{"id":55754,"date":"2019-05-19T16:14:08","date_gmt":"2019-05-19T13:14:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=55754"},"modified":"2022-12-11T15:07:34","modified_gmt":"2022-12-11T13:07:34","slug":"jephthah-and-his-daughter-from-the-bible-on","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/jephthah-and-his-daughter-from-the-bible-on\/","title":{"rendered":"Jephthah And His Daughter \u2013 From The Bible On"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[690,384,363],"acf":{"old_id":"55754","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":33877,"related_cahpter":"222","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"God\u2019s midrashic response to Jephthah\u2019s vow - not what you might have expected\u2026.","content":"

Our chapter relates the story of Jephthah the Gileadite, a mighty warrior, whose father was Gilead and whose mother was a prostitute (Judges 11:1). After his half-brothers reject him, denying him any share in the inheritance of their common father, Jephthah goes off to the Land of Tov, where he gathers about him a gang of good-for-nothings (vv. 2-3). When the Ammonites attack Israel, the elders of Gilead go to Jephthah and beg him to be their commander in their war with the Ammonites (verse 4). <\/span><\/p>\n

Before Jephthah advances against the Ammonites, tragically, he makes his well-know vow to God. After defeating the Ammonites, when Jephthah returns to his home, he is met by his daughter, \u201cdancing to the sound of timbrels\u201d. When Jephthah sees her, he tears his clothes and cries out: \u201cOh no, my daughter! I have made a vow to the Lord that I cannot break\u201d. \u00a0She replies: \u201cMy father! \u2026 Do to me just as you promised \u2026But grant me this one request. Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry\u201d. She and her friends go into the hills and weep because she would never marry. After the two months, she returns to her father, and he sacrifices her as he had vowed. And from then on, the young women of Israel go out for four days each year to commemorate the daughter of Jephthah (verses 34-40).<\/span><\/p>\n

According to the first-century CE Jewish text, Biblical Antiquities (Pseudo-Philo), Chapters 39-40, God was very angry at Jephthah, saying: \u201cIf a dog had met Jephthah first, would he have offered a dog to Me?! His punishment will be that he will indeed slaughter his own only child.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

According to this text, Jephthah\u2019s daughter is named Seila, and to her is attributed a long poem of lamentation over her impending death. The Midrash (Tanhuma Buber, Behuqotai 7) further condemns Jephthah as having been unaware of the halakhah permitting revocation of rashly made vows (see Mishnah Nedarim, Chapter 9). After having argued with her father, Jephthah\u2019s daughter petitions the Sanhedrin in her day to release her father, Jephthah, from his vow, but they do not find sufficient warrant to do so. The aforementioned Rabbinic tradition emphasizes that God never told Jephthah to sacrifice his daughter, citing the verse \u201cThey have built the high places of Baal to burn their children in the fire as offerings to Baal\u2014something I did not command or mention, nor did it enter My mind\u201d (Jeremiah 19:5).<\/span><\/p>\n

Significantly, the tragic story of Jephthah\u2019s Daughter has inspired several artistic works as varied as Handel\u2019s 1752 Oratorio and a 1957 historical novel by the German-Jewish writer Lion Feuchtwanger.<\/span><\/p>\n

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