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New Living Translation |   | |
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| | Jdg 12:1 | Then the tribe of Ephraim mobilized its army and crossed over to Zaphon. They sent this message to Jephthah: "Why didn't you call for us to help you fight against Ammon? We are going to burn down your house with you in it!"
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| | Jdg 12:2 | "I summoned you at the beginning of the dispute, but you refused to come!" Jephthah said. "You failed to help us in our struggle against Ammon.
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| | Jdg 12:3 | So I risked my life and went to battle without you, and the LORD gave me victory over the Ammonites. So why have you come to fight me?"
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| | Jdg 12:4 | The leaders of Ephraim responded, "The men of Gilead are nothing more than rejects from Ephraim and Manasseh." So Jephthah called out his army and attacked the men of Ephraim and defeated them.
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| | Jdg 12:5 | Jephthah captured the shallows of the Jordan, and whenever a fugitive from Ephraim tried to go back across, the men of Gilead would challenge him. "Are you a member of the tribe of Ephraim?" they would ask. If the man said, "No, I'm not,"
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| | Jdg 12:6 | they would tell him to say "Shibboleth." If he was from Ephraim, he would say "Sibboleth," because people from Ephraim cannot pronounce the word correctly. Then they would take him and kill him at the shallows of the Jordan River. So forty-two thousand Ephraimites were killed at that time.
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| | Jdg 12:7 | Jephthah was Israel's judge for six years. When he died, he was buried in one of the towns of Gilead.
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| | Jdg 12:8 | After Jephthah, Ibzan became Israel's judge. He lived in Bethlehem,
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| | Jdg 12:9 | and he had thirty sons and thirty daughters. He married his daughters to men outside his clan and brought in thirty young women from outside his clan to marry his sons. Ibzan judged Israel for seven years.
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| | Jdg 12:10 | When he died, he was buried at Bethlehem.
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| | Jdg 12:11 | After him, Elon from Zebulun became Israel's judge. He judged Israel for ten years.
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| | Jdg 12:12 | When he died, he was buried at Aijalon in Zebulun.
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| | Jdg 12:13 | After Elon died, Abdon son of Hillel, from Pirathon, became Israel's judge.
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| | Jdg 12:14 | He had forty sons and thirty grandsons, who rode on seventy donkeys. He was Israel's judge for eight years.
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| | Jdg 12:15 | Then he died and was buried at Pirathon in Ephraim, in the hill country of the Amalekites.
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