Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!dimacs.rutgers.edu!aramis.rutgers.edu!athos.rutgers.edu!christian From: wheaton!kroth@uunet.uu.net (Ken Roth) Newsgroups: soc.religion.christian Subject: Jephthah Message-ID: Date: 25 Apr 91 03:32:15 GMT Sender: hedrick@athos.rutgers.edu Lines: 89 Approved: christian@aramis.rutgers.edu >Hebrews 11 is the famous chapter on the heroes of faith: Abel, Enoch, >Noach, Abraham, Moses, Rahab, Gideon, Barak, Samson, Jephthah >... HANG ON A MINUTE THERE! What's _Jephthah_ doing in that list? Ah yes, another perennial(sp?) problem, one which has made many people wonder through the ages. I will not delete most of the article, to save myself typing time. [Heb 11:32-34 deleted] >Now, the story of Jephthah is found in the "Book of Monsters", >in Judges chs 11 and 12. [deleted some about why it can be called the 'Book of Monsters'] >But the worst thing about Jephthah is his rash vow and consequent >sacrifice of his daughter. Never mind the author of Judges, how >could the author of _Hebrews_ possibly have thought well of someone >who had committed human sacrifice? >I can think of only three explanations, and I'm posting this in order to >ask for more. >1. The author of Hebrews didn't mean to write "Jephthah"; either he > made a slip of the pen or it has crept in during subsequent copying. > -- I have put my trust in God's Word, but I do not believe that > copyists are infallible. (Ever heard of the "wicked Bible"?) You cannot allow for this, because a mis-copy this large would be caught for the very same reason you point out, it seems too strange. >2. The author of Hebrews had a different Jephthah in mind. > -- That's not impossible. There are _many_ cases of famous > people with similar names living around the same time. (When > I was an undergraduate I once received someone else's results, > because we had the same name, not just the same surname.) > However, one would expect to find evidence for this other > Jephthah. Nope, same Jephthah. [Possibly a different story known by author] Ok, I might as well start some major commenting here. One day when I was skimming through some texts in the college library, I came upon a thesis called 'Jephthah's and his Vow' (Or something like that). I was interested and picked it up to get an overview of the text. When I reached the conclusion, the first sentence was 'Jephthah killed his daughter.' Period, that's it. I have had a class with a discussion of this story at least once, and the only reasonable explanation is that he did, in fact, kill his daughter. There is no way to explain it away, and we should not even try. We have to say, looking back, that he did a great wrong. The wrong was not sacrificing his daughter, but making a foolish vow before God. The book of Judges has written in it, three times, the phrase 'everyone did as he saw fit'. And there are dozens of occasions of 'The Israelites did evil in the eyes of the Lord'. These were times when everyone did what they thought to be right. Did God TELL Jephthah to kill his daughter? Or even to make the vow? No. >Or am I reading too much into Hebrews 11? Is the author claiming no >more than "_once_ in his life, Jephthah trusted God in a battle against >Israel's oppressors"? Well, Jephthah DID trust God in this battle. Just as David trusted God to destroy the wicked who seek to harm him, Jephthah trusted God to accept his sacrifice even before he gave it. He DID release the nation from the oppression of their neighbors. The moderator adds... >As to Jephthah, I'm not sure I think he's as much a monster as you >paint him. It's clear that the author of Judges does to some extent >see this as a period of anarchy, when there was no king. But I am >reluctant to judge people by later standards. Just to show that God uses fools like Jephthah (and me8-). I think it is also important to realize that we cannot judge the people of the ooollddddeenn days like we do people today. This does not excuse their actions, but puts them in the correct perspective. Some people say that the Israelites were cruel in killing whole groups of people off, including the women and children, but compare what they did to the Assyrians and such, and you will see that they were MUCH nicer than these other empires. Go in peace. Ken Roth