August 22, 2004

Reading through the Bible in one Year: Hosea 1-7

Weekly Memory Verse: John 1:12

Good Evening Brothers and Sisters,

Genesis 34:1-31 (NASB95)
¹ Now Dinah the daughter of Leah, whom she had borne to Jacob, went out to visit the daughters of the land. ² When Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite, the prince of the land, saw her, he took her and lay with her by force. ³ He was deeply attracted to Dinah the daughter of Jacob, and he loved the girl and spoke tenderly to her. ⁴ So Shechem spoke to his father Hamor, saying, “Get me this young girl for a wife.” ⁵ Now Jacob heard that he had defiled Dinah his daughter; but his sons were with his livestock in the field, so Jacob kept silent until they came in. ⁶ Then Hamor the father of Shechem went out to Jacob to speak with him. ⁷ Now the sons of Jacob came in from the field when they heard it; and the men were grieved, and they were very angry because he had done a disgraceful thing in Israel by lying with Jacob’s daughter, for such a thing ought not to be done. ⁸ But Hamor spoke with them, saying, “The soul of my son Shechem longs for your daughter; please give her to him in marriage. ⁹ “Intermarry with us; give your daughters to us and take our daughters for yourselves. ¹⁰ “Thus you shall live with us, and the land shall be open before you; live and trade in it and acquire property in it.” ¹¹ Shechem also said to her father and to her brothers, “If I find favor in your sight, then I will give whatever you say to me. ¹² “Ask me ever so much bridal payment and gift, and I will give according as you say to me; but give me the girl in marriage.” ¹³ But Jacob’s sons answered Shechem and his father Hamor with deceit, because he had defiled Dinah their sister. ¹⁴ They said to them, “We cannot do this thing, to give our sister to one who is uncircumcised, for that would be a disgrace to us. ¹⁵ “Only on this condition will we consent to you: if you will become like us, in that every male of you be circumcised, ¹⁶ then we will give our daughters to you, and we will take your daughters for ourselves, and we will live with you and become one people. ¹⁷ “But if you will not listen to us to be circumcised, then we will take our daughter and go.” ¹⁸ Now their words seemed reasonable to Hamor and Shechem, Hamor’s son. ¹⁹ The young man did not delay to do the thing, because he was delighted with Jacob’s daughter. Now he was more respected than all the household of his father. ²⁰ So Hamor and his son Shechem came to the gate of their city and spoke to the men of their city, saying, ²¹ “These men are friendly with us; therefore let them live in the land and trade in it, for behold, the land is large enough for them. Let us take their daughters in marriage, and give our daughters to them. ²² “Only on this condition will the men consent to us to live with us, to become one people: that every male among us be circumcised as they are circumcised. ²³ “Will not their livestock and their property and all their animals be ours? Only let us consent to them, and they will live with us.” ²⁴ All who went out of the gate of his city listened to Hamor and to his son Shechem, and every male was circumcised, all who went out of the gate of his city. ²⁵ Now it came about on the third day, when they were in pain, that two of Jacob’s sons, Simeon and Levi, Dinah’s brothers, each took his sword and came upon the city unawares, and killed every male. ²⁶ They killed Hamor and his son Shechem with the edge of the sword, and took Dinah from Shechem’s house, and went forth. ²⁷ Jacob’s sons came upon the slain and looted the city, because they had defiled their sister. ²⁸ They took their flocks and their herds and their donkeys, and that which was in the city and that which was in the field; ²⁹ and they captured and looted all their wealth and all their little ones and their wives, even all that was in the houses. ³⁰ Then Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, “You have brought trouble on me by making me odious among the inhabitants of the land, among the Canaanites and the Perizzites; and my men being few in number, they will gather together against me and attack me and I will be destroyed, I and my household.” ³¹ But they said, “Should he treat our sister as a harlot?”^[1]

Dinah was raped by Shechem.  Through a long process of crunching numbers, it is estimated that Dinah was between 13 and 15 years old when this happened.  At the age of 13, a girl was considered to be a woman at that time.  There was several tragedies that occurred here, first Dinah was raped, or violated by another man.  The second tragedy was that since she was violated she would never be able to have a legitimate marriage after that. 

The language in the Hebrew suggests that Dinah did not have pure motives when she went out into the land, it seems to imply that she went out as a prostitute into the land according to the "Word Biblical Commentary: Genesis 16-50.  If that were the case, Jacob may have felt that she had it coming, thus explaining his seemingly deficient attitude.  Yet Dinah did not go out into the land to search out the sons, she went out to visit the daughters of the land.  The most likely case is that when she was visiting the daughters, Shechem took her by force. 

Genesis 24:3 (NASB95)
³ and I will make you swear by the Lord, the God of heaven and the God of earth, that you shall not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I live,

Genesis 24:37 (NASB95)
³⁷ “My master made me swear, saying, ‘You shall not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, in whose land I live;

Genesis 27:46 (NASB95)
⁴⁶ Rebekah said to Isaac, “I am tired of living because of the daughters of Heth; if Jacob takes a wife from the daughters of Heth, like these, from the daughters of the land, what good will my life be to me?”

Genesis 28:1 (NASB95)
¹ So Isaac called Jacob and blessed him and charged him, and said to him, “You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan.

