The Ethical Challenge of Jephthah’s Fulfilled Vow

By Robert B. Chisholm Jr.

[Robert B. Chisholm Jr. is Chair and Professor of Old Testament Studies, Dallas Theological Seminary, Dallas, Texas.]

The scene is Jephthah’s altar, covered with the charred remains of his daughter. Just weeks before, this vibrant young woman, gyrating to the beat of her tambourine, was the first to greet her victorious father as he returned home from battle. But now she is reduced to a pile of ashes and bones. The smoke, laced with the odor of incinerated human flesh, drifts into the nostrils of those standing by, giving them a convenient excuse for eyes suddenly filled with tears. The sheer horror of the scene seems to demand silence. But then shrieks mixed with angry laments, largely in higher vocal ranges, come cascading back through the corridors of future ages, demanding an explanation for this atrocity committed against their sister.

Indeed, Jephthah’s fulfilled vow poses a major ethical challenge. In seeking to meet this challenge, at least four sets of questions must be addressed. (1) Did the divine Spirit prompt Jephthah to make this vow? If Jephthah were indeed empowered by the Spirit, would this not ensure that the vow was proper? (2) Did God really expect Jephthah to fulfill his grisly vow? Having made his vow, did Jephthah have any option other than to fulfill it? (3) What about the narrator? Does his icy reportorial style, devoid of editorializing, suggest that he justified Jephthah or worse yet, placed the blame for this tragedy on Jephthah’s daughter? (4) If God did not demand this holocaust from Jephthah, how then could He let such a thing happen in His name? Do not His inactivity and silence suggest complicity in the crime?

Before attempting to answer these questions, the nature of Jephthah’s vow must first be discussed. The remarks above assume that Jephthah did offer his daughter as a human sacrifice. Was this actually the case?

Did Jephthah Offer His Daughter As A Human Sacrifice?

The final clause in Jephthah’s vow in Judges 11:31 literally refers to a burnt offering (עֹלָה): “and I will offer up him/it [as] a burnt offering.” The language is the same as in 2 Kings 3:27, which tells how the Moabite king Mesha, in an effort to save himself from the attacking Israelite army, offered his firstborn son as a “burnt sacrifice” (עֹלָה).[1] The syntactical construction is the same in both texts: hiphil of עלה plus a suffixed pronoun functioning as a direct object plus עֹלָה functioning as an adverbial accusative.[2] Does this mean that Jephthah, like Mesha, was willing or even intended to offer a human being as a burnt sacrifice?

A closer look at the wording of the vow’s apodosis is in order. After the initial verb a masculine singular participle with the prefixed article appears, followed by a relative pronoun and third masculine singular verb (lit., “the one going out who goes out”). What did Jepththah have in mind? Was he expecting a human being to meet him or perhaps an animal? Unfortunately the language is not conclusive in answering that question. The substantival masculine singular participle (הַיּוֹצֵא, lit., “the one going out”) is used elsewhere of inanimate objects (Num. 21:13; 32:24) as well as persons (Jer. 5:6; 21:9; 38:2). In each case the context must determine the referent. The use of the infinitive לִקְרָאתִי, “to meet me,” can be used of animals as well as people (Judg. 14:5; Job 39:21). However, with the exception of Job 39:21, the collocation of the infinitive לִקְרָאת, “to meet,” and the verb יצא, “go out,” is used of persons, not animals. The construction of Iron Age houses would allow for an animal to come through the doors of a house,[3] but one must ask, Did animals typically greet returning conquerors?[4] It was far more likely that a woman would greet Jephthah (see 1 Sam. 18:6).[5] Of course all these considerations are academic. No matter what Jephthah’s intention may have been at the time of the vow, the fact that he actually did offer up his daughter indicates that the language of the vow was fluid enough to encompass human beings, including women.[6] He was willing and maybe even intending to make a human offering from the very beginning, though he apparently did not expect his daughter to meet him first.[7]

Because of the emphasis on the daughter’s virginity in Judges 11:37-39, some argue that Jephthah did not sacrifice his daughter, but instead devoted her to a life of celibacy as a servant of the Lord.[8] According to this view the apodosis in verse 31 would have to read, “He will belong to the Lord, or I will offer him up as a burnt sacrifice.”[9] In other words, if a human came through the doors, Jephthah would commit him or her to the Lord’s service (much as Hannah did with Samuel), but if an animal came through the doors, he would offer it up as a whole burnt offering to the Lord.[10] However, this understanding of the syntax is questionable, for the waw before the second clause is more naturally taken here as sequential or as explicative, specifying exactly how the one coming through the doors would become the Lord’s.[11] When the verbal sequence used here (a conjunction plus a perfect verbal form followed by another conjunction plus a perfect verbal form)[12] appears elsewhere in Joshua, Judges, and Samuel, the second verb can give a sequential or consequential action, provide a complementary idea, or specify the preceding action, but it never gives an alternative to the first verb.[13] This strongly suggests that Jephthah’s daughter became the Lord’s by being sacrificed to Him as a whole burnt offering or that she was formally declared to be the Lord’s and then as a consequence was sacrificed to Him.

The language of the vow’s fulfillment must also be considered. In verse 39 the statement “she did not know a man” (literal translation) is a disjunctive, not a consecutive, clause.[14] The disjunctive clause is both preceded and followed by wayyiqtol clauses. This same basic syntactical structure (wayyiqtol clause plus a disjunctive clause with an independent pronoun and a perfect verbal form plus a wayyiqtol clause) appears in several other passages. In these examples the disjunctive clause is usually contrastive (Gen. 32:23-24 [Eng., vv. 22-23]; 42:8-9; Judg. 3:18-19; 9:17-18; 10:12-13; 1 Kings 19:3-4; 2 Kings 5:24-25). In Judges 16:20-21 the disjunctive clause seems to be explanatory (lit., “he thought . . . for he did not know”); in 1 Samuel 25:37-38 it is either clarifying or consequential (lit., “His heart failed him, that is/so that he became like a stone”); and in 1 Kings 1:41 it is circumstantial or parenthetical (lit., “they heard it while they finished eating” or “they heard it—now they had finished eating”). The action or condition described in the disjunctive clause is concurrent with or subsequent to that of the preceding wayyiqtol clause, with the possible exception of 1 Kings 1:41. Unlike so many of these structurally parallel texts, the disjunctive clause in Judges 11:39 is not contrastive. Of the various options either of the two following would seem to fit best: (a) parenthetical: “He did to her as he had vowed—now she had never known/did not know a man”;[15] or (b) consequential: “He did to her as he had vowed and consequently she never knew a man.” This second approach would allow the celibacy view, but it fits the sacrificial view as well. When her father offered her up as a burnt offering, she died a virgin, depriving her of an opportunity to be a wife and mother, the expectation and desire of the typical Israelite young woman in that culture.[16]

Whether the clause is taken as parenthetical or consequential, the emphasis on her virginity highlights the tragedy of the event by noting her unrealized potential. While the syntax does not demand the sacrificial view, either understanding certainly allows it. The reference to her virginity is not a barrier to the sacrificial view.

