340 Bernard P. Robinson contents from a Deuteronomic perspective. The Deuteronomic view about vows is that, once made, they have to be carried out; but that there is no need to make them in the first place (Deut 23,21-23). Jephthah’s vow is surely to be taken as one that he should not have made. Once he had made it, and his daughter had presented herself, was he obliged to sacrifice her, since vows must be fulfilled (Deut 23,21)? Or did the prohibition on human sacrifice (Deut 12,31; 18,10) override this? It is hard to know what the narrator thinks about this. Since, however, what is vowed is vowed to YHWH, and since human sacrifice is from a Deuteronomic point of view repugnant to him, it seems likely that he thought that YHWH would rather have the vow broken than that the child should die. It should be noted that Jephthah’s is not the only rash oath in Judges. To vow to give his daughter to whosoever should capture Debir (1,12) is foolish of Caleb; what if the captor should turn out to be a foreigner, illegitimate, or a slave? Micah’s mother invokes a hasty curse on the silver that she has lost, unaware that the thief is her own son. In 21,1, the Israelites swear not to give their daughters in marriage to Benjamites (and have to resort to casuistry in order to prevent that tribe from dying out). Judges thus seems to share Deuteronomy’s hostility to rash vows. After 11,29, where the spirit of YHWH comes upon Jephthah, one perhaps expects him immediately to go out and vanquish his foes (like Othniel, Judg 3,10, Samson, Judg 14,19, and Saul, 1 Sam 11,6). Instead he makes a vow. The idea will probably be that Jephthah wants to make doubly sure of victory (and thereby secure his coveted position as çar). He has insufficient trust in God’s spirit (34). Jephthah desires to bind God rather than embrace the gift of the spirit. What comes to him freely, he seeks to earn and manipulate. The meaning of his words is doubt, not faith; it is control, not courage (35). b) 11,34-38: The Vow Fulfilled. Jephthah returns from the battlefield and “when Jephthah came to his house at Mizpah, there was his daughter (36). wnmm besides her (?), he (34) So, for example, P. TRIBLE, Texts of Terror (Philadelphia 1984) 93-116, “The Daughter of Jephthah: An Inhuman Sacrifice”, 96. (35) TRIBLE, Texts of Terror, 97. (36) Like the Levite’s concubine (Judg 19) and the woman with the millstone (Judg 9,53), she is not named. In Ps Philo, LAB 39-40, the girl’s name is given as Seila. (She has also sometimes been known as Iphis [=Iphigeneia].)