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The BibleJudges 11

The Bible

Judges 11

1
English · Berean Standard Bible

Now Jephthah the Gileadite was a mighty man of valor; he was the son of a prostitute, and Gilead was his father.

2
English · Berean Standard Bible

And Gilead’s wife bore him sons who grew up, drove Jephthah out, and said to him, “You shall have no inheritance in our father’s house, because you are the son of another woman.”

3
English · Berean Standard Bible

So Jephthah fled from his brothers and settled in the land of Tob, where worthless men gathered around him and traveled with him.

4
English · Berean Standard Bible

Some time later, when the Ammonites fought against Israel

5
English · Berean Standard Bible

and made war with them, the elders of Gilead went to get Jephthah from the land of Tob.

6
English · Berean Standard Bible

“Come,” they said, “be our commander, so that we can fight against the Ammonites.”

7
English · Berean Standard Bible

Jephthah replied to the elders of Gilead, “Did you not hate me and expel me from my father’s house? Why then have you come to me now, when you are in distress?”

8
English · Berean Standard Bible

They answered Jephthah, “This is why we now turn to you, that you may go with us, fight the Ammonites, and become leader over all of us who live in Gilead.”

9
English · Berean Standard Bible

But Jephthah asked them, “If you take me back to fight the Ammonites and the LORD gives them to me, will I really be your leader?”

10
English · Berean Standard Bible

And the elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, “The LORD is our witness if we do not do as you say.”

11
English · Berean Standard Bible

So Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead, and the people made him their leader and commander. And Jephthah repeated all his terms in the presence of the LORD at Mizpah.

12
English · Berean Standard Bible

Then Jephthah sent messengers to the king of the Ammonites, saying, “What do you have against me that you have come to fight against my land?”

13
English · Berean Standard Bible

The king of the Ammonites answered Jephthah’s messengers, “When Israel came up out of Egypt, they seized my land, from the Arnon to the Jabbok and all the way to the Jordan. Now, therefore, restore it peaceably.”

14
English · Berean Standard Bible

Jephthah again sent messengers to the king of the Ammonites

15
English · Berean Standard Bible

to tell him, “This is what Jephthah says: Israel did not take away the land of Moab or of the Ammonites.

16
English · Berean Standard Bible

But when Israel came up out of Egypt, they traveled through the wilderness to the Red Sea and came to Kadesh.

17
English · Berean Standard Bible

Then Israel sent messengers to the king of Edom, saying, ‘Please let us pass through your land,’ but the king of Edom would not listen. They also sent messengers to the king of Moab, but he would not consent. So Israel stayed in Kadesh.

18
English · Berean Standard Bible

Then Israel traveled through the wilderness and bypassed the lands of Edom and Moab. They came to the east side of the land of Moab and camped on the other side of the Arnon. But they did not enter the territory of Moab, since the Arnon was its border.

19
English · Berean Standard Bible

And Israel sent messengers to Sihon king of the Amorites, who ruled in Heshbon, and said to him, ‘Please let us pass through your land into our own place.’

20
English · Berean Standard Bible

But Sihon would not trust Israel to pass through his territory. So he gathered all his people, encamped in Jahaz, and fought with Israel.

21
English · Berean Standard Bible

Then the LORD, the God of Israel, delivered Sihon and all his people into the hand of Israel, who defeated them. So Israel took possession of all the land of the Amorites who inhabited that country,

22
English · Berean Standard Bible

seizing all the land from the Arnon to the Jabbok and from the wilderness to the Jordan.

23
English · Berean Standard Bible

Now since the LORD, the God of Israel, has driven out the Amorites from before His people Israel, should you now possess it?

24
English · Berean Standard Bible

Do you not possess whatever your god Chemosh grants you? So also, we possess whatever the LORD our God has granted us.

25
English · Berean Standard Bible

Are you now so much better than Balak son of Zippor, king of Moab? Did he ever contend with Israel or fight against them?

26
English · Berean Standard Bible

For three hundred years Israel has lived in Heshbon, Aroer, and their villages, as well as all the cities along the banks of the Arnon. Why did you not take them back during that time?

27
English · Berean Standard Bible

I have not sinned against you, but you have done me wrong by waging war against me. May the LORD, the Judge, decide today between the Israelites and the Ammonites.”

28
English · Berean Standard Bible

But the king of the Ammonites paid no heed to the message Jephthah sent him.

29
English · Berean Standard Bible

Then the Spirit of the LORD came upon Jephthah, and he passed through Gilead and Manasseh, then through Mizpah of Gilead. And from there he advanced against the Ammonites.

30
English · Berean Standard Bible

Jephthah made this vow to the LORD: “If indeed You will deliver the Ammonites into my hand,

31
English · Berean Standard Bible

then whatever comes out the door of my house to greet me on my triumphant return from the Ammonites will belong to the LORD, and I will offer it up as a burnt offering.”

32
English · Berean Standard Bible

So Jephthah crossed over to the Ammonites to fight against them, and the LORD delivered them into his hand.

33
English · Berean Standard Bible

With a great blow he devastated twenty cities from Aroer to the vicinity of Minnith, as far as Abel-keramim. So the Ammonites were subdued before the Israelites.

34
English · Berean Standard Bible

And when Jephthah returned home to Mizpah, there was his daughter coming out to meet him with tambourines and dancing! She was his only child; he had no son or daughter besides her.

35
English · Berean Standard Bible

As soon as Jephthah saw her, he tore his clothes and said, “No! Not my daughter! You have brought me to my knees! You have brought great misery upon me, for I have given my word to the LORD and cannot take it back.”

36
English · Berean Standard Bible

“My father,” she replied, “you have given your word to the LORD. Do to me as you have said, for the LORD has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites.”

37
English · Berean Standard Bible

She also said to her father, “Let me do this one thing: Let me wander for two months through the mountains with my friends and mourn my virginity.”

38
English · Berean Standard Bible

“Go,” he said. And he sent her away for two months. So she left with her friends and mourned her virginity upon the mountains.

39
English · Berean Standard Bible

After two months, she returned to her father, and he did to her as he had vowed. And she had never had relations with a man. So it has become a custom in Israel

40
English · Berean Standard Bible

that each year the young women of Israel go out for four days to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite.

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Hebrew text: Westminster Leningrad Codex (public domain). Original work of the Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible available at https://github.com/openscriptures/morphhb (CC BY 4.0). · Source ↗

Hebrew text: Westminster Leningrad Codex (public domain), from the Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible. Original work of the Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible available at https://github.com/openscriptures/morphhb (Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International, https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). Changes: lemma and morphology markup removed; morpheme separators removed; qere readings shown in [brackets] after the ketiv, which is shown in (parentheses); petucha/setuma marks omitted; verses renumbered to English versification (Psalm titles moved to headings).

The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible, BSB. Dedicated to the public domain. · Source ↗

The Holy Bible, King James Version (Authorized Version), standard text of 1769; electronic text courtesy of eBible.org and the CrossWire Bible Society. Public domain outside the United Kingdom. In the UK, rights in the Authorized Version are vested in the Crown under Letters Patent, administered by Cambridge University Press. · Source ↗

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