An Ephraimite army heads across the Jordan River to Gilead and confronts Jephthah. They are angry because Jephthah and the Gileadites fought off the Ammonites and the Ephraimites claim that they were not consulted in the matter and that they would have helped. Jephthah replies that he did call them, but they did not help.
This escalates to our first inter-tribal civil war and 42,000 Ephraimites are killed. As they try to escape across the river, the Gileadites would ask them to say a word “Shibboleth” and their accent will give them away that they are actually Ephraimites. It is also stated that the Ephraimites claim that the Ephraimites are renegades from Manasseh and Ephraim.
I don’t think get a lot of details of why they’re fighting each other. My guess is that regional and cultural divisions are already apparent between tribes (ex., regional accents). There may be more cultural conflicts with the Gileadites in particular and these backwater people (who may have done human sacrifice) are “leading” Israel against their oppressors. So, maybe nothing more than regional jealousies sprouting into war when they should be uniting against common foes.
Jephthah dies after leading Israel for 6 years. The chapter quickly summarizes three other leaders with very little detail about them – Ibzan, Elon, and Abdon. Each of them seem to come from a different tribe and area of the country, so God is not picking favorites among the tribes despite their jealousies.
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