Did The Divine Spirit Prompt Jephthah To Make His Vow?

Exum suggests that gaps in the text make it possible that “Jephthah makes his vow under the influence of Yhwh’s spirit.”[17]

She adds that the vow’s “position between the coming of the spirit of Yhwh upon Jephthah and the victory renders it impossible to determine whether victory comes as the result of the spirit, or the vow, or both.” However, Webb points out that the vow is clearly marked as an “interruption,” for verse 32 picks up where verse 29 left off.[18] An analysis of the clausal structure of the passage[19] bears this out (translation is the author’s):

v. 29a The Lord’s Spirit empowered Jephthah.

(wayyiqtol initiated: initiates new scene)

v. 29b He passed through Gilead and Manasseh

(wayyiqtol initiated: describes sequential action)

v. 29c and went to Mizpah in Gilead.

(wayyiqtol initiated: sequential action)

v. 29d From Mizpah in Gilead he approached the Ammonites.

(qatal disjunctive offline)[20]

v. 30a Jephthah made a vow to the Lord,

(wayyiqtol initiated: flashback)[21]

v. 30b saying,

(wayyiqtol initiated: focusing/specifying)

v. 30c “If you really do hand the Ammonites over to me,

v. 31 then whoever is the first to come through the doors of my house to meet me when I return safely from fighting the Ammonites—he will belong to the Lord and I will offer him up as a burnt sacrifice.”

v. 32a Jephthah approached the Ammonites to fight with them,

(wayyiqtol initiated: resumptive)

v. 32b and the Lord handed them over to him.

(wayyiqtol initiated: sequential action)

Of note is the disjunctive clause at the end of verse 29 and the resumptive clause at the beginning of verse 32 (where the verb עבר, “approach,” is repeated). Webb concludes that the text’s structure indicates that “while the victory is causally related to Jephthah’s endowment with the Spirit it is only incidentally related to the vow.”[22]

But even if the Spirit did not prompt the vow, would not the empowerment by the Spirit ensure that the vow was proper? When one surveys the evidence in the Book of Judges, it becomes apparent that the Spirit empowered recipients for physical conflict, but possession of the Spirit did not insulate the recipient from foolish behavior. This problem first surfaced with Gideon, who asked for a sign from God shortly after being endowed with the Spirit (6:34-40). Most assess Gideon’s request in a negative light, though one must admit that the text itself leaves it to the reader to decide which of Gideon’s actions should be attributed to the divine Spirit and which should not. In this regard Exum asks, “Is he no longer under the influence of the spirit when he asks for a sign or does the spirit not obviate the need for a sign?”[23] Olson draws attention to the fact that the empowerment by the Spirit left Gideon essentially unchanged. “Before the Spirit of the Lord comes upon him, Gideon is cowardly, hesitant, and secretive (6:11-33). After the Spirit of the Lord has come upon him (6:34), Gideon does not change.”[24] Noting that the Spirit’s presence did not have a positive effect on Jephthah or Samson, Olson concludes, “Othniel embodies the ancient ideal of a faithful judge empowered in a special way by the Spirit of the Lord. But when the divine Spirit gradually reappears in later judges, the Spirit is no longer a positive force. In the hands of unfaithful leaders like Gideon, Jephthah, and Samson, the divine Spirit becomes ineffectual and ultimately dangerous and destructive in the extreme.”[25] Olson seems to imply that the Spirit is a malevolent force in these later, post-Othniel accounts, or at least a powerful force that can be used for good or bad by the one who possesses it. If this is Olson’s intent, this viewpoint must be challenged. Gideon’s story demonstrates that possession of the divine Spirit did not automatically make one a paradigm of faith. God provided the capacity to act in faith, but human freedom remained operative and could thwart the Spirit’s positive influence. Despite the Spirit’s empowerment, Gideon lapsed into doubt. The same was true of Jephthah.[26]

Did Jephthah Have Any Option Other Than To Sacrifice His Daughter?

According to Block, Jephthah had two alternatives. First, Jephthah could have spared his daughter and “brought the curse down upon himself.”[27] However, it is unlikely that Jephthah would have thought in such individualistic terms. He probably would have assumed, perhaps correctly, that any curse falling on him would have a corporate dimension and that his daughter would be judged along with him. Either way his daughter was doomed. After all, the Old Testament is replete with examples of judgment encompassing an individual’s children. For example the Lord warned His enemies that their sin would have negative consequences for their family throughout their lifetime (Exod. 20:5; 34:7; Num. 14:18). Dathan’s, Abiram’s, and Achan’s innocent children died along with their sinful parents (Num. 16:27, 32; Josh. 7:24). David, with the Lord’s approval, allowed the Gibeonites to execute Saul’s seven sons because of their father’s crimes against that city (2 Sam. 21:1-9, 14). The Lord also took the lives of four of David’s sons because of his sin against Uriah (2 Sam. 12:5-6, 10; cf. 12:14-15; 13:28-29; 18:15; 1 Kings 2:25).[28]

Second, Block argues that Jephthah “could have followed the Mosaic Torah and paid twenty shekels to the priest at the central shrine as compensation for the life of his daughter.”[29] He adds, “Leviticus 27:1-8 regulates cases in which one person vows another, that is, devotes a person to the sanctuary for sacred service and then for reasons unspecified finds it impossible or impractical to fulfill the vow.”[30] However, it is unlikely that the Levitical law cited by Block is applicable in Jephthah’s situation. As Block admits, Jephthah’s situation is different in that he promised a burnt offering. Block nevertheless cites the rabbinical principle of qal wå˙ômer and states, “A rule that applied in a lesser case would certainly apply in a more serious case involving the very life of a human being.”[31] This seems far less than certain.

