Judges 11:39,40 - Coke's Commentary on the Holy Bible

It came to pass at the end of two months— When Jephthah returned victorious, he was met by his daughter, who accordingly became the object of his vow, and therefore, as we understand it, being in every respect improper for a burnt-offering, she was to be devoted to a single state in the service of the Lord: the greater calamity to Jephthah, as she was his only child, Judges 11:34.; a circumstance which the sacred historian dwells upon, besides her he had neither son nor daughter. Immediately upon her father's signifying his vow to her she seems to have understood him, and, with pious alacrity, submits to the decree; though celibacy, and the want of offspring, were esteemed by the women of Israel as one of the severest punishments, Judges 11:36. She requests to be allowed two months to bewail this calamity; to bewail her being cut off, as it were, from Israel, and deprived of all hope to become a mother among those from whom the Messiah was to spring. Jephthah complies with her request; and at the end of two months she returned to her father, who did with her, says the sacred writer, according to his vow;—and she knew no man. In which words, it is as clear as the light, that the vow of Jephthah was fulfilled; for, if she had been slain as a burnt-offering, it would have been absurd to have told us, that she afterwards knew no man. And, indeed, the passage is so plain, that one would wonder that it could ever have come into the heads of writers to conceive, that her father, who was a truly pious man, (see on Judges 11:11.) could have thought of offering up his daughter as a sacrifice to that GOD, who never allowed or admitted such horrid sacrifices, and whose great quarrel against the baneful idols of the heathens was, that they called for and accepted the sacrifices of sons and daughters. See Leviticus 18:21; Leviticus 20:2.Deuteronomy 12:31; Deuteronomy 18:10. Jephthah vowed, that whatever met him upon his return from a victorious war, if a human creature, and proper for that service, should certainly be consecrated to the service of the LORD; or, if an animal fit for a sacrifice, should immediately be offered up for a burnt-offering. His daughter met him; she willingly confirms her father's vow; and wishes to bewail herself for that state of virginity to which she was devoted; which completed, her father did with her according to his vow, and, therefore, she knew no man; but was devoted to the Lord a virgin to the end of her life: and it continued a custom in Israel, we are further informed, for the virgins of Israel to go to the daughter of Jephthah, the Gileadite, to console her four days in the year: so Houbigant translates the verse, observing, that there is nothing in history to lead us to believe that this custom was kept up after the death of Jephthah's daughter; nay, the virgins of Israel are said expressly to have gone to the daughter of Jephthah herself, for no other place is specified whither they could go. This appears to us the genuine sense of a passage upon which volumes have been written. Those who choose to enter more deeply into the subject may consult Pfeifferi, Dub. Vex. Dodwell, Schudt, Smallridge, or Sykes.