Category Archives: Biblical Women

The Heart of Judah

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From the 14th century “Sister Haggadah” Spain, Catalonia (Barcelona). 1325-1374 CE. Copyright: British Library [Public domain]

This is a story about the heart of Judah.   We will look at what may possibly form/transform Judah’s heart, and read an interesting rabbinic commentary that illustrates how Judah’s heart enables him to “draw near” to his estranged brother Joseph “in order to arouse Joseph’s love and spark his compassion.”

WOMEN WHO FORM JUDAH’S HEART

Judah has two formative women in his life who I would argue contribute strongly to the development of a great heart: his mother Leah and his daughter-in-law Tamar.

LEAH

First: Leah. When Jacob, who would be Judah’s father, sets out to take a wife, he choses Rachel, daughter of Laban. (Note, Rachel did not choose Jacob, but that’s a story for another time.)  He serves Laban 7 years to be able to marry Rachel.   Laban tricks Jacob into taking Leah for a wife before he can marry Rachel.  Rachel is from the beginning the favored wife, and Leah pines for Jacob to love her.   When her first three sons arrive, Leah gives them names which signify that God has seen her affliction (Re’uven/See, a son!), that God has heard that she is hated (Shim’on/ Hearing) and finally that the third son will join her to her husband (Levi/Joining). (Gen 29:32-34).  [Names as translated by Everett Fox].  Taken together, the names show that Leah is unhappily pining away, feeling unloved and alone.

When the fourth son arrives Leah stops giving birth for a time and gives thanks to God.  She calls the child Yehuda/Giving Thanks (Gen 29:35 Fox). None of the names are precisely written according to the meaning invested in them.  However, biblical names are often assigned a meaning in the text suggested by a word with similar letters.  By the explanations of the text, we may see that as she carries and births Judah, Leah is turning her attention away from affliction, hatred, and loneliness, and towards praise for the Divine.  Put another way, she stops thinking of herself in relation to how her husband neglects her and connects herself directly to the Divine. I suggest that Judah is born with this connection to the Divine instead of the negative emotions denoted in the names of the first three sons.  Furthermore, in the unwritten text we may as a result imagine a special bond between mother and son.  This bond based upon thanksgiving gives Judah the possibility of a compassionate heart. We understand already that he may be fated to outshine his older brothers in leadership and in fact be one of the progenitors of King David.   This is not to say that Judah is racking up good deeds as he grows up, but, to his credit, he is the brother chiefly responsible for keeping Joseph alive, sold into slavery instead of slain.

TAMAR

The second strong female who molds Judah’s heart is Tamar, his daughter-in-law.   Tamar is married in sequence to each of Judah’s older sons, Er and Onan, who die leaving her twice-widowed. Judah packs Tamar off to her father’s house with a vague promise to marry her to the third son, Shelah, when he comes of age.  This leaves the widow Tamar chained to Judah’s family, with no chance to find another husband.  At that time, a woman without husband and sons would have been in a precarious situation, as she would not inherit from her father.  Time drags on, Shelah grows up, and Judah does not make the marriage, perhaps because he fears that Tamar caused the death of his sons.  (The text indicates otherwise: that God took both sons for their wickedness).  Finally, after the death of Judah’s wife, Tamar waylays Judah when he is in a festive mood, appearing to him as a veiled woman available for sexual encounter.   Afterward, Tamar takes Judah’s signet, cord and staff as pledge for payment of a kid from his flock.  These articles would have been clearly identifiable as belonging to Judah.  When Tamar becomes pregnant, Judah finds out and is furious with her.  He threatens to burn her. Tamar produces his signet, cord and staff, proving that he is the father (Gen 38:1-25).   At this point, Judah realizes he was wrong to deprive Tamar of her rights and of her societal need to marry Shelah׃

And Judah acknowledged them, and said, She has been more righteous than I; because I did not give her to Shelah my son. And he knew her again no more. (Gen 38:26)

Tamar teaches Judah to recognize a person more righteous than himself.  I suggest that this recognition turns Judah himself towards righteousness and enables him to enact love for his father, and to open up Joseph’s heart. Further, that the maternal/divine influence at birth enables Judah to take in the lessons from his daughter-in-law Tamar.

JUDAH AND JOSEPH:  THE HEART IN ACTION

The Joseph saga in our text is long and varied.  There are two key points which work together to show Judah’s heart in action:  Joseph’s withdrawal from his family and Judah’s tender outreach at their meeting.