Contrary to Block’s proposal, Niditch views Jephthah’s vow as unredeemable because it was made in the context of war. She compares the language and syntax of Jephthah’s vow (Judg. 11:30-31) to “the vow of ḥerem” in Numbers 21:2-3. Though the root חרם is not used in Jephthah’s case, Niditch is convinced the institution of חֵרֶם underlies Jephthah’s war vow.[32] Following Niditch’s lead, one could argue on the basis of Leviticus 27:28-29 that Jephthah was unable to redeem his daughter because she had been devoted to the Lord (the verb חרם, “dedicate,” is used in vv. 28-29).[33] However, it is unlikely that this law is relevant to understanding Jephthah’s vow because the root חרם does not appear with reference to it.[34]

Janzen offers a better and simpler alternative. He points out that the deuteronomistic history makes it clear that “obeying is better than sacrificing.” Against the background of the deuteronomic law, “the question of child sacrifice is hardly a borderline issue.”[35] He states, “Jephthah’s vow should never have been made in the first place since it was, in reality, an illegal bribe; yet after it was made, Jephthah was certainly under no obligation to fulfill it and thus augment his sin.[36] Obeying is better than sacrifice here because, as in the case of Saul, Jephthah has a direct command from Yhwh—in his case in the form of deuteronomic law—that obviated the sacrifice. In Dtr’s eyes, when Israel wishes to sacrifice, it has an obligation to do so in a manner that does not, unlike the sacrifices of Saul, the Elides and Jephthah, contradict the will of Yhwh.”[37]

In other words if Jephthah had understood the Lord’s priorities and commands, he would have realized that fulfilling his vow simply compounded his crime. Of course therein lies the problem. After all, if he had known the Law, he would not have promised God a human sacrifice in the first place! Jephthah’s ignorance compounds the tragedy, for his daughter’s life could and should have been spared in accord with the principle that obedience supersedes sacrifice. But perhaps the most important point is this: No matter what Jephthah did or did not know about the Law, the Lord did not expect Jephthah to fulfill his vow and He should not be implicated in Jephthah’s crime. From the Lord’s perspective Jephthah had not backed himself into a corner where sacrificing his daughter was his only option. On the contrary, the Lord did not demand the fulfillment of a vow that violated His Law.

Did The Narrator Justify Jephthah?

Some authors are understandably troubled by the narrator’s apparent neutrality.[38] Fuchs goes even further, arguing that Jephthah’s indictment of his daughter (v. 35), while not necessarily reflecting the narrator’s point of view, is allowed to stand “as the only explicit evaluation of the daughter’s actions.”[39] The silence of the narrator and of God makes Jephthah a victim. She also contends that the daughter’s relatively calm and reasoned response (v. 36) endorses and justifies Jephthah’s point of view.[40] In short she argues that the narrational style is designed to protect both Jephthah and the Lord from criticism.[41]

An analysis of point of view is in order. Berlin speaks of “three senses in which the term point of view can be applied”: (1) The “perceptual point of view” is “the perspective through which the events of the narrative are perceived.” In Jepthah’s story the narrator is content to take the stance of a neutral observer and report the events objectively. He also reports, through quoted material, the perspectives of Jephthah and his daughter. (2) The “conceptual point of view” is “the perspective of attitudes, conceptions, world view.” This will be discussed below. (3) The “interest point of view” is “the perspective of someone’s benefit or disadvantage.” In this story the narrator’s focus is on Jephthah.[42]

Because the narrator’s focus of interest is Jephthah, the seemingly objective perceptual perspective actually reflects a father’s perspective, perhaps to create sympathy for Jephthah and highlight the tragic and ironic dimension of what happened. But this need not mean that the narrator blamed Jephthah’s daughter. Jephthah’s words display a realistic quality; when people face the consequences of their foolish behavior, they often try to place the blame elsewhere. Pressler calls his response “a classic case of blaming the victim.”[43] Perhaps the contrast between Jephthah’s irrational accusation and his daughter’s obedient demeanor highlights his folly, as well as her vulnerability. Assis points out that “Jephthah’s egocentricity does not allow him to see his daughter’s tragedy.”[44]

The narrator’s conceptual point of view is that of the deuteronomic law, familiarity with which he assumes on the part of his readers. As Römer points out, Deuteronomy forbids human sacrifice in no uncertain terms (12:29-31; 18:10).[45] Perhaps, in light of this, the narrator felt it unnecessary to offer moral commentary on Jephthah’s act. Sometimes, as photographic journalism has demonstrated, simple depiction is more effective than verbiage. The words of Bal, used with reference to the scene of the dead concubine in Judges 19, are applicable here: “Vision is a mode of speech in this horror-story.”[46] The simple, stark words, “he did to her as he had vowed” (v. 39), activate the imagination and conjure up an appalling image that prints the words “guilty” over the perpetrator.

The wider context of the story must also be taken into account.[47] The Book of Judges traces the changing roles of women in conjunction with the deterioration in male leadership. Against this background Jephthah’s daughter is definitely a sympathetic figure, while Jephthah’s folly marks a further descent in male leadership.[48]

The early chapters of Judges present an ideal of male leadership, especially through the portrait of Othniel. Unfortunately later judges, who were plagued by deficient faith (Barak, Gideon, Jephthah) and/or lack of wisdom (Gideon, Jephthah, Samson), failed to live up to this ideal.[49] By the end of Samson’s story Israel’s greatest warrior was reduced to a helpless and vulnerable female role, much like the Canaanite general Sisera earlier in the book. By the end of the book no leaders are present. Instead Israelite men were warring with each other and caused untold suffering for Israelite women.[50]

The changing roles of the women in tandem with the inadequate male leaders contribute to this account of Israel’s societal decline. In contrast to Acsah, who inspired mighty deeds, women were soon forced into other roles. Because of Barak’s weak faith and Gideon’s lack of wisdom, Deborah, Jael, and the unnamed woman in Thebez assumed the role of warriors, demonstrating the same courage, cunning, and prowess as the earlier heroes Othniel, Ehud, and Shamgar. As the male leaders continued to lose effectiveness and then disappeared altogether, the highly valued and heroic women of the early chapters step aside for the brutalized victims in the later chapters.

