A Survey of the Old Testament Law--Finishing Leviticus (Leviticus 27)

Finally, chapter 27. This chapter is rather anticlimactic. It deals mostly with how to affix a valuation to people, or property or animals, and how much it would cost to redeem these things. When we think about sports, and how much money some of the players make, it boggles the mind. Read about some of the contracts these guys are making, how many millions they get—even if they're a second-string bench warmer. And yet those whose careers make more of a difference in our lives every day—these people, many times, struggle just to make what they're worth. But under the Law, every person, in various age ranges, was valued the same. You didn’t look at one 30-year-old man and say, “He’s worth about 30 shekels” and then look at another and say, “Eh, I’ll give you a couple shekels for him.” The price of redeeming one man was the same as another—that valuation did, however, vary by age. We will be using the NASB for our text.

Leviticus 27:1-8 (NASB)—1 Again, the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, “2 Speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, ‘When a man makes a difficult vow, he shall be valued according to your valuation of persons belonging to the LORD. 3 If your valuation is of the male from twenty years even to sixty years old, then your valuation shall be fifty shekels of silver, after the shekel of the sanctuary. 4 Or if it is a female, then your valuation shall be thirty shekels. 5 If it be from five years even to twenty years old then your valuation for the male shall be twenty shekels and for the female ten shekels. 6 But if they are from a month even up to five years old, then your valuation shall be five shekels of silver for the male, and for the female your valuation shall be three shekels of silver. 7 If they are from sixty years old and upward, if it is a male, then your valuation shall be fifteen shekels, and for the female ten shekels. 8 But if he is poorer than your valuation, then he shall be placed before the priest and the priest shall value him; according to the means of the one who vowed, the priest shall value him.’”

Those who were between the ages of twenty and sixty were assigned a higher valuation for one simple reason—they could work, either in the field, or tending herds or flocks, or weaving. From five years old to twenty, they were valued slightly less because they only had potential. They could be trained. From one month old to five years old—children in this range don’t really do a whole lot, other than eat and drool and poop and pull their sisters hair, so they’re valued even less. And anybody from sixty years and older, their days of working in the field (or the mill, or the loom) were pretty much behind them—but they could still teach the younger folks. This is a principle that we find even in the New Testament, in the letter Paul wrote to Timothy, telling him how to instruct the older widows. 1st Timothy 5:1-10 (NASB)—1 Do not sharply rebuke an older man, but rather appeal to him as a father, to the younger men as brothers, 2 the older women as mothers, and the younger women as sisters, in all purity.3 Honor widows who are widows indeed…5 Now she who is a widow indeed and who has been left alone, has fixed her hope on God and continues in entreaties and prayers night and day…9 A widow is to be put on the list only if she is not less than sixty years old, having been the wife of one man, 10 having a reputation for good works; and if she has brought up children, if she has shown hospitality to strangers, if she has washed the saints' feet, if she has assisted those in distress, and if she has devoted herself to every good work. We should not need Social Security or other government programs—at least not for the elderly in the church. They should be taken care of by their family and/or the church. And even the Law stated that the elderly still had some value.

Now what is the reason for this list of valuations? In verse 2, God talks about a man who has made a “difficult vow”. This is probably referring to one of the Peace Offerings found in chapters 3 and 6. Leviticus 7:16—“‘16 But if the sacrifice of his [peace] offering is a vow…’” Just to kind of refresh our memory, there were two different types of “vows” one could make—there was a vow of devotion (the vow of abstinence [the [קָרְבָּן, qorban]), and the vow of destruction [the [חֵרֶם, cherem, or Greek [ἀνάθεμα, anathema]). The “vow of devotion” was basically a promise the person makes to God. “If God delivers me through this, I will offer Him the best of my herd.” We used the example of Jacob in Genesis 28:20-21—20 Then Jacob made a vow, saying, "If God will be with me, and keep me in this way that I am going, and give me bread to eat and clothing to put on, 21 so that I come back to my father's house in peace, then the LORD shall be my God." If someone made a “vow of devotion” קָרְבָּן (qorban), it simply meant that the person had set some possession and had dedicated it to the use of the temple. They may have held the object in their physical possession—but it belonged to God. The Nazirite vow was a type of קָרְבָּן (qorban). The “vow of destruction” (Hebrew [חֵרֶם, cherem], Greek [ἀνάθεμα, anathema]). We read about things being declared חֵרֶם (cherem) in Joshua 6. The things dedicated to חֵרֶם (cherem) were, of course, those things in the city of Jericho that the LORD commanded them to destroy. We’ll talk more about that when we get to the end of this chapter.

