And Jephthah made a vow to the Lord. He said, “If you give me victory over the Ammonites, I will give to the Lord whatever comes out of my house to meet me when I return in triumph. I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering.” [Judges 11:30-31 (NLT)]
Skeptics love to ask how God could allow Jephthah to offer up his daughter as a burnt sacrifice. First, let’s note that it never says God approved of his sacrifice. In fact, Scripture makes it clear that such a sacrifice was abhorrent to the Lord. In His wisdom and mercy, God even provided a way out if someone made a rash or unrealistic vow. Leviticus 27 explains that such a vow could be purchased back with a 20% penalty and describes how valuations were to be determined. Although Jephthah displayed knowledge of Israel’s history when negotiating with the Ammonites, he showed his ignorance of God and God’s law with his rash vow. Moreover, there is no reason to think his daughter was sacrificed in the Tabernacle. It’s more likely that such a horrific event would have been part of a pagan ceremony.
Unlike Deborah, Gideon, and Samson, Jephthah was not a God-appointed judge or leader. Having been chased away by his brothers, he was living in the land of Tob with a “band of worthless rebels.” [11:3] Jephthah only came to the aid of Gilead because they promised he’d become ruler if victorious. That God used this “great warrior” to accomplish His purpose does not mean Jephthah was a godly man.
What Jephthah meant by his vow seems clear; he used ‘olah which meant “whole burnt offering.” In the 250 times ‘olah occurs in Scripture, it always refers to an actual sacrifice burnt on an altar. Nevertheless, because the text doesn’t explicitly state how he implemented his vow, there is some ambiguity regarding his daughter’s fate. As an alternative to being incinerated, some commentators hold that she was dedicated to God and lived in seclusion for the remainder of her life. Until the 12th century, however, both non-rabbinic sources and the Jewish sages of the Midrash took this tragic story literally—Jephthah immolated his daughter! Their commentaries cast blame upon Jephthah, the high priest, and the people who allowed such depravity.
Nevertheless, finding this story of human sacrifice intolerable, some rabbis tried to find a more acceptable alternative in the 1100s. Rabbi Abraham Ibn Ezra and others reinterpreted the text to mean that Jephthah’s vow really was that whatever appeared, if appropriate for sacrifice, would die but, if it wasn’t appropriate, would be consecrated for holiness. They contended that Jephthah built a house for his daughter outside the city where, isolated from the world, she devoted the rest of her life to God. Perhaps the reasoning behind their explanation can be found in the time period—an era when a tremendous number of monasteries and convents were being established throughout Europe. The rabbis may have been influenced by the Christian monastic ideals of chastity, poverty, and obedience. While a nice alternative, the concept of perpetual virginity, celibacy, and asceticism never appeared in the Hebrew Bible or Jewish texts. Priests and Nazarites could be married, Jeremiah was the only prophet not to marry, and there was no tradition of Jewish women secluding themselves and becoming the equivalent of nuns. The first commandment in Scripture was to be fruitful and multiply [Genesis 1:28] and a Hebrew woman’s highest achievement was a large family. Nevertheless, this interpretation has been adopted by many Christian commentators. Granted, Jephthah’s daughter condemned to a life of perpetual seclusion and virginity makes for a less repulsive ending to her tale but we should beware of creatively interpreting Biblical accounts to make them easier to stomach!
Although the Bible is without error, that doesn’t mean it is without difficulties. There is no acceptable alternative to the girl’s sacrifice just as there are no acceptable alternatives to stories like Lot offering up his daughters to be gang-raped [Genesis 19], the revenge taken on Shechem after Dinah’s rape [Genesis 34], or the massacre of 85 innocent priests and their families [1 Samuel 22]. The Bible’s record of an event doesn’t mean it’s endorsed and we never should assume that God approved of all that it reports. Just as God didn’t approve of David’s sins of rape, adultery, and murder, He didn’t approve of Jephthah’s sacrifice. Scripture records the real-life errors and sins of flawed human beings—people like us. It tells us what happened without necessarily telling us what should have happened or providing a moral to the story. The Old Testament’s great heroes of faith were not without faults and transgressions; neither are we! Let us learn from their mistakes.
Like Christians, Hindus believe that, when the body dies, the soul does not. Unlike Christians, however, Hindus believe that, after death, the soul lives on in an astral body until it is reborn in another physical body. This cycle is continually repeated until the soul reaches a certain state of perfection (moksha) and is released from the bondage of birth and death. At that time, like a drop of water that eventually merges into the ocean, the soul will finally merge into God and become one with its creator. Of course, once absorbed by the sea, the drop would cease to exist.
I recently met Esha while walking and we occasionally stop to chat. Although the bindi (mark) on her forehead told me she is a Hindu and the cross I wear told her I am Christian, our different faiths have not prevented us from talking about God and our beliefs. My younger son’s marriage brought many Hindus into our extended family and I try to understand this complicated religion.
In the years following the exiles’ return to Judah and the rebuilding of the Temple, adherence to the Law grew lax. Knowing how to live a Jewish life depended on knowing the commandments of the Torah but the people had drifted away from God and His word and were committing the same sins that got them exiled! More than fifty years after the Temple’s rebuilding, Ezra arrived in Jerusalem. As a priest and teacher of the law, Ezra was shocked to find such disobedience. He tore his clothes and pulled his hair in sorrow before kneeling in prayer. He led the people in prayers of confession and repentance after which they swore a solemn oath to follow the Lord’s commands.
The timelines in most Bibles indicate that the first captives were taken to Babylon in 605 BC and the first exiles returned to Judah in 538 BC. No matter how you figure it, the years don’t quite match Jeremiah’s prophecy of seventy years. Is “close” good enough for God or does He round up? If we are to trust Biblical prophecy, it should be accurate, and this apparent discrepancy is troubling.
Even without knowing what a petard is, we probably know that when someone gets “hoisted by his own petard,” he’s been foiled by his own scheme. When Shakespeare’s audience heard this phrase spoken by Hamlet in 1600, they knew a petard was a bomb. In the bard’s day, hoisted had more than one meaning. Along with lifted, it meant removed or taken out. Taken literally, Hamlet’s phrase meant that his enemy would be blown up by his own bomb!
Devotions of the Heart 