What Does Judges 11:34 Mean in the King James?
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.
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
The word translated “only” makes the daughter’s life singular before the cost of the vow can become abstract.
THE MEANING
The verse holds celebration and vulnerability in the same frame: the daughter comes toward her father with music and dance, and she is his only child. Her singularity is already present before any cost that follows; she is not an interchangeable place in a household.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The idea that she is an interchangeable child dissolves in the verse itself: no other son or daughter stands beside her.
THE ROOT
יְחִידָה
yeḥidah
GROWS FROM
יחד
y-ḥ-d
To join or be united; this word family also describes what is singular or alone.
The root family holds togetherness and singularity side by side: יָחִיד (yāḥîḏ, “only, unique”) names one who stands alone, while יַחַד (yaḥad, “together”) names what is joined. Calling her יְחִידָה makes her more than a family position; it keeps this one daughter fully visible.
ALSO GROWS
yāḥîḏ: Only, solitary, unique.
יָחִיד
The masculine form is used of Isaac as Abraham’s “only son” in Genesis 22:2, linking the two passages through the same word family.
yaḥad: Together, jointly.
יַחַד
Its sense of being joined sits beside יְחִידָה’s sense of being the one; the verse names a singular life within a family bond.
לִקְרָאתוֹ
liqra'to
GROWS FROM
קרא
q-r-ʾ
Call out, summon, proclaim; in this form, come to meet.
The Hebrew form for “to meet him” belongs to the קרא family, whose words include calling and summoning. The meeting is a directed approach toward him, answered here by the sound and movement of celebration.
ALSO GROWS
qārāʾ: Call out, summon, proclaim.
קָרָא
This is the root behind “to meet him,” giving the encounter a sense of directed approach.
miqrāʾ: Reading aloud, assembly, convocation.
מִקְרָא
The word can name a gathering called together; here, the daughter comes toward her father to meet him.
THE PATTERN
Scripture makes the cost of an offering personal by naming the life at stake as someone’s only one.
And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn.For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.THE THREAD
And he said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land of Moriah; and offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of.The same Hebrew word, יָחִיד (yāḥîḏ, “only one”), names Isaac as Abraham’s only son. That shared word makes this daughter’s singularity echo the child placed under an offering command, keeping the human cost personal rather than abstract.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us