Note 44 — Chapter XII · IF NON-TOL­ERA­TION WAS PART OF THE DI­VINE LAW A­MONG THE JEWS, AND WHETH­ER IT WAS AL­WAYS PUT IN PRAC­TICE.

It is plain by the text that Jephthah did actually sacrifice his daughter. Doctor Calmet; in his dissertation upon Jephthah’s vow, says, that “God did not approve these vows; but when once any one had made them, he insisted upon their being fulfilled, was it only to punish those who made them, and to put a check upon them in the doing it by fear of being obliged to perform them.” This action of Jephthah is condemned by St. Augustine and almost all the fathers, although the Scripture says that he was filled with the spirit of God; and St. Paul in the eleventh chapter of his Epistle to the Hebrews, greatly praises Jephthah, exalting him even above Samuel and David. St. Jerome, in his Epistle to Julian, expresses himself thus; “Jephthah sacrificed his daughter to the Lord, and therefore the Apostle has placed him among the saints.” Here now is a diversity in opinions, concerning which it is not permitted us to pronounce a decision; nay, it is even dangerous to have any opinion of our own.