"And Dinah the daughter of Leah, which she bare unto Jacob, went out to see the daughters of the land. And when Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite, prince of the country, saw her, he took her, and lay with her and defiled her. And his soul clave unto Dinah the daughter of Jacob, and he loved the damsel, and spake kindly unto the damsel. And Shechem spake unto his father Hamor, saying, Get me this damsel to wife. And Jacob heard that he had defiled Dinah his daughter: now his sons were with his cattle in the field: and Jacob held his peace until they were come. And Hamor the father of Shechem went out unto Jacob to commune with him. And the sons of Jacob came out of the field when they heard it: and the men were grieved, and they were very wroth, because he had wrought folly in Israel in lying with Jacob's daughter; which thing ought not to be done. And Hamor communed with them, saying, The soul of my son Shechem longeth for your daughter: I pray you give her him to wife. And make ye marriages with us, and give your daughters unto us, and take our daughters unto you. And ye shall dwell with us: and the land shall be before you; dwell and trade ye therein, and get you possessions therein. And Shechem said unto her father and unto her brethren, Let me find grace in your eyes, and what ye shall say unto me I will give. Ask me never so much dowry and gift, and I will give according as ye shall say unto me: but give me the damsel to wife. And the sons of Jacob answered Shechem and Hamor his father deceitfully, and said, because he had defiled Dinah their sister: and they said unto them, We cannot do this thing, to give our sister to one that is uncircumcised; for that were a reproach unto us: but in this will we consent unto you: If ye will be as we be, that every male of you be circumcised; then we will give our daughters unto you, and we will take your daughters to us, and we will dwell with you, and we will become one people. But if ye will not hearken unto, to be circumcised; then will we take our daughter, and we will be gone. And their words pleased Hamor, and Shechem, Hamor's son. And the young man deferred not to do the thing, because he had delight in Jacob's daughter: and he was more honourable than all the house of his father. " (Genesis 34:1-19)
Let's pause here for a moment in this passage and reflect on what has brought these events to pass.
In the first place, this is not the place that the Lord has called Jacob to. He was to go home; but instead he dwelled here in the city of Shechem, perhaps named so after the prince of the land: Shechem, son of Hamor (or Emmor as in Acts 17:2).
Secondly, Dinah has not kept to her family as she most likely was expected to do. Perhaps her curiosity overcame her; perhaps loneliness and longing to be with other girls (although we would assume the multitude of servants Jacob would have had would have daughters, perhaps she wasn't allowed to make companions of them). In either case, she left the safety and protection of her family's camp which probably numbered as many as the Hivites themselves; and placed herself in danger. And danger came by way of a prince who abused the privileges of royalty as later on a great King of Israel named David would also do.
But the bulk of the blame for the shameful aspects of this event do fall on Shechem, who sadly was the most honorable man in his father's house. In fact, he does appear to want to do right by Dinah on the one hand (he tells Jacob to ask any dowry he wants and Shechem will pay it as long as he can keep Dinah). He most definitely is smitten with Dinah, but whether it is true love or true lust is debatable, no matter what his actions. The passion of lust could create this great a frenzy to have the object of one's desires as much as the passion of love could. The difference is that true love is honorable; true lust forgets about honor in its efforts to obtain its desires.
Such, I believe, was the case with Shechem. For honor, both to Dinah and to her family, would have been to restore Dinah to her family along with at least SOME manner of repentance for the wrongdoing before offering to make it right by marriage. Shechem's princely arrogance did not offer any repentance or remorse for his former bad treatment of Dinah.
This is the very thing that outraged Dinah's brothers, Simeon and Levi. And where a man has multiple wives, the duty of protecting the honor of the daughter, Dinah, does not fall to her father, but to her own brothers, the sons of Leah.
The tragedy is had the two fathers, Jacob and Hamor, worked it out, they would have come to a wise and peaceable outcome because of their maturity and life experience. But two young bucks full of pride and revenge, and obviously with hardened hearts as well, took matters into their own hands without consulting the wisdom of their father.
