Judges 12:6-8

Amplified Bible

⁶they said to him, “Then say ‘Shibboleth.’” And he said, “Sibboleth,” for he could not ^[a]pronounce it correctly. Then they seized him and killed him at the fords of the Jordan. At that time forty-two thousand of the Ephraimites fell.

⁷Jephthah judged Israel for six years. Then Jephthah the Gileadite died and was buried in one of the cities of Gilead.

⁸And after him Ibzan of Bethlehem judged Israel.

Read full chapter

Footnotes

Judges 12:6 Lit speak thus. The difference in pronunciation was between a Hebrew consonant with an ‘sh’ sound, which the Ephraimites evidently did not have in their dialect, and another consonant with a sharp ‘s’ sound. This difference was similar to that between the Hebrew greeting “Shalom,” and the greeting “Salaam” used in Islamic circles. Shibboleth has even been accepted into English as a word meaning “a peculiarity of pronunciation.” In Hebrew it refers to an ear or head of grain.