Day 13
Genesis 34-36, Psalm 12, Matthew 12
So Dinah, daughter of Jacob, gets raped by this guy Shechem and then he decides he loves her and goes to his father and tells him to “get me this girl to be my wife.” (Probably left out the rape part… or maybe not.) So Shechem and his dad, Hamor, go to Dinah’s dad (the custom because women were pretty much chattle) to beg and bribe for her hand in marriage. Jacob and Dinah’s brothers were outraged but for some reason couldn’t say so outright so they make a deal they didn’t think would be considered – all the men in
Hamor’s clan must be circumcised. And, considering the mega-goods (read: women, land, livestock, riches) they’ll receive, they do it! Sheesh. In Dinah’s brothers’ favor, though, they do eventually rescue her but then, in their rage, they murder all the men in the Hamor clan and take all their goods (including women and children). We think, ‘Will it never stop’? It’s inconceivable for us to imagine women and children AND men being treated with such abuse and yet… consider the recent news from India, around the world, and even from our own country.
And the psalmist laments, “Help, O Lord, for there is no longer anyone who is godly…” and the reorientation from God is an assurance from within that same psalmist, “You, O Lord, will protect us; you will guard us from this generation forever.”
And then He comes to do just that. This man Jesus comes to us, courageously feeding the hungry and healing the maimed, the blind, and the mute on the Sabbath; this Jesus who commits these sacred acts, fulfills the prophecy long foretold; this Jesus makes us all one body and calls us all to do the will of the Father no matter the generation, no matter the lament. May we heed his call and transform this world.
The Rev. Wendy Tobias, Associate Priest, St. Joseph’s Episcopal Church
Genesis 34-36, Psalm 12, Matthew 12
So Dinah, daughter of Jacob, gets raped by this guy Shechem and then he decides he loves her and goes to his father and tells him to “get me this girl to be my wife.” (Probably left out the rape part… or maybe not.) So Shechem and his dad, Hamor, go to Dinah’s dad (the custom because women were pretty much chattle) to beg and bribe for her hand in marriage. Jacob and Dinah’s brothers were outraged but for some reason couldn’t say so outright so they make a deal they didn’t think would be considered – all the men in
Hamor’s clan must be circumcised. And, considering the mega-goods (read: women, land, livestock, riches) they’ll receive, they do it! Sheesh. In Dinah’s brothers’ favor, though, they do eventually rescue her but then, in their rage, they murder all the men in the Hamor clan and take all their goods (including women and children). We think, ‘Will it never stop’? It’s inconceivable for us to imagine women and children AND men being treated with such abuse and yet… consider the recent news from India, around the world, and even from our own country.
And the psalmist laments, “Help, O Lord, for there is no longer anyone who is godly…” and the reorientation from God is an assurance from within that same psalmist, “You, O Lord, will protect us; you will guard us from this generation forever.”
And then He comes to do just that. This man Jesus comes to us, courageously feeding the hungry and healing the maimed, the blind, and the mute on the Sabbath; this Jesus who commits these sacred acts, fulfills the prophecy long foretold; this Jesus makes us all one body and calls us all to do the will of the Father no matter the generation, no matter the lament. May we heed his call and transform this world.
The Rev. Wendy Tobias, Associate Priest, St. Joseph’s Episcopal Church
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