JOSEPH’S WITHDRAWAL

When Joseph’s brothers sell him into slavery, Joseph prospers in Egypt and becomes the Pharaoh’s right hand man, in charge of his stores.  Years go by, yet Joseph never sends word to his family that he is thriving in Egypt, nor does he reach out to them when famine hits.   Why doesn’t he do so? Aviva Zornberg suggests that Joseph’s forgetting is a matter of survival for himself after trauma.  God makes him forget, but also Joseph embraces the forgetfulness.  She expounds on Gen 41:51

  “..when he comes to name his first-born son, he calls him Menasseh – forgetfulness: ‘for God has made me forget completely my suffering and the house of my father’ (Gen 41.51).  Joseph has forgotten his history, himself… For if he is to survive his own unwitnessed death in the pit, he must forget his father’s house, his past, himself.”  Zornberg pg 302.

Joseph becomes unknowable and remains hidden – to himself, to his Egyptian friends and relations, and to his family.  He walks like an Egyptian.  Then the brothers come to visit and start to penetrate the wall of forgetfulness.  All the brothers but one arrive when famine hits in Canaan, Joseph’s homeland.  They leave at home Benjamin, the youngest, Joseph’s full brother, the only other child of Jacob’s favorite wife Rachel.  Jacob will not hear of Benjamin leaving home, not with Joseph already lost to him.

When the brothers arrive in Egypt, they do not recognize Joseph.

Gen 42:[7] And Joseph saw his brethren, and he knew them, but made himself strange unto them, and spoke roughly with them… [8] And Joseph knew his brethren, but they knew not him.

Joseph knows his brothers but does not reveal himself, in fact he makes himself strange to them.  Zornberg suggest this is self-disguise.

“Beyond the asymmetrical drama of recognition and non-recognition, there is the enigma of ‘He made himself strange unto them.’ This reflexive verb suggests a more-than-tactical move of self-disguise on Joseph’s part.”    Zornberg pg 303

Joseph accuses his brothers of being spies (mirgalim – the word is repeated 7 times with 25 verses).  He demands that they return with their brother Benjamin to prove they are not.  In private, Joseph cries when he hears his brothers talk about their guilt in mistreating him and how it has lead to what they think is a requirement to pay for their transgression by bringing Benjamin (Gen 42:21-24).  The brothers go home, leaving Shimon behind, bound up, but do not immediately return with Benjamin.  Reuben offers to guarantee Benjamin’s safety by pledging that Jacob can slay Reuben’s two sons if Reuben does not return with Benjamin.  It’s a ghastly offer and Jacob does not accept (Gen 42:37-38)

When the famine becomes extreme again, Judah steps up to safeguard Benjamin’s return so that the brothers can revisit Egypt.  Unlike Reuben, Judah simply takes all the surety on his own shoulders.  (Gen 43:8-9).  Surely his heart, which has been expanded by the influences of Leah and Tamar, is feeling love for his father.   Rabbi Yitz Greenberg writes:

“[F]ar from reacting violently to Jacob’s total possessive love for Rachel’s youngest son, Judah will give up his own life in order not to break his father’s heart again.”

Jacob has no choice but to allow Benjamin to go.  When they arrive, Joseph’s heart yearns for Benjamin but he again remains hidden and cries to himself.  Joseph’s long years of hiding himself, of “self-disguise,” have crusted over his heart – made it difficult for him to reveal himself even now:

Gen 43 [29] And he lifted up his eyes, and saw Benjamin his brother, his mother’s son, and said: ‘Is this your youngest brother of whom ye spoke unto me?’ And he said: ‘God be gracious unto thee, my son.’ [30] And Joseph made haste; for his heart yearned toward his brother; and he sought where to weep; and he entered into his chamber, and wept there.

Joseph sends the brothers home with bountiful food supplies, and a silver goblet hidden in Benjamin’s pack, then dispatches his steward to accuse them of theft.  The brothers swear that whomever has the goblet will be Joseph’s bondsman (Gen 44:9).   They find the goblet in Benjamin’s pack and Joseph threatens to keep Benjamin as a servant.   This is a disaster! The brothers fall on the ground in front of Joseph as if to plead for Benjamin.  Judah is their spokesman.  Then a remarkable thing occurs.  Judah draws near to Joseph.

JUDAH DRAWS NEAR – CRACKING JOSEPH’S HEART

Then Judah draws near to him [Joseph].  Vayigash elayiv Yehudah.  [Gen 44:18].