With Jephthah’s sacrifice of his daughter the crisis in Israelite leadership during this period is evident. After the chaos produced by Abimelech, the Yahweh-worshipping Jephthah seems to have restored quality leadership to Israel. But it is shocking to see that even a Yahweh-worshipper had become so pagan in his thinking that he would resort to human sacrifice to assure success. The radically changing role of the story’s major female character draws attention to the continuing decline in the quality of male leadership and in the society’s spiritual discernment. In the earlier stories women heroically delivered the nation from oppressors; now an Israelite woman becomes an innocent victim of her own father’s lack of faith and wisdom.[51] In contrast to Acsah, who received from her father Caleb a husband and a blessing in the form of life-giving springs, Jephthah’s unnamed daughter (unnamed to emphasize that she did not help carry on a genealogical line?) was doomed to a brief life of infertility culminating in a hideous death.[52] To make matters even worse, Jephthah’s slaughter of his own flesh and blood foreshadows his battle with Ephraim (his brothers, if he was from the tribe of Manasseh) and in turn the bloody civil war described in the book’s final chapters in which many Israelite women, like Jephthah’s daughter, became victims of a misplaced oath and male brutality.[53] The image of Jephthah’s daughter weeping as she walked over the hills (v. 38) foreshadows the nation’s weeping during and after the war with Benjamin (20:23, 26; 21:2).[54]

Janzen demonstrates that the account illustrates the “most important theme” of the deuteronomistic history, namely, “when Israel worships like foreigners, it will act like foreigners.”[55] In the literary sequence of the story Jephthah’s pagan sacrifice is followed by the Ephraimites’ invasion of Gilead, which mimics the Ammonite invasion at the beginning of the story.[56]

How Can God’s Silence Be Explained?

God’s silence, while puzzling and even disturbing, need not be interpreted in some fatalistic manner to mean that He required fulfillment of the vow or approved of the sacrifice.[57] Just because Jephthah ostensibly made his offering to God does not mean that God desired it or found it acceptable (see Mic. 6:6-8). The reality is that God grants humans the freedom to act against His antecedent (or in this case, moral) will.[58] Certainly one wishes God had spoken from the sky, as He did to Abraham, and prevented Jephthah from offering his daughter. However, God typically does not intervene to prevent immoral human acts, even when they seem to be done in His name. Commenting on this story, Bowman observes, “When human freedom to act in destructive ways is exercised, God does not intervene and compromise the exercise of this freedom. Instead the deity allows divine power to be constrained.”[59]

This is, of course, not the only instance in Judges where God was a silent, seemingly absent, observer while an atrocity was committed. How could God stand idly by and allow the men of Gibeah to perpetrate such a horrific crime against the Levite’s concubine? Unterman sees God’s silence as evidence that Gibeah was “a town abandoned by God.”[60] He attempts to demonstrate that Judges 19 contains verbal echoes of “the Binding of Isaac.”[61] The narrator intends to contrast God’s intervention for Isaac with God’s silence in Gibeah in order to highlight the fact that Gibeah was “a town unfit for man or God.”[62] Perhaps the report of God’s silence in Judges 11 facilitates a contrast between the pagan-like Jephthah, who proposed to God a human sacrifice as an illegal bribe, and the faithful Abraham, who responded in unwavering obedience to God’s seemingly irrational demand that he sacrifice the son of promise.

But this still fails to account adequately for the fact of God’s silence. Bowman addresses the problem of God’s silence in Gibeah from a theological angle. “Like that of Jephthah’s daughter, this story suggests that a human act of self-preservation results in innocent suffering. When human beings are irresponsible in exercising their freedom, God does not intervene. Instead God allows divine power to be constrained.”[63] Bowman then adds, “The Epilogue thus confirms and intensifies the emerging portrait of God in Judges, one in which the deity refrains from intervention in order to preserve the exercise of human freedom, even if that exercise results in innocent victims. It also confirms and intensifies the emerging portrayal of human beings as flawed in the exercise of their freedom. The narrator’s portrayals stress human responsibility, not divine accountability, and emphasize responsible human interaction, not responsive divine intervention.”[64]

Summary And Final Reflections

Four sets of questions were raised at the beginning of this article. The following paragraphs summarize the proposed answers.

First, the discourse structure of the text suggests that the Lord’s Spirit did not prompt or cause Jephthah to make his vow. In the period of the judges the Spirit empowered individuals for conflict, but possession of the Spirit did not prevent the recipient from acting foolishly.

Second, Jephthah did have an option other than sacrificing his daughter. Rather than fulfilling his improper vow, he should have realized that obedience is more important than sacrifice, and so he should have refused to follow through on his promise. But his thinking was so pagan that he failed to understand this. Indeed, if he had been aware of the deuteronomic law, he would never have vowed such a sacrifice in the first place nor attempted to bribe God.

Third, the narrator’s apparent neutrality does not mean he was justifying Jephthah. His seemingly cold, objective perceptual point of view actually reflects a fatherly perspective designed to generate sympathy for Jephthah, the narrator’s focus of interest. If the narrator’s conceptual point of view was the deuteronomic law, then he assumed his audience’s familiarity with the prohibition against human sacrifice and simply described the violation of this law in a reportorial style devoid of editorializing.

The wider context of the story must also be considered. The Book of Judges traces the changing roles of women in conjunction with deterioration in male leadership. Against this background Jephthah’s daughter is definitely a sympathetic figure, while Jephthah’s folly marks a further descent in leadership. With Jephthah’s sacrifice of his daughter, the crisis in Israelite leadership during this period is evident. The radically changing role of the story’s major female character draws attention to the continuing decline in the quality of male leadership.

Fourth, God’s silence should not be interpreted to mean that He required fulfillment of the vow or approved of the sacrifice. Just because Jephthah ostensibly made his offering to God does not mean that God desired it or found it acceptable. God grants humans the freedom to act against His moral will and typically allows the consequences of those free moral actions to unfold without His intervening.

Recognizing this fact should prompt believers to think long and hard about actions they contemplate, because they cannot assume God will intervene and prevent negative consequences or collateral damage. God has granted humans the dignity of causality, for better or worse. Possessing this freedom gives individuals genuine power to impact God’s world, either positively or negatively, but it also carries with it grave responsibility. In contrast to Jephthah, believers must make sure they know God’s standards and act accordingly. Otherwise their actions may be horrifying and bring frightening and tragic consequences.

