Judges 12:1-7--Jephthah's Conflict with Ephraim

Judges 12:1-7
English Standard Version

Jephthah's Conflict with Ephraim
12 The men of Ephraim were called to arms, and they crossed to Zaphon and said to Jephthah, “Why did you cross over to fight against the Ammonites and did not call us to go with you? We will burn your house over you with fire.” 2 And Jephthah said to them, “I and my people had a great dispute with the Ammonites, and when I called you, you did not save me from their hand. 3 And when I saw that you would not save me, I took my life in my hand and crossed over against the Ammonites, and the LORD gave them into my hand. Why then have you come up to me this day to fight against me?” 4 Then Jephthah gathered all the men of Gilead and fought with Ephraim. And the men of Gilead struck Ephraim, because they said, “You are fugitives of Ephraim, you Gileadites, in the midst of Ephraim and Manasseh.” 5 And the Gileadites captured the fords of the Jordan against the Ephraimites. And when any of the fugitives of Ephraim said, “Let me go over,” the men of Gilead said to him, “Are you an Ephraimite?” When he said, “No,” 6 they said to him, “Then say Shibboleth,” and he said, “Sibboleth,” for he could not pronounce it right. Then they seized him and slaughtered him at the fords of the Jordan. At that time 42,000 of the Ephraimites fell.

​7 Jephthah judged Israel six years. Then Jephthah the Gileadite died and was buried in his city in Gilead.

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Ephraim along with much of the other Canaanite-dwelling Israelites treated the Trans-Jordan tribes (who always identified themselves as being of Gilead) like they were of another country with the Jordan River being a boundary between them.  The Ephraimites did not answer the call of their brothers when they were asked to come and defend them, yet they were upset when Jephthah crossed the Jordan River to give chase to the Ammonites because the Ephraimites wanted to share in the spoils of victory without doing the hard work.

Jephthah puts them in their place and says they would have been a part of the battle if they had responded when he called for help, but when his fellow Israelites ignored him, it was clear that the LORD Himself would be the one that would get the glory for the victory, and they had no right to march against him to make war that day for Jephthah and the inhabitants of Gilead were only defending Canaan from foreign invaders as they had sworn they would do.

Jephthah gathered all the men of Gilead and they fought against the Ephraimites and struck down many of them and the men of Gilead captured the fords of the Jordan (the place where the Ephraimites needed to cross the river) so that any time anyone tried to cross over they asked if they were of the tribe of Ephraim, and if they said "No" then they tested them to tell them to say the word Shibboleth​.  Apparently the tribe of Ephraim could not make the "Sh" sound and would say Sibboleth, so they would be be caught if they lied about their identity.  Any who were found to be of Ephraim were killed when they tried to cross over so that about 42,000 Ephraimites were killed in this battle.

Jephthah remained judge over Israel for six years (we'll see that the people will once again do what is right in their own eyes and will return to their idolatry and paganism and will need to be judged again).  He died and was buried among his people in the city of Gilead.  There are a few minor judges that we'll talk about next time--they are mostly just mentioned by name and are there to get us from Jephthah to Sampson who is the next major judge we will talk about.  We'll see with Sampson just how corrupt even the judges have become.