Why, the rabbis ask, did Judah draw near to the apparent stranger, when he was already in front of him?  What can be the meaning hidden behind text that appears to be a repetition of what is already known?  The text has already told us that Judah and his brothers have fallen prostrate on the ground in front of Joseph (Gen 44:14).

Menahem Mendel of Vitebsk, (1730-1788) writes:

 “The Or ha-Hayyim [Ḥayyim ben Moshe ibn Attar 1696-1743] asks why the term and Judah approached is necessary [since we know Judah was already standing close to Joseph], appropriately explaining that the drawing near to Joseph took place within Judah’s heart, as in the verse ‘As face answers to face in water, so does one man’s heart to another’ (Prov. 27:19).  With these words Judah sought to inspire Joseph’s compassion, and therefore he approached him in his heart, drawing near to Joseph and truly loving him, in order to arouse Joseph’s love and spark his compassion.  The words of the Or ha-Hayyim are certainly wise and faithful.”  Green, pg 153 from Peri Ha-Arets

The Or ha-Hayyim interprets this verse to mean that Judah, in approaching with his heart the unknown Egyptian, who had “made himself strange,” was able to raise up the sparks of love and compassion from Joseph.  Judah pleads with Joseph to allow Benjamin to go home and to permit Judah to stay as the bondsman.  In response, Joseph opens his heart to all his brothers and reveals his true self.  Aviva Zornberg points to the verse where Judah breaks though Joseph’s crusted heart.

This is “the sentence that accesses Joseph’s pain…[Judah says] ‘For how can I go back to my father if the boy is not with me?  Let me not be witness to the evil that would befall my father.’ (Gen. 44:34).  Zornberg pg 306

Rabbi Yitz Greenberg describes the moment this way:

“Joseph’s blocking wall crumbles. He is flooded with yearning for the father who loved him more than life…. Joseph, moved to the core, reaches out to his father and family. He brings them down to Egypt and nurtures them lovingly through the famine and its aftermath.”

Judah performs the opposite of keeping the stranger at arm’s length. Judah’s compassion for Benjamin, and the loving way in which he approaches Joseph, breaks through Joseph’s Menasseh – his tactical amnesia.    We note that Joseph cried upon seeing his brothers, but prior to Judah drawing near, he did not reveal himself.  Had he wanted to unite with his family, he could have done that years ago.  But Judah drew his heart near to Joseph’s heart and melted the isolation which Joseph had built up around him.

FINAL WORDS

Judah’s heart is steeped in the maternal/divine connection with his mother Leah.  It is further tempered by Tamar’s lesson about righteousness.  Judah first leads his brothers in saving Joseph’s life, then demonstrates great love for his father.  In the end his heart reaches out directly to Joseph’s heart “in order to arouse Joseph’s love and spark his compassion.”

If your neighbor feels like a stranger to you, be like Judah: open your heart and bring the neighbor within arm’s length.  Rabbi Julia Watts Belser, who researches ancient texts in conversation with disability studies, queer theory, feminist thought, and environmental ethics, issues a clarion call:

Let us strive together to break down barriers within ourselves and our communities.  Let us refashion the crusted architecture of our minds that keeps the Holy at bay.” Belser pg 28-29

SOURCES

Belser, Julia Watts.  “God on Wheels: Disability and Jewish Feminist Theology.” Tikkun. 29. 27-29, 2014.

Fox, Everett. The Five Books of Moses: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. New York: Schocken Books, 1997.

Green, Dr Arthur, Rabbi Ebn Leader, Ariel Evan Mayse, and Rabbi Or N. Rose. Speaking Torah: Spiritual Teachings from around the Maggid’s Table, Vol. 1. 1 edition. Woodstock, Vermont: Jewish Lights, 2013. [Menahem Mendel of Vitebsk, 1730-1788 quoted Peri Ha-Arets] (pg 153)

Greenberg, Rabbi Yitz  “Can We Save the Unity of the Jewish People? Parashat VaYigash 5781” Accessed 12/27/20: https://www.hadar.org/torah-resource/can-we-save-unity-jewish-people#source-9535

Zornberg, Avivah Gottlieb. The Murmuring Deep: Reflections on the Biblical Unconscious. New York: Schocken Books, 2009.

