When Jephthah set forth against the Ammon ites he solemnly vowed to the Lord, 'If thou shalt without fail deliver the children of Ammon into my hands, then it shall be, that whatsoevet cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the children of Am mon, shall surely be the Lord's, and I will offer it up for a burnt offering,' He was victorious. The Ammonites sustained a terrible overthrow. He did return in peace to his house in Mizpeh. As lie drew nigh his house, the one that came forth to meet him was his own daughter, his only child, in whom his heart was bound up. She, with her fair companions, came to greet the tri umphant hero with timbrels and with dances. But he no sooner saw her than he rent his robes, and cried, Alas, my daughter! thou hast brought me very low; . . . for I have opened my mouth unto the Lord, and cannot go back.' Nor did she ask it. She replied, My father, if thou bast opened thy mouth unto the Lord, do to me ac cording to that which has proceeded out of thy mouth ; forasmuch as the Lord hath taken ven geance for thee of thine enemies, the children of Ammon.' But after a pause she added, 'Let this thing be done for me : let me alone two months, that I may go up and down upon the mountains, and bewail my virginity, I and my fellows.' Her father of course assented ; and when the time expired she returned, and, we are told, he did with her according to his vow.' It is then added that it became 'a custom in Israel, that the daughters of Israel went yearly to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite four da.s in the year.' The victory over the Ammonites was followed by a quarrel with the proud and powerful Ephraimites on the west of the Jordan. This tribe was displeased at having had no share in the glory of the recent victory, and a large body of men belonging to it, who had crossed the river tc share in the action, used very high and threatening lanvuage when they found their services were not required. Jephthah, finding his remonstrances had no effect, re-assembled some of his disbanded troops and gave the Ephraimites battle, when they were defeated with much loss. The victors seized the fords of the Jordan, and when any one came to pass over, they made him pronounce the word Shibboleth [an ear of corn], but if he could not give the aspiration, and pronounced the word RS Sibboleth, they knew him for an Ephraimite, and slew him on the spot. This is a remarkable instance of the dialectical differences, answering to the varieties in our provincialisms, which had already sprung up among the tribes, and of which other instances occur in Scripture.
Jephthah judged Israel six years, during which we have reason to conclude that the exercise of his authority was almost if not altogether con fined to the country east of the Jordan.
Volumes have been written on the subject of Jephthah's rash vow ; ' the question beim, whether, in doing to his daughter according to' his vow,' he really did offer hcr in sacrifice or not. The negative has been stoutly maintained by many able pens, from a natural anxiety to clear the character of one of the heroes in Israel from so dark a stain. But the more the plain rules of common sense have been exercised in our view of Biblical transactions; and the better we have suc ceeded in realizing a distinct idea of the times in which Jephthah lived and of the position which he occupied, thc less reluctance there has been to admit the interpretation which the first view of the passage suggests to every reader, which is, that he really did offer her in sacrifice. The expla
nation which denies this maintains that she was rather doomed to perpetual celibacy ; and this, as it appears to us, on the strength of phrases which, to one who really understands the character of the Hebrew people and their language, suggest no thin,g more than that it was considered a lament ahle thing for any daughter of Israel to die childless. To live unmarried was required by no law, custom, or devotement among the Jews : no one had a right to impose so odious a condition on another, nor is any such condition implied or expressed in the vow which Jephthah uttered. To get rid of a difficulty which has no place in the text, but arises from our reluctance to receive that text in its obvious meaning—we invent a new thing in Israel, a thing never heard of among the Hebrews in ancient or modern times, and more entirely opposed to their peculiar notions than any thing which the wit of man ever devised—such as that a damsel should be consecrated to perpetual vir ginity in consequence of a vow of her father, which vow itself says nothing of the kind. If people allow themselves to be influenced in their interpretations of Scripture by dislike to take the words in their obvious meaning, we might at least expect that the explanations they would have us receive should be in accordance with the notions of the Hebrew people, instead of being en tirely and obviously opposed to them. The Jewish commentators themselves generally admit that Jephthah really sacrificed his daughter ; and even go so far as to allege that the change in the pon tifical dynasty from the house of Eleazar to that of Ithamar was caused by the high-priest of the time having suffered this transaction to take place.
It is very true that human shzrifices were for bidden by the law. But in the rude and unsettled ag,e in which the judges lived, when the Israelites had adopted a vast number of erroneous notions and practices from their heathen neighbours, many things were done, even by good men, which the law forbade quite as positively as human sacrifice. Such, for instance, was the setting up of the altar by Gideon at his native Ophrah, in direct but un designed opposition to one of the most stringent enactments of the Mosaical code.
It is certain that human sacrifice was deemed meritorious and propitiatory by the neighbouring nations [SA.ca(FicE] ; and, considering the manner of life the hero had led, the recent idolatries in which the people had been plunged, and the pecu liarly vague notions of the tribes beyond the Jor dan, it is highly probable that he contemplated from the first a human sacrifice, as the most costly offering to God known to him. It is difficult to conceive that he could expect any other creature than a human being to come forth out of the door of his house to meet him on his return. Ilis house was surely not a place for flocks and herds, nor could any animal be expected to come forth to meet him,' e., with the purpose of meeting him, on his return. We think it likely that he even con templated the possibility that his daughter might be the person to come forth, and that he took merit to himself for not expressly withholding even his only child from the operation of a vow which he deemed likely to promote the snceess of his arms. His affliction when his daug,hter actually came forth is quite compatible with this notion ; and the depth of that affliction is scarcely recon cilable with any other alternative than the actual sacrifice.