So what would happen was this: the person would make the vow; they would find it difficult to fulfill that vow; they would need to be released from that vow. Which makes it pretty clear that we should be really careful about making vows (see Joshua chapter 9). Ecclesiastes 5:4-5 (NASB)—4 When you make a vow to God, do not be late in paying it; for He takes no delight in fools. Pay what you vow! 5 It is better that you should not vow than that you should vow and not pay. But if you do make that vow you can't pay, you can be redeemed. You can either pay the valuation based on your age, or, if you can't afford that, the priest will judge and put a price on you, so that you may thus fulfill that vow.

Leviticus 27:9-10 (NASB)—“‘9 Now if it is an animal of the kind which men can present as an offering to the LORD, any such that one gives to the LORD shall be holy. 10 He shall not replace it or exchange it, a good for a bad, or a bad for a good; or if he does exchange animal for animal, then both it and its substitute shall become holy.’” Once you offer your animal for sacrifice, it belonged to the priest. Period, end of story. If you vowed the next ox to be born to YHVH, and it is born with some kind of defect or blemish—perhaps it has a short leg or some scaly patch of skin—you do not go to the priest and say, “Look, I know I vowed this ox to the LORD, but as you can see it’s not fit for God’s use. Here, let me give you this better one from my herd.” You don’t do that. If that one is not fit, and you want to offer a better specimen, then guess what—both the good one and the bad one belonged to God. The good one was used for sacrifice; the bad one went to the family of the priest. “If he does exchange animal for animal, then both it and its substitute shall become holy.” John Gill—“Whatsoever was devoted to sacred use was never to be put to any profane one; and this was also to teach men not to be hasty and fickle in such things, but to consider well what they did, and abide by it.” Or, as Paul warned Timothy, Do not lay hands upon anyone too hastily and thereby share responsibility for the sins of others; keep yourself free from sin (1st Timothy 5:22 (NASB)).

Leviticus 27:11-13 (NASB)—“‘11 If, however, it is any unclean animal of the kind which men do not present as an offering to the LORD, then he shall place the animal before the priest. 12 The priest shall value it as either good or bad; as you, the priest, value it, so it shall be. 13 But if he should ever wish to redeem it, then he shall add one-fifth of it to your valuation.’” That is, if you wanted to give the priest a donkey for him to use—perhaps to use for travel, or some other use outside of the sanctuary—if you wanted to buy it back, the priest had to put a value on it, add 20%, and then you could buy it back. “The priest shall value it, whether it be good or bad, should rather be rendered, the priest shall estimate it between good and bad, that is, at a moderate price, as though it were neither very good nor very bad. And so in the next verse” (Spence and Exell, The Pulpit Commentary).

Leviticus 27:14-25 (NASB)—“‘14 Now if a man consecrates his house as holy to the LORD, then the priest shall value it as either good or bad; as the priest values it, so it shall stand. 15 Yet if the one who consecrates it should wish to redeem his house, then he shall add one-fifth of your valuation price to it, so that it may be his. 16 Again, if a man consecrates to the LORD part of the fields of his own property, then your valuation shall be proportionate to the seed needed for it: a homer of barley seed at fifty shekels of silver. 17 If he consecrates his field as of the year of jubilee, according to your valuation it shall stand. 18 If he consecrates his field after the jubilee, however, then the priest shall calculate the price for him proportionate to the years that are left until the year of jubilee; and it shall be deducted from your valuation. 19 If the one who consecrates it should ever wish to redeem the field, then he shall add one-fifth of your valuation price to it, so that it may pass to him. 20 Yet if he will not redeem the field, but has sold the field to another man, it may no longer be redeemed; 21 and when it reverts in the jubilee, the field shall be holy to the LORD, like a field set apart; it shall be for the priest as his property. 22 Or if he consecrates to the LORD a field which he has bought, which is not a part of the field of his own property, 23 then the priest shall calculate for him the amount of your valuation up to the year of jubilee; and he shall on that day give your valuation as holy to the LORD. 24 In the year of jubilee the field shall return to the one from whom he bought it, to whom the possession of the land belongs. 25 Every valuation of yours, moreover, shall be after the shekel of the sanctuary. The shekel shall be twenty gerahs.”