Notes

1. Further evidence for human sacrifice exists even earlier than Mesha’s time. According to Richard Hess, an Egyptian relief from Medinet Habu, dating to the thirteenth century B.C., “depicts citizens of Ashkelon within their besieged walls raising incense burners to their deities and lifting up smaller figures, perhaps children who are about to be hurled to their deaths or in some other manner to be sacrificed for the salvation of their city” (Israelite Religions: An Archaeological and Biblical Survey [Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2007], 136). Here Hess correlates this evidence with the account of Jephthah’s sacrifice (ibid., 224-25).
2. In Genesis 22:13 the preposition לְ appears before עֹלָה, but it is omitted in both Judges 11:31 and 2 Kings 3:27.
3. See Robert G. Boling, Judges, Anchor Bible (New York: Doubleday, 1975), 208, contrary to George F. Moore, Judges, International Critical Commentary (Edinburgh: Clark, 1895), 299-300. Philip J. King and Lawrence E. Stager point out that livestock occupied the ground floor of the typical pillared house in Iron Age Israel (Life in Biblical Israel [Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2001], 34); for a drawing of such a house see p. 29. Robert D. Miller II, describing the typical house in the highlands of Palestine during the period 1200-1000 B.C., observes, “One of the first-floor rooms was a court for the animals” (Chieftains of the Highland Clans: A History of Israel in the 12th and 11th Centuries B.C. [Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2005], 98). Herbert C. Brichto seems to overlook this fact. He comments, “Animals come out of barn sheds and paddocks, not out of a house’s doors” (Toward a Grammar of Biblical Poetics: Tales of the Prophets [New York: Oxford University Press, 1992], 211).
4. Mieke Bal, Death and Dissymmetry: The Politics of Coherence in the Book of Judges (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1988), 45. See also Yaira Amit, The Book of Judges: The Art of Editing (Leiden: Brill, 1999), 88.
5. Esther Fuchs, Sexual Politics in the Biblical Narrative: Reading the Hebrew Bible as a Woman, Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplements (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 2000), 183; and Naomi Steinberg, “The Problem of Human Sacrifice in War: An Analysis of Judges 11,” in On the Way to Nineveh: Studies in Honor of George M. Landes, ed. S. L. Cook and S. C. Winter (Atlanta: Scholars, 1999), 125.
6. Jephthah did not object to offering his daughter on the basis of the gender of the form used in the vow. From his perspective the masculine form was fluid enough to include a female.
7. Tony W. Cartledge, Vows in the Hebrew Bible and the Ancient Near East, Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplements (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1992), 179-80.
8. For a survey of the history of interpretation of Jephthah’s vow see David M. Gunn, Judges, Blackwell Bible Commentaries (Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2005), 133-69. For a study of how Judges 11:30-40 has been viewed in Jewish and historical-critical circles see Alexandra Rottzoll and Dirk U. Rottzoll, “Die Erzählung von Jiftach und seiner Tochter (Jdc 11,30-40) in der mittelalterlich-jüdischen und historisch-kritischen Bibelexegese,” Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft 115 (2003): 210-30. For a brief survey of some Christian readings of the story see J. L. Thompson, “Preaching Texts of Terror in the Book of Judges: How Does the History of Interpretation Help?” Calvin Theological Journal 37 (2002): 49-61. Cornelis Houtman examines some ways in which the story has been treated in Christian devotional literature (“Rewriting a Dramatic Old Testament Story: The Story of Jephthah and His Daughter in Some Examples of Christian Devotional Literature,” Biblical Interpretation 13 [2005]: 167-90). B. P. Robinson discusses various ways in which the details have been understood in the history of interpretation (“The Story of Jephthah and His Daughter: Then and Now,” Biblica [2004]: 331-48). Christopher T. Begg analyzes Josephus’s version of the Jephthah story (“The Josephan Judge Jephthah,” Scandinavian Journal of the Old Testament 20 [2006]: 161-88). For further analysis of historical Jewish interpretation see Shulamit Valler, “The Story of Jephthah’s Daughter in the Midrash,” in Judges: A Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series), ed. A. Brenner (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1999), 48-66; and P. S. Kramer, “Jephthah’s Daughter: A Thematic Approach to the Narrative as Seen in Selected Rabbinical Exegesis and in Artwork,” in Judges: A Feminist Companion to the Bible (Second Series), 67-92.
9. The structure of the entire apodosis is unique. The initial וַהָיָה (v. 31a) introduces the apodosis, “then (it will be).” It is followed by a substantival participle (הַיּוֹצֵא, lit., “the one going out”), a relative clause (with relative pronoun, imperfect verb, prepositional phrase, and infinitive construct), and a temporal clause (with a preposition, infinitive construct, and two prepositional phrases), but there is no predicate complementing הַיּוֹצֵא. One expects an imperfect verbal form to appear (see Josh. 7:15; 1 Kings 19:17; Isa. 24:18). Instead another וַהָיָה appears; it seems to provide the complement for the initial participle. This may be translated literally, “Then [it will be] the one coming out, who comes out from the doors of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the Ammonites, [then he] will become the Lord’s.”
10. Some take a different approach. Brichto, appealing to the law of the firstborn in Exodus 13:11-13, argues that Jephthah intended to offer an animal from the very beginning (Toward a Grammar of Biblical Poetics, 213-14). When his daughter appeared, Jephthah had to redeem her by offering an animal in her place. But this meant she belonged to the Lord and could not be married. He writes, “If Jephthah’s daughter now belonged to YHWH, she could not be given or taken in marriage. By cloistering her off from contact with any male, Jephthah would have ‘executed upon her the vow he had taken’ ” (p. 214). Pamela T. Reis offers a unique interpretation (Reading the Lines: A Fresh Look at the Hebrew Bible [Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2002], 105-30). She proposes that Jephthah vowed to offer the first servant who met him as if he or she were a burnt offering. In other words the language is metaphorical (p. 114). In her view Jephthah was trying to motivate the men of Gilead to support him in the upcoming battle. He promised to dedicate a servant to the Lord in the