Discovery BoxJudges 11:8-33 
Context11:8 The leaders of Gilead said to Jephthah, “That may be true, 1 but now we pledge to you our loyalty. 2 Come with us and fight with the Ammonites. Then you will become the leader 3 of all who live in Gilead.” 4 11:9 Jephthah said to the leaders of Gilead, “All right! 5 If you take me back to fight with the Ammonites and the Lord gives them to me, 6 I will be your leader.” 7 11:10 The leaders of Gilead said to Jephthah, “The Lord will judge any grievance you have against us, 8 if we do not do as you say.” 9 11:11 So Jephthah went with the leaders of Gilead. The people made him their leader and commander. Jephthah repeated the terms of the agreement 10 before the Lord in Mizpah.
11:12 Jephthah sent messengers to the Ammonite king, saying, “Why have 11 you come against me to attack my land?” 11:13 The Ammonite king said to Jephthah’s messengers, “Because Israel stole 12 my land when they 13 came up from Egypt – from the Arnon River in the south to the Jabbok River in the north, and as far west as the Jordan. 14 Now return it 15 peaceably!”
11:14 Jephthah sent messengers back to the Ammonite king 11:15 and said to him, “This is what Jephthah says, ‘Israel did not steal 16 the land of Moab and the land of the Ammonites. 11:16 When they left 17 Egypt, Israel traveled 18 through the desert as far as the Red Sea and then came to Kadesh. 11:17 Israel sent messengers to the king of Edom, saying, “Please allow us 19 to pass through your land.” But the king of Edom rejected the request. 20 Israel sent the same request to the king of Moab, but he was unwilling to cooperate. 21 So Israel stayed at Kadesh. 11:18 Then Israel 22 went through the desert and bypassed the land of Edom and the land of Moab. They traveled east of the land of Moab and camped on the other side of the Arnon River; 23 they did not go through Moabite territory (the Arnon was Moab’s border). 11:19 Israel sent messengers to King Sihon, the Amorite king who ruled in Heshbon, and said to him, “Please allow us to pass through your land to our land.” 24 11:20 But Sihon did not trust Israel to pass through his territory. He 25 assembled his whole army, 26 camped in Jahaz, and fought with Israel. 11:21 The Lord God of Israel handed Sihon and his whole army over to Israel and they defeated them. Israel took 27 all the land of the Amorites who lived in that land. 11:22 They took all the Amorite territory from the Arnon River on the south to the Jabbok River on the north, from the desert in the east to the Jordan in the west. 28 11:23 Since 29 the Lord God of Israel has driven out 30 the Amorites before his people Israel, do you think you can just take it from them? 31 11:24 You have the right to take what Chemosh your god gives you, but we will take the land of all whom the Lord our God has driven out before us. 32 11:25 Are you really better than Balak son of Zippor, king of Moab? Did he dare to quarrel with Israel? Did he dare to fight with them? 33 11:26 Israel has been living in Heshbon and its nearby towns, in Aroer and its nearby towns, and in all the cities along the Arnon for three hundred years! Why did you not reclaim them during that time? 11:27 I have not done you wrong, 34 but you are doing wrong 35 by attacking me. May the Lord, the Judge, judge this day between the Israelites and the Ammonites!’” 11:28 But the Ammonite king disregarded 36 the message sent by Jephthah. 37
11:29 The Lord’s spirit empowered 38 Jephthah. He passed through Gilead and Manasseh and went 39 to Mizpah in Gilead. From there he approached the Ammonites. 40 11:30 Jephthah made a vow to the Lord, saying, “If you really do hand the Ammonites over to me, 11:31 then whoever is the first to come through 41 the doors of my house to meet me when I return safely from fighting the Ammonites – he 42 will belong to the Lord and 43 I will offer him up as a burnt sacrifice.” 11:32 Jephthah approached 44 the Ammonites to fight with them, and the Lord handed them over to him. 11:33 He defeated them from Aroer all the way to Minnith – twenty cities in all, even as far as Abel Keramim! He wiped them out! 45 The Israelites humiliated the Ammonites. 46
1 tn Heb “therefore”; “even so.” For MT לָכֵן (lakhen, “therefore”) the LXX has an opposite reading, “not so,” which seems to be based on the Hebrew words לֹא כֵן (lo’ khen).
2 tn Heb “we have returned to you.” For another example of שׁוּב אֶל (shuv ’el) in the sense of “give allegiance to,” see 1 Kgs 12:27b.
