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| Artwork showing the woman laying on the doorstep, and her husband finds her. Image attribution: "By Gustave Doré - National Library of Poland, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=182444497" |
[content note: rape]
I have some thoughts about this post, Fearless Ones and Fallen Sparrows: A Meditation on Judges 19 by Helen Paynter. I came across it via this post by Sheila Wray Gregoire, PODCAST: Why Is the Old Testament So Cavalier About the Abuse of Women? feat. Helen Paynter.
Let me first give a summary of the bible story in question, Judges 19. Trigger warning: It's about a brutally violent gang rape, and the victim dies from her injuries. It's about a man (referred to as "a Levite" in this story) who was traveling with his concubine, and one night, the place where they were staying was surrounded by a group of men, telling the owner of the house to send the man out so they could rape him. But instead, he told them they could rape his concubine, and sent her out to them. They raped her the whole night, and she died. Then the man cut her body into 12 pieces and sent them out to various places in Israel, to publicize what had happened. This continues on into chapters 20 and 21 with a violent battle, and then men being very proud of themselves for their clever plan to capture a bunch of women and force them into marriage.
So the whole story is terrible.
Before I clicked on the link to Helen Paynter's post, I was thinking about what it might say. From the perspective of Christians who believe in the bible, well, what do you do with this story?
Let me tell you what a typical commentary on this passage might say:
First of all, it would assure us that many passages in the bible are descriptive, not prescriptive. In other words, the bible is telling us that this is a thing that happened. It's not telling us this is a good thing, it's not telling us that God approved of it, it's not telling us that this is what we should do. Many bible stories are there to tell us what not to do!
And sure, this "descriptive vs prescriptive" concept helps with Judges 19, but there are also passages in the bible where *God* commands the Israelites to kill entire cities of people. So those were "prescriptive." So honestly, I think "these stories are descriptive, not prescriptive" is kind of BS. Many of the violent passages in the bible *very much are* "prescriptive."
Then, it would point out that this story is bracketed by these statements: "In those days Israel had no king" in Judges 19:1, and "In those days Israel had no king; everyone did as they saw fit" in Judges 21:25. So, you see, this is a story about what happens when people just make up their own morality. When they don't have an authority to tell them what's right and wrong. Look how society descends into chaos when people aren't committed to following God! Hey, kinda like how modern people are like, "we have to accept all religions" and "whatever you want to do is fine as long as you're consenting adults." This story serves as a warning about how off-track people get when they don't have the ABSOLUTE TRUTH about GOD as their authority.
Maybe this hypothetical commentary would stop there. Or maybe it would keep going, with these insights:
This story is very similar to the story of Sodom in Genesis 19. In that story, 2 angels came to get Lot and his family out of Sodom, before God destroyed the city. A group of men surrounded Lot's house and asked Lot to send out the angels (who looked like human men) so they could rape them. Lot said, "no, take my 2 virgin daughters instead" but then the angels fought back and got Lot and his wife and daughters out of there.
So, you see, this story shows us that Israel had become just as bad as Sodom was. !!! Wow, can you believe, the people that God brought out of Egypt, and gave laws to, and gave land to, and now they're just as bad as Sodom! But God is so merciful, God still loves them and has a plan for them, and God eventually got things turned around.
And maybe this commentary would even point out the homosexual angle. When the men surrounded the house, they asked for the owner of the house to send out the male guest so they could rape him. The owner and guest refused, and sent the guest's concubine out instead. So, you see, these violent men who gang-raped her, they were gay. Wow, that's another layer of sin; not only are they rapists, they're also gay.
So, based on my experience reading commentaries and bible study materials written by white, conservative men, that's what such materials would say about Judges 19. It's about sin. It's about what not to do. It's about what happens when society doesn't follow God's laws. The takeaway message for us is, don't sin like that.
(The secondary takeaway message is, reassuring us that just because the bible records bad and violent things that happen, that doesn't diminish the bible's inerrancy and authority over our lives. So yeah we're horrified by this story, but don't let that make you suspicious of the bible or of God.)
So I was thinking about all this, before I clicked on Paynter's post. Let's take a look at it. Fearless Ones and Fallen Sparrows: A Meditation on Judges 19
Yes, this post does start out by asking, "But why is this story in my Bible? Why is this account of ancient mob violence in my sacred text?", but it doesn't take the "this is descriptive, not prescriptive," approach, or talk about how the point is we shouldn't sin. Instead, it talks about the reality of sexual violence in the world. The systems in this world which perpetuate violence against women because they just don't value women's lives.
What if Ghulam stumbled across this story? Ghulam grew up in Pakistan. And when I say “grew up,” I mean that at the age of eleven she was pulled out of school to marry a forty-year-old man. She’d hoped to become a doctor. Now she’s just concerned with whether she will survive the pregnancy she will conceive when she ovulates for the first time.
