Leviticus 11 to 13: I got you under my skin...

Leviticus 11

God tells Moses what is edible and what ain't.

Verse 20-2: "All fowls that creep, going upon all four, shall be an abomination unto you. Yet these may ye eat of every flying creeping thing that goeth upon all four, which have legs above their feet, to leap withal upon the earth; Even these of them ye may eat; the locust after his kind, and the bald locust after his kind, and the beetle after his kind, and the grasshopper after his kind."

And ooh,germs, germs everywhere! OCD GOD?

Verse 32: "And upon whatsoever any of them, when they are dead, doth fall, it shall be unclean; whether it be any vessel of wood, or raiment, or skin, or sack, whatsoever vessel it be, wherein any work is done, it must be put into water, and it shall be unclean until the even; so it shall be cleansed."

Purity and Danger and all that Mary Douglas stuff...

Leviticus 12

Women are unclean for seven days after giving birth to a boy. After his circumcision-

What's that useless piece of skin at the end of a penis called?
A man...

she's unclean for another 33 days, and shall touch no halloed thing, nor come into the sanctuary.

Since females are obviously inherently yuckier and ickier, after giving birth to a “maid child”, a woman is unclean two weeks, and then a further 66 days.

In either case, burnt offerings are due the prie... sorry, the LORD

Leviticus 13

God does dermatology outpatients clinics...

Verse 2-4 “When a man shall have in the skin of his flesh a rising, a scab, or a bright spot, and it be in the skin of his flesh like the plague of leprosy; then he shall be brought unto Aaron the priest, or unto one of his sons the priests: And the priest shall look on the plague in the skin of the flesh: and when the hair in the plague is turned white, and the plague in sight be deeper than the skin of his flesh, it is a plague of leprosy: and the priest shall look on him, and pronounce him unclean. If the bright spot be white in the skin of his flesh, and in sight be not deeper than the skin, and the hair thereof be not turned white; then the priest shall shut up him that hath the plague seven days.”

Basically, if the priest thinks you've got leprosy,

Verse 21-25 "But if the priest look on it, and, behold, there be no white hairs therein, and if it be not lower than the skin, but be somewhat dark; then the priest shall shut him up seven days: And if it spread much abroad in the skin, then the priest shall pronounce him unclean: it is a plague. But if the bright spot stay in his place, and spread not, it is a burning boil; and the priest shall pronounce him clean. Or if there be any flesh, in the skin whereof there is a hot burning, and the quick flesh that burneth have a white bright spot, somewhat reddish, or white; Then the priest shall look upon it: and, behold, if the hair in the bright spot be turned white, and it be in sight deeper than the skin; it is a leprosy broken out of the burning: wherefore the priest shall pronounce him unclean: it is the plague of leprosy."

- and these versus remind me of an extremely crude diagnostic algorithm- then you'll be treated like an, er, leper.

Verse 45-6 “And the leper in whom the plague is, his clothes shall be rent, and his head bare, and he shall put a covering upon his upper lip, and shall cry, Unclean, unclean. All the days wherein the plague shall be in him he shall be defiled; he is unclean: he shall dwell alone; without the camp shall his habitation be.”

But given how clothes are expensive and all, and a proper dry cleaner isn't to be had for a good 3400 years or so, then decontamination is important...

Verse 56-9 “And if the priest look, and, behold, the plague be somewhat dark after the washing of it; then he shall rend it out of the garment, or out of the skin, or out of the warp, or out of the woof: And if it appear still in the garment, either in the warp, or in the woof, or in any thing of skin; it is a spreading plague: thou shalt burn that wherein the plague is with fire. And the garment, either warp, or woof, or whatsoever thing of skin it be, which thou shalt wash, if the plague be departed from them, then it shall be washed the second time, and shall be clean. This is the law of the plague of leprosy in a garment of woollen or linen, either in the warp, or woof, or any thing of skins, to pronounce it clean, or to pronounce it unclean.”

And look, I've gone all this way without making ONE joke about failing driving tests/comments to prostitutes etc etc. You've got to hand it to me...

Genesis 34-36; massacres, cheating and the slow delineation of the People of Israel

Chapter 34 starts very interestingly with the brief story of Dinah. I had wanted to combine writing about this with the novel The Red Tent, but Genesis has bowled along a lot quicker than I expected, so I'll have to blog about the latter in a while.
So, Dinah, daughter of Jacob and Leah, is 'taken and defiled' by Shechem son of Hamor, a prince of a land also Shechem.
As with Rebekah, but with more drastic consequences, it is never really made clear whether Biblical 'taking' in a sexual sense is an act of rape or simply any form of copulation. Is Dinah 'defiled' because she is raped, or simply because the act of sex has not been sanctioned by her fathers and brothers? Dinah, of course, has no voice in this, so we can never really know.
Shechem, however, seems very keen to marry her:

"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" (chapter 34 verse 11).

