(4) In process of time.--Marg., after days, implying the time between Jephthah's expulsion in early youth and his mature manhood.

The children of Ammon made war.--The fact that this is introduced as a new circumstance, though it has been fully related in Judges 10:8-9; Judges 10:17-18, probably arises from the use of some new, and probably Gileadite, document in these two chapters.

Verse 4. - This verse brings us back to Judges 10:17, and reunites the two streams of narrative.

11:1-11 Men ought not to be blamed for their parentage, so long as they by their personal merits roll away any reproach. God had forgiven Israel, therefore Jephthah will forgive. He speaks not with confidence of his success, knowing how justly God might suffer the Ammonites to prevail for the further punishment of Israel. Nor does he speak with any confidence at all in himself. If he succeed, it is the Lord delivers them into his hand; he thereby reminds his countrymen to look up to God as the Giver of victory. The same question as here, in fact, is put to those who desire salvation by Christ. If he save you, will ye be willing that he shall rule you? On no other terms will he save you. If he make you happy, shall he make you holy? If he be your helper, shall he be your Head? Jephthah, to obtain a little worldly honour, was willing to expose his life: shall we be discouraged in our Christian warfare by the difficulties we may meet with, when Christ has promised a crown of life to him that overcometh?And it came to pass in process of time,.... Some time after Jephthah had been expelled from his father's house, and he was become famous for his martial genius, and military exploits; or at the close of the eighteen years' oppression of the children of Israel by the Ammonites, or some few days after the children of Israel were gathered together at Mizpeh, that the people and princes of Gilead were preparing for war with Ammon, and were thinking of a proper person to be their general:

that the children of Ammon made war against Israel; not only passed over Jordan again, and encamped in Gilead, but began to attack them in some place or another, at least threatened them with it, and made motions towards it.