Brief story of Judith

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In the Septuagint (LLX), Judith is a bad-ass heroine, heartily accepted and lauded by her people after she saves them from Holofernes. She is portrayed as quite independent – relying upon her faith in God, but very inner directed, brave, and splendid. Lots of intertextual links to Jewish heroes, male and female. Jerome’s Latin Vulgate (4th C CE) turns her into a chaste super pious widow who is basically following God’s direction – still a heroine, story much the same, but more directed – not so much agency – and not so fully respected. A story you would expect from a celibate Christian priest.

There is zero in Jewish tradition concerning Judith until about 1000 CE. Never was a Hebrew version of the LLX story. Jerome, in making the Latin Vulgate claims to have translated from Hebrew but this cannot be established. None of the Jewish historians, philosophers or rabbis mention her until she appears in the middle ages. Her story then is similar to LLX, but gets wrapped into multiple midrashic and liturgical stories of Hanukkah and Judah. She becomes quite prominent as a Jewish heroine (see first illustration – above), perhaps partly because it is a time of increasing nationalism (12th-14th centuries or so), perhaps in reaction to Christian adoration of the Virgin Mary. Judith remains a hero to the Jewish people over time (see second illustration).

Christian art in the 15th century mixed Judith up with quite misogynist views of women. The art in last frame shows that she was conflated with Salome and both were portrayed as rather vile seducers.

A Candle on the Darkest Days – Hanukkah, Judith, and Rebecca Nov 19, 2020

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Ruach HaYam teaching presented by Penina Weinber

Picture is a photo of a small hannukiah lit in the midst of a great cold wind on the cobblestone front porch of an empty house on a Maine beach on the 6th day of Hanukkah in 2019.

No, we’re not at Hanukkah yet, but we are at the Jewish calendar date 3 Kislev, the beginning of the month in which Hanukkah falls, and the darkest month of the year. We are two days after the new moon of Kislev. We can take hope in candles lit against the darkness. We are also at Parashat Toldot, Genesis 25:19-28:9, wherein Rebecca makes the most existential cry of the entire Torah, and Jacob and Esau fight against the gender roles assigned them at birth, reversing them with the support of the Divine and Rebecca. And we’re at Transgender Day of Remembrance. As Jill Hammer writes below, we are in a time of introspection and outward action. We’ll talk about the texts, about Judith and Rebecca, about gender roles, and about how to bring light into darkness.

Jill Hammer’s book The Jewish Book of Days: A Companion for All Seasons situates each day of the year in its season, quarter, phase, and part of nature. Jill writes this about Kislev, in ancient Israel:

“Once the new moon was announced, bonfires were lit in the hills above Jerusalem. Far-flung communities would see the bonfires and light their own, until all the Jewish communities knew that the new moon had come. As stars help a ship locate itself on the sea, the bonfires helped Jews locate themselves in time, joining them to the root consciousness of their people.
According to Rabbi Judah, the 1st of Kislev is the first day of winter in Israel (Babylonian Talmud, Bava Metzi’a 106b). We are close now to the darkest days of the year, and the new moon bonfires remind us of the Hanukkah candles growing each night. The flames teach that when the moon is dark, we can expect its face to shine again, and when the sunlight is dimming, soon it will begin to grow again. This is true also for us: The quiet of introspection can and should lead to outward action in the world.”

Penina Weinberg is an independent Hebrew bible scholar whose study and teaching focus on the intersection of power, politics and gender in the Hebrew Bible. She has run workshops for Nehirim and Keshet and has been teaching Hebrew bible for 10 years. She has written in Tikkun and HBI blog, and is the leader and founder of Ruach HaYam.

*** Ruach HaYam https://www.facebook.com/groups/Ruach.HaYam/ study sessions provide a queer Jewish look at text, and are welcoming to LGBTQ+ and allies, to any learning or faith background, to all bodies, and friendly to beginners***

And the Fire Flashed all Around: Song of Songs (April 23, 2020)

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Ruach HaYam teaching presented by Penina Weinberg via Zoom – April 23, 2020

  • 6:45pm – 7:15pm meeting will be open for logging in and schmoozing.
  • Study begins at 7:15.
  • Zoom information here

[Image:Shir Hashirim (Mandatory Palestine, ca. 1930) Decorated scroll is a product of the circle of the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design in Jerusalem, dated to circa 1930. From JTS Library]

Penina Weinberg will lead this interactive discovery of Song of Songs through text study, discussion, pictures, and music [if technology cooperates]. Like Ben Azzai, we will link up the words of the Torah with the Writings, until the fire flashes all around. Sunglasses are recommended.

