Even today there are Christians who view keeping a vow as more important than the sin that might be performed in keeping it. A fad called "Promise Keepers" started off with an odd belief that if a man made a vow to other men, he would be more likely to keep his vow to his wife. " This fad elevated led to people actually eating dirty socks, with all the inerrant dangers of serious infection ingesting so much bacteria, just to keep a silly bet made over a sports game. "If they win, I'll eat my dirty socks". It is not unreasonable to believe that Jephthah has such a religious fetish, or that his honor was culturally or personally more important than his love for a daughter.

As it turns out, behind the scenes, God used that the record of Jephthah to paint a picture of Christ and the cross. And to rid any notion of such future fetishes, the law contains a provision that if a wife makes a vow, her husband may annul it when he hears of it. When a Christian (the bride) makes a sinful vow, Christ releases him of it and provides grace for the sin. Your secret oaths (Masons, Mormons, and others), under penalty of death, were sinful, and you are not bound by them. Receive grace from Christ. Alter continues to make the point that a text of scripture cannot be understood doctrinally unless it's literary forms are first observed and understood. Many a Bible scholar can identify Hebrew literary elements defined in patterns, but there is little guidance how to interpret those patterns. This commentary hopes to add such guidance to the discussion.