Joseph's Wife Asenath was Dinah's Daughter

THE WIVES OF THE SONS OF JACOB

Judah was the first of the sons of Jacob to enter wedlock. After the sale of Joseph to the Midianites, his brethren had said to Judah, "If conditions were as before, our father would provide wives for us now. As it is, he is entirely absorbed by his grief for Joseph, and we must look about for wives ourselves. Thou art our chief, and thou shouldst marry first."

Judah's marriage with Alit the daughter of the noble merchant Shua, which was consummated at Adullam, the residence of his friend Hirah, or, as he was called later, Hiram, king of Tyre, was not happy. His two oldest sons died, and shortly thereafter his wife also. It was Judah's punishment for having begun a good deed and left it unfinished, for "he who begins a good deed, and does not execute it to the end, brings down misfortune upon his own head." Judah had rescued Joseph from death, but it was his suggestion to sell him into slavery. Had he urged them to restore the lad to his father, his brethren would have obeyed his words. He was lacking in constancy to persist until he had completed the work of Joseph's deliverance, which he had begun.95

In the same year, the year of Joseph's misfortune, all his other brethren married, too. Reuben's wife was named Elyoram, the daughter of the Canaanite Uzzi of Timnah. Simon married his sister Dinah first, and then a second wife. When Simon and Levi massacred the men of Shechem, Dinah refused to leave the city and follow her brethren, saying, "Whither shall I carry my shame?" But Simon swore he would marry her, as he did later, and when she died in Egypt, he took her body to the Holy Land and buried it there. Dinah bore her brother a son,96 and from her union with Shechem, the son of Hamor, sprang a daughter, Asenath by name, afterward the wife of Joseph. When this daughter was born to Dinah, her brethren, the sons of Jacob, wanted to kill her, that the finger of men might not point at the fruit of sin in their father's house. But Jacob took a piece of tin, inscribed the Holy Name upon it, and bound it about the neck of the girl, and he put her under a thornbush, and abandoned her there. An angel carried the babe down to Egypt, where Potiphar adopted her as his child, for his wife was barren. Years thereafter, when Joseph travelled through the land as viceroy, the maidens threw gifts at him, to make him turn his eyes in their direction and give them the opportunity of gazing upon his beauty. Asenath possessed nothing that would do as a present, therefore she took off the amulet suspended from her neck, and gave it to him. Thus Joseph became acquainted with her lineage, and he married her, seeing that she was not an Egyptian, but one connected with the house of Jacob through her mother.97

Beside the son of Dinah, Simon had another son, whose name was Saul, by Bunah, the damsel he had taken captive in the campaign against Shechem.

Levi and Issachar married two daughters of Jobab, the grandson of Eber; the wife of the former was named Adinah, the wife of the latter, Aridah. Dan's wife was Elflalet, a daughter of the Moabite Hamudan. For a long time their marriage remained childless, finally they had a son, whom they called Hushim. Gad and Naphtali married women from Haran, two sisters, daughters of Amoram, a grandson of Nahor. Naphtali's wife, Merimit, was the older of the two, and the younger, the wife of Gad, was named Uzit.

Asher's first wife was Adon, the daughter of Ephlal, a grandson of Ishmael. She died childless, and he married a second wife, Hadorah, a daughter of Abimael, the grandson of Shem. She had been married before, her first husband having been Malchiel, also a grandson of Shem, and the issue of this first marriage was a daughter, Serah by name. When Asher brought his wife to Canaan, the three year old orphan Serah came with them. She was raised in the house of Jacob, and she walked in the way of pious children, and God gave her beauty, wisdom, and sagacity.

Zebulon's wife was Maroshah, the daughter of Molad, a grandson of Midian, the son of Abraham by Keturah.

For Benjamin, when he was but ten years old, Jacob took Mahlia to wife, the daughter of Aram, the grandson of Terah, and she bore him five sons. At the age of eighteen he married a second wife, Arbat, the daughter of Zimran, a son of Abraham by Keturah, and by her also he had five sons.98

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Taken from: http://www.globusz.com/ebooks/LegJew2/00000020.htm

"What" is Dinah?



[AMAIC comment. We believe that Dinah was a real historical person, the daughter of Jacob and distant [relative] of the Jewish heroine, Judith, who has a 16-generation genealogy going back to contemporaries of Moses]. 

by John R. Salverda

　

The story of Dinah in the book of Genesis can give us great insight as to how mythology works. The retellings of her story by the Greeks are clearly classified as Myths, but what is a myth, exactly… ? What follows is not meant to denigrate the Scriptural truths as mythology, but rather to elevate mythology as a similar attempt to tell the truth, using symbolic poetry rather than telling it prosaically. In doing so I am forced to point out that the Scriptures themselves are not altogether free of the use of “allegories” which, if found in other sources would be classified as mythology.

I am personally of the opinion that the character that has come down to us as Dinah was, at one time, considered to be more than simply the role that she portrays in the book of Genesis as a human woman. It seems as though she has been euhemerized into an historic personage, but never-the-less she was still "the virgin daughter of Israel." Perhaps her story was an allegorical one (as was the story of Abraham, Sarah, Hagar, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph, etc.), told to teach about the story of the nation of Israel itself, which was also often referred to as the "Virgin of Israel." It is not unusual for a nation, a city, a church, or a population, to be figuratively symbolized as a female character. Even modern nations, (without, presumably, resorting to idolatry), have similar traditions. The U.S.A. has it’s "Columbia," the U.K. has "Britannia," and Rome had it’s "Roma," all feminine personifications that are symbolic of each their own national spirit. The nation of Israel was also referred to as a "woman," and the "maiden," and the "virgin," she was known as Zion (or Jerusalem) and called the "bride," or "wife," of God. ("Therefore thus saith the LORD; Ask ye now among the heathen, who hath heard such things: the virgin of Israel hath done a very horrible thing." Jeremiah 18:13, "Again I will build thee, and thou shall be built, O virgin of Israel: thou shall again be adorned with thy tabrets, and shall go forth in the dances of them that make merry." Jeremiah 31:4, "...O virgin of Israel, turn again to these thy cities. How long wilt thou go about, O thou backsliding daughter?..." Jeremiah 31:21,22, "The virgin of Israel is fallen; she shall no more rise: she is forsaken upon her land; there is none to raise her up." Amos 5:2.) The well known female personification, the totem, of the nation of Israel had committed her "whoredoms" with the inhabitants of the land of Canaan. The story of the "rape" of Dinah, seems to me, like a way to mitigate the guilt of the "virgin," perhaps this is the original purpose of the tale.

