The Old Testament: Ruth I – Property and Marriage Rights

Posted on April 12, 2013 by virgowriter

I had a phone conversation with a good friend of mine.  We’d been disagreeing about how religion in general and the Bible specifically is used against gay people.  As a religious person who also supports gay people, she felt a bit torn.  I won’t rehash the whole discussion, but one point I made to her was that for all the laws in place, anything short of providing the same rights to gays as well as straights hinders gay people.

The issue is at the federal level, not the state level. This is why civil unions are not a good compromise. One example I gave her was the issue of inheritance.  If a couple own a home together, and having lived in it for years, have paid it off together, a problem arises if one dies before the other.  Even though both parties contributed equally to the home, for a number of foreseeable reasons, only one partner’s name might be on the title.

If this is the partner who dies, the surviving partner gets screwed.  If there’s no will, the surviving partner has no claim to the home.  If there is a will—and, let’s face it, there should be—the surviving partner can “inherit” his home.  For married people this would happen automatically—will or no.  The rub she didn’t know about: since the property is inherited, the surviving partner gets hit with a death tax (of roughly 36%) on the inherited property—the property you already paid for. What a warm and fuzzy reality to learn after you lose the love of your life.

This is the same issue Edie Windsor, an 83-year-old-widow, encountered when her partner died.  Her case is the reason the Supreme Court is hearing a case against DOMA: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/03/27/17489073-lesbian-widow-behind-doma-challenge-i-think-its-gonna-be-good?lite

Turns out property rights have always been an issue—and you thought the plot thread that sets Downtown Abbey in motion was strange.  In Ruth, though, the property inheritance rights also include marriage rights, and there’s a line that needs to be honored.  At the head of this line is the kinsman-redeemer.

Ruth tells the story of Naomi, who, along with her husband and sons, relocates from famine-stricken Judah to Moab.  There, eventually, the sons marry, and after about 10 years, along with her husband, the sons die (1:5).  Naomi decides to return to Judah, telling her two daughters-in-law to remain and move on with their lives.  Ruth refuses and accompanies Naomi.

While trying to get by in Judah, Ruth—as was apparently common back then—works a field for the remnants of a harvest.  The field’s owner, Boaz, is a distant relative of Naomi.  After a short series of events, he falls for Ruth; however, due to a strange inheritance law involving Naomi’s husband’s land, Boaz does not have first dibs on Ruth—he must clear this with the first in line for inheritance, the kinsman redeemer (3:2).

I’m unclear how being obligated to the widow of the land ties you also to the former daughter-in-law, but this all gets worked out. It’s handled in a fun, happy, everything-works-out-in-the-end kind of way. But it’s hard not to think of an end-of-game Monopoly transaction, where one player lands on a high-rent, loaded with a hotel property, and has to devise a complicated trade involving all the railroads and string of yellow properties to cover the debt.

Their story ends like a sweet Disney movie, with Naomi becoming the grandmother to their child, a son who begins the line that will one day lead to David (as in David and Goliath).

In general, this book is a touching story of family loyalty.  And, thankfully, the laws that dictate inheritance worked out well for both parties.  If only things nowadays worked out so smoothly.

The Book Samuel 1 up next.  The first book (apparently) to be split. Did people lose their attention spans between Genesis and Samuel 1?

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The Old Testament: Judges III- Punishing Their Own

Posted on April 9, 2013 by virgowriter

In October of 2012, two teenage brothers (ages 15 and 17) lured a 12-year-old girl into their house so they could steal her bike. They killed her. Apparently they wanted the bike for parts.  The girl’s disappearance made the news, and the crack in the case happened when the mother of the two boys read something on her sons’ Facebook pages that compelled her to call the police on her own children. (You can read about the story here: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/10/24/new-jersey-authorities-say-girl-was-strangled-by-teen-brothers-for-parts-her/)

This story shows how morality trumps familial bonds. I don’t know how I would respond if I were put in this type of situation. Sure, the severity of the crime would make a big difference, but I realize that it shouldn’t.  I also know how easy it is to say “sure, I would do the right thing.” But there’s a big difference between knowing what you should do and having the strength to follow through with it.