3 sn Then you will become the leader. The leaders of Gilead now use the word רֹאשׁ (ro’sh, “head, leader”), the same term that appeared in their original, general offer (see 10:18). In their initial offer to Jephthah they had simply invited him to be their קָצִין (qatsin, “commander”; v. 6). When he resists they must offer him a more attractive reward – rulership over the region. See R. G. Boling, Judges (AB), 198.
4 tn Heb “leader of us and all who live in Gilead.”
5 tn “All right” is supplied in the translation for clarification.
6 tn Heb “places them before me.”
7 tn Some translate the final statement as a question, “will I really be your leader?” An affirmative sentence is preferable. Jephthah is repeating the terms of the agreement in an official manner. In v. 10 the leaders legally agree to these terms.
8 tn Heb “The
9 sn The
10 tn Heb “spoke all his words.” This probably refers to the “words” recorded in v. 9. Jephthah repeats the terms of the agreement at the
11 tn Heb “What to me and to you that…?”
12 tn Or “took”; or “seized.”
13 tn Heb “he” (a collective singular).
14 tn Heb “from the Arnon to the Jabbok and to the Jordan.” The word “River” has been supplied in the translation with “Arnon” and “Jabbok,” because these are less familiar to modern readers than the Jordan.
15 tc The translation assumes a singular suffix (“[return] it”); the Hebrew text has a plural suffix (“[return] them”), which, if retained, might refer to the cities of the land.
16 tn Or “take”; or “seize.”
17 tn Heb “For when they went up from.”
18 tn Or “went.”
19 tn Heb “me.” (Collective Israel is the speaker.)
20 tn Heb “did not listen.”
21 tn Heb “Also to the king of Moab he sent, but he was unwilling.”
22 tn Heb “he”; the referent (Israel; the pronoun in the Hebrew text represents a collective singular) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
23 tn The word “River” is not in the Hebrew text, but has been supplied in the translation for clarity.
24 tn Heb “to my place.”
25 tn Heb “Sihon.” The proper name (“Sihon”) has been replaced in the translation by the pronoun (“he”) because of English style; a repetition of the proper name here would be redundant in English.
26 tn Heb “all his people” (also in the following verse).
27 tn That is, took as its own possession.
28 tn Heb “from the Arnon to the Jabbok, and from the desert to the Jordan.” The word “River” has been supplied in the translation with “Arnon” and “Jabbok,” because these are less familiar to modern readers than the Jordan.
29 tn Heb “Now.”
30 tn Or “dispossessed.”
31 tn Heb “will you dispossess him [i.e., Israel; or possibly “it,” i.e., the territory]?” There is no interrogative marker in the Hebrew text.
32 tn Heb “Is it not so that what Chemosh your god causes you to possess, you possess, and all whom the
33 tn The Hebrew grammatical constructions of all three rhetorical questions indicate emphasis, which “really” and “dare to” are intended to express in the translation.
sn Jephthah argues that the Ammonite king should follow the example of Balak, who, once thwarted in his attempt to bring a curse on Israel, refused to attack Israel and returned home (Num 22-24).
34 tn Or “sinned against you.”
35 tn Or “evil.”
36 tn Heb “did not listen to.”
37 tn Heb “Jephthah’s words which he sent to him.”
38 tn Heb “was on.”
39 tn Heb “passed through.”
40 tn Heb “From Mizpah in Gilead he passed through [to] the Ammonites.”
41 tn Heb “the one coming out, who comes out from.” The text uses a masculine singular participle with prefixed article, followed by a relative pronoun and third masculine singular verb. The substantival masculine singular participle הַיּוֹצֵא (hayyotse’, “the one coming out”) is used elsewhere of inanimate objects (such as a desert [Num 21:13] or a word [Num 32:24]) or persons (Jer 5:6; 21:9; 38:2). In each case context must determine the referent. Jephthah may have envisioned an animal meeting him, since the construction of Iron Age houses would allow for an animal coming through the doors of a house (see R. G. Boling, Judges [AB], 208). But the fact that he actually does offer up his daughter indicates the language of the vow is fluid enough to encompass human beings, including women. He probably intended such an offering from the very beginning, but he obviously did not expect his daughter to meet him first.
42 tn The language is fluid enough to include women and perhaps even animals, but the translation uses the masculine pronoun because the Hebrew form is grammatically masculine.
43 tn Some translate “or,” suggesting that Jephthah makes a distinction between humans and animals. According to this view, if a human comes through the door, then Jephthah will commit him/her to the
44 tn Heb “passed over to.”
45 tn Heb “with a very great slaughter.”
46 tn Heb “The Ammonites were humbled before the Israelites.”