For those who wish to read the legendary version of the Shechem incident, this tradition is outlined in Ginzberg's "Jewish Legends" http://www.globusz.com/ebooks/LegJew1/00000121.htm "THE OUTRAGE AT SHECHEM"

The Scriptural account in Genesis offers no mention of any offspring as the result of Dinah's rape, this seems odd to me because Jewish legends clearly do. The Midrash Pirke De-Rabbi Eliezer (Chap. 38) records a view that Asenath (the wife of Joseph, and mother of Ephraim and Manasseh,) was actually the daughter of Joseph's sister Dinah, conceived in her rape by Shechem.

For those who wish to read the legendary version of the daughter of Dinah as Asenath in Egypt, this can also be found in Ginzberg's "Jewish Legends" http://www.globusz.com/ebooks/LegJew2/00000020.htm "THE WIVES OF THE SONS OF JACOB"

In regards to the allegation that Asenath was the daughter of Dinah, the reader is urged to see also; http://www.johnpratt.com/items/docs/lds/meridian/2000/puzzle_ans.html#2 (point #6) where it is asserted that: "The Bible states, "These are the names of the children of Israel," (Gen. 46:8), and there are indeed 70 names which follow. The seventieth name, which appears to be extra, is that of Asenath, the wife of Joseph." Thereby indicating that Asenath was indeed thought to be "a (grand) child of Israel."

An original version of this tale, no doubt included the point that Dinah (an euhemerized version of the nation of Israel itself) left ancestors as a result of her "rape." As to why there is no mention of this in Genesis, I would say; Perhaps the Jewish editors of the Scriptures were well aware of the Allegorical association between Dinah and their national personification, "the Virgin of Israel." They also knew that the Messiah was to be born of "the Virgin" (indicating that He would be an Israelite). However they promoted the Davidic Messiah (as opposed to the Ephraimitic, or Messiah ben Joseph), and were not inclined to report that a descendant of Dinah through Asenath would lend allegorical credibility to the concept of the "Messiah ben Joseph," a parallel, but sometimes thought to be competing, Messianic tradition.

The story known as "The Rape of Dinah" was a very popular and apparently widely known tale. Besides the various Hebrew versions of the story, it also seems apparent that colonists from Israel had incorporated the tale into Greek mythology. Unlike the Scriptural Dinah, and more like the Dinah of the Jewish legends, the Greek versions of the Virgin are always impregnated by the “rape.”

The Greek myth about the Rape of Danae was brought to Greece by Danite (the Israelite tribe of Dan) colonists who were known in Greece as "the Danaans" (For my reasons backing this assertion please see the article that I have written on the subject and have posted elsewhere in this forum. http://westerncivilisationamaic.blogspot.com/2012/01/danaans-and-tribe-of-dan.html). The progeny of Danae include Perseus and Heracles both highly Messianic characters, Heracles in particular injures his foot while slaying a serpent, the Lernian Hydra. Later Heracles sacrifices himself on his own Golgotha because the Hydra blood had poisoned him (accordingly he was resurrected to immortality on Olympus).

I would urge anyone who wants to learn more about the story of Dinah, to study the Greek myth of Danae. Even the obscure detail of being locked up in a chest in related in both stories; "Jacob ... concealed his daughter Dinah in a chest, lest Esau desire to have her for wife, and he be obliged to give her to him." (from Ginzberg "Jewish Legends") Robert Graves, in book 1 of his two volume work, "the Greek myths," (60.1,3) says that the Greek Danae was called, by the Hebrews, Dinah. Perhaps by way of explanation he previously intimates, that the Danaans who told her story, were part of a group of early arriving Helladic colonists from Palestine.

I wrote an article comparing the Greek myth of Acrisius, Proetus, and Danae, with the Scriptural story of Jacob, Esau, and Dinah. The entire article can be found at http://jrs.bravehost.com/Acrisius.html for those who wish to read it in it's entirety. An excerpt of which follows:

Comparing the two stories Jacob and Esau, with Acrisius and Proetus, the first thing that most people will notice in any comparison between the two pairs, is that in each case we have the birth of twins who struggle, even in the womb before birth, over who should receive the kingdom as a birthright. The motif of twins struggling with each other in the womb before birth is a fairly rare one. The early life of both sets of twins are remarkably similar. The Greek myth has Acrisius and Proetus initially alternating their possession of the kingdom inheritance for a time. In the Hebrew Scriptures Esau has the initial inheritance for a time until Jacob tricks him out of it, but then Esau travels to Seir, marries into a local Canaanite clan, and begins to raise an army among them with the idea of destroying Jacob. Therefore Jacob flees to Syria where he increases his forces and returns, at this point, there is a meeting between the two groups, however, instead of fighting to the death, there is a stand off between the two brothers who decide to split the kingdom up, Esau taking Seir which he names after himself “Edom,” while Jacob retained the land which he named after himself, “Israel.” Now, the Greek myth, has a very similar series of events occur between their equivalent set of twins Acrisius and Proetus. Just as did Jacob in Israel, Acrisius gained the upper hand and refused to let Proetus have his rightful share in the kingdom inheritance. Therefore, Proetus goes off and marries into a local Greek clan, the Lycians, among whom he raises an army with the intent of destroying his brother Acrisius and regaining the Argolian throne. However, again just as in the Scriptural account, when there is a meeting of their two armies, it leads to a stand off between them. The two brothers, instead of fighting to the death, decide to split up the kingdom, Proetus taking Tiryns, while Acrisius retained the kingdom of Argolis.

