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This story exemplifies one concept I have always found absurd in the bible: God commands death for the tiniest of infractions.
Numbers 15:32-36 While the Israelites were in the desert, a man was found gathering wood on the Sabbath day. Those who found him gathering wood brought him to Moses and Aaron and the whole assembly, and they kept him in custody, because it was not clear what should be done to him. Then the LORD said to Moses, "The man must die. The whole assembly must stone him outside the camp." So the assembly took him outside the camp and stoned him to death, as the LORD commanded Moses.
Maybe the guy was cold, and needed to make a fire. Maybe he had OCD and can't help but pick up sticks. But, no need to pick up sticks when your brain is being crushed by stones. The lord has spoken.
I have a particular perspective I ascribe to that helps me put these stories in their context.
The Old Testament was not written in real time. It was written and/or placed in its final form long after much of the details it speaks about. This allowed the authors quite a bit of creative license.
Apparently it was put together after the start of the Babylonian Exile during a time when the Jews were at a loss as to how they could have suffered such humiliation by the hands of hated heathens such as the Babylonians. Their religious heads seized the opportunity to sell the idea that the reason they (the Jews) fell into such a destiny was because they forsook their god and broke his commandments.
To ensure this would not happen again, their history was retold complete with stories such as the one you presented. The contents became the Old Testament.
Ahem...at least get it right. Abraham married Hagar the egyptian. She then bore him his 1st son Ishamel. No hanky panky affairs
Except the "hanky panky" Abraham had with his concubines!
Genesis 25:5-7
5 Abraham left everything he owned to Isaac. 6 But while he was still living, he gave gifts to the sons of his concubines and sent them away from his son Isaac to the land of the east.
Genesis 32:22-32 is a story of Jacob wrestling with God himself. Jacob was overpowering God, so God touched Jacob's hip (which is the reason why Israelites don't eat the tendon at the hip), and pleaded to be let go. Jacob said "I will not let you go unless you bless me," so God blessed him and renamed him Israel, and Jacob let God go.
I would love to read your rendition of what happened in Judges 11:29-38!
29 Then the Spirit of the LORD came upon Jephthah. He crossed Gilead and Manasseh, passed through Mizpah of Gilead, and from there he advanced against the Ammonites. 30 And Jephthah made a vow to the LORD : "If you give the Ammonites into my hands, 31 whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the LORD's, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering."
32 Then Jephthah went over to fight the Ammonites, and the LORD gave them into his hands. 33 He devastated twenty towns from Aroer to the vicinity of Minnith, as far as Abel Keramim. Thus Israel subdued Ammon.
34 When Jephthah returned to his home in Mizpah, who should come out to meet him but his daughter, dancing to the sound of tambourines! She was an only child. Except for her he had neither son nor daughter. 35 When he saw her, he tore his clothes and cried, "Oh! My daughter! You have made me miserable and wretched, because I have made a vow to the LORD that I cannot break."
36 "My father," she replied, "you have given your word to the LORD. Do to me just as you promised, now that the LORD has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites. 37 But grant me this one request," she said. "Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry."
38 "You may go," he said. And he let her go for two months. She and the girls went into the hills and wept because she would never marry. 39 After the two months, she returned to her father and he did to her as he had vowed. And she was a virgin.
From this comes the Israelite custom 40 that each year the young women of Israel go out for four days to commemorate the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite.
I would love to read your rendition of what happened in Judges 11:29-38!
29 Then the Spirit of the LORD came upon Jephthah. He crossed Gilead and Manasseh, passed through Mizpah of Gilead, and from there he advanced against the Ammonites. 30 And Jephthah made a vow to the LORD : "If you give the Ammonites into my hands, 31 whatever comes out of the door of my house to meet me when I return in triumph from the Ammonites will be the LORD's, and I will sacrifice it as a burnt offering."
32 Then Jephthah went over to fight the Ammonites, and the LORD gave them into his hands. 33 He devastated twenty towns from Aroer to the vicinity of Minnith, as far as Abel Keramim. Thus Israel subdued Ammon.
34 When Jephthah returned to his home in Mizpah, who should come out to meet him but his daughter, dancing to the sound of tambourines! She was an only child. Except for her he had neither son nor daughter. 35 When he saw her, he tore his clothes and cried, "Oh! My daughter! You have made me miserable and wretched, because I have made a vow to the LORD that I cannot break."
36 "My father," she replied, "you have given your word to the LORD. Do to me just as you promised, now that the LORD has avenged you of your enemies, the Ammonites. 37 But grant me this one request," she said. "Give me two months to roam the hills and weep with my friends, because I will never marry."
38 "You may go," he said. And he let her go for two months. She and the girls went into the hills and wept because she would never marry. 39 After the two months, she returned to her father and he did to her as he had vowed. And she was a virgin.
From this comes the Israelite custom 40 that each year the young women of Israel go out for four days to commemorate the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite.
A vow to God should be taken very seriously.
But I'm sure Pastor Deguire will give you a much more entertaining sermon from his church's POV..
Beats me. Apparently it was not that important to god.
Still isn't. It's only important to people who want to shove their version og god down your throat.
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