Open English Translation JDG Chapter 11

11 Now Yiftah the Gileadite was a fierce warrior, but he was a prostitute’s son and his father was Gilead. 2 Gilead’s wife also gave birth to sons for him, and when those sons of the wife grew up, they drove Yiftah out and told him, “You won’t get any inheritance from our father’s estate because you’re a son of another woman.” 3 So Yiftah fled from the presence of his half-brothers and he settled in the Tob region. Unprincipled men associated around Yiftah and went around with him.

4 Some time later, the Ammonites battled against Yisrael. 5 and that was when the elders of Gilead went to summon Yiftah from the Tob region. 6 Then requested Yiftah, “Come and be our commander so we can fight against the Ammonites.”

7 “Don’t you all hate me? Yiftah asked them. “Didn’t you yourselves drive me out of my father’s house? So why have you all come to me now when you have troubles?”

8 “Well, true,” the Gilead elders replied, “But now we’ve turned back to you. So join with us and fight against the Ammonites, and you’ll become commander over all of who lives in Gilead.”

9 “If you bring me back to fight against the Ammonites,” Yiftah asked them, “and if Yahweh helps me defeat them, is it correct that I’ll actually become your leader?”

10 “Yahweh will be a witness between us,” the Gilead elders responded, “that we’ll most certainly do what you just said.” 11 So Yiftah went with the Gilead elders, and the people set him as commander and leader over themselves. (Yiftah had spoken all those words before Yahweh at Mitspah.)

12 Then Yiftah sent messengers to the Ammonite king, demanding, “What’s happened with respect to me and to you, that you’ve come against me to fight over my land?”

13 The Ammonite king responded to Yiftah’s messengers, “Because the Israelis seized my land when they came out of Egypt. It went from the Arnon river up to the Yabbok river, and over to the Yordan river. Now return the land peaceably.”

14 Then Yiftah sent messengers back to the Ammonite king 15 to tell him, “Yiftah wants you to know that Yisrael didn’t take land from Moab nor from you Ammonites. 16 However in their coming up from Egypt, Yisrael went through the wilderness as far as the Red Sea until arriving at Kadesh. 17 When Yisrael (Israel) sent messengers to the king of Edom, saying, ‘Please may we pass through your land,’ the king of Edom wouldn’t listen. Yisrael likewise sent to the king of Moab, but he wasn’t willing either, so Yisrael stayed at Kadesh.[ref] 18 Then we went through the wilderness and turned away from the land of Edom and the land of Moab, then went the long way around the eastern border of Moab. They camped on the other side of the Arnon river, but they didn’t go within Moab’s borders, because the Arnon was the border of Moab.[ref] 19 Yisrael sent messengers to the Amorite King Sihon, the king of Heshbon and asked him, ‘Please, let us pass through your land as far as our place.’[ref] 20 But King Sihon didn’t trust Yisrael passing through within his border, so he assembled all of his people together and they camped at Jahaz, and he battled with Yisrael. 21 Then Yisrael’s god, Yahweh, handed King Sihon and all his people over to Yisrael and we defeated them. Thus Yisrael took possession of all of the land of the Amorites inhabiting that region—22 everything within the Amorite territory from the Arnon river to the Yabbok, and from the wilderness as far as the Jordan. 23 So since it was Yisrael’s god Yahweh that expelled the Amorites out of the presence of his people Yisrael, do you actually think that you can take it now? 24 Wouldn’t you take possession if your god Chemosh, allowed you to? So too all that our god Yahweh has dispossessed ahead of us, we’ll possess that. 25 Are you really better now than Zippor’s son, King Balak of Moab? Did he dare contend with Yisrael or did he ever wage war against them?[ref] 26 Yisrael lived in Heshbon and in its villages for three hundred years, and in Aroer and in its villages, and in all the cities that are along the banks of the Arnon—so why didn’t you repossess them during that time? 27 I haven’t done anything wrong to you, but you’re doing wrong in dealing with me by fighting against me. Yahweh, the judge, will decide today between the Israelis and the Ammonites.” 28 But the Ammonite king didn’t take any notice of Yiftah’s message to him.

29 Then Yahweh’s spirit empowered Yiftah, and he passed through the Gilead and Menashsheh, and through Mizpah of Gilead, and from there he passed through the Ammonite region, 30 and he made a promise to Yahweh, “If you really give me victory over the Ammonites, 31 then whoever’s the first person to come out of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the battle against the Ammonites, that person will belong to Yahweh, and I will offer him up as a whole burnt offering.” 32 So Yiftah went to the Ammonite territory to fight against them, and Yahweh enabled them to defeat them. 33 Then he attacked them from Aroer and as far as the entrance to Minnith, twenty cities, and then up to Avel-Keramim, slaughtering a huge number. So the Ammonites were subdued by the presence of the Israelis.

34 When Yiftah got back to his house in the Mizpah area, look, his daughter was coming out to meet him with tambourines and with dancing. She was their only child—he didn’t have any son or daughter apart from her. 35 When he saw her, he tore his clothes and said, “Oh no! My daughter! Indeed, you’ve made me bow in grief, and you’re among those who cause me pain, because I made a vow to Yahweh and I can’t go back on it.”

36 Then she said to him, “My father, you’ve made a vow to Yahweh. Do to me whatever you promised, after what Yahweh has done for you—total vengeance against your Ammonite enemies.” 37 But she asked her father, “Just do this one thing for me: release me for two months, so I can go away and take some companions. I’ll fall prostrate on the hills and I’ll weep because I’ll never have a chance to marry.” 38 He agreed and then sent her away for two months. She went with some companions, and she wept on the hills because she’d never be a mother. 39 Then at the end of the two months, she returned to her father and he carried out his vow with respect to her so indeed she never had a chance to marry.

After that, it became a custom in Yisrael 40 that the young women of Yisrael go to commemorate the daughter of Yiftah the Gileadite for four days during the year.