During the course of these dynastic struggles, Acrisius, the Greek version of Israel, had a daughter named Danae, who had gotten ravaged. While Israel himself had a daughter named Dinah, who also was ravaged. In each case the analogous virgin was thought to have been raped by the enemy of her father and, also in each case, revenge had been taken against this enemy. We also learn, whether in the Hebrew story or in the Greek rendition of it, that the respective despoilers had actually fallen in love with, each their own version of, the victimized maiden.

As the book of Genesis comes to it’s end, we learn that the Hebrew patriarch Israel, and Dinah as well, had to leave his inherited kingdom after all. Driven by a famine he left the promised land and he went into Egypt, leaving his brother Esau behind in the kingdom uncontested. The scriptural account then goes on at this point to tell the story of the Exodus. Returning to the Greek myths, we find from Ovid that ultimately Proetus drove his twin Acrisius from the throne and out of Argolis, Hyginus says that Acrisius followed his daughter Danae and grandson Perseus to the land of their exile, Seriphos, leaving his brother Proetus behind in the kingdom uncontested. This is the point in the Greek myth, where the story of the dynastic struggles over Argolis ends, and the story of Perseus begins. (the myth of Perseus can indeed be shown to be a Greek variant of the Hebrew story of the Exodus.)

I wrote an article called "Perseus" wherein I included reasons for believing that his mother Danae was a personification of the nation of Israel. It can be found elsewhere in this forum in it's entirety at http://westerncivilisationamaic.blogspot.com/2012/03/youth-of-perseus.html . What follows is the pertinent passage:

The slaying of Medusa is portrayed as a prerequisite to freedom for the captive mother of Perseus, "Danae." Danae was the earthly wife of Zeus, and she was being held captive by an earthy king, there can be no mistake in identifying her with Zion, the nation that gave birth to Moses. It is evident that while in Egypt, the Israelites pronounced the name "Zion," as "Zoan," it was the name of the City-state of their captivity, "the field of Zoan." The classical Greeks knew of this place and called it "Tanis," they identified the goddess, who was named after this place, with "Athena." In the Assyrian cuneiform inscriptions, the same Egyptian district was called, "Sinu." A clever philologist can find this far famed woman’s name throughout ancient literature, besides those already mentioned, here is a partial list of the name Zion transliterated; Diana, Dione, Deino, Dion, Dinah, Sinai, Hesione, Thyone, (even backwards) Anath (the name "Asenath" is thought to be Egyptian for "beloved of Anath"), Neith, and Nut.

Another Greek myth, with apparent connections to the story of Dinah, is called "The Rape of Aigina," it is from the Sisyphus cycle of Greek mythology and comes from Corinth (recognized as a "Phoenician" settlement). This myth seems to reflect a more "Canaanite" or "Shechemite" point of view. Her rape produces offspring leading to Achilles, another Greek hero with obvious Messianic attributes (his death is the result of a wound in the heel).

I wrote an article comparing the Greek myth of Sisyphus, with the Scriptural story of Joseph. For those who wish to read it in it's entirety the article can be found here; http://forums.about.com/n/pfx/forum.aspx?tsn=1&nav=display&webtag=ab-ancienthist&tid=5167 . An excerpt of which is as follows:

An inclusion in the Sisyphus cycle of Greek mythology, was the story of a character named, "Asopus," his tale, which is also known as, "the rape of Aegina," clearly borrows, quite liberally, from the story of Jacob. Even the Greek names of the players retain their phonetic similarities to the original Hebrew cast. The name "Sisyphus" passes as "Joseph-us," "Asopus" is plausibly a Greek form of the name "Jacob," (with a soft "c" and the usual Greek suffix "-us" appended,) moreover, the name of the daughter of Asopus, "Aegina," is a very likely Greek transliteration of the Hebrew name of Jacob’s daughter, "Dinah," whose story, of course, has correspondingly come to be known as, "the rape of Dinah." It was this account for which Sisyphus became famously chided, as was Joseph elsewhere, as a tattle tale, because he gave a damning report for which he, it is said in the Greek myth, had earned his well known eternal punishment. The myth of the rape of Aegina helps us to identify the Hebrew city of Shechem with the Greek city of Corinth, because it was in the vicinity of Shechem that the rape of Dinah occurred. Just as Joseph was especially loved by Jacob, who made rationalizations for Joseph’s dreams and tattling telling, so Sisyphus gets recompense from Asopus. For Sisyphus was rewarded for "informing" to Asopus. Just as Jacob dug a well on Mount Ebal in Shechem and then gave (in his deathbed blessing through Joseph), the city to Ephraim as a so called extra shoulder. We learn from Pausanias in recounting the Greek myth that the well, or fountain, or spring called the "Upper Peirene" on the mountain at Corinth; "The spring, which is behind the temple, they say was the gift of Asopus to Sisyphus. The latter knew, so runs the legend, that Zeus had ravished Aegina, the daughter of Asopus, but refused to give information to the seeker before he had a spring given him on the Acrocorinth." (Pausanias, 2.5.1). Note how the story of the Mountain, the temple, and the well as a gift to Sisyphus from Asopus, were all "borrowed" from the story of Shechem. More evidence for the identification of Asopus with Jacob, lies in the mythic claim that Zeus had inflicted Asopus with a permanent limp, as a result of his contention with the king of the gods. Jacob, of course, limped because of a similar contention.

That the lives of the Patriarchs, and Matriarchs, of the Scriptures were not only about the story simply told in the book of Genesis, but rather were allegories and foreshadowings of things greater than themselves, we are told over and over again. The apostle Paul tells us in Galatians 4:22-26, “For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a freewoman. ... Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one from the mount Sinai, which brings forth children to bondage, which is Hagar. For this Hagar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answers to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.” We are told in our catechism classes that the sacrifice of Isaac, was also that of the Passover Lamb of God at the Exodus (not to mention that of the Christ). The life of Joseph foreshadows the trials and tribulations of Jesus and the role of Christianity in the future World. None of this is taken as if we are doubting the original stories that are told in the Scriptures as myths. So perhaps a little better understanding of the life of Dinah also includes a bit of allegory and foreshadowing.

John wrote (e-mail 26 Mar)


Dear Damien,



Thanks for that, You've done a fine job (I was a bit worried about all those links), the article looks great.



