Judges 11:24

24. Wilt thou not The thought involved in the previous verse is here expanded in a sort of argumentum ad hominem. You yourselves, it is urged, would most earnestly insist on possessing that which your god had given into your hands; and shall not we do the same?

Chemosh The great deity of the Moabites and Ammonites. “Jewish tradition affirms that he was worshipped under the symbol of a black star; and Maimonides states that his worshippers went bareheaded, and abstained from the use of garments sewn together by the needle. The black star, the connexion with Arabian idolatry, and the fact that Chemosh is coupled with Moloch, favour the theory that he had some analogy with the planet Saturn.” Kitto’s Cyclopaedia. He is here spoken of as a local and national deity, but it is not necessary to assume that Jephthah himself believed in his real existence and divinity. He speaks with respect, however, of the religion of his foe, and this fact, together with the recent existence of Ammonitish idolatry in Israel, (Judges 10:6,) affords some ground to believe that there was still among the Israelites too much reverence for the gods of the heathen.

The Lord Jehovah. Note the antithesis. Chemosh thy god Jehovah our God. The Ammonites held both to be national deities. The more ignorant Israelites always inclined to the same view; the well-taught Israelite recognised that Jehovah was indeed the national God, but also God over all; and the truly pious held him to be sole God, all else being “a lie.”