19“Then Israel sent messengers to Sihon king of the Amorites, the king of Heshbon. Israel said to him, ‘Allow us to cross through your country to our homeland.’ 20But Sihon would not trust Israel to pass through his territory. Sihon mustered all his troops, and they encamped at Jahaz; he engaged Israel in battle. 21But the LORD, the God of Israel, delivered Sihon and all his troops into Israel’s hands, and they defeated them; and Israel took possession of all the land of the Amorites, the inhabitants of that land. 22Thus they possessed all the territory of the Amorites from the Arnon to the Jabbok and from the wilderness to the Jordan.
23“Now, then, the LORD, the God of Israel, dispossessed the Amorites before His people Israel; and should you possess their land? 24Do you not hold what Chemosh your god gives you to possess? So we will hold on to everything that the LORD our God has given us to possess.
25“Besides, are you any better than Balak son of Zippor, king of Moab? Did he start a quarrel with Israel or go to war with them?
26“While Israel has been inhabiting Heshbon and its dependencies, and Aroer and its dependencies, and all the towns along the Arnon for three hundred years, why have you not tried to recover them all this time? 27I have done you no wrong; yet you are doing me harm and making war on me. May the LORD, who judges, decide today between the Israelites and the Ammonites!”
28But the king of the Ammonites paid no heed to the message that Jephthah sent him.
29Then the spirit of the LORD came upon Jephthah. He marched through Gilead and Manasseh, passing Mizpeh of Gilead; and from Mizpeh of Gilead he crossed over [to] the Ammonites. 30And Jephthah made the following vow to the LORD: “If you deliver the Ammonites into my hands, 31then whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me on my safe return from the Ammonites shall be the LORD’s and shall be offered by me as a burnt offering.”
32Jephthah crossed over to the Ammonites and attacked them, and the LORD delivered them into his hands. 33He utterly routed them—from Aroer as far as Minnith, twenty towns—all the way to Abel-cheramim. So the Ammonites submitted to the Israelites.
34When Jephthah arrived at his home in Mizpah, there was his daughter coming out to meet him, with timbrel and dance! She was an only child; he had no other son or daughter. 35On seeing her, he rent his clothes and said, “Alas, daughter! You have brought me low; you have become my troubler! For I have b-uttered a vow-b to the LORD and I cannot retract.” 36“Father,” she said, “you have uttered a vow to the LORD; do to me as you have vowed, seeing that the LORD has vindicated you against your enemies, the Ammonites.” 37She further said to her father, “Let this be done for me: let me be for two months, and I will go with my companions and lamentc upon the hills and there bewail my maidenhood.” 38“Go,” he replied. He let her go for two months, and she and her companions went and bewailed her maidenhood upon the hills. 39After two months’ time, she returned to her father, and he did to her as he had vowed. She had never known a man. So it became a custom in Israel 40for the maidens of Israel to go every year, for four days in the year, and chant dirges for the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite.
12 The men of Ephraim mustered and crossed [the Jordan] to Zaphon. They said to Jephthah, “Why did you march to fight the Ammonites without calling us to go with you? We’ll burn your house down over you!” 2Jephthah answered them, “I and my people were in a bitter conflict with the Ammonites; and I summoned you, but you did not save me from them. 3When I saw that you were no saviors, I risked my life and advanced against the Ammonites; and the LORD delivered them into my hands. Why have you come here now to fight against me?” 4And Jephthah gathered all the men of Gilead and fought the Ephraimites. The men of Gilead defeated the Ephraimites; for a-they had said, “You Gileadites are nothing but fugitives from Ephraim—being in Manasseh is like being in Ephraim.”-a 5The Gileadites held the fords of the Jordan against the Ephraimites. And when any fugitive from Ephraim said, “Let me cross,” the men of Gilead would ask him, “Are you an Ephraimite?”; if he said “No,” 6they would say to him, “Then say shibboleth”; but he would say “sibboleth,” not being able to pronounce it correctly. Thereupon they would seize him and slay him by the fords of the Jordan. Forty-two thousand Ephraimites fell at that time.
7Jephthah led Israel six years. Then Jephthah the Gileadite died and he was buried in one of the towns of Gilead.
8After him, Ibzan of Bethlehemb led Israel. 9He had thirty sons, and he married off thirty daughters outside the clan and brought in thirty girls from outside the clan for his sons. He led Israel seven years. 10Then Ibzan died and was buried in Bethlehem.
11After him, Elon the Zebulunite led Israel; he led Israel for ten years. 12Then Elon the Zebulunite died and was buried in Aijalon, in the territory of Zebulun.
13After him, Abdon son of Hillel the Pirathonite led Israel. 14He had forty sons and thirty grandsons, who rode on seventy jackasses. He led Israel for eight years. 15Then Abdon son of Hillel the Pirathonite died. He was buried in Pirathon, in the territory of Ephraim, on the hill of the Amalekites.
13 The Israelites again did what was offensive to the LORD, and the LORD delivered them into the hands of the Philistines for forty years.
2There was a certain man from Zorah, of the stock of Dan, whose name was Manoah. His wife was barren and had borne no children. 3An angel of the LORD appeared to the woman and said to her, “You are barren and have borne no children; but you shall conceive and bear a son. 4Now be careful not to drink wine or other intoxicant, or to eat anything unclean. 5For you are going to conceive and bear a son; let no razor touch his head, for the boy is to be a nazirite to God from the womb on. He shall be the first to deliver Israel from the Philistines.”
6The woman went and told her husband, “A man of God came to me; he looked like an angel of God, very frightening. I did not ask him where he was from, nor did he tell me his name. 7He said to me, ‘You are going to conceive and bear a son. Drink no wine or other intoxicant, and eat nothing unclean, for the boy is to be a nazirite to God from the womb to the day of his death!”’
8Manoah pleaded with the LORD. “Oh, my Lord!” he said, “please let the man of God that You sent come to us again, and let him instruct us how to act with the child that is to be born.” 9God heeded Manoah’s plea, and the angel of God came to the woman again. She was sitting in the field and her husband Manoah was not with her. 10The woman ran in haste to tell her husband. She said to him, “The man who came to me beforea has just appeared to me.” 11Manoah promptly followed his wife. He came to the man and asked him: “Are you the man who spoke to my wife?” “Yes,” he answered. 12Then Manoah said, “May your words soon come true! What rules shall be observed for the boy?” 13The angel of the LORD said to Manoah, “The woman must abstain from all the things against which I warned her. 14She must not eat anything that comes from the grapevine, or drink wine or other intoxicant, or eat anything unclean. She must observe all that I commanded her.”
15Manoah said to the angel of the LORD, “Let us detain you and prepare a kid for you.” 16But the angel of the LORD said to Manoah, “If you detain me, I shall not eat your food; and if you present a burnt offering, offer it to the LORD.”—For Manoah did not know that he was an angel of the LORD. 17So Manoah said to the angel of the LORD, “What is your name? We should like to honor you when your words come true.” 18The angel said to him, “You must not ask for my name; it is unknowable!”
19Manoah took the kid and the meal offering and offered them up on the rock to the LORD; b-and a marvelous thing happened-b while Manoah and his wife looked on. 20As the flames leaped up from the altar toward the sky, the angel of the LORD ascended in the flames of the altar, while Manoah and his wife looked on; and they flung themselves on their faces to the ground.—21The angel of the LORD never appeared again to Manoah and his wife.—Manoah then realized that it had been an angel of the LORD. 22And Manoah said to his wife, “We shall surely die, for we have seen a divine being.” 23But his wife said to him, “Had the LORD meant to take our lives, He would not
