A REVIEW

Chisholm frames the discussion on the ethicalness or un-ethicalness of Jephthah’s fulfilled vow as a Q & A of sorts– he poses and then offers his response to five questions. The first question he puts forth is whether or not Jephthah actually offered his daughter as a human sacrifice. According to Chisholm the wording of the vow’s apodosis (Judges 11:31) may not be conclusive that human sacrifice was intended but it does allow for it. The substantive masculine singular participle (“the one going out”) refers elsewhere to persons (Num 22:11; Deut 2:23; Josh 5:4; 1 Sam 17:20; 1 kings 8:19; Jer 5:6; Jer 21:9) and inanimate objects (Num 21:13; 32:24; Deut 14:22). The infinitive “to meet” can refer to people (Gen 14:17; 19:1), animals (Job 39:21) or inanimate beings (Isa. 14:9). To the view that argues that the mention of the virginity of Jephthah’s daughter implies that Jephthah did not sacrifice his daughter, but instead devoted her to a life of celibacy as a servant of the Lord, Chisholm counters that the syntax does not support the reading “He will belong to the Lord, or I will offer him up as a burn sacrifice.” When the verbal sequence used here (a conjunction plus a perfect verbal form followed by another conjunction plus a perfect verbal form) appears elsewhere in Joshua, Judges, and Samuel, the second verb never gives an alternative to the first verb. This, according to Chisholm, strongly suggests that Jephthah’s daughter became the Lord’s by being sacrificed to Him as a whole burnt offering or that she was formally declared to be the Lord’s and then as a consequence was sacrificed to Him.

The second question is whether or not Jephthah’s vow can be attributed to divine prompting. Here Chisholm’s concurs with Webb’s conclusion, namely, in marking the vow (vv 30-31) as an interruption, the text’s structure indicates that while victory is casually related to Jephthah’s endowment with the Spirit it is only incidentally related to the vow.

The third question has to do with whether or not God really expected Jephthah to fulfill this grisly vow? In other words, having made his vow, did Jephthah have any option other than to fulfill it? Chisholm disagrees with Block about the applicability of Lev 27:1-8 to Jephthah’s situation. Leviticus 27:1-8 regulates cases in which one person vows another, that is, devotes a person to the sanctuary for sacred services and then for reasons unspecified finds it impossible or impractical to fulfill the vow. Chisholm also disagrees with Niditch about the applicability of the vow of herem (Num 21:2-3, cf Lev 27:28-29) because the word herem does not appear in Jepththah’s vow. Instead,Chisholm sides with Janzen’s explanation: the deuteronomistic history makes it clear that “obeying is better than sacrifice.” Against the background of the deuteronomistic law, the question of child sacrifice is hardly a borderline issue (cf Deut 12:29-31; 18:10)

The fourth question is: Does the narrator’s icy reportorial style, devoid of editorializing, suggest that he justified Jephthah or worse yet, placed the blame for this tragedy on Jephthah’s daughter? Chisholm’s response is that because of the narrator’s focus of interest is Jephthah, the seemingly objective perceptual perspective actually reflects a father’s perspective.

The final question is: 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? According to Chisholm, God’s silence, while puzzling and even disturbing, need not be interpreted in some fatalistic manner to mean that He required fulfillment of the vow or approved of the sacrifice. The reality is that God grants humans the freedom to act against His antecedent or moral will.