This section doesn't really need much commentary; we have already discussed either all that is covered here, or at least the principle behind these words. Basically, if you wanted to buy back what you had dedicated to YHVH, you had to add 20% to the price. The valuations were prorated based on the number of years until Jubilee. If you don’t redeem it by the Year of Jubilee, or you sell it to another man, you don’t get it back. And the shekel that was to be used, the shekel of the sanctuary, was twenty gerahs. “What’s a gerah”? A gerah was equivalent in weight to about 16 coffee beans. If you want to do a home study on your own and weigh them yourself, feel free.

Leviticus 27:26-27 (NASB)—“‘26 However, a firstborn among animals, which as a firstborn belongs to the LORD, no man may consecrate it; whether ox or sheep, it is the LORD's. 27 But if it is among the unclean animals, then he shall redeem it according to your valuation and add to it one-fifth of it; and if it is not redeemed, then it shall be sold according to your valuation.’” Again, simple. The firstborn among any animal that could be sacrificed to YHVH could not be redeemed. On the night of the first Passover, Exodus 13:1-2 (NASB)—1 Then the LORD spoke to Moses, saying, 2 "Sanctify to Me every firstborn, the first offspring of every womb among the sons of Israel, both of man and beast; it belongs to Me." Now, if you did not want to redeem that firstborn of unclean animals, and you couldn’t find a buyer for it, God gave instructions for just such a situation in Exodus 13:11-13 (NASB)—“11 Now when the LORD brings you to the land of the Canaanite, as He swore to you and to your fathers, and gives it to you, 12 you shall devote to the LORD the first offspring of every womb, and the first offspring of every beast that you own; the males belong to the LORD. 13 But every first offspring of a donkey you shall redeem with a lamb, but if you do not redeem it, then you shall break its neck; and every firstborn of man among your sons you shall redeem.” The firstborn belonged to God, period, paragraph, end of story. This concept of the firstborn belonging to God is echoed in Christ. Colossians 1:15 (NASB)—He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. 1st Corinthians 3:23 (NASB)—You belong to Christ; and Christ belongs to God. Now, it’s true that Christ belonged to God long before He became flesh and made His tabernacle among men. And He has been given the preeminence as the Firstborn of God because God has made us brothers and sisters of Christ. Romans 8:29 (NASB)—For those whom He foreknew, He also predestined to become conformed to the image of His Son, so that He would be the firstborn among many brethren.

Leviticus 27:28-29 (NASB)—“‘28 Nevertheless, anything which a man sets apart to the LORD out of all that he has, of man or animal or of the fields of his own property, shall not be sold or redeemed. Anything devoted to destruction is most holy to the LORD. 29 No one who may have been set apart among men shall be ransomed; he shall surely be put to death.’” This would be talking about the sacrifice of a Peace Offering—specifically, a Peace Offering of a vow, and even more specifically, the Peace Offering of a vow of destruction, or חֵרֶם (cherem) (Greek ἀνάθεμα, anathema). Now, let’s not get ahead of ourselves and ask, “But, does this mean that Yitzhak could offer his servant as a חֵרֶם (cherem) and that servant would be put to death?” No, that is NOT what this means. The חֵרֶם (cherem) was not to be used in that manner. (Jephthah learned that lesson the hard way in Judges 11). Only God could set someone aside for destruction. And He did. Joshua 6:17-18 (KJV)—“17 And the city shall be accursed (חֵרֶם [cherem]), even it, and all that are therein, to the LORD…18 And ye, in any wise keep yourselves from the accursed thing (חֵרֶם [cherem]), lest ye make yourselves accursed (חָרַם [cherem]), when ye take of the accursed thing (חֵרֶם [cherem]), and make the camp of Israel a curse (חֵרֶם [cherem]), and trouble it.” Nothing that God had put under the ban (חֵרֶם [cherem]) could be redeemed. It had to be destroyed. Anything devoted to destruction for the glory of God was to be destroyed. We have already studied this in detail when we looked at chapter 3 and the Peace Offering, so if you want to read more about it, you can do so there.