There are several such anecdotes in the post. Paynter's overall point is, the violence in the story, the misogyny, the way the men didn't protect the woman, but sent her out to be raped, to save themselves- this is real, this is still happening in the world today. And the reason this story is in the bible is because this woman was not forgotten by God. Her suffering did matter, and the bible records it and remembers it. And to all the victims of sexual violence and senseless violence in the world today, God sees you, and you matter to God.
I would describe Paynter's article as a feminist reading of Judges 19. Reading it with an awareness of the reality of sexual violence today. Very different from the bible commentaries I used to read. (I definitely prefer Paynter's interpretation.)
What really struck me, and the reason I decided to blog about this, is how it illustrates the way that the "white conservative male" reading of the bible *is* a specific reading, coming from a specific perspective. I grew up in that environment, and I believed we were just reading *what the bible said*; we weren't "biased." When I started hearing people talk about "this is a white perspective on the bible; Black Christians have a different perspective," it didn't make any sense to me. We're just reading what's right there on the page! We're just being objective. It has nothing to do with being white, I thought.
But anyway, what I've laid out in this post, the hypothetical bible commentary written by a white man, it's all looking through the lens of sin. Pointing out the sin in this story. It's coming from a perspective where the purpose of the bible is to give us moral lessons. The point of Judges 19 is "what not to do."
And wow, that is not just an "unbiased"/ "objective" way to look at the bible. That is a very specific belief, based on one's own perspective. The idea that the bible is about rules and morality, teaching us what to do and what not to do. Maybe that's not what the bible has to be!
In other words, when white Christians read this story, we imagine ourselves in the position of the characters who had a choice. Who chose to do these "sinful" things- and the lesson for us is that we should choose differently. We don't imagine ourselves in the position of the victim, who never had a choice. Who suffered unjustly because other people chose to "sin."
(I mean, I'm sure there are also commentaries written by white male Christians who find a way to blame this woman for being gang-raped. Trying to assign some "sin" onto her. Horrible.)
Looking at this story, and thinking it's about telling us not to sin. Not imagining that you yourself would ever be in a position where people are doing these "sinful" things to you, and you can't escape. Not realizing that these kinds of things are real, that they are still happening in our world today.
Yeah, the "white man perspective" certainly is a perspective, not just the default "unbiased" way to read the bible.
And the other thing I'm thinking about is, a big difference between these two different perspectives is ... how to I put this... the question of whether the world is just, and you experience consequences due to your own choices and actions.
The bible commentaries I used to read, which would point out the "sin" in this passage, and tell us that we are not supposed to act like that, were based in an overall framework where we have the freedom to choose how we act, and we will experience good or bad consequences based on our own actions. The belief that God has set up the world to operate fairly: don't sin, because you will experience consequences for your sin. (Sure, there are some caveats, sometimes bad things happen to good people, but only if it's part of "God's plan"- so, it can't be that bad.)
A worldview where you are free and you are in control of what happens to you. You just have to make sure you follow God's rules and don't sin, and you'll have a good life. God will make sure of it. In this view, God is powerful and makes sure the world operates fairly.
But the feminist reading in Paynter's post, it's more like... how do I put this... it feels kind of powerless? The most we can say, for victims who suffer violence because *other people* choose to sin, is that God sees their suffering and God cares about them. Okay, but these horrible things are still happening. God isn't intervening to stop this.
I suppose the feminist reading could inspire us to take action to do something about these injustices ourselves (since God isn't doing anything). You could say that the first step is seeing the problem and valuing the victims of this kind of injustice- and then we should take action to make a world where this doesn't happen.
But still, the feminist reading gives me a feel of... we're down here in this mess, trying to make sense of the world we live in, trying to find where God is. They seem so far away, They are letting these things happen, but we can comfort ourselves by believing that They care.
It's quite different from the view of the white-male-centered bible study materials, which present the bible as solid reliable rules given to us directly by God. The certainty. The trust. We *know* God told us to just follow these rules and life will be good.
That world isn't real, though. This white-male-centered view of the bible doesn't have anything helpful to say to victims who suffer unjustly because of other people's "sin." This view can't recognize the reality of injustice, that there are real women now who truly do suffer sexual violence similar to what we see in Judges 19. All it can do is read this horrific story of a gang rape and say, well, don't do that.
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Related
Motivated By Inerrancy Or Sexism?
Was Jesus' Death a Good Thing or a Bad Thing?
Yes, I Want Justice (A post about white evangelicals and #BlackLivesMatter)
"The Kingdom of Children" (a book about child liberation theology)
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