the ark, at... [ Continue Reading ]
FROM ARNON EVEN UNTO JABBOK ... - The land bounded by the Arnon on the south, by the Jabbok on the north, by the Jordan on the west, and by the wilderness on the east was, of old, the kingdom of Sihon, but then the territory of Reuben and Gad.... [ Continue Reading ]
Consult the marginal references. If the ark with the copy of the Law Deuteronomy 31:26 was at Mizpeh, it would account for Jephthah’s accurate knowledge of it; and this exact agreement of his message with Numbers and Deuteronomy would give additional force to the expression, “he uttered all his word... [ Continue Reading ]
THEN THE SPIRIT OF THE LORD ... - This was the sanctification of Jephthah for his office of Judge and savior of God’s people Israel. Compare Judges 6:34; Judges 13:25. The declaration is one of the distinctive marks which stamp this history as a divine history. The geography is rather obscure, but... [ Continue Reading ]
The words of this verse prove conclusively that Jephthah intended his vow to apply to human beings, not animals: for only one of his household could be expected to come forth from the door of his house to meet him. They also preclude any other meaning than that Jephthah contemplated a human sacrific... [ Continue Reading ]
As in the conflicts with the Moabites, Canaanites, and Midianites Judges 3; Judges 4; Judges 7, the battle was on Israelite territory, in self-defense, not in aggressive warfare. THE PLAIN OF THE VINEYARDS - Rather, “Abel-Ceramim” (compare Abel-Meholah), identified with an “Abel” situated among vin... [ Continue Reading ]
HIS DAUGHTER CAME OUT TO MEET HIM - The precise phrase of his vow Judges 11:31. She was his “only child,” a term of special endearment (see Jeremiah 6:26; Zechariah 12:10). The same word is used of Isaac Genesis 22:2, Genesis 22:12, Genesis 22:16.... [ Continue Reading ]
Jephthah was right in not being deterred from keeping his vow by the loss and sorrow to himself (compare the marginal references), just as Abraham was right in not withholding his son, his only son, from God, when commanded to offer him up as a burnt-offering. But Jephthah was wholly wrong in that c... [ Continue Reading ]
The touching submission of Jephthah’s daughter to an inevitable fate shows how deeply-rooted at that time was the pagan notion of the propriety of human sacrifice.... [ Continue Reading ]
BEWAIL MY VIRGINITY - To become a wife and a mother was the end of existence to an Israelite maiden. The premature death of Jephthah’s daughter was about to frustrate this end.... [ Continue Reading ]
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).... [ Continue Reading ]