And finally, Leviticus 27:30-34 (NASB)—“‘30 Thus all the tithe of the land, of the seed of the land or of the fruit of the tree, is the LORD's; it is holy to the LORD. 31 If, therefore, a man wishes to redeem part of his tithe, he shall add to it one-fifth of it. 32 For every tenth part of herd or flock, whatever passes under the rod, the tenth one shall be holy to the LORD. 33 He is not to be concerned whether it is good or bad, nor shall he exchange it; or if he does exchange it, then both it and its substitute shall become holy. It shall not be redeemed.’” 34 These are the commandments which the LORD commanded Moses for the sons of Israel at Mount Sinai. What is one of the most controversial subjects in the church? The tithe. I'm gonna say it from the outset; get it out of the way so you know where I'm coming from. Here goes: the church, under the new covenant (Hebrews 8:6-13) is not—not—bound by any 10% tithe. But what do we always hear from pulpits of those churches that teach that the church, even though not under the Law is under the tithe? “You're robbing God!” And to whom do they run for their refuge? Malachi. Specifically Malachi 3:8—“Will a man rob God? Yet you are robbing Me! But you say, 'How have we robbed You?' In tithes and offerings.” And they read that verse and they declare, “SEE!!”—and they speak in all capital letters—“SEE!! MALACHI SAYS YOU'RE ROBBING GOD IF YOU DON’T TITHE!!” And they have taken that verse out of context in order to prop up their flawed doctrine. If they were to read that verse in its proper context, they would (if they were so convicted) cease to teach the “give your 10% or God will curse you” tithe.

In fact, next time someone asks you, “Do you believe in the tithe?” you should ask them this simple question—“Which tithe?” And they will look at you like you’ve got three eyeballs. “Well, what do you mean ‘which tithe’? The 10% tithe!” And when you ask them to show you, from the Scripture, where it says that the church, under the new covenant, is bound neck and heel to give 10% of their income to the preacher, they may drag you to Hebrews 7, where the writer talks about Abram tithing to Melchizedek. And then you ask them, “What did Abram tithe from?” And they will once again look at you like you have three eyeballs. Then you elaborate and ask, “Did he tithe, one time, from the spoils of war—or did he tithe from everything he made for the rest of his life?” Of course he did not give Melchizedek 10% of everything he ever made for the rest of his life. It was a one-time deal. But then, they will pull out (what they think is) their trump card, and say, “Aha! But we must tithe because the tithe was in force before the Law!” Really. So Abram was under compulsion to give Melchizedek 10% of the spoils of war? Let’s think about this a second. If the Law was not in place, how could Abram be under compulsion to give Melchizedek the tithe? And, one more way to answer this last objection—ask them another question: was the Sabbath in place before the Law? If they say “Yes,” then ask them if they keep the Sabbath. If they don’t, then ask them “Well, the Sabbath was in place before the Law, but you don’t keep the Sabbath. And yet the tithe, which existed before the Law, you place around people’s necks like a millstone?”

I hate to say “We’ll talk more about the tithe when we get to it”—but I have to. Because under the Law there were actually three tithes (the Malachi Tithe® was actually that which was set aside for the widows and orphans, and you actually ate one of the other tithes), and they are all in the book of Deuteronomy, so you'll have to wait on that. But before we leave this topic, let me say this—should we, the church, be giving? Absolutely. Do we do it because we are under compulsion to do so? Absolutely—NOT. 2nd Corinthians 9:6-7 (NKJV)—6 But this I say: He who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. 7 So let each one give as he purposes in his heart, not grudgingly or of necessity; for God loves a cheerful giver. Was the tithe of necessity to the Israelite? Yes. So we are to give, not of necessity, then are we bound, by Law, to the tithe? No. If you want to read an excellent treatment of the subject of tithing, read Jim McClarty’s book “A Guide to New Covenant Giving” (You can read the free PDF at http://www.salvationbygrace.org/uc/sub/docs/grace_giving.pdf )