sense that he would pay a redemption price for the person, releasing him or her from the ordinary responsibilities of work. (For a woman this would include the “work” of bearing children.) By showing his willingness to absorb such a financial loss, Jephthah was demonstrating to the Gileadites that he was a generous man, willing to share the spoils of victory with his men, and he was also suggesting that the victory would prove to be lucrative. There would be many servants among the spoil, thereby making it easy to replace the one dedicated (ibid., 114-15). According to Reis, Jephthah’s daughter knew about the vow and purposely greeted him first. Why? Reis argues that it was customary for women to greet victorious warriors. Jephthah’s daughter, a spoiled child in Reis’s view, perhaps assumed her father would iron out any problems related to the vow (ibid., 126). But Reis then suggests that the daughter may have acted in order “to defy convention and continue to be the one and only love of an extremely indulgent father [rather] than become some man’s first wife” (ibid.). When her father responded in anger, she decided to undo the consequences. She made a foray into the mountains to appeal to local pagan gods to intervene on her behalf, but to no avail (ibid.). In this scenario the Israelite women did not mourn what happened to Jephthah’s daughter (v. 40). Instead they celebrated “her choice of independence and self-determination” and triumphed in “one young woman’s achievement of autonomy” and “her success in shaping her own life” (ibid., 127). Reis’s proposed explanation for Jephthah’s daughter’s motivation seems far-fetched. It transforms an ancient Israelite young woman who, like virtually every other woman in that patriarchal society, would have accepted her primary life’s role as entailing marriage and motherhood, into a very modern, Westernized-looking, spoiled brat who managed to escape the responsibilities of work and childbearing and in so doing became the “poster child” for her fellow ancient Israelite feminists!
11. The expression “belong to the Lord” (הָיָה לַיהוָה) is neither a technical phrase for sacrifice (though see Lev. 23:18) nor for dedicating a person to the Lord. It can be used of sacrifices (Lev. 23:18, 20; 27:32), priests (1 Kings 2:27), altars (Isa. 19:19), memorials (Isa. 55:13), and worshippers (Mal. 3:3).
12. This differs from cases where a perfect with waw introduces an apodosis after a perfect with waw in the protasis (see, e.g., Judg. 1:12 and 1 Sam. 17:9).
13. See, among others, Joshua 1:15; 4:3; 6:18; 7:9; 20:4; 23:12, 16; 24:20; Judges 2:18; 4:6, 20; 6:18; 11:8; 13:3; 16:7, 11, 17; 19:9; 21:21; 1 Samuel 1:22; 2:15, 35; 4:9; 6:8; 8:20; 9:8, 19; 10:3-4, 6; 12:14; 14:34; 15:3; 16:2, 23; 17:35, 46; 19:2-3; 23:2, 23; 25:5, 31; 31:4; 2 Samuel 6:22; 7:10, 12; 9:10; 11:15; 12:11, 16, 22; 14:3, 26; 15:2, 5, 14, 25; 17:2, 9, 17. Judges 16:17 is particularly noteworthy because within the apodosis a first person perfect verbal form follows a third person form (note וַסָר, “would leave”) as in Judges 11:31b. The second verb is consequential or reiterative-complementary in its relationship to the first (Samson’s loss of strength made him weak, just like other men). See also Genesis 34:15-16 and Exodus 18:16, where the apodosis of a conditional sentence has at least two perfects (each with the prefixed conjunction) describing sequential or complementary actions, but not alternatives.
14. As Moore points out, the pronoun הִיא, “she,” would not be inserted before the negated verb if this clause were part of the basic narratival framework (Judges, 303).
15. In this case it is not clear if the perfect has a past perfect or simple past function.
16. See the insightful comments of C. A. Brown, “Judges,” in Joshua, Judges, Ruth (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2000), 230-31.
17. J. Cheryl Exum, Tragedy and Biblical Narrative (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 49-50.
18. Barry G. Webb, The Book of Judges: An Integrated Reading, Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplements (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1987), 62-63.
19. The layout below marks wayyiqtol clauses with roman type, the disjunctive clause with boldface type, and quoted speech with italics.
20. The disjunctive clause in verse 29d appears to signal a transition to the actual battle account after a description of the preliminaries. This view of its function finds support in verse 32a, where the statement is essentially repeated and followed by a reference to the battle proper. The repetition in verse 32a gives the impression that the narrative has been interrupted and the battle unnecessarily delayed by the negotiations described in verses 30-31. David A. Dawson views the final clause of verse 29 as the conclusion to what he calls the “aperture section” of the battle episode (Text-linguistics and Biblical Hebrew, Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplements [Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1994], 159). Whether one calls it introductory (to the battle proper) or concluding (to the prologue to the battle proper), it clearly marks a boundary within the scene.
21. The wayyiqtol clause in verse 30a seems to carry on the action within this scene, but the resumptive nature of verse 32a (cf. v. 29d) suggests this may not be an ordinary sequential account of events. Verses 30-31 can be viewed as a flashback embedded within the main narrative. Another option is that verses 29d and 32a describe Jephthah’s approach as a two-stage process. In this case verse 30a is initiatory and verse 32a sequential. Even in this scenario the use of the disjunctive clause in 29d suggests that the vow is not a consequence of the empowerment by the Spirit.
22. Webb, The Book of Judges: An Integrated Reading, 62-63 (italics his).
23. Exum, Tragedy and Biblical Narrative, 164 n. 7.
24. Dennis T. Olson, “The Book of Judges,” in The New Interpreter’s Bible (Nashville: Abingdon: 1998), 2:767 (see also 2:802).
25. Ibid., 767-68.
