Today’s Scripture Reading (June 19,
2015): Genesis 34
In 2012, a
man walked into the local police department office and placed the severed head
of his sister on the counter. He also proclaimed himself innocent of his sister’s
death. His sister’s death was her own fault. Earlier in the year she left her
marriage (the marriage had been arranged by her parents) on accusations of
abuse. But then she had simply disappeared. No one seemed to know why, but it
was possibly over a dispute on whether she should return to her abusive spouse.
When her brother finally caught up with her, she was living with an old
boyfriend. The brother had walked into the house and physically removed her to
the street. There, with neighbors looking on, he had publicly declared her sin
and then executed her by removing her head off with a large knife. It was an
honor killing, and as hard as it might be to believe, honor killings continue
to happen today. But there are many that believe that honor killings do nothing
but bring more dishonor to the family, to the predominate culture, and to the
nations in which they take place. After all, what honor can be found in the
killing of a young defenseless girl – no matter what her crime might be?
It is a
question that plagues the modern mind’s sense of fairness. In a dual, at least
both parties theoretically have a chance, but with an honor killing, the victim
is usually both a family member and defenseless. And somehow our minds don’t
seem to be able to make sense out of such an action. It seems impossible to
defend what is honorable by acting with dishonor. But I recognize that now I am
speaking out of my own cultural bias.
Strictly
speaking, what Simeon and Levi did in defense of the their sister was not an
honor killing because it was carried out against people who were totally unrelated
to the brothers, but it did contain some of the same elements. For starters,
the killing were in defense of the honor of their sister, Dinah. She had been
raped and from the standpoint of her two brothers (Simeon and Levi were full
brothers of Dinah – the rest of the boys were half-brothers, all having the
same father but different mothers) her honor had been stolen from her and they
meant to restore it. But the problem is that in trying to restore honor to the
family, the boys acted dishonorably in several ways. First, they used a sacred covenant
between the descendants of Abraham and God as a weapon. The circumcision that
the men performed on themselves left them incapacitated and vulnerable to the
violence of Simeon and Levi. The intention of Simeon and Levi was never to
bring the Shechemites closer to God, their intention was to incapacitate. Secondly,
they backed out of an agreement that they themselves had proposed even after
the Shechemites had fulfilled their part of the deal to the letter. Thirdly,
they killed men who did not have the ability to defend themselves. In this
moment there was nothing that the men of Shechem could do to protect
themselves. Fourth, the robbery of the town and the surrounding area seemed to
be based on greed, not honor. And lastly, in taking the women of the town
captive and either using them as slaves, unwilling sexual partners or selling
them into slavery, they were committing the same acts of dishonor that had been
perpetrated on their sister, but the dishonor of Dinah was simply multiplied
hundreds of times as the brothers dealt with the widows and daughters of the
town.
While the
plan seems to have been conceived by Dinah’s full brothers, it does not seem
possible for the plan to have been carried out without the help of all of the
brothers. The dishonor that Simeon and Levi felt had touched their family in
the act perpetrated against Dinah, now infiltrated the entire family of Jacob.
It does not seem possible that anyone could claim to have been innocent of the
dishonorable actions of Simeon and Levi. The family of Jacob had become a
stench to the other inhabitants of the area. The two brother had brought the
whole family down to the level of the worst of the town of Shechem – and the
dishonor of the family of Jacob was made complete.
Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Genesis
35
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