One more thing: We are taught to tithe off the top. And to make sure it’s the very best. But what was it that belonged to God? Leviticus 27:32-33—“32 For every tenth part of herd or flock, whatever passes under the rod, the tenth one shall be holy to the LORD. 33 He is not to be concerned whether it is good or bad.” You simply hold out a rod, have your animals file underneath it one at a time, and count as they pass under the rod. And every tenth animal that passed under that rod belonged to God, and therefore went to the priests and Levites. And you don’t check it to see if it had a blemish. You simply count it, and hand it over. This was God’s way of saying “Everything belongs to Me. The good, the bad—it’s all mine. And I will do with it as I please.” The fact that God commanded they not be concerned whether it was good or bad served a purpose, however. Whenever the priests and Levites were in a sinful state, God could very easily blight the herds and flocks, and give the blighted animals the priests’ and Levites’ portions.

So that concludes our study of the book of Leviticus. We will now, naturally, move directly on to the book of Numbers, which is more of a narrative, although there are many theological implications and applications which we will glean from the texts. I hope you have enjoyed this study, and that you will enjoy Numbers.

A Survey of the Old Testament Law--The Peace Offering Part 2 (3:1-17; 7:11-21)

Today we begin by examining the third type of Peace Offering of a vow, this being the “vow of destruction” (the Hebrew [חֵרֶם, cherem], or Greek [ἀνάθεμα, anathema]). Where have I heard the word ἀνάθεμα (anathema) before? Oh yeah. 1^st Corinthians 16:22 (KJV)—If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be ἀνάθεμα (anathema). Paul uses it in a couple other verses (although translated into English rather than transliterated from the Greek). Galatians 1:8-9—8 But even if we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be accursed (ἀνάθεμα (anathema)). 9 As we have said before, so now I say again, if anyone preaches any other gospel to you than what you have received, let him be accursed (ἀνάθεμα (anathema)). Let him be devoted to destruction. We read about things being declared חֵרֶם (cherem) in Joshua 6. The things dedicated to חֵרֶם (cherem) were, of course, those things in the city of Jericho that the LORD commanded them to destroy. Joshua, son of Nun, makes this warning very clear to all within the sound of his voice when he declares in Joshua 6:16-18—16 And it came to pass at the seventh time, when the priests blew with the trumpets, Joshua said unto the people, “Shout; for the LORD hath given you the city. 17 And the city shall be accursed (חֵרֶם (cherem)), even it, and all that are therein, to the LORD: only Rahab the harlot shall live, she and all that are with her in the house, because she hid the messengers that we sent. 18 And ye, in any wise keep yourselves from the accursed thing (חֵרֶם (cherem)), lest ye make yourselves accursed, when ye take of the accursed thing חֵרֶם (cherem), and make the camp of Israel a curse (חֵרֶם (cherem)), and trouble it.” Anything that was devoted to destruction for the glory of God was to be destroyed. Not just for grins and giggles, but so that all things which call themselves “God” (which are not God) may be obliterated and the true God be magnified.

A person could put under the חֵרֶם (cherem) either land, or beasts, or even people. Leviticus 27 is the first place we read about putting something (or someone) under חֵרֶם (cherem). In Leviticus 27:16-21—“‘16 If a man dedicates to the LORD part of a field of his possession, then your valuation shall be according to the seed for it…17 If he dedicates his field from the Year of Jubilee, according to your valuation it shall stand. 18 But if he dedicates his field after the Jubilee, then the priest shall reckon to him the money due according to the years that remain till the Year of Jubilee, and it shall be deducted from your valuation. 19 And if he who dedicates the field ever wishes to redeem it, then he must add one-fifth of the money of your valuation to it, and it shall belong to him. 20 But if he does not want to redeem the field, or if he has sold the field to another man, it shall not be redeemed anymore; 21 but the field, when it is released in the Jubilee, shall be holy to the LORD, as a devoted field; it shall be the possession of the priest.’” To make it simple: if you declare a portion of your field to be חֵרֶם (cherem) during the year of Jubilee, you get 50 shekels. For every year after that, they knock a shekel off the price. Let’s say you declare a piece of land חֵרֶם (cherem) 7 years after the last Jubilee. If you want it back, you have to redeem it by paying back what you received, plus one-fifth. Now, if you declare it חֵרֶם (cherem) and you get your 43 shekels, and then you turn and sell that land to someone who is not of your tribe—it’s gone. And even closer to our point here, if you declare that piece of land חֵרֶם (cherem), and the next Jubilee rolls around, and you haven’t redeemed it—tough luck, Lucy. It belongs to the priests. It is חֵרֶם (cherem) to YHVH. Period, paragraph.