And, in accordance with that promise, Shechem and his father agree to have their entire male population, inclduing themselves, circumcised, and appear to be regarding Jacob and his descendants as future neighbours and residents.
Some of Dinah's brothers, however, have other views on the subject and butcher the entire population of the city:

"v25 And it came to pass on the third day, when they were sore [from being circumcised], 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 they slew all the males.
v26 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.
v27 The sons of Jacob came upon the slain, and spoiled the city, because they had defiled their sister.
v28 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, of course, they take all the women and children captive.
Obviously with my usual tendency towards bias on the issue, one of my reactions is to think that this seems like a pretty standard reaction of Israelis towards Shechem, which is modern Nablus, one of the worst battered cities of the West Bank, where military incursions and checkpoints seem to replicate this indiscriminate violence and economic despoilation.
But in chapter 35, we move briskly on, with no apparent judgement or comment from God as to whether this wholesale slaughter was an OK thing to do. Unsurprisingly, though, there is a note that Jacob and his sons start to be feared from this point. No shit, since they seem to be behaving like a great big gang of bandits, wandering round Canaan doing pretty much as they fancy (any more parallels with what Israel gets away with in the modern era, anyone?)
Interestingly, though, it is at this point that Jacob seems to start consolidating his extended family's religious identity within the worship of the God he has allied himself to:

"v2 Then Jacob said unto his household, and to all that were with him, Put away the strange gods that are among you, and be clean, and change your garments:
v3 And let us arise, and go up to Beth-el; and I will make there an altar unto God, who answered me in the day of my distress, and was with me in the way which I went.
v4 And they gave unto Jacob all the strange gods which were in their hands, and all their earrings which were in their ears; and Jacob hid them under the oak which was by Shechem."

And, in a statement which is going to cause all kind of trouble over the next few millenia, God tells Jacob and his sons that the land is theirs:

"v10 And God said unto him, Thy name is Jacob: thy name shall not be called any more Jacob, but Israel shall be thy name: and he called his name Israel.
"v11 And God said to him, I am God Almighty: be fruitful and multiply; a nation and a company of nations shall be of thee, and kings shall come out of thy loins;
"v12 And the land which I gave Abraham and Isaac, to thee I will give it, and to thy seed after thee will I give the land."

Rachel also dies giving birth to her final son and is buried near Bethlehem, at a place still called Ramat Rahel. There is now a nice little settlement and some archaeological sites there, with a huge and very scary-looking concrete wall (predating the even huger and scarier wall round the whole of the West Bank) and military watchtowers. On my second stay in Bethlehem with ISM I managed to get a bit lost looking for the long road with the cashpoints on it which skirts the bottom of the hill where Manger Square is situated, and nearly walked myself and two friends into the Ramat Rahel checkpoint, which given that the soldiers were very jumpy due to an imminent invasion would not have been a fab idea. Scared the hell out of me, anyway.
Chapter 36, given how far behind I am on this project, is fortunately mainly a list of the sons of Esau and their descendants, the kings of Edom. Edom is one of those myriad Old Testament kingdoms which warrant brief mentions in the act Bible because they aren't in the bloodline which will form the people of Israel, but which were actually very interesting and in some cases powerful regional polities in their own right. Edom itself was situated in what is now Southern Jordan and part of Southern Israel and the Negev, mainly desert areas which contains such natural and architectural wonders as Wadi Rum and Petra and the historically significant Via Nova Traiana, or King's Highway, built by the Romans to maintain control over this part of their empire. Although archaeological evidence for the start date of the Edomite empire is hazy, it certainly lasted a thousand years, often warring with Israel and allying with Babylon to sack Jerusalem.

Genesis 32-4: The usual rape and pillage.

Chapter 32

Jacob wants to head home, but is worried Esau is still sore [Ed: you've used this one before]
Jacob reminds God of His promises of safety, sends a big fat bribe

Verse 24-5 “Two hundred she goats, and twenty he goats, two hundred ewes, and twenty rams. Thirty milch camels with their colts, forty kine, and ten bulls, twenty she asses, and ten foals”. And a partridge in a pear tree.

And Jacob sends his two wives and two womenservants and eleven sons (the daughters aren't mentioned) over some ford and is All Alone.

And Jacob does some Greco-Roman wrestling (alright, that's anachronistic) with an evenly matched stranger. It's a stalemate until Jacob blesses the guy, who says “Now you're called Israel”

Verse 28 “... for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men and hast prevailed.”

Anyhow, because these two were touching each other up at the hollow of the thigh, this is why

Verse 22 “Therefore the children of Israel eat not of the sinew which shrank which is upon the hollow of the thigh, unto this day: because he touched the hollow of Jacob's thigh in the sinew that shrank.”

[Of course, for the really loopy dietary restrictions, wait till Leviticus, some time in February]

Chapter 33

Esau ain't sore [Ed: what did I just tell you? You're fired] and

Verse 4 “And Esau ran to meet him, and embraced him and fell on his neck and kissed him: and they wept.”