Please don't get me wrong, I do not deny the actual existence of Dinah as a person. This is why I placed the word "what" in quotes. In fact I, as do you apparently, think that she left descendants, a supposition that is not confirmed Biblically. Do you have a theory as to why such a possibility may have been expunged from the Biblical record? I would love to hear it.



You think (Why?) that Judith has descended from Dinah, well maybe so. The Greek myths alluded to are older than the life of Judith, and who knows how old Ginzberg's "Jewish Legends" on the subject may be. Danae is an ancestor of Heracles, and Aegina of Achilles, and if Joseph actually did wed the daughter of Dinah then, the Messiah Ben Joseph would be her descendant.



Now, as to referring to Dinah as a "what;" I feel justified in the same way that Paul in Galatians referred to "Hagar" as mount Sinai in Arabia. Surely Paul believed that Hagar had really lived.



Keep up the good work. -John

Damien replied (28 Mar)


....

By "ancestor" in relation to Dinah and Judith I meant fellow relative of Simeon, not a direct descendant as in great-g-g-g(etc)-mother.

The Simeonite Judith refers back to Dinah by way of contrast. Dinah was ravaged by the gentile, whereas it was Judith's great triumph that she was not (in fact that is the first thing she tells the Bethulians upon her return).

The Bible is very selective. E.g. you would think from it that the Philistines inhabited merely the Shephelah region, whereas archaeology shows that they occupied a far greater territory. Again, there is virtually no interest in Solomon after he had apostatised, yet he went on to do great things after that, in a commercial and mercantile and architectural sense.

The Bible does tell us that there was great further coverage of (e.g. kings) in other written sources. The scribes were apparently not going to duplicate what was already freely available perhaps. I wish we had those records now.

Seemingly Dinah, too, was of no great interest later for whatever reason.

Regards
Damien.

In the Steps of Jael and Deborah: Judith as Heroine

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In the Steps of Jael and Deborah: Judith as Heroine
Sidnie White Crawford
University of Nebraska-Lincoln, scrawford1@unl.edu


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In the Steps of Jael and Deborah: Judith as Heroine 

Sidnie Ann White

Albright College 

   Judith is one of the most memorable characters in Hebrew litera- ture. In a remarkable story of courage and resourcefulness, she saves her people by one single action that is both compelling and repugnant. Leading female characters are rare enough in Israelite literature to be constantly compared with one another, and Judith has often been lik- ened to Miriam, Deborah, Jael, the wise women of Tekoa and Abel- beth-Maacah, and Esther.¹ And this is not an exhaustive list! I would like to argue that the comparison to Jael and Deborah is neither superfi- cial nor coincidental, but that the author of Judith had the story of Jael and Deborah in the front of his mind as he wrote his story.² In fact, in my judgment the author of Judith used the story of Jael and Deborah as the model for the story of Judith.

   The first parallel to draw between the stories is the obvious one: a heroine slays an enemy of Israel singlehandedly, by attacking his head. This is, in fact, the correspondence that drew me to the two stories in the first place. However, as I began to investigate the stories, I noticed that many other exact similarities were present, in plot, character and actions. Many of these parallels have been noted by other commentators before me.³ However, no one, as far as I have been able to verify, has brought them all together in one place. When they are drawn together, I think that it will be plain that the author of Judith used the story of Jael and Debo- rah in Judges 4 and 5 as a model, and that the actions of the heroine, Ju- dith, parallel the actions of the two heroines in Judges 4 and 5, Jael and Deborah. In this paper I will demonstrate exact similarities in the struc- ture and plot of the stories, the characters of the stories, and certain ele- ments common to both, particularly the song of victory.

   At this point I should make it clear that I am assuming that the au- thor of the book of Judith knew Judges 4 and 5 as single unit. Source criticism isolates Judges 5, the Song of Deborah, as a very ancient poetic piece, while placing the prose narrative of Judges 4 at a later date.⁴ This is no doubt correct; however, the author of Judith did not use source criti- cism, and therefore did not separate the chapters. The author read them as one story, and this reading is reflected in the story of Judith.

   First, a summary of the story of Judges 4 and 5. The plot is typical of the book of Judges: Yahweh, on account of the people’s sin, allows Jabin

5

_{6 FROM “NO ONE  SPOKE ILL  OF HER”: ESSAYS ON JUDITH  IN THE STEPS OF JAEL AND DEBORAH  7}

the king of Canaan to oppress the Israelites. The people cry out for deliverance, so Yahweh stirs up a judge to save them. Now, however, comes an interesting twist: the judge is a woman, Deborah. Deborah sends for her general, Barak, to rouse him for battle against Sisera. Barak and Deborah lead some of the tribes to battle against Sisera, and manage to defeat him. Sisera then flees on foot and comes upon the tent of Jael, identified as the wife of Heber the Kenite, an ally or friend of Jabin. Jael invites Sisera into the tent, covers him with some sort of covering, gives him milk to drink, and, when he has fall- en asleep from exhaustion, drives a tent-peg into his skull and shat- ters it. Afterwards, when Barak arrives, she takes him into the tent and shows him Sisera’s dead body. Finally, Deborah and Barak sing a great victory hymn, in which Jael’s deed is lauded. This is the story as the author of the book of Judith knew it.

   I would like to start my comparison by looking at the structure of the two stories. The story of Jael begins with a political struggle (which has religious implications) between the Israelites and a foreign power, moves to a climax in a private scene between the heroine Jael and Isra- el’s enemy Sisera, which ends in his death, and concludes with a trium- phant victory song. The book of Judith uses precisely the same struc- ture. The story begins with a political and religious struggle between the Israelites and a foreign power (chaps. 1–7), moves to a climax in a private scene between the heroine Judith and Israel’s enemy Holofernes (chaps. 8–15), and ends in a triumphant victory song (chap. 16). So the overall structure of the two stories is precisely the same.⁵

   Now I will move to an investigation of the details of plot and character, beginning with the major characters of Judith and Ho- lofernes, then filling in the details with the other characters. In that way I hope that the detail of the parallels between Judith and Jael and Deborah will be clear.

