Judges 11:17-36

¹⁷Then Israel sent men to the king of Edom saying, Let me now go through your land; but the king of Edom did not give ear to them. And in the same way he sent to the king of Moab, but he would not; so Israel went on living in Kadesh.

¹⁸Then he went on through the waste land and round the land of Edom and the land of Moab, and came by the east side of the land of Moab, and put up their tents on the other side of the Arnon; they did not come inside the limit of Moab, for the Arnon was the limit of Moab.

¹⁹And Israel sent men to Sihon, king of the Amorites, the king of Heshbon; and Israel said to him, Let me now go through your land to my place.

²⁰But Sihon would not give way and let Israel go through his land; and Sihon got together all his people, and put his army in position in Jahaz, and made war on Israel.

²¹And the Lord, the God of Israel, gave Sihon and all his people into the hands of Israel, and they overcame them; so all the land of the Amorites, the people of that land, became Israel's.

²²All the limit of the Amorites was theirs, from the Arnon as far as the Jabbok and from the waste land even to Jordan.

²³So now the Lord, the God of Israel, has taken away their land from the Amorites and given it to his people Israel; are you then to have it?

²⁴Do you not keep the lands of those whom Chemosh your god sends out from before you? So we will keep all the lands of those whom the Lord our God sends out from before us.

²⁵What! are you any better than Balak, the son of Zippor, king of Moab? Did he ever take up a cause against Israel or make war against them?

²⁶While Israel was living in Heshbon and its daughter-towns and in Aroer and its daughter-towns and in all the towns which are by the side of the Arnon, for three hundred years, why did you not get them back at that time?

²⁷So I have done no wrong against you, but you are doing wrong to me in fighting against me: may the Lord, who is Judge this day, be judge between the children of Israel and the children of Ammon.

²⁸The king of the children of Ammon, however, did not give ear to the words which Jephthah sent to him.

²⁹Then the spirit of the Lord came on Jephthah, and he went through Gilead and Manasseh, and came to Mizpeh of Gilead; and from Mizpeh of Gilead he went over to the children of Ammon.

³⁰And Jephthah took an oath to the Lord, and said, If you will give the children of Ammon into my hands,

³¹Then whoever comes out from the door of my house, meeting me when I come back in peace from the children of Ammon, will be the Lord's and I will give him as a burned offering.

³²So Jephthah went over to the children of Ammon to make war on them; and the Lord gave them into his hands.

³³And he made an attack on them from Aroer all the way to Minnith, overrunning twenty towns, as far as Abel-cheramim, and put great numbers to the sword. So the children of Ammon were crushed before the children of Israel.

³⁴Then Jephthah came back to his house in Mizpah, and his daughter came out, meeting him on his way with music and with dances; she was his only child; he had no other sons or daughters.

³⁵And when he saw her he was overcome with grief, and said, Ah! my daughter! I am crushed with sorrow, and it is you who are the chief cause of my trouble; for I have made an oath to the Lord and I may not take it back.

³⁶And she said to him, My father, you have made an oath to the Lord; do then to me whatever you have said; for the Lord has sent a full reward on your haters, on the children of Ammon.