He tells Jacob/Israel to keep his prezzies. “No, I insist.” says Jake.

Esau heads home,leaving some of his flock. Jacob heads of to “Succoth” and builds himself a house, then to Shalem where he buys some land and builds an altar.
Doesn't he worry about all the work he is creating for Biblical scholars and archeologists? His carbon dating footprint must be massive!

Chapter 34

Dinah, Leah's daughter went out to see the daughters of the land.

Verse 2 “And when Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite, prince of the country, saw here, he took her, and lay with her, and he defiled her.”

Not clear if she's a willing participant (see this great column by Dan Savage about rape), but he loves her and wants her as a wife. So his dad Hamor meets Jacob and asks for her hand (well, all of her actually) in marriage for his son. And wider than this-

Verse 9 “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.”

So, straightforward exchange-of-women-as-foundations-of-civilisation stuff. Stops you from splashing around in the shallow end of the gene pool.

No can do, says Jacob's lot, cos you have foreskins, and our kinship possibilities are quite circum... scribed.

So these clowns have a big spokescouncil/Samoan circle

Verse 20 “And Hamor and Schehem his son came unto the gate of their city, and communed ith the men of their city, saying..."

Jacob and his lot are so worth having around that (male readers of a nervous disposition may want to look away now. Everyone will unconsciously cross their legs...

Verse 24 “And unto Hamor and unto Shechem his son hearkened all that went out of the gate of his cityl and every male was circumcised, all that went out of the gate of his city.”

And you feel like yelling out, “It's a trick, don't do it”, like in a horror movie “Don't go down there!!”

And sure enough

Verse 25 “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 boldl, and slew all the males.”

It's nice to know that such barbaric collective punishment isn't done anymore by soi-disant Chosen People of God. Oh, wait....

Anyhow, they go on a looting binge

Verse 28 “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.”

Because two wrongs make a right, you see.

And Jacob worries about the perception management dilemma they know face

Verse 30 “...You have troubled me to make me stink among the inhabitants of the land, among the Canaanites and the Perizzites, and I being few in number, they shall gather themselves together against me and slay me: and I shall be destroy, I and my house.”

“WTF, pa” say Simeon and Levy;

Verse 31 “Should he deal with our sister as with a harlot?”

Genesis 13 to 17- smiting, land grabs, inconceivable fertility

Chapter 13

Abram and his brother's kid Lot are big and rich

Ch 13 verse 6 And the land was not able to bear them, that they might dwell together: for their substance was great,so that they could not dwell together.

So, here we could talk about carrying capacity, and critiques of Hardin's tragedy of the commons. But we won't.

So Lot lights out for the territory (Sodom, where the men were wicked), which you can't do nowadays that the world ain't empty.

And Abram heads for Hebron. Sigh.

Chapter 14

Kings smiting each other. Or rather, kings getting their underlings to smite each other.
What's a bayonet- a weapon with a worker at both ends...

And Abram goes behind enemy lines to rescue his nephew Lot, and then refuses the booty the King of Sodom offers him.

Chapter 15

So God rewards Abram with a kind of whack fertility programme

verse 9 Take me a heifer of three years old, and a she goat of three years old, and a ram of three years old, and turtledove, and a young pigeon. And some slugs, snails and puppy dogs' tails while you're at it.

Crikey, Abram nods off and then...

Verse 18 In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying. “Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates...

There may be trouble ahead... God's no better at real estate than he is at terra-forming...

Chapter 16

Sarai can't get up the duff. She gives Abe her Handmaid, Hagar, to knock up.

It works, but be careful what you wish for

Ch 16 verse 3 And he went in unto Hagar, and she conceived: and when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress was despised in her eyes.

Abram gives Sarai permission to be a cow to Hagar. Sarai is a cow, thus Hagar legs it. She gets skiptraced and brought back by one of gods angels acting as a bailbondsmanangel, who says the kid, “Ismael” is going to be a proper psycho. Which should be no hassle for an 86 year old dad to cope with, eh?

Chapter 17

Abram gets a deed poll from God as a 99^th birthday present- now “Abraham” and Sarai becomes “Sarah.”

And here's the deal. In exchange for the real estate previously mentioned ("all the land of Canaan”) then Abe's lot

Verse 10 Every man child among you shall be circumcised

So, what's the materialist anthropological take on this? Enquiring minds would like to know.
[Tacky joke- “What's the biggest drawback?” “An elephant's foreskin.”]

And Abraham actually laughs in the face of God

Verse 17 Then Abraham fell upon his face and laughed and said in his heart. Shall a child be born unto him that is an hundred years old? And shall Sarah, that is ninety years old, bear?

God says 'yup, and he'll be called Isaac. And chill, Ishmael the psycho will not be forsaken.'

And Ismael will not be foreskinned either.

Abraham, Ishmael and all the blokes are then circumcised. These verses are basically repeated, which I'll be has made congregations through the ages wince and cross their legs repeatedly when they hear them.