She said to him, My father, you have opened your mouth to Yahweh; do to me according to that which has proceeded out of your mouth, because Yahweh has taken vengeance for you on your enemies, even on the children of Ammon.
"If God’s mind can change for the sake of graciously allowing people to live, why cannot Jephthah change his mind [about slaying his daughter]? At other places in the Old Testament, God even breaks the Torah in order to allow the people to live-for instance, inviting an adulterous people to return instead of killing them (see Jeremiah 3:11-14), and allowing Israel, the disobedient child, to be spared rather than stoned (see Hosea 11:1-9). In Jephthah’s case, Jephthah could actually have appealed to the Torah as support for not sacrificing his child. But he does not. Where are the imaginative diplomatic skills of Judges 11:12-28, where Jephthah shows detailed awareness of Numbers 21, a Torah narrative?" [Note: McCann, pp. 84-85.] 