Penina Weinberg is an independent Hebrew bible scholar whose study and teaching focus on the intersection of power, politics and gender in the Hebrew Bible. She has run workshops for Nehirim and Keshet and has been teaching Hebrew bible for 10 years. She has written in Tikkun and HBI blog, and is the leader and founder of Ruach HaYam.

*** Ruach HaYam https://www.facebook.com/groups/Ruach.HaYam/ study sessions provide a queer Jewish look at text, and are welcoming to LGBTQ+ and allies, to any learning or faith background, to all bodies, and friendly to beginners***

Megillat Esther – Modes of Resistance and Ridicule (Feb 20, 2020)

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Ruach HaYam teaching presented by Penina Weinberg at Congregation Eitz Chayim, 136 Magazine Street, Cambridge, MA – 6:45pm – 9:30pm.
[Images: Esther in Persian attire proudly sitting on throne, Mordechai in front writing, Ahasuerus behind, by Arthur Szyk, 1950. Queen Vashti refusing to appear before Ahasuerus. 15th century manuscript illumination]
(Scroll to end for logistics)

The book of Esther has it all: heroic women, man of valor, ridicule of authority, harsh treatment of our enemies, eunuchs serving as messengers, advisors, guards, assassins, and soldiers. See Peter Toscano https://petersontoscano.com/eunuch-inclusive-esther-queer-theology-101/  (no longer available here)
But no name of God appears. As we study, we will discover moments of pride, times of laughter, and dismay at violence. And wonder at the purpose of the tale. We will share our collective wisdom on this well-known story as we head into Purim.

Penina Weinberg is an independent Hebrew bible scholar whose study and teaching focus on the intersection of power, politics and gender in the Hebrew Bible. She has run workshops for Nehirim and Keshet and has been teaching Hebrew bible for 10 years. She has written in Tikkun and HBI blog, and is the leader and founder of Ruach HaYam.

** Logistics**
Study starts promptly at 7:15 pm. We open the doors at 6:45 for schmoozing. Feel free to bring your own veggie snack for the early part. A parking consideration is in effect for the three blocks around EC during all regularly scheduled events. It is a good idea to put a note in the windshield that you are attending an event at EC.  If you would like a copy of parking permit, go here   Permit for this event will be found there a couple weeks before event.
Accessibility information: all gender/accessible bathrooms, entry ramp.

*** Ruach HaYam https://www.facebook.com/groups/Ruach.HaYam/ study sessions provide a queer Jewish look at text, and are welcoming to LGBTQ+ and allies, to any learning or faith background, to all bodies, and friendly to beginners***

Exodus: non-binary identity and living (or not) one’s destiny (Jan 16, 2020)

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Ruach HaYam teaching presented by Penina Weinberg at Congregation Eitz Chayim, 136 Magazine Street, Cambridge, MA – 6:45pm – 9:30pm.
[Miriam dancing at the crossing of the Red Sea. Chludov Psalter. 9th century.]
(Scroll to end for logistics)
RSVP

Join us as we begin the book of Exodus, for a study of Shemot, both Torah portion and book. We will see how binary labels miss the complexity of life. Moses is Israelite, Egyptian, Midianite. A killer and a prophet who fights his destiny. The midwives are Israelite and Egyptian. Israelite slaves have almost lost their identities. Ziporah is magician, nemesis, finger of God.

We will also look at how the daughters, like Miriam, are saved alive and save the day. The large arc of the exodus journey, from beginning to end, is energized by 17 women, Shifrah, Puah, Miriam, Jocheved, Pharaoh’s daughter, Zipporah and 6 sisters plus 5 daughters of Zelophehad, Mahlah, Noa, Hoglah, Milcah, and Tirzah. Yet the stupid Pharoh will save the daughters alive.

Perhaps we will take a clue from Joy Ladin who writes, in her book, The Soul of the Stranger: Reading God and Torah from a Transgender Perspective:

“God knows what transgender people know: the binaries that make identities seem clear and simple, easy to express and enforce, are, in practice, impossible to maintain, because they do not and cannot fit the complexity of human lives and human communities… [We live in] a world in which, as the plagues and miracles of the Exodus remind us, everything we think we know can change in an instant… in a world in which the distinction between who is ‘us’ and who is ‘them’ can be a matter of life and death.”