26. In Samson’s case the actions prompted by the Spirit should not be viewed in a negative light. Downplaying the divine Spirit’s role in the killing of the Ashkelonites, K. Lawson Younger Jr. accuses Samson of “murder and larceny” (Judges and Ruth, NIV Application Commentary [Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2002], 304). Olson contends that the Lord’s Spirit “impels Samson to act powerfully but with unthinking impulse, violence, and faithlessness” (“The Book of Judges,” 767). In Samson’s experience the Spirit is “no longer a positive force” (ibid., 768). On the contrary “the divine Spirit becomes ineffectual and ultimately dangerous and destructive in the extreme” (ibid.). According to Olson, the Spirit prompted Samson to kill the lion (14:6) and in so doing to break “the nazirite prohibition of touching a corpse or eating anything unclean” (ibid., 850-51). He also empowered Samson to murder the Ashkelonites and to steal their clothing, thus violating two commandments of the Decalogue (Deut. 5:17, 19). However, it is not certain that the rule about touching corpses applied in Samson’s case. Even if it did, it is not certain that the rule pertained to animal corpses. Furthermore, given Samson’s calling to be a warrior, it is doubtful that Numbers 6:9 applied in his case. See Robert B. Chisholm Jr., “Identity Crisis: Assessing Samson’s Birth and Career,” Bibliotheca Sacra 170 (April–June 2009): 155-61. As for Samson’s alleged violations of the commandments prohibiting murder and theft, these rules would not apply to acts of divinely sanctioned war. Samson’s murderous act, prompted by the Spirit of the Lord, is problematic for many modern readers. However, like Ehud’s assassination of Eglon, it should not be viewed in isolation. Ehud’s murderous deed initiated a divinely sanctioned war of liberation against the oppressive Moabites. Likewise Samson’s murderous deed should be viewed as an act of divinely sanctioned war against the oppressive Philistines. From the very beginning of the story the Lord obviously intended to deliver Israel from the Philistines through Samson (Judg. 13:5). The narrator later stated that the Lord nudged Samson in the direction of the Philistines in order to ignite a conflict (14:4). Having laid the foundation for strife, the Lord’s Spirit empowered Samson to inaugurate the war. This does not mean that Samson understood his actions in this light. This is where Ehud and Samson differed. Ehud was aware that he was leading a war of liberation. Samson was unaware of his role as God’s deliverer; he was simply expressing his indignation at being cheated. But Samson’s very human, selfish response to Philistine trickery became a weapon of war in the Lord’s hand.
27. Daniel I. Block, Judges, Ruth, New American Commentary (Nashville: Broadman & Holman, 1999), 377.
28. For a detailed study of the theme of corporate punishment in the Old Testament see Joel S. Kaminsky, Corporate Responsibility in the Hebrew Bible, Journal for the Study of the Old Testament Supplements (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1995).
29. Block, Judges, Ruth, 377. This view seems to reflect the interpretation of the Targum. Younger states that Jephthah was “tragically” ignorant of the law of redemption (Judges and Ruth, 265, including n. 57). Contrary to what Block states, Leviticus 27:5 suggests that the conversion price for Jephthah’s daughter (if she was between the ages of five and twenty) would have been ten shekels, not twenty.
30. Block, Judges, Ruth, 377.
31. Ibid.
32. Susan Niditch, War in the Hebrew Bible (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993), 33-34. See also Alice Logan, “Rehabilitating Jephthah,” Journal for Biblical Literature 128 (2009), 665-85.
33. Logan, “Rehabilitating Jephthah,” 682.
34. Logan contends that Jephthah’s action, when viewed in its historical and cultural context, would have been viewed as commendable (ibid., 665-85). Her argument is unconvincing, because, as noted above, it is based on the faulty notion that Jephthah’s vow must be understood in light of the institution of חֵרֶם, when in fact the term is not used here. She argues that ancient readers would understand and agree that Jephthah’s war vow would have to be fulfilled. But she overlooks the fact that this war vow is presented as a bribe to the Lord, in violation of Deuteronomic law (see below). Her proposal that the language of Judges 11:30, 36, 39 echoes Numbers 21:2 and 30:2 is convincing, but she misinterprets the significance of these intertextual connections. She states that “to educated Israelites,” familiar with the Numbers traditions, the intertextual citations “would have been recognized as legal arguments advanced to convince them that Jephthah’s act was not only sanctioned but also mandated by God” (p. 680). On the contrary, the echoes have an ironic function here. Jephthah’s vow (v. 30), while constructed like that of Numbers 21:2, is a perversion of the war vow because of its pagan (offering a human sacrifice) and illegal (equivalent to a bribe) nature (see below). His daughter tragically adhered to an ancient principle of vow-keeping (v. 36; cf. Num. 30:2) in a context where the principle was invalidated by the nature of the vow. Finally the narrator’s observation that he fulfilled his vow (v. 39), in words that echo Numbers 30:2, simply adds to the tragic irony of the scene, rather than giving legal sanction to his actions.
35. David Janzen, “Why the Deuteronomist Told about the Sacrifice of Jephthah’s Daughter,” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 29 (2005): 345.
36. Jephthah’s vow was wrong, first and foremost, because it promised a human sacrifice, in violation of deuteronomic law. Janzen characterizes Jephthah’s vow as an “illegal bribe.” Likewise Webb comments, “Ironically, after resting his case confidently with Yahweh the judge (11.27), Jephthah now slips a bribe under the table” (The Book of Judges, 64). Olson argues that this bribe violated an important principle of deuteronomic law. He maintains that the vow was inappropriate “in this particular context” because it was a “bribe” designed “to influence the divine judge in the context of a court case.” He explains, “Jephthah has himself set up the conflict with the Ammonites as a court battle with the Lord as judge (11:27). According to Deuteronomy’s laws, bribes to judges are strictly prohibited lest they influence judges’ decisions (Deut. 16:19). This prohibition is grounded in Israel’s understanding of God, who ‘is not partial and takes no bribe’ (Deut 10:17NRSV). Thus Jephthah’s vow in itself violates a deeply held Israelite norm in regard to the prohibition of gifts or bribes to judges” (“The Book of Judges,” 832).
37. Janzen, “Why the Deuteronomist Told about the Sacrifice of Jephthah’s Daughter,” 345-46.
38. See for example J. Cheryl Exum, “The Centre Cannot Hold: Thematic and Textual Instabilities in Judges,” Catholic Biblical Quarterly 52 (1990): 422; and Thomas Römer, “Why Would the Deuteronomists Tell about the Sacrifice of Jephthah’s Daughter?” Journal for the Study of the Old Testament 77 (1998): 37.
39. Fuchs, Sexual Politics in the Biblical Narrative, 186-87.
40. Ibid., 190.
41. Ibid., 193.
42. Adele Berlin, Poetics and Interpretation of Biblical Narrative (Sheffield: Almond, 1983), 47.
