[S5] Post-Premiere Discussion - 5.09 'The Dance of Dragons'

So, basically what happened in this story is that he promised to offer up whatever came out as a sacrifice to God. (Note that, in Hebrew, the part that says "and I" could very well mean "or I", and it becomes "shall surely be the Lord's (aka consecrated to his service), or I will offer it up for a burnt offering") It would be burnt if it was an animal. The quote you just gave was him making the promise, not actually carrying out the order. When a human is sacrificed to God in most of the Old Testament, they go to the Tabernacle in Shi'loh. The scripture is a little unclear on whether or not this happened or if she was actually burned (there are parts that could be interpreted as the latter, but at the same time it says that the daughters of Israel went out to give commendation to her every year after the sacrifice was made, etc.) However most analyses of the account would hold that Jephthah's daughter was given up to service and her virginity consecrated so that she could never marry because of other times when humans were 'sacrificed'. Notice for example in the story of Samuel, his mother promised him as a sacrifice if he could be born, since she was barren and couldn't have children. The sacrifice ended up being to give him into service at the tabernacle. This also seems likely because the Jews are generally very anti-human sacrifice at this point of the bible, since their enemies whom they have been fighting for years at this point frequently do so, and the Jews often tried to be as different from the 'nations' as possible. There's also multiple chronologically prior scriptures speaking against human sacrifice. This would have also released Jephthah from his vow to make her a 'burnt' offering, even if the original text was meant to say 'and', since you aren't obligated to follow an illegal vow.

However, in the cases when commentators disagree with this and think Jephthah did in fact burn his daughter, it actually becomes a cautionary tale. Jephthah was not a particularly scholarly Judge, he had been chosen for his martial abilities, hence why he's the one doing the fighting and not the other Judges. In this version of the story, Jephthah makes this vow not knowing it would be his daughter that came out. When she did come out, he would not actually be burdened with sacrificing her as a burnt offering anymore, since you aren't obligated to fulfill a vow that transgresses the law (which is very clearly anti-human sacrifice). However, because of his ignorance he went forward with it anyway in this interpretation, so it's a warning about not being informed in regards to religion. This is primarily a Jewish interpretation and it's less common even among Jews, though.

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