earticle

영어

Feminist theologians have ascribed the primary cause of the tragic death of Jephthah’s daughter to her father’s hasty vow. But this paper addresses that Jephthah’s vow itself was not the real cause. Rather, his vow could be considered to be a pious religiosity, considering the context of the battlefield. The real problem of his vow should be found in the very result of human sacrifice. Yet this paper presents that the daughter’s sacrifice was not the problem entirely of an individual, her father, but that of both her father and the community of the Gileadites through the interpretive lens of René Girard. This narrative reveals two aspects of mimetic crisis behind the scene. One aspect is between Jephthah and the Gileadites, and between the Gileadites and the Ammonites. Jephthah wants to be the insider of the Gileadites. In turn, the Gileadites want the political, military and administrative constitution like the Canaanites. This mimetic desire inevitably results in military conflicts. Jephthah’s daughter was entangled in such a mimetic crisis. She was sacrificed and then, annually her death was commemorated by Israelite women. This paper presents that the annual commemoration is not a simple lamentation for her death but, more importantly, to expose that the daughter was a scapegoat for patriarchal mimetic violence.

한국어

지금까지 여성신학자들이 입다의 딸의 죽음의 원인을 주로 입다의 서원에서 찾으려고 한 것과 달리, 이 논문은 이 사건의 이면에 복합적인 정치적, 사회적, 문화적 모방 위기가 있음을 보이고자 한다. 필자는 이 논문을 통해 애곡제의가 단순한 애곡이 아니라, 입다의 딸이 남성들의 폭력적 모방 경쟁의 희생양임을 폭로하고, 이를 ‘되풀이하여 자세히 말하는’ 제의임을 밝힌다.