Judges 11:22-37

²²They took over everything within the territory of the Amorites, from the Arnon to the Jabbok, and from the wilderness to the Jordan.

²³So then Yahweh, the God of Israel, has driven out the Amorites before his people Israel, and should you now take possession of their land?

²⁴Will you not take over the land that Chemosh, your god, gives you? So whatever land Yahweh our God has given us, we will take over.

²⁵Now are you really better than Balak son of Zippor, king of Moab? Did he dare to have an argument with Israel? Did he ever wage war against them?

²⁶While Israel lived for three hundred years in Heshbon and its villages, and in Aroer and its villages, and in all the cities that are along the banks of the Arnon—why then did you not take them back during that time?

²⁷I have not done you wrong, but you are doing me wrong by attacking me. Yahweh, the judge, will decide today between the people of Israel and the people of Ammon.”

²⁸But the king of the people of Ammon rejected the warning Jephthah sent him.

²⁹Then the Spirit of Yahweh came on Jephthah, and he passed through Gilead and Manasseh, and passed through Mizpah of Gilead, and from Mizpah of Gilead he passed through to the people of Ammon.

³⁰Jephthah made a vow to Yahweh and said, “If you give me victory over the people of Ammon,

³¹then whatever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the people of Ammon will belong to Yahweh, and I will offer it up as a burnt offering.”

³²So Jephthah passed through to the people of Ammon to fight against them, and Yahweh gave him victory.

³³He attacked them and caused a great slaughter from Aroer as far as Minnith—twenty cities—and to Abel Keramim. So the people of Ammon were put under the control of the people of Israel.

³⁴Jephthah came to his home at Mizpah, and there his daughter came out to meet him with tambourines and with dancing. She was his only child, and besides her he had neither son nor daughter.

³⁵As soon as he saw her, he tore his clothes and said, “Oh! My daughter! You have crushed me with sorrow, and you have become one who causes me pain! For I have made an oath to Yahweh, and I cannot turn back on my promise.”

³⁶She said to him, “My father, you have made a vow to Yahweh, do to me everything you promised, because Yahweh has taken vengeance for you against your enemies, the Ammonites.”

³⁷She said to her father, “Let this promise be kept for me. Leave me alone for two months, that I may leave and go down to the hills and grieve over my virginity, I and my companions.”