   Judith enters the story at a late point in the plot, as has been not- ed many times.⁶ Craven states that this is not because of lack of skill on the part of the author, but because he has prepared for Judith’s en- trance by creating an almost unbearable state of suspense through an account of the enemy’s seeming invincibility.⁷ I would also suggest that the author’s artistic decision was influenced by the fact that Jael enters the scene quite late in her story, after the battle and defeat of Sisera’s army.⁸ Once the heroines appear, the stories move fairly quickly to their 

climaxes, given the relative length of each. Of course, the story of Ju- dith is much longer and richer in detail than the story of Jael, as befits a free-standing novella.

   Once the heroines enter, they are identified. Judith is identified as the widow of Manasseh, while Jael is described as the wife of Heber

the Kenite. I will not enter here into the discussion of whether ’e^–šet

^h_.^{eber means wife of an individual or female member of a certain clan.9}

I would suggest that, whatever the original meaning, the author of Ju-

dith would have understood the phrase to mean “wife of Heber.” The important thing to notice is that both Judith and Jael are identified as married, but their husbands are, for one reason or another, absent. The same is also true of Deborah, who, in Judg 4:4, is identified as the wife of Lappidoth,¹⁰ an absent spouse. Women, in patriarchal Israelity soci- ety, received their identity first from their fathers and then from their husbands, but these women receive their identity from their actions, and, in fact, give identity to their husbands, thus turning the stereotype on its head. In addition, Judith, Jael and Deborah are all, as far as we know, childless, again an unusual state in their societies. Finally, Judith and Jael, by the former’s status as a widow, and the latter’s member- ship in a non-Israelite clan, are marginal members of Israelite society. This fact emphasizes the theme in both stories of the weak (symbolized by the female) triumphing over the strong (symbolized by the male) with the help of Yahweh.¹¹

   After describing Judith, the author tells of her reaction to the bar- gain struck between Uzziah and the people of Bethulia (7:23–32). She is appalled, and berates the elders for their lack of faith in God. There is no parallel to this speech in the actions of Jael. In fact, one of the major differences between the two stories is that everything is known about Judith’s motivation for her action, and nothing is known about Jael’s. Here, however, the character of Deborah becomes the model. Deborah and Judith are both firm in their conviction that their actions accord with Yahweh’s will. In Judges 4, Deborah makes a speech to Barak, giving him his marching orders and assuring him that Yahweh will be with him. However, she notes in 4:9 that Yahweh will triumph by “the hand of a woman,” a motif used throughout both stories.¹²  In Judg 4:21, Jael takes the hammer in her hand. and in the victory song in Judges 5 we are told that “she put her hand to the tent peg and her right hand to workmen’s mallet” (v 26). In her speech to the elders, Judith

   

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says, “The Lord will deliver Israel by my hand” (Jdt 8:33), an unmis- takable parallel to Deborah’s statement about the hand of a woman. She repeats the statement in her prayer, in chap. 9. Then, at the end of the climactic scene, she tells the people of Bethulia to praise God, who “has destroyed our enemies by my hand this very night” (Jdt 13:14). The motif of a woman’s hand creates another similarity between the two stories.

   After her speech to the elders, Judith goes to prepare herself for her mission. This too is without parallel in the story of Deborah and Jael (although Zeitlin, among others, has compared this to the story of Es- ther¹³). Once prepared, Judith summons her maid and they set out for the “Assyrian” camp. Face-to-face with Holofernes, she begins a dia- logue that is laced with double-talk and irony. Immediately the parallel with Jael comes to mind. Jael welcomes Sisera into her tent and prom- ises to protect him, all the while intending to kill him. “Turn in, my lord, turn in; fear not” (Judg 4:18). Jael has been taken to task many times for violation of the law of hospitality, while Judith has been con- demned for lying.¹⁴ While Jael does violate the law of hospitality, the act should be seen, as Soggin puts it, “in the context of a complex con- flict of loyalties.”¹⁵  Where does one’s loyalty lie? Jael clearly places herself on the side of the Israelites (her name means “Yah is God,” thus identifying her with the Yahweh worshipers), and the text celebrates her for that action. As for Judith, her language is deliberately ambigu- ous. For example, in 11:6, Judith says to Holofernes, “And if you fol- low the words of your maidservant, God will accomplish something through you, and my lord will not fail to achieve his purposes.” “My lord” in Greek is ho kyrios mou. Holofernes assumes she is addressing him, but every Greek-speaking Jew of the period would have heard the Greek translation of “Yahweh” in her words. This use of irony is meant to bring a chuckle of recognition from the reader.¹⁶

   The correspondences now come thick and fast in the climax of the story. In the Assyrian camp Judith is invited to a banquet in the tent of Holofernes. Likewise, Jael invites Sisera into her tent. Holofernes drinks too much wine at the banquet, and passes out drunk. Jael gives Sisera goat’s milk to drink, which, as has been widely pointed out, has a soporific effect.¹⁷

The sexual theme in the book of Judith, recognized by many,¹⁸ is 

powerful in this scene. Holofernes declares his intention of having sex- ual intercourse with Judith (12:12). Judith responds to his invitation to the banquet by saying “Who am I, to refuse my lord?”, clearly a double entendre! Holofernes, at the sight of Judith, is described as “ravished.” Wine is served, and then, at the end of the banquet, the other guests tactfully withdraw, leaving Judith and Holofernes alone. If this were a movie, the screen would be fading to black. However, this is not a movie, and Holofernes soon meets his gory end.

   Mieke Bal has argued that the scene between Jael and Sisera is implicitly sexual.¹⁹    Sisera enters Jael’s tent. She covers him with a śĕmîkāh (for a discussion of this term, see below). She offers him a special drink, and then covers him again. As he drifts off to sleep (all passion spent?), she murders him. A tie between sex and death is well- known in ancient literature, including the biblical literature.²⁰   For ex- ample, the story of Samson and Delilah presents an instance in which sexual intercourse is closely linked with the death of the man. Even though Judges 4 does not specifically state that sexual intercourse took place between Jael and Sisera, the inference is plausible. I would sug- gest that the author of Judith makes explicit what is implied in the story of Jael and Sisera. Sensing the sexual innuendos behind the actions of both Jael and Sisera, he chooses to make those innuendos overt in the actions of Judith and Holofernes.