43. Carolyn Pressler, Joshua, Judges, and Ruth, Westminster Bible Companion (Louisville: Westminster John Knox, 2002), 204.
44. Elie Assis, Self-interest or Communal Interest: An Ideology of Leadership in the Gideon, Abimelech and Jephthah Narratives (Judg 6-12), Vetus Testamentum Supplements (Leiden: Brill, 2005), 216.
45. Römer, “Why Would the Deuteronomists Tell about the Sacrifice of Jephthah’s Daughter?” 30.
46. Mieke Bal, “A Body of Writing: Judges 19,” in Judges: A Feminist Companion to the Bible, ed. A. Brenner (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic, 1993), 222.
47. In this regard see J. Clinton McCann, Judges, Interpretation (Louisville: John Knox, 2002), 83-85.
48. See Robert B. Chisholm Jr., “The Role of Women in the Rhetorical Strategy of the Book of Judges,” in Integrity of Heart, Skillfulness of Hands, ed. Charles H. Dyer and Roy B. Zuck (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1994), 34-46.
49. Like Barak and Gideon (Judg. 4:8; 6:17, 36-37), Jephthah’s use of “if” prior to the battle testifies to his uncertainty about its outcome and testifies to his deficient faith. The closest parallels to Jephthah’s vow are in 14:12 and 16:11. In both passages, as in 11:30-31, the protasis has the conditional אִם followed by the infinitive absolute and imperfect, whereas the apodosis, introduced by a weqatal, states a promise or guaranteed outcome if the action proposed in the protasis is realized. Phyllis Trible suggests that the presence of the infinitive absolute in Jephthah’s vow signals his uncertainty and insecurity. By using this emphatic form, Jephthah seems to have been “pushing the bargaining mode of discourse to its limit” (Texts of Terror: Literary-Feminist Readings of Biblical Narratives [Philadelphia: Fortress, 1984], 96). However, in two of the three other cases where a vow is introduced by a formula utilizing a wayyiqtol form of נדר, “swear,” the infinitive absolute appears before the imperfect (cf. Num. 21:2; 1 Sam. 1:11, in contrast to Gen. 28:20). (See also 2 Sam. 15:8, where a qatal form appears in the introductory formula and an infinitive absolute [cf. qere] precedes the yiqtol verb in the protasis.) So the syntax appears to reflect the vowing idiom, rather than some unique emphasis on Jephthah’s part. In these other vows אִם is conditional, and the imperfect is hypothetical. For a study of these texts see David Marcus, Jephthah and His Vow (Lubbock, TX: Texas Tech University, 1986), 18-21. Gregory T. K. Wong argues that one can detect a weakness of faith in Samson as well (cf. 15:18). In fact Samson’s weakness comes after a God-given victory, in contrast to earlier judges who expressed weakness of faith prior to victory (Compositional Strategy of the Book of Judges, Vetus Testamentum Supplements [Leiden: Brill, 2006], 163-65). Wong also proposes that one can detect an “increasing prominence” in “self-interest as motivation” for action as one moves from Gideon to Jephthah to Samson (ibid., 165-76). This contributes to the theme of deteriorating leadership in the book’s central section.
50. Anyone familiar with Hebrews 11 might object that this appraisal of the judges is overly negative. After all, in Hebrews 11:32 the judges Gideon, Barak, Samson, and Jephthah are listed, along with Samuel, David, and the prophets, as examples of those who accomplished great deeds through faith. In the case of the judges the narrator probably has in mind the conquering of kingdoms (v. 33) and the defeating of foreign armies through mighty exploits in battle (v. 34). Of course each of the judges listed won significant victories over foreign enemies and each exhibited a degree of faith in doing so. The point of Hebrews 11 seems to be that God can accomplish great things through human instruments when faith is present, as illustrated by the experience of the judges and others. The narrator’s use of the Old Testament text in this regard is neither strained nor improper.
51. L. Juliana M. Claassens makes a strong case for seeing wisdom themes in the Jephthah story (“Theme and Function in the Jephthah Narrative,” Journal of Northwest Semitic Languages 23 [1997]: 211). “In view of these wisdom elements, it is possible that Jephthah is portrayed as someone who was not wise, somebody whose example therefore was not to be followed. This notion is particularly compelling considering that the wisdom tradition . . . implies that wisdom can commonly be associated with speech, especially in societies which are orally inclined. A person was considered wise when he/she knew what to say and even more important when to say it. . . . Consequently it can be said that Jephthah’s behaviour is that of a foolish person” (ibid., italics hers). See also L. Juliana M. Claassens, “Notes on Characterisation in the Jephthah Narrative,” Journal of Northwest Semitic Languages 22 (1996): 114. She contends that the main theme of the story is “the danger of impulsive speech, so often warned against by Israelite sages” (ibid., italics hers).
52. Pressler, Joshua, Judges, and Ruth, 207. In this regard note also the sharp contrast between childless Jephthah and the so-called minor judges (mentioned both before and after the Jephthah story), who had numerous offspring (10:4; 12:9, 14). See E. T. Mullen Jr., Narrative History and Ethnic Boundaries (Atlanta: Scholars, 1993), 156 n. 97.
53. Exum, “The Centre Cannot Hold,” 423, 430. Of course the foreshadowing is at the literary level only, for the events of chapters 20-21 seem to have occurred chronologically before Jephthah’s conflict with the Ephraimites.
54. McCann, Judges, 87.
55. Janzen, “Why the Deuteronomist Told about the Sacrifice of Jephthah’s Daughter,” 341.
56. Ibid., 352-53.
57. See Römer, who cites Ecclesiastes 5:3-4 (“Why Would the Deuteronomists Tell about the Sacrifice of Jephthah’s Daughter?” 37-38); and Janzen, “Why the Deuteronomist Told about the Sacrifice of Jephthah’s Daughter,” 344-46.
58. For an insightful discussion of this point see C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity (New York: Macmillan, 1979), 52-53.
59. Richard G. Bowman, “Narrative Criticism: Human Purpose in Conflict with Divine Presence,” in Judges and Method: New Approaches in Biblical Studies, ed. G. A. Yee (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1995), 37. See also McCann, Judges, 86-87.
60. Jeremiah Unterman, “The Literary Influence of ‘The Binding of Isaac’ (Genesis 22) on ‘The Outrage of Gibeah’ (Judges 19),” Hebrew Annual Review 4 (1980): 164.
61. Ibid., 161-64. See also Trible, Texts of Terror, 80.
62. Unterman, “The Literary Influence of ‘The Binding of Isaac’ (Genesis 22) on ‘The Outrage of Gibeah’ (Judges 19),” 164.
63. Bowman, “Narrative Criticism: Human Purpose in Conflict with Divine Presence,” 41.
64. Ibid.