And Jephthah vowed a vow unto the Lord, and said, If thou shalt without fail deliver the children of Ammon into mine hands, Then it shall be, that whatsoever cometh forth of the doors of my house to meet me, when I return in peace from the children of Ammon, shall surely be the Lord's, and I will offer it up for a burnt offering.
Jehovah accepted the bargain and gave Jephthah the victory.
And Jephthah came to Mizpeh unto his house, and, behold, his daughter came out to meet him with timbrels and with dances: and she was his only child; beside her he had neither son nor daughter.
And it came to pass, when he saw her, that he rent his clothes, and said, Alas, my daughter!
Then the poor man explains to his child the vow he had made unto the Lord. The young woman was willing to be offered up as a "burnt offering" unto the Lord, if she could have two months' time to wander about and bewail her sad fate.
And it came to pass at the end of two months, that she returned unto her father, who did with her according to his vow which he had vowed. *
* Judges xi, 30-39.
Why should Americans have anything to do with an Asiatic cult which tempts a father to kill the son that had called him papa, or which actually permits a father to burn alive his only child—the child that ran to greet him with a kiss? There was a good excuse to burn the clothes, or the timbrels with which Jephtha's daughter ran to meet her father, instead of the young lady herself. A good argument could have been made that the first object the returning general saw was the timbrels in her hand, but the Lord would not accept anything less than human flesh in those days.
There are many other examples in the "Holy Bible" as objectionable as those already mentioned. Frequently the only way to turn away the "wrath of God" from the people, was to hang a few heads against the sun, or massacre a whole community, children included, or to draw the sword upon the members of one's own family. What does the reader think of all this—in the bible! Why are not men ashamed to print and distribute twenty million copies a year of a book so foreign to the best feelings of our age and country? Why should such a book be forced into our homes and schools, or placed in the hands of our little ones immediately after they have left their cradles? Why should there be a copy of this book in every room of every hotel in the land?
Before dismissing this subject it would be well to point out that the long practice of human and animal sacrifices is responsible for the cruelty to children and animals in modern times. Humanity to our dumb neighbors has not been one of the distinguished virtues of either Jews or Christians, and though we live in the twentieth century we have to support societies specially devoted to preventing cruelty to children. In the same way associations have been organized to protect animals against mistreatment.