Then, we read a little something that makes us pause. Leviticus 27:28-29—“‘28 Nevertheless no devoted offering that a man may devote to the LORD of all that he has, both man and beast, or the field of his possession, shall be sold or redeemed; every devoted offering is most holy to the LORD. 29 No person under the ban, who may become doomed to destruction among men, shall be redeemed, but shall surely be put to death.’” You could dedicate animals to the חֵרֶם (cherem), obviously. And once you declare that animal חֵרֶם (cherem) you could not redeem it. You dedicated it to destruction for the glory of God—it’s over, you don’t get it back. But the really odd thing here is you could dedicate people to the חֵרֶם (cherem). One could dedicate another person to destruction. That sounds bizarre to us. That sounds cruel and inhumane. BUT—let’s think about this, and not just rashly write this off as some insane addition that some corrupt scribe inserted here. For the most glaring example of rashly assigning one to חֵרֶם (cherem), we look at Jephthah. Judges 11:29-33—29 Then the Spirit of the LORD came upon Jephthah, and he passed through Gilead and Manasseh, and passed through Mizpah of Gilead; and from Mizpah of Gilead he advanced toward the people of Ammon. 30 And Jephthah made a vow to the LORD, and said, "If You will indeed deliver the people of Ammon into my hands, 31 then it will be that whatever comes out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the people of Ammon, shall surely be the LORD's, and I will offer it up as a burnt offering." 32 So Jephthah advanced toward the people of Ammon to fight against them, and the LORD delivered them into his hands. 33 And he defeated them from Aroer as far as Minnith—twenty cities—and to Abel Keramim, with a very great slaughter. Thus the people of Ammon were subdued before the children of Israel. Sounds great, yeah? Good news, Jephthah led the people of Israel to a mighty victory. And as a Peace Offering, he makes a vow of חֵרֶם (cherem) of the first living thing that comes out of his house to greet him at home!

Not so fast. What was the first living thing to greet him when he got home? Judges 11:34-39—34 When Jephthah came to his house at Mizpah, there was his daughter, coming out to meet him with timbrels and dancing; and she was his only child. Besides her he had neither son nor daughter. 35 And it came to pass, when he saw her, that he tore his clothes, and said, "Alas, my daughter! You have brought me very low! You are among those who trouble me! For I have given my word to the LORD, and I cannot go back on it"…39 And it was so at the end of two months that she returned to her father, and he carried out his vow with her which he had vowed. What happened here? Well, this is one place where we must depart from the traditional translations. In verse 31, when Jephthah makes this fateful vow, what we have read had been the traditional rendering. However, it may not actually be accurate. At the risk of sounding like I have this notion that I have somehow solved one of the greatest difficulties in Scripture—one which the most learned of men have wrestled with for years—after pouring over much material, I must come to the conclusion that what happened here was NOT that Jephthah promised to take the first human that came out the door to greet him, take that person to the priest and have the priest kill, cut up, and burn that person. Let’s talk about this a moment.

If Jephthah had promised to offer the first person out the door as a Burnt Offering on YHVH’s altar, and if YHVH had held Jephthah to that vow—then any Israelite could put any other Israelite under חֵרֶם (cherem), and there would be all kinds of human sacrifice going on, and they would be no different form the pagans who worshipped Molech. Keil and Delitzsch—

“…the law concerning the ban and a vow of the ban [חֵרֶם (cherem)] could not possibly give any individual Israelite the right to ban [חֵרֶם (cherem)] either his own child or one of his household to the Lord, without opening a very wide door to the crime of murder. The infliction of the ban [חֵרֶם (cherem)] upon any man presupposed notorious wickedness, so that burnt-offering and ban [חֵרֶם (cherem)] were diametrically opposed the one to the other.”

