The Ethical Challenge of Jephthah’s Fulfilled Vow -- By: Robert B. Chisholm, Jr.

Journal: Bibliotheca Sacra
Volume: BSAC 167:668 (Oct 2010)
Article: The Ethical Challenge of Jephthah’s Fulfilled Vow
Author: Robert B. Chisholm, Jr.


The Ethical Challenge of Jephthah’s Fulfilled Vow

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 ...

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