Today’s post is about a person from the Bible that has a strange story. Her story is very intertwined with the story of her father, Jephthah. Before we get into the nitty gritty of why we should care about Jephthah’s daughter, note that in the Bible (or even in tradition itself) we never find out what her name actually is. So in our post I will refer to her as JD. 

Side note: JD are two of my initials. When I was a little child, I used to love to listen to my mom make up stories. The main character of her stories was always JD (to represent me). JD’s parents had the same initials as my parents, too. My mom would tell the most extravagant stories of JD going on different adventures and having different careers. I especially loved listening to these made up stories during our long car rides. Twenty years later I would love to hear one of those silly made up stories again, but that’s not how life worked out. While the made up JD always had a happy ending, the JD in our post today did not.

Basic Story

In the book of Judges we see an Israel that has no king but God. They are spread around the area of modern day Israel, mostly clustered among their own tribes. During this time there is an apparent cycle of prosperity, sin and destruction as the people try to be self-sufficient, the crying out to God by the people dealing with destruction, God appointing a judge (more like a military leader than the judicial judges of 2024), victories by the judge, and then back to a short time of prosperity. Most of the judges during this time had apparent flaws, but also accomplished big things for the Israelite people. 

Now that we got that boring background out of the way, let’s jump into our main characters: Jephthah and his daughter. Jephthah is the judge that we read about in Judges 11. Look how he is described in verse one:

Jephthah the Gileadite was a valiant warrior, but he was the son of a prostitute, and Gilead was his father. Judges 11:1 CSB

Jephthah - a valiant warrior. Brave, fearless, courageous, heroic, daring, audacious, confident, determined, unwavering. That was his character. But he was the son of a prostitute, which meant he had no inheritance and essentially no value to society. After running away from his home, he met up with some “worthless men” (the CSB actually calls them that, lol. ) The NIV refers to them as a gang of scoundrels. Essentially Jephthah becomes the leader of this gang of outlaws. Can you even imagine God using a guy like this?

Well, his reputation must have become well known because the elders back in his hometown seek him out to ask for help in fighting against the Ammonites. Jephthah reminds the Ammonite king of the history of the Israelites. (This tidbit is important for us to remember because it shows that Jephthah does understand the laws of the Bible.)

That brings us to verse 29, where the Spirit of the Lord comes on Jephthah and he crosses over to the Ammonite land. He’s got to be feeling brave and courageous and ready for a fight. In those feelings, he makes a vow to God.

Jephthah made this vow to the Lord: “If you in fact hand over the Ammonites to me, whoever comes out the doors of my house to greet me when I return safely from the Ammonites will belong to the Lord, and I will offer that person as a burnt offering.” Judges 11:30-31 CSB 

And Jephthah made a vow to the Lord and said, “If you will give the Ammonites into my hand,  then whatever comes out from the doors of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the Ammonites shall be the Lord's, and I will offer it up for a burnt offering.” Judges 11:30-31 ESV

Jephthah seems pretty ready to win with a promise like that, right? I purposely gave you the verses in two different versions. Some commentaries state that the Hebrew word ‘whoever’ is the same as ‘whatever.’ Also note another variation in the ending. CSB says “will belong to the Lord, and I will offer that person as a burnt offering.” ESV says “shall be the Lord’s, and I will offer it up for a burnt offering.” We’ll come back to this.

So Jephthah makes this bold statement / vow / bargain with God. Of course he wins the battle and goes home all excited and victorious. And guess who walks out of his front door? Yep! His daughter, or JD.

When Jephthah went to his home in Mizpah, there was his daughter, coming out to meet him with tambourines and dancing! She was his only child; he had no other son or daughter besides her. When he saw her, he tore his clothes and said, “No! Not my daughter! You have devastated me! You have brought great misery on me. I have given my word to the Lord and cannot take it back.” Judges 11:34-35 CSB

The tradition at the time was for people of the household to meet their victorious warrior outside with singing, dancing, and cheering to celebrate. Keeping that in mind, I find it so odd that Jephthah would be upset or surprised to see his daughter, his only child, come out of the house to welcome him home. Also, I would be so hurt if I were JD, going out to sing and dance to welcome my father home from winning a great battle, and his response to me was “you have devastated me!” Um, rude. 