So, what was the vow that Jephthah vowed? Well, Dr. William Hales, a Hebrew scholar from the 1800’s, interprets it thus:

“When Jephthah went forth to battle against the Ammonites, he vowed a vow unto the Lord, and said, ‘If thou wilt surely give the children of Ammon into my hand, then it shall be that whatsoever cometh out of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the children of Ammon, shall either be the Lord’s, or I will offer it up (for) a burnt-offering.’ According to this rendering of the two conjunctions…the vow consisted of two parts: 1. That what person soever met him should be the Lord’s or be dedicated to his service; and, 2. That what beast soever met him, if clean, should be offered up for a burnt-offering unto the Lord. This rendering and this interpretation is warranted by the Levitical law about vows.

“The נדר  (neder), or vow, in general, included either persons, beasts, or things dedicated to the Lord for pious uses; which, if it was a simple vow, was redeemable at certain prices, if the person repented of his vow, and wished to commute it for money, according to the age or sex of the person (see Leviticus 27:1-8): this was a wise regulation to remedy rash vows. But if the vow was accompanied with חֵרֶם (cherem), devotement, it was irredeemable, as in the following case, Leviticus 27:28—‘“Notwithstanding, no devotement which a man shall devote unto the Lord, (either) of man, or beast, or of land of his own property, shall be sold or redeemed. Every thing devoted is most holy to the Lord”’

“…there are three distinct subjects of devotement to be applied to distinct uses: the man to be dedicated to the service of the Lord, as Samuel by his mother Hannah (see 1^st Samuel 1:11); the cattle, if clean, such as oxen, sheep, goats, turtle-doves, or pigeons, to be sacrificed; and if unclean, as camels, horses, asses, to be employed for carrying burdens in the service of the tabernacle or temple; and the lands, to be sacred property.

“This law therefore expressly applied…to Jephthah’s case, who had devoted his daughter to the Lord, or opened his mouth to the Lord, and therefore could not go back…she was, therefore necessarily devoted, but with her own consent to perpetual virginity in the service of the tabernacle, and such service was customary, for in the division of the spoils taken in the first Midianitish war, of the whole number of captive virgins the Lord’s tribute was thirty-two persons (see Numbers 31:15-40). This instance appears to be decisive of the nature of her devotement.”

To summarize, although Jephthah did indeed offer his daughter to YHVH as an עֹלָה (olah), he did not necessarily devote her to destruction as a חֵרֶם (cherem). Therefore, she need not be slaughtered a bloody עֹלָה (olah), but she was presented, as Paul encourages us to present ourselves, as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God (Romans 12:1). And indeed, Adam Clarke bolsters this argument by quoting the great Hebrew scholar of the 1600’s, Charles Francois Houbigant on the last verses in this chapter, Judges 11:39-40, which have come to us as reading, And it became a custom in Israel that the daughters of Israel went four days each year to lament the daughter of Jephthah the Gileadite. Monsieur Houbigant rather renders it thus: “But this custom prevailed in Israel that the virgins of Israel went at different times, four days in the year, to the daughter of Jephthah, that they might comfort her.” Mister Clarke concludes from this rendering (and, I believe, rightly so), that, “This verse also gives evidence that the daughter of Jephthah was not sacrificed: nor does it appear that the custom or statute referred to here lasted after the death of Jephthah’s daughter.” Many, many years later, Solomon would warn us about making hasty vows in Ecclesiastes 5:2-5—2 Do not be rash with your mouth, And let not your heart utter anything hastily before God. For God is in heaven, and you on earth; Therefore let your words be few…4 When you make a vow to God, do not delay to pay it; For He has no pleasure in fools. Pay what you have vowed—5 Better not to vow than to vow and not pay.

So that covers the Peace Offerings (שֶׁלֶם (shelem)) “of a vow”—the vow of devotion, the vow of abstinence (קָרְבָּן (qorban)), and the vow of destruction (חֵרֶם (cherem)). Next week we will turn our attention to the “voluntary” (or “freewill”) offering.