The fifth episode of the third season of the Retelling the Bible Podcast is posted today (May 29, 2019). You can listen to the episode and subscribe to the podcast by following one of these links or by searching for the podcast on your favourite platform:

SHOW NOTES

This episode is based on Judges 11 in the Old Testament of the Bible. (Click the references to read the original texts). Any direct biblical quotations in the episode are taken from the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible.

Here are a few of my thoughts on the episode.

The Book of Judges

I love the Book of Judges. It is a book that is full of colourful characters and exciting exploits. There is plenty of violence and action for those who like that kind of thing. The historicity of the book is rather difficult to pin down, though. None of the heroes of the book are known from any other historical source or archaeology.

The stories in the Book of Judges do not reflect a unified nation of Israel. Rather what we see is a group of independent tribes and clans who largely take care of their own affairs. The judges seem to emerge at times of crisis and appear to have the authority to call on tribes and clans to join together and fight against a common enemy or threat. This has lead to many suggesting that Israel was, in that period of time, what might be called a tribal confederacy.

There would have been no centralized government, no king, and so nothing like what we would recognize as a standing army trained and equipped by the state. When the people needed to fight to defend their lands, they would look to their own family, clan or tribe depending on the size of the threat. Men would take the implements that they used to work on their farms and they would literally beat their plowshares into swords,and their pruning hooks into spears. (Joel 3:10) When the threat was overwhelming, a number of tribes would gather together under the leadership of a charismatic hero.

This coalition of tribal militias must have been enabled by some sort of agreement or covenant between the tribes. A strong military leader, called a judge, would have assumed the authority to make the call for the tribal militias to arm themselves and gather together to fight.

None of the judges in the Book of Judges, ever calls together all of the tribes of Israel as they are identified elsewhere in the Bible. Each one seems to operate within a certain defined region, so it is perhaps not very surprising that none of them was significant enough on the international scene to gain notice or notoriety.

The Book of Judges tells the stories of the judges according to a pattern. One judge rises in one region, leads for a while and then disappears. This is followed by a period of time when there is no leadership and foreign influences wreak havoc among the tribes. Then another judge arises and the cycle is repeated.

It is reasonable to assume that it did not all happen in such a straightforward and cyclical way. This likely has more to do with the agenda of the editors then it does with the actual sequence of events Presumably, the stories and legends of the various judges were stories that circulated independently, primarily in the regions associated with them. Some of these legends may have grown around actual historical figures while others could have been invented by local populations who felt that they needed a hero of their own.

All of this is a way of saying that we really don’t know anything about a real, historical Jephthah.

Bat-Jephthah

My personal opinion, after reflecting on this story, is that Bat-Jephthah is a heroine. Now, that might be something that’s a little bit difficult for modern readers to stomach. She seems to us to be little more than a victim. Readers have been so embarrassed by her that many have worked hard to explain the ending away.

Many have protested, for example, that the Bible repeatedly speaks out against human sacrifice, and indeed it does. Clearly, it was practiced by some ancient Israelites and some Israelite neighbours at various times and that is why the condemnation is so loud.

Therefore, some will protest, Jephthah clearly does not understand what the will of God is in this particular matter. There are passages in the Pentateuch that are particularly concerned with preventing human sacrifice by offering ways in which animal victims or even payment in silver may be substituted for human victims. Surely, they will say, Jephthah should have availed himself of such provisions.

It is true that the biblical tradition did develop such alternatives and safeguards. But none of them are in view in the story of Jephthah. The sacrificial system and the understanding of it is still clearly in development and flux. Jephthah has no access to an easy way out.

It seems that the daughter of Jephthah is indeed a tragic sacrificial victim. But that does not mean that she is not a strong character. She seems to embrace her fate, but she does it in a way that creates a legacy for her. Normally, the only way that a woman in that world could leave anything behind her was by bearing and raising children. This route to legacy was being denied to Bat-Jephthah. and yet she found a way to be remembered and even celebrated after her death. As I think about it, she is one of a very small and elite club of women to achieve a legacy apart from childbearing, something that only men could generally do. That is an achievement, perhaps a hollow one, but an achievement nonetheless.

The importance of vows

One very interesting thing that I discovered by turning this biblical story into my own narrative was that the theme of vows and their importance and their inviolability seem to run throughout the entire narrative. Vows made between various parties and witnessed by the gods were, in many ways, the very foundation about ancient society. It was because of vows, made before Yahweh, that the tribes of Israel would come to the defense of one another in a time before a unified government.

So vows are clearly there to protect and save the tribes of Israel. But, as I reflected on Jephthah’s story, it struck me that such vows could certainly be a double-edged sword. It must have been a vow that drew Jephthah into a conflict that he would not have chosen. It clearly was a vow that condemned his daughter to death. The story of Jephthah may have served as an illustration of the power and danger that came with making vows.

Telling the story also gave me much more sympathy for Jephthah. He was clearly damaged goods. Labelled as illegitimate and the son of a prostitute from birth, this would have been something that dragged him down throughout his entire life. Being rejected by his father and family can only have been a severe social and psychological blow. How can we expect anyone to form strong and healthy relationships after suffering something like that? Nevertheless, there seems to be a strong attachment between Jephthah and his daughter. He seems to have learned to love at least one person. But once again, that decision to love made him extremely vulnerable. His subsequent sacrifice of his daughter reminds me of a certain scene from a Marvel movie:

None of this, of course, justifies what Jephthah did to his daughter, which was indeed based on the patriarchal assumption that a woman was nothing more than the property of her dominant male relative.

What I learned from this retelling

The reason I so love the narrative approach to biblical passages is that it gives the opportunity to add depth to the characters. The many times I had read the story of Jephthah before, I had largely seen him as a two-dimensional character — a man who makes a rash vow and who foolishly follows through on it. He seems to be little more than a monster and a fool. His daughter, for her part, merely comes across as a nameless victim. Telling the story forced me to come to terms with his background and his rejection by his family. While none of this served to justify him for what he did to his daughter, it certainly made him more of a flawed human being and less of a monster.

As for how I came to see a heroic dimension to Bat-Jephthah, perhaps that is a bit of wishful thinking on my part. And yet I believe that, given her time and the limitation placed upon her, the fact that she managed to create an enduring renown is something truly heroic.