Genesis 28:6 (NASB95)
⁶ Now Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob and sent him away to Paddan-aram to take to himself a wife from there, and that when he blessed him he charged him, saying, “You shall not take a wife from the daughters of Canaan,”

Genesis 28:8 (NASB95)
⁸ So Esau saw that the daughters of Canaan displeased his father Isaac; ^[2]

A precedent had been set that the sons and daughters of Abraham's descendants were not to intermarry with the sons and daughters of the land.  Shechem demonstrated true love for her through his actions following the act of rape, which is interesting.  It makes you wonder if he thought that she was a prostitute.  The act of rape is a violent act, not one of love.  This was demonstrated when Amnon raped Tamar later in:

2 Samuel 13:15-17 (NASB95)
¹⁵ Then Amnon hated her with a very great hatred; for the hatred with which he hated her was greater than the love with which he had loved her. And Amnon said to her, “Get up, go away!” ¹⁶ But she said to him, “No, because this wrong in sending me away is greater than the other that you have done to me!” Yet he would not listen to her. ¹⁷ Then he called his young man who attended him and said, “Now throw this woman out of my presence, and lock the door behind her.” ^[3]

The point here is that the author of this chapter indicates that more was going on than met the eye.  Shechem raped her, and had an inconsistent attitude that he wanted to marry her.  

Then the tables switch again, Shechem refers to her as a "young child", rather than as a woman, and demands that she is purchased as his wife. This washes out the previous words of seeming love and care, and demonstrates that Shechem views her as an object, not a person. 

The third tragedy was that Jacob did not act immediately upon receiving the knowledge of the violation.  Imagine, he just heard that his young daughter was raped, and he allowed her to remain with the rapist in his house, allowing her to be under a situation where she was probably raped again against her will.  He waited until his sons came in from the field, then passed the news on to them.  It wasn't important enough to him to call his sons to action immediately.  Jacob demonstrated by his actions that he did not love her, and this was probably because she was the daughter of Leah.  Jacob did not just tolerate the act, he entertained Hamor as a guest in his home until the sons returned from the field.  From his actions and his attitude toward Hamor, nothing seemed to be wrong.

When the sons came in from the field and heard the news, they took matters into their own hands.  This is the fourth tragedy in this chapter, the sons of Jacob did not seek wisdom from God on how to handle the situation.  Rather they took the matter and reacted to it in a natural worldly way.  The lies and deceit that were used bring back memories of the way that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had lied and deceived the inhabitants of the land where they lived in order to promote their own interests.  This should be a good object lesson to all of us, our children will imitate our actions, whether they are good or bad.  Hopefully if they imitate good actions, they will take them to the next level.  Unfortunately in this case, Jacobs sons took the deceptive example of their father to the next level, demonstrating a hideously evil side of themselves.

Before we are too hard on them, consider that their sister was being held captive by Shechem.  Jacob may not have loved and cherished his daughter, but his sons did.  Through the deceit that they used, they greatly reduced the odds of resistance from the enemy, and increased the likelihood of success.  The fifth disaster, and one due largely to Jacob's attitude was a massive slaughter of the men of the land.  One commentary noted that this is still a custom among the nomadic peoples, that if a girl is violated, the judgment of the rapist is generally by the brothers of the girl.  At any rate, they liberated their sister, after the slaughter.

The sixth disaster was when the sons of Jacob looted the land and enslaved the women and children.  Consider the fact that they took all of the possessions, women and children of the land into captivity. In a way, they complied with the agreement that they had made in jest earlier.  They did share the wealth with the people of the land, by introducing the women and children into slavery, and by assuming the possessions of the people. 

Genesis 49:5-7 (NASB95)
⁵ “Simeon and Levi are brothers; Their swords are implements of violence. ⁶ “Let my soul not enter into their council; Let not my glory be united with their assembly; Because in their anger they slew men, And in their self-will they lamed oxen. ⁷ “Cursed be their anger, for it is fierce; And their wrath, for it is cruel. I will disperse them in Jacob, And scatter them in Israel.

Joshua 19:1 (NASB95)
¹ Then the second lot fell to Simeon, to the tribe of the sons of Simeon according to their families, and their inheritance was in the midst of the inheritance of the sons of Judah.

Joshua 19:9 (NASB95)
⁹ The inheritance of the sons of Simeon was taken from the portion of the sons of Judah, for the share of the sons of Judah was too large for them; so the sons of Simeon received an inheritance in the midst of Judah’s inheritance.^[4]

Although they appeared to get away with the atrocity, consider that God had used them to issue punishment on the king who had violated the law of God.  In the reaction of the flesh they appeared to come out as victors in the battle, but lost their inheritance.  The Levites were dispersed among the nations of Israel as priests, and only allowed to own small towns where they could support their families.  Simeon was scattered among the tribe of Judah.  The Levites were placed in a position where they were not able to bear a sword again, being selected to be priests only using knives and swords to kill and prepare animals for sacrifice.  The violent and spontaneous nature of these two was paid for dearly.

I am going to close here, it seems the more I ponder the passage, the more that I see.  If you would like to add your comments be sure to write in.

Questions for thought:

How would you have handled the situation?

In light of the wrath that was given out in this passage, what do you think that God's view of rape is?

Father, as we consider this passage today, I pray that each of us will be encouraged by the human actions of the participants in the story.  When we are close to faltering the next time, remind us of this story and its outcome.

In Him,

Joe Turner.