   After the men are asleep, the women murder them by attacking their heads, Jael by shattering Sisera’s skull, Judith by beheading Ho- lofernes. Boling suggests that the word in Judg 4:21, normally translat- ed as “temple,” raqqâh. should be translated as “neck.”²¹ I am not con- vinced that there is enough evidence to support the translation “neck”; clearly, though, some vulnerable portion of the skull, not necessarily the temples, is meant. In any case, both Sisera and Holofernes meet their death by means of a head injury. Finally, Judith pulls down Ho- lofernes’ bed-canopy (kônôpion) and takes it with her. The mention of the canopy or curtain here recalls the action of Jael when she covers Sisera with a śĕmîkāh. The śĕmîkāh is a hapax legomenon in Hebrew, and has been variously translated. LXX^A has derrei (skin), while LXX^{B has epibolaio}, ^{(covering, wrapper). In English it has been translated as} a “rug” or a “wooly covering,” or it has been identified as the curtain of goatskin which separates the inner portion of the tent from the outer

   

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portion.²² If this latter translation is correct (and there is no conclusive proof one way or the other), then we have a close parallel to the kônô- pion of the Judith story. In any case, we do have a covering motif (a symbol of deceptive security?) in both scenes.

   After making her way out of the camp, with the head of Holofern- es stored in her food bag, Judith returns to Bethulia, where she trium- phantly displays the head to the people of the city. Achior is shown the head of Holofernes and is so astonished and awe-struck that he promptly converts to Judaism. The character of Achior is loosely modeled on the character of Barak in Judges 4 and 5. He is a secondary male character who acts as a foil for the leading female character, Judith, as Barak acts as a foil for Deborah, and later Jael. In the first part of the book of Ju- dith, Achior informs Holofernes that the Jews cannot be defeated because their God protects them, thus enraging Holofernes and setting in motion the central plot of the story. Similarly, Barak’s response to Deborah’s call sets the action of the story in motion in two ways: when he states that he will not go forth to battle without Deborah, he gives her the opportunity to predict that Sisera will fall by the hand of a woman, thus foreshadow- ing the action of Jael,²³ and, by leading the Israelites to the confronta- tion with Sisera, he begins the chain of events that allows Jael’s deed to take place. After their initial appearances, both characters leave the stage, only to return after the heroine has completed her action. The parallel is quite clear here. Judith displays the head of Holofernes to Achior, just as Jael displays the body of Sisera to Barak. These events confirm Yahweh’s use of a weak, marginalized member of the society in order to save it. Achior is a more fully drawn character, as we would expect in the book of Judith, and he is also a foreigner, which adds an interesting twist to the story. The conversion of Achior, without parallel in Judges 4 and 5, re- flects the later date of the book of Judith. In the post-exilic period, mem- bership in the Jewish community was determined by ethnic group and re- ligious affiliation, while in the book of Judges membership in the people of Israel was determined by tribal affiliation. So Achior’s conversion is one more symbol of the triumph of Yahweh in the book of Judith, a sym- bol not possible in the milieu of the book of Judges. Notice that in Daniel

1–6 (which is also post-exilic) the triumph of Daniel is always followed by the conversion of the king. In any case, Achior’s function in the story is the same as that of Barak. 

   Finally, at the end of her story, Judith leads the victorious Israelites in a triumphant hymn to Yahweh. Many commentators have suggested that this hymn is modeled on victory hymns found in the pre-exilic lit- erature, most notably Exodus 15 (the Song of Miriam) and, of course, Judges 5.²⁴ It seems to me that the parallel is clearest with Judges 5, es- pecially if it is realized that the author of Judith used not only Jael as a model for his leading female character, but also Deborah. The struc- ture of the hymns is similar; as Dancy writes: “One notable feature in common between Judith’s and Deborah’s songs is the way that in both of them the heroine sometimes speaks in the first person, sometimes is spoken of in the third.’¹²⁵ Again, I would argue that this feature is not accidental. A close investigation of the structure of the hymn is called for.

   Both hymns begin in the first person, with a call to bless Yahweh. The language of the Song of Deborah is notoriously difficult and I do not wish to enter into the translation debate here. Unless otherwise stat- ed, I will be using the translation of the RSV. After the initial call to praise, each song continues with a poetic description of the events re- counted in the prose narrative.²⁶ In v 6 of the song of Judith the person of the verb changes from first to third, to describe the action of Judith. In Judg 5:12 the person changes from the first to the second (referring to Deborah), leading eventually to a description of the actions of Jael in the third person.²⁷ Finally, each hymn ends with the destruction of the enemies of Israel: “So perish all thine enemies, O LORD!” (Judg 5:31), and “Woe to the nations that rise up against my people!” (Jdt 16:17).

   Moving from structure to theme, John Craghan has noted the theme of the disruption of nature which appears in both songs: in the Song of Deborah the mountains quake when Yahweh marches from Seir (vv 4–

5), and in Jdt 16:15 the mountains shake and the rocks melt at the pres- ence of Yahweh.²⁸ Patrick Skehan has also noted that vv 13–17, an an- thology of praise, contain material found in Judges 5.²⁹  For example, in v 13 Judith, having switched back to the first person, sings “I will sing to my God a new song.” This is similar to Deborah’s “I, to Yahweh even I will sing, I will sing to Yahweh the God of Israel” in Judg 5:3.³⁰

So the hymns contain structural and thematic similarities. The most im- portant parallel to note, however, is the position of each hymn, coming at the end of the prose narrative, followed by a brief epilogue.

