Judges 11: Beauty and the Beast
Last night I read in Judges chapter 11 with growing horror, that Jephthah made a vow to God. If God gave him great victories, he promised to sacrifice whatever came out of his house first when he got home.
I know what happens here, I thought to myself – I’ve seen Beauty and the Beast!1
Later we read that his daughter comes out to greet him first. To keep his vow he must sacrifice her to God2.
Why is this in my bible?
As a daughter I find that pretty abhorrent.
As a Beauty and the Beast fan I have always thought that the father was pretty stupid to make a promise without thinking it through.
As a Christian I wonder, why is this in the bible?
My mum used to tell me that just because something was in the bible, didn’t make it right. Her theory was that the bible tells the story of what happened and is not a record of approval.
I hope that God would not have approved of a father sacrificing his daughter as a burnt offering.
So according to the gospel of mum it is in the bible as a record of what happened. However its pretty clear the bible does not record everything that ever happened in the whole world. There must be a reason someone decided this was important enough to be recorded for posterity.
Maybe it was:
To emphasise that we need to think things through?
To show that our promises are sacred, no matter how extreme they might be?
To warn us that even people with Gods favour who win victories are not exempt from doing stupid things?
A closer look
In verse 29 the bible says that the Spirit of the Lord came upon Jephthah.
Then in verse 30 and 31 Jephthah says to God “If you give me victory over the Ammonites, I will give to the Lord whatever comes out of my house to meet me when I return in triumph. I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering.”
So the spirit of the Lord is on him, and he opens his mouth and instead of just humbly asking for victory he makes a promise, a bargain if you will. In exchange for victory he will give God an unknown sacrifice.
Maybe we need to think very carefully about how we ask God for things. Even when we feel close to God and that his spirit is with us we are not exempt from our own stupidity.
Maybe it is better to know that we cannot give anything worthy, in exchange for Gods blessing.
Humility may be a better heart position than that trying earn or deserve God’s gift by promising something in return.
As I said in an article on bargaining with God, I think bargains are tricky little things and we really need to be very careful about the promises we make.
I want to be open to Gods gifts, without needing to earn them.
I want to be able to ask God freely for things, knowing that I don’t deserve them and the only reason he will give them to me is because he loves me. Not because I promise to sacrifice my daughter.But that’s just me.
What do you think?
KG
1 First side note: After doing some careful research (ie. googling it) I find that some versions of Beauty and the Beast don’t include this promise. Instead the daughter sacrifices herself to save her father, which I think is nicer, in a free choice kind of way.
2 Second side note: Some jewish traditions say that Jephthah did not actually kill his daughter but that she was forced to live in the mountains alone and dedicate her life to God. Personally I think this is incorrect and people just hate this part of the bible so much they wanted to change it to be more palatable.
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