Anyways, look how JD responds: 

Then she said to him, “My father, you have given your word to the Lord. Do to me as you have said, for the Lord brought vengeance on your enemies, the Ammonites.” She also said to her father, “Let me do this one thing: Let me wander two months through the mountains with my friends and mourn my virginity.” Judges 11:36-37 CSB

HOLD ON JUST A MINUTE. What? This is just plain weird. Don’t you think? This makes me wonder if JD knew about Jephthah’s vow / promise / bargain beforehand. We can’t know for sure, but it almost appears that way. She clearly understands how important keeping your word to God is. Then she makes one small tiny request- to go on a two month long vacay with her girlfriends to mourn her virginity. What in the world?! But it gets better: 

“Go,” he said. And he sent her away two months. So she left with her friends and mourned her virginity as she wandered through the mountains. At the end of two months, she returned to her father, and he kept the vow he had made about her. And she had never been intimate with a man. Now it became a custom in Israel that four days each year the young women of Israel would commemorate the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite. Judges 11:38-40 CSB

Daddy Jephthah lets JD go on her vacation in the mountains. That’s sweet, right? And when she returned, it says “he kept the vow he had made about her.” Yikes. That leads us to believe he offered her as a burnt offering. But then we read that she was never able to be intimate with a man, and then the Israelite women made a customary remembrance each year in honor of JD. 

Well, now I have lots of questions. 

• If Jephthah knew the laws of the Bible as well as he seemed to, how would he not have known that it was against God’s laws to sacrifice people?

• If Jephthah was about to kill JD, why was she so vain as to mourn her virginity instead of her life? And why didn’t she just run away while on her mountain vacay?

• Where in the world is JD’s mom at this time? Why didn’t she knock some sense into Jephthah? 

• Did Jephthah really sacrifice his daughter?

Scholars are divided on the answers to these questions. I seem to agree more with the scholars and commentators that argue semantics (the way things are worded). This would mean Jephthah’s vow was more about ‘whatever’ than ‘whoever’ came out of the house. And that his vow was to give that ‘whatever’ to God OR allow it to be given as a burnt offering. The reasoning behind this is that in Hebrew the same conjunction word is used for both “and” and “or”. Seems to make sense, right? Following this train of thought makes JD mourning her virginity make more sense because if she was dedicated to God that would mean she would have to be a servant of His and never marry or have her own family. Again, we don’t know for sure the answers to my (and probably your) questions. 

What do we know about her?

JD was reliable. She obviously loved and respected her father. She kept her word and knew the importance of keeping your word to God. 

What can we learn from this situation?

I think one huge take away from this story is the reminder of how important our words and especially our promises are. We tend to exaggerate everything in our culture today. I even caught myself doing it today when I was describing finding a worm on me after doing yard work. I told Mel, “It was so awful.” But was it, DeeDee? No. It was gross, but it was easily solved and I was able to go about my day. So why did I feel the need to exaggerate the situation? Why do we feel the need to do so about so many things in life? “This is the best pizza in the whole world.” “I love you to the moon and back.” “You are my best friend forever.” 

Jesus commands us in Matthew 5:37- But let your ‘yes’ mean ‘yes,’ and your ‘no’ mean ‘no.’ Anything more than this is from the evil one.

So, as we go about today, let us use our words wisely. Let us not make promises that we don’t want to keep, or may even forget we made. May we say ‘yes’ and mean it, and say ‘no’ and mean it. And for Pete’s sake, let us not think we are big and bad enough to try and bargain with the One True God, who is greater and wiser and more powerful than we can begin to imagine.