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   The epilogue in Judges 5 is indeed brief: “And the land had rest for forty years,” a typical ending from the book of Judges.³¹ The end- ing of the book of Judith, though longer, has a similar message: “And no one ever again spread terror among the people of Israel in the days of Judith, or for a long time after her death.” (16:25) So Judith, like Jael and Deborah, brings peace to the land for a generation (forty years indicating a generation in the book of Judges). In fact, the book of Judith seems to embrace the theology of the book of Judges (which is the theology of the Deuteronomist).³² In his speech to Holofernes, Achior states: “As long as they [the Israelites] did not sin against their God they prospered, for the God who hates iniquity is with them. But when they departed from the way which he had appointed for them, they were utterly defeated in many battles and were led away captive to a foreign country; the temple of their God was razed to the ground, and their cities were captured by their enemies.” (5:17–18) The the- ology of the book of Judges, of course, is clear from its structure: the people sin, which brings on punishment; the people repent, caus- ing God to raise up a judge to save them; during the lifetime of the judge the people obey Yahweh, and the land is at peace. This “obedi- ence brings reward, disobedience brings punishment” covenant theol- ogy is exactly the theology of Achior’s speech. A second commonal- ity between the book of Judith and the book of Judges is the imper- manence of the role of Judith. She comes forward for a specific task, and, when that task is completed, retires from the stage. This model is drawn from that of the judges, e.g., Othniel, Ehud, and Shamgar, and of course, Deborah. Finally, and this is a very minor point, neither the book of Judges nor the book of Judith is placed in a time of king- ship. Judges, of course, is part of the pre-monarchical history of Isra- el, while in Judith the people seem to be under the authority of a high priest in Jerusalem.³³

   Now I would like to point out some parallels not mentioned in the synopsis of the plot. First is the entire absence of miracle in the prose narratives of both stories.³⁴ Judith and Jael perform their deeds in com- pletely realistic ways; they seize the chance given to them by the mo- ment. At no point in the narrative, up until the climactic scene, is the audience assured that “everything will be all right.” Only the awesome assurance of Deborah and Judith, made clear in their speeches, gives that comfort, and that is a matter of faith, not empirical proof. Second, 

the deeds of Jael and Judith are not explicitly commissioned by Yah- weh. They act on their own; salvation is achieved by human initiative, although Yahweh is credited with the victory. Especially in the book of Judith the heroine’s reliance on the guidance of Yahweh is made clear in her speeches and prayers; yet nowhere is it stated that Yahweh told Judith to do precisely what she did. This is even more so the case with Jael, about whose thoughts and motivations we know nothing. This mo- tif of “salvation by human initiative” is often present in the Hebrew Bi- ble in stories about women: for example, both Ruth and Esther achieve their goals through their own initiative.

   Finally, I would like to mention two correspondences which did not figure directly into the comparison of the character of Judith with those of Jael and Deborah. The first concerns the male characters Ne- buchadnezzar and Holofernes. Nebuchadnezzar is a king, who appears at the beginning of the story of Judith (1:1–2:13), leaves the action, and never reappears. Holofernes, the leading male character, is Nebuchad- nezzar’s general but wields considerable power on his own, and it is his defeat which frees the Israelites from the threat of Nebuchadnezzar. The male characters in the story of Jael have similar roles and func- tions. In the final form of the story, Jabin, the king of Canaan, is men- tioned at the beginning of the story but plays no role in the story itself. The leading male character, Sisera, is described as Jabin’s general, but he acts as his own agent, and it is his defeat which frees the Israelites from the oppression of Jabin.³⁵ The fact that this obvious parallel oc- curs outside of the main plot is further support for the argument that the author of Judith had the story of Jael in mind when he wrote his story. Second, the battle in both stories is followed by a rout of the respective enemies. These routs occur at different points in the narrative: the rout of the Assyrians takes place after the death of Holofernes, while that of the Canaanites happens before the death of Sisera. It is true, of course, that these scenes are common to battle stories. However, a minor simi- larity like this one points to an overall scheme of parallels that show the author of Judith adhering very closely to his model.

   To conclude, in this paper I have argued, by citing the correspond- ing elements of two stories, that the author of the book of Judith used the specific story of Jael and Deborah as the model for his story. The comparison begins with the fact that both stories have heroines who save the Israelites by murdering the commander of the enemy forces,

   

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and this murder is accomplished by destroying the head of the victim. But the parallels go beyond this central fact to correspondence in struc- ture, plot and character. The sheer number of both large and small par- allels makes the theory of the Jael model highly plausible. Nor would this model have passed unnoticed by the readers of the book of Judith. This modeling technique is a good example of the use of earlier biblical literature in the literature of the second-temple period,³⁶   and demon- strates the high esteem in which it was held at this time.

   ¹ For example, see George W.E. Nickelsburg, Jewish Literature Between the Bible and the Mishnah (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1981) 106.
   ² The author of the book of Judith is anonymous, and may have been either male or female. Unfortunately, the English language does not have a graceful way to express a neuter human subject; therefore, when it is unavoidable I will use the masculine pronoun to describe the author. This is in no way to be taken as indicat- ing the (proven) gender of the author.

³ For example, Carey A. Moore, Judith (AB 40; Garden City, NY: Doubleday,

1985);

   Morton A. Enslin and Solomon Zeitlin, The Book of Judith (Jewish Apocry- phal Literature 8, Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1972); John Craghan, Esther. Judith. Tobit. Jo- nah. Ruth (Old Testament Message 16; Wilmington, DE: Michael Glazier, 1982),

et al.

   ⁴ See, for example, Robert G. Boling, Judges (AB 6A; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1975) and J. Albert Soggin, Judges (OTL; Philadelphia: Westminster,

1981).

   ⁵ Toni Craven, in her article “Artistry and Faith in the Book of Judith” (Se- meia 8 [1977] 75), makes the following statement about the structure of the book: “The form and content of Part I sketch a religious/political struggle over true sov- ereignty and true deity;
   the form and content of Part II detail the resolution of this struggle by the hand of the widow Judith.” This is true enough; however, as stated above, I would argue that the structure is actually tripartite, with the concluding victory celebra- tions separate from the Judith/Holofernes section.
   ⁶ J.C. Dancey, for example, says “Now at last with the introduction of the heroine the narrative gets into full stride....” (The Shorter Books of the Apocrypha [CBC; Cambridge:

Unversity Press, 1972] 95).