In Judges, a man searches for and finds his concubine.  Under her father’s roof, the man, his servant and his concubine remain for five days. They then travel to the town of Gibeah, where—first red flag—they are denied lodging (a poor display of manners back then). Resting in a town square, they meet an old man, who offers them shelter (19:20). The male townsfolk get wind of this couple’s presence and arrive at the old man’s home.  There, they demand that the man and his male servant be sent out so that they can have sex with them (19:22). Sound familiar?

As a replay of the scene at Lot’s house in Sodom and Gomorrah, the old man steps out to reason with the mob, offering his virgin daughter and the female concubine to pacify them (19:24).  Pissed, they take the concubine and rape her to death—which took all night (19:25).  The visiting men leave the old man’s house the next morning, taking her the concubine’s dead body.  Disgusted by this experience, the man cuts her body into 12 pieces.  Yes, 12 pieces.  He then sends one of these pieces to each of the 12 tribes of Israel as a sign of what’s happened.

Since this was not the typical present to receive in the archaic form of mail, the tribes are alarmed.  They gather to investigate what happened (20:3) and they marshal the strength to end the deplorable behavior of one of their own tribes. Gibeah will suffer, and suffer badly (20:37).

For all the time devoted to Israel exacting vengeance on other people in the Old Testament, it’s interesting (and perhaps sad in the way that all annihilation is) to see them hold themselves accountable. I may have had issues with their wholesale slaughter, but here they show they are at least not hypocrites—they hold everyone to the same standard. They don’t let loyalty to their own trump morality.

Next up: The Book of Ruth. Curious about a book named for a woman.

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The Old Testament: Judges II – Women Step up (The Empowered Woman Archetype)

Posted on April 7, 2013 by virgowriter

An archetype is a pattern that has been repeated in storytelling so often that it becomes a template for our understanding. For example, we have seen what it means to be a hero so often that we know his or her characteristics, we understand the moment we identify this character in a story what his or function in a story will be.  We also look to these archetypes for an understanding of possibilities.  If we only see a hero as male, we only think of heroes as males.  Conversely, if the female’s only function in a story is to be passive or serve as someone the hero needs to rescue, we understand perhaps that this is all a female is capable of (and we think of her as the Damsel in Distress).  This is one reason why people have such strong reactions to stereotypes in our media today (films, TV shows, music, books, etc.).

It’s also why so much is made of representation in the Bible.  Since the stories in the Bible are so often male-driven, they have been used to justify our male-driven culture.  Therefore, it’s nice to finally see some strong women take charge for a change.

Deborah, a prophetess who seems to live on the outskirts of town, is consulted for war strategy.  When she is encouraged to join the war party, she gives a head’s up to Barak, who will lead the army against Israel’s oppressor (Jabin, kin of Canaan), suggesting she’ll get the credit, not him.  Since there is little (any?) mention of women in battle thus far, this deserves mention.  Second, not only will she get credit—don’t all prophesies come true in this context?—but the fact that she warned she would and the man STILL wanted her to join them suggests that he was okay with a woman being praised—at the expense of a man, no less.  Since so much of the Old Testament shafts women at nearly every turn, it’s nice to see them given some positive screen time.

But Deborah is not the only grrr-girl.  As Jabin’s forces are conquered, the general/commander Sisera flees and finds refuge in a tent.  Turns out he picked the wrong tent.  The woman doesn’t get along with him—some family squabble—and she takes a tent pin and stabs him in the neck, killing him.  No nice and easy poisoning his food or drink.  She stabs him in the neck (4:21).

But not all women had to rely on brute force or physical strength.  Samson, a leader of Israel favored by God, has some issues with a woman he falls for—Delilah.  She shows how crafty a woman can be.  Since Samson has his enemies, these men pay Delilah to extract the secret to his strength.  Sensing a trap, perhaps, he lies to her three different times (16:7, 11, 13-14).  When she works through his defenses for the fourth time, he’s screwed (16:21).

In the end, these female-driven parts of Judges present an archetype of an empowered woman, and thereby create a model from which women can draw inspiration: they too can be active members of society, and not just ones identified with the home.  For all of the push to keep women barefoot and pregnant in the kitchen, it’s surprising that I haven’t heard about Deborah and Delilah more.  Why aren’t their stories trotted out more as examples that show women are just as capable as men?

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