As the moon chases away the sun we come back to the old old words of the not so young Testament. Today’s reading covers a very serious subject: forcible rape and the repercussions that followed. It also covers the relocation of Esau. Here are my thoughts:
Violence begat violence and sin begat sin in this horrid tale of Dinah’s rape. She ventures outside the protection of her own city to visit the daughters of the land and gets raped by Shechem, son of Hamor. The Bible records this as a disgraceful thing that ought not have been done. Then Israel’s (Jacob’s) sons abuse the covenant of circumcision during peace talks with Hamor in order to get all the men in Hamor’s camp to circumcise themselves. While they are still recovering, the sons of Israel go in and murder every male in the camp and take all the children and women along with livestock and other items as loot.
The above act of violence causes Israel to once again flee from his current location. The rest of today’s reading is mainly expository. It tells the genealogy of Esau, whose sons would become the bitter enemies of the nation of Israel.