   ⁷ Toni Craven, Artistry and Faith in the Book of Judith. (SBLDS 70; Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1983) 58.

   ⁸ This has also been noticed by Alonso-Schökel: “The delayed appearance of Judith may be compared to the later appearance of Jael....” (Luis Alonso-Schökel, “Narrative Structures in the Book of Judith.” Protocol Series of the Colloquies of  

the Center for Hermeneutical Studies in Hellenistic and Modern Culture 11 [1975]
4). Of course, when Jael enters the scene the Israelite army has already won the battle; when Judith appears the Israelites are on the verge of being utterly defeated.
   ⁹ For a complete discussion and further bibliography, see Mieke Bal, Death and Dissymmetry: The Politics of Coherence in the Book of Judges(Chicago: Uni- versity of Chicago Press, 1988) 211–212.
   ¹⁰ The question of whether Lappidoth is meant as a proper masculine name has been raised by some. If it is not the name of Deborah’s otherwise unknown husband, what is it? Judah J. Slotki lists four midrashic interpretations: 1. It is a nickname for Barak (“lightning”). 2. It indicates her inflammatory speeches and war-like spirit. 3. It symbolizes the divine inspiration which created sparks and flames. 4. She prepared wicks for the lamps in the sanctuary (Judah J. Slotki, “Judges” in Joshua and Judges [ed. A. Cohen; London: Soncino, 1950] 186). The first two interpretations are the ones most often suggested by commentators today.
   ¹¹ Mieke Bal, Murder and Difference: Gender. Genre and Scholarship on Sisera’s Death (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1988) 20–21; Craghan, Es- ther. Judith. Tobit. Jonah. Ruth. 89. The notion underlying both stories is that these are unusual roles for women. As P.R. Sanday notes, in most cultures “women give birth and grow children; men kill and make weapons” (Sanday, Female Power and Male Dominance: On the Origins of Sexual Inequality [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981] 5). The violation of these cultural norms by these women may be perceived as dangerous; this is particularly true in the case of Deborah,
who has the charisma of Yahweh (this was suggested to me by Dr. William Poehl- mann of St. Olaf College in a private conversation).
   ¹²  Patrick W. Skehan, “The Hand of Judith,” CBQ 25 (1963) 94–110. The fol- lowing comments are heavily dependent on Skehan’s article.

¹³  Solomon Zeitlin, “Introduction: The Book of Esther and Judith: A Parallel”

in Enslin and Zeitlin, The Book of Judith. 1–37.
   ¹⁴  For example, Wayne Shumaker, in Alonso-Schokel, Colloquies, 50, says: “I have compunctions about her [Judith’s] methodology.” For the question of Jael’s violation of the law of hospitality, see Boling, Judges, Soggin, Judges, et al.

¹⁵  Soggin, Judges. 78.

¹⁶ For more on the use of irony in the book of Judith, see Moore, Judith. 78–85.

¹⁷ As Boling puts it, “she duped him and doped him” (Judges, 98).

¹⁸  For a discussion, see Bal, Murder and Difference, 105.

¹⁹  Bal, Murder and Difference, 105.

   ²⁰  Stith Thompson titles this folklore motif “Death from intercourse,” motif T182 (Stith Thompson, Motif Index of Folk-Literature: A Classification of Narra- tive Elements in Folktales. Ballads. Myths. Fables. Mediaeval Romances. Exempla Fabliaux. Jest-Books. and Local Legends[vol 5; Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1955–58] 362). It has been noticed before that the influence of folklore mo- tifs is prominent in Judith. For example, Mary P. Coote notes “In its basic pattern and motifs the story of Judith strongly resembles a type of traditional rescue story

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in which a female figure assumes the role of the hero and saves a male figure (or
a social group) from captivity” (in Alonso-Schökel, Colloquies, 21). For a further discussion of the folklore influence, see Moore, Judith, 78.

²¹  Boling, Judges, 93, 98. 22 22 Soggin, Judges, 62.

   ²³  It is not germane to our purpose to determine whether or not Barak’s re- fusal to go without Deborah is the result of fear. For a discussion of this question, see Bal, Murder and Difference, 45ff., 115.

²⁴  Craven, Artistry and Faith, Moore, Judith, et al.

²⁵  Dancy, The Shorter Books of the Apocrypha, 124.

   ²⁶  I would reiterate my earlier statement that the author of Judith knew the story of Jael and Deborah in its final form, as it now appears in the book of Judges; he did not separate it into sources.

²⁷ The song of Judith shifts back to the first person in v 11.

²⁸  Craghan, Esther. Judith. Tobit. Jonah, Ruth. 124.

²⁹  Skehan, “The Hand of Judith,” 95.

   ³⁰ Translation by F.M. Cross and D.N. Freedman in Studies in Ancient Yah- wistic Poetry (Missoula, MT: Scholars Press, 1975) 13.

³¹  Cf., for example, 8:28. The book of Judges is given its structure by the

Deuteronomistic Historian (Dtr).

³² That is, the theology of the conditional covenant.

³³  Moore, Judith, 50.

³⁴  Enslin and Zeitlin, The Book of Judith, 42.

³⁵  James D. Martin, The Book of Judges (Cambridge: Cambridge University

Press, 1975) 54.

³⁶  For other examples of the use of earlier biblical literature in the literature

of the second-temple period, see the category “Expansions of the ‘Old Testament’“ in The Old Testament Pseudepigrapha (vol. 2; ed. J.H. Charlesworth; Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1985). Many of the books in this category are in a different liter- ary genre than the book of Judith (e.g., Jubilees); however, they do demonstrate the reuse of the biblical text in the second-temple period. The elements in the book of Judith which are not found in the story of Jael and Deborah, such as the conversion of Achior, are motifs which appear in other post-exilic books such as Esther and Daniel. 

From “No One Spoke Ill of Her”: Essays on Judith, edited by James C. VanderKam (Atlanta, Georgia: Scholars Press, 1992), pages 5–16. In EARLY JUDAISM AND ITS LITERATURE series, Wil- liam Adler, Series Editor; Number 02. Copyright © 1992 by The Society of Biblical Literature. Used by permission.