1. Now Jephthah the Gileadite was a mighty man of valor, but he was son of a prostitute, while Gilead was Jephthah’s father.
2. But Gilead’s wife bore him sons, and when the wife’s sons grew up, they drove Jephthah out and said to him, “You won’t inherit in our father’s house, for you are a son of another woman.”
3. Then Jephthah fled from his brothers and lived in the land of Tob. Some worthless fellows joined with Jephthah and went out with him.
4. Now it came about after a while that the children of Ammon fought with Israel.
5. When the children of Ammon made war against Israel, the elders of Gilead went to fetch Jephthah from the land of Tob.
6. They said to Jephthah, “Come and be our chief, so we may fight the children of Ammon.”
7. Jephthah then said to the elders of Gilead, “Didn’t you hate me and drive me out of my father’s house? So why are you coming to me now that you’re in trouble?”
8. “Here is why we’re now turning to you,” the elders of Gilead said to Jephthah. “Come with us, fight the children of Ammon, and then you will become head over all the inhabitants of Gilead.”
9. So Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, “If you take me back home to fight the children of Ammon, and Adonai gives them over to me, I should become your head!”
10. The elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, “Let Adonai be witness between us if we don’t do as you say.”
11. Then Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead, and the people made him head and chief over them, after Jephthah repeated all his terms before Adonai at Mizpah.
12. Then Jephthah sent messengers to the king of the children of Ammon saying, “What have you to do with me, that you have come to me to make war on my land?”
13. The king of the children of Ammon answered the messengers of Jephthah, “Because Israel took away my land, when they came up from Egypt, from the Arnon to the Jabbok as far as the Jordan. Now therefore, return them peaceably.”
14. But Jephthah sent messengers again to the king of the children of Ammon,
15. and said to him, “Thus says Jephthah, ‘Israel did not take away the land of Moab or the land of the children of Ammon.
16. For upon departing from Egypt, Israel traveled through the wilderness to the Sea of Reeds and came to Kadesh,