"And Hamor and Shechem his son came unto the gate of their city, and communed with the men of their city, saying, These men are peaceable with us; therefore let them dwell in the land, and trade therein; for the land, behold, it is large enough for them; let us take their daughters to us for wives, and let us give them our daughters. Only herein will the men consent unto us for to dwell with us, to be one people, if every male among us be circumcised, as they are circumcised. Shall not their cattle and their substance and every beast of theirs be ours? Only let us consent unto them, and they will dwell with us. And unto Hamor and unto Shechem his son hearkened all that went out of the gate of his city; and every male was circumcised, all that went out of the gate of his city. And it came to pass on the third day, when they were sore, that two of the sons of Jacob, Simeon and Levi, Dinah's brethren, took each man his sword, and came upon the city boldly, and slew all the males. And they slew Hamor and Shechem his son, with the edge of the sword, and took Dinah out of Shechem's house, and went out. The sons of Jacob came upon the slain, and spoiled the city, because they had defiled their sister. They took their sheep and their oxen, and their asses, and that which was in the city, and that which was in the field. And all their wealth, and all their little ones, and their wives took they captive, and spoiled even all that was in the house. And Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, Ye had troubled me to make me stink among the inhabitants of the land, among the Cannanites and the Perizites: and I being few in number, they shall gather themselves together against me, and slay me; and I shall be destroyed, I and my house. And they said, Should he deal with our sister as with an harlot?" (Genesis 34:20-31)
The gate of a city was the gathering place for the men, in which public announcements were made. This is why we find in Proverbs 31 mention of the virtuous woman's husband sitting in the gate of the city. It was a place where men "read" the newspapers and discussed politics and world events with one another, a necessary thing in those days for survival. Only there were no newspapers; all news traveled by word of mouth. And, as in this case, royal edicts were announced. Only the Hivites were apparently not commanded to be circumcised; they heard the king's and prince's opinions and decided it was a wise thing to do. And again, Shechem was considered a most honorable man; one whom the other men of the village apparently trusted.
Notice that Simeon and Levi imposed only an outward form of religion upon the Shechem and the Hivites; there was no mention of worshiping the one true God versus the many pagan gods that the Hivites worshipped. But then again, it was all deceit anyway. Religion used as a tool in a plot to murder; a thing that will repeat itself in every century to follow, by religions of all sorts. (Thus a distinction is made between religion and true God-worshippers; beginning here with Jacob's sons.) They know, of course, that the circumcisions will disable the men and make them useless to defend themselves. I think they might have taken their own servants with them to help in the slaughter, for even after killing the men, I don't know how they could have gathered up all the women and children and animals and belongings of the Hivite town without help. But certainly it was by Simeon and Levi's hands alone that the king and his son were slain and Dinah retrieved.
It was a cowardly and hideously violent thing to do. One that brought shame to Jacob's house; and no glory to God. When Jacob rebuked his sons, it appears that he has no concern about the evil of what they have done, other than that it brought his own household into risk of also being slaughtered. This was indeed a real risk from ALL the Cannanites and Perizites in the entire land who did indeed outnumber Jacob's household. But Jacob doesn't address the evil that his sons have done.
Perhaps he knew it would be a waste of time for they had such hardened consciences that it would not have touched them; even as fear of retribution upon themselves and their family members doesn't move them either. They have no remorse. Their youthful arrogance and pride rule them in horrendous ways.
And we will see in the days to come what price they will pay for this senseless vengeance.
3 comments:
As you state in the next posting, there were false gods / idol worship occurring in Jacob’s household. And it appears this is occurring only with the servants. If we take this logic, then why would Simeon and Levi, who have been exposed to God through their father, exact punishment of one man on the many? Why kill all the men of the town for the actions of Shechem alone? And, for that matter, killing him does not seem equal punishment for the crime (although I shudder to think what I would do if someone did that to one of my daughters). I don’t know what the punishment would be for a man back in Jacob’s day for a man who took a woman and violated her, but death seems excessive.
I agree with you that honor could have been restored to Dinah and her family by some agreement between Jacob and Hamor - - two mature and rational minds, compared to the impulsive reaction of Jacob’s two sons. Their action was above and beyond what was needed to restore Dinah to her family and honor.
You mention in the next posting that Jacob and his family return to Bethel. I assume the women and children captives also go with them, is that correct? GW
It does appear that they took all those captured women and children with them; which is a good thing in the sense that they certainly could not have survived on their own without any men. Perhaps Jacob felt responsible to now care for them all because of his sons' actions. Regarding Jacob's sons doing such evil when they have a father who knows God (whom God speaks to even!)...you know, Job was a righteous man, but he was continually offering sacrifices for his children to cover their sins, for he believed that "it may be that my sons have sinned, and cursed God in their hearts." His children were big on feasting which I take to mean partying a bit. The point of this being that children don't always follow in the righteousness of their parents. Such was the case with Simeon and Levi. The things they are capable of have been exhibited here, but they will do more harm before they are done. Certainly they let their anger know no bounds...totally out of control. No, the punishment they inflicted upon the whole town was not called for. It was extremely excessive and cruel. While Jacob may have wished in his heart that the perpetrator of this evil on his daughter would die, still he would have been merciful because mercy had been shown him regarding Esau. His sons don't have a lot to commend them at all, which makes it amazing that God later calls the tribe of Levi to be priests, isn't it? That in itself would be worth studying a bit further, wouldn't it?
Thank you for your insight. And yes, it does seem strange that God would call the tribe of Levi to be his priests....I do agree, that is worthy of studying and undertanding that action by God.
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