Then Jephthah gathered together all the men of Gilead, and fought with Ephraim: and the men of Gilead smote Ephraim, because they said, Ye Gileadites are fugitives of Ephraim among the Ephraimites, and among the Manassites.
The men of Gilead smote Ephraim, because they said, Ye Gileadites are fugitives of Ephraim. The remonstrances of Jephthah, though reasonable and temperate, were not only ineffectual, but followed by insulting sneers that the Gileadites were reckoned both by the western Manassites and Ephraimites as outcasts, the scum and refuse of their common stock. This was addressed to a specially sensitive people. A feud immediately ensued. The Gileadites, determined to chastise this public affront, gave them battle; and having defeated the Ephraimites, chased their foul-mouthed but cowardly assailants out of the territory; and rushing to the ford of the Jordan-a few miles below the confluence of the Jordan and the Jabbok (Wady Zerka) - intercepted and killed every fugitive. The method adopted for discovering an Ephraimite was by the pronunciation of a word naturally suggested by the place where they stood. "Shibboleth" means a stream, "Sibboleth" a burden. The Eastern tribe had, it seems, a dialectical provincialism in the sound of Shibboleth; and the Ephraimites could not bring their organs to pronounce it.