Penina Weinberg is an independent Hebrew bible scholar whose study and teaching focus on the intersection of power, politics and gender in the Hebrew Bible. She has run workshops for Nehirim and Keshet and has been teaching Hebrew bible for 10 years. She has written in Tikkun and HBI blog, and is the leader and founder of Ruach HaYam.

** Logistics**
Study starts promptly at 7:15 pm. We open the doors at 6:45 for schmoozing. Feel free to bring your own veggie snack for the early part. A parking consideration is in effect for the three blocks around EC during all regularly scheduled events. It is a good idea to put a note in the windshield that you are attending an event at EC.  If you would like a copy of parking permit, go here   Permit for this event will be found there a couple weeks before event.
Accessibility information: all gender/accessible bathrooms, entry ramp.

*** Ruach HaYam study sessions provide a queer Jewish look at text, and are welcoming to LGBTQ+ and allies, to any learning or faith background, to all bodies, and friendly to beginners***

Trans Experience in Hebrew Bible – from Joy Ladin’s Book (May 23, 2019)

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Ruach HaYam Teaching presented by Penina Weinberg at Congregation Eitz Chayim, 136 Magazine Street, Cambridge, MA – May 23, 2019. 6:45pm. (Scroll to end for logistics)

Join us at Ruach HaYam, an independent queer havurah, for a discussion about Joy Ladin’s book, The Soul of the Stranger: Reading God and Torah from a Transgender Perspective. In her book, Joy writes that “The covenant with Abraham is founded on Abraham, Sarah, and Jacob’s embrace of trans experience: their willingness to live outside the gender roles they were born to and become the kinds of people they were not supposed to be. By portraying trans experience as the foundation for covenant with Abraham, the Torah plants God’s recognition that people do not have to be what binary gender says we are at the heart of the Abrahamic religious tradition.”

This is not a presentation by the author, but will be a conversation led by Penina Weinberg, who has attended many of Joy’s readings. We will read mostly from Chapter 2 of Joy’s book, and look at the Torah texts to which she refers. How might Joy’s theology help to heal the divide between religious and LGBTQ communities? How does her definition of “trans experience” apply to ourselves? If you have an opportunity to obtain The Soul of the Stranger: Reading God and Torah from a Transgender Perspective before our meeting, please do so, but it’s not required.

Banner image: Baruch Nachson (contemporary Israeli artist), Avraham Welcoming the Three Angels (acrylic on canvas). Abraham and Sarah preparing food for the angels, accompanied by barn animals and rider on horseback.

Penina Weinberg is an independent Hebrew bible scholar whose study and teaching focus on the intersection of power, politics and gender in the Hebrew Bible. She has run workshops for Nehirim and Keshet and has been teaching Hebrew bible for 10 years. She has written in Tikkun and HBI blog, and is the leader and founder of Ruach HaYam.

** Logistics**
Study starts promptly at 7:15 pm. We open the doors at 6:45 for schmoozing. Feel free to bring your own veggie snack for the early part. A parking consideration is in effect for the three blocks around EC during all regularly scheduled events. It is a good idea to put a note in the windshield that you are attending an event at EC.   You will find a note here if you wish to print one out.
Accessibility information: all gender/accessible bathrooms, entry ramp.

Ruach HaYam study sessions provide a queer Jewish look at text, but are welcoming to any learning or faith background, to all bodies, and friendly to beginners.

Samson and Delilah – the REAL Story (February 21, 2019)

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Ruach HaYam Teaching presented by Penina Weinberg at Congregation Eitz Chayim, 136 Magazine Street, Cambridge, MA – February 21, 2019. 6:45pm. (Scroll to end for logistics)

Join us at Ruach HaYam, an independent queer havurah, for a close study of the saga of Samson and Delilah, including Samson’s “miraculous” birth, the riddle of the lion and much more (Judges 13-16), led by Penina Weinberg with a special presentation by Mimi Yasgur on using theater to understand the text. As with the Song of Deborah, we will study stereotypical gender roles, non-normative gender roles, and how power is wielded. Also we’ll note the drama and comedy inherent in this tale.

Banner image: The angel departing from Manoah and his wife; the couple kneeling before a sacrificial pyre with a burning goat and the angel rising over the flames; after Maarten de Vos. Engraving with contemporary coloring. At British Museum.

Penina Weinberg is an independent Hebrew bible scholar whose study and teaching focus on the intersection of power, politics and gender in the Hebrew Bible. She has run workshops for Nehirim and Keshet and has been teaching Hebrew bible for 10 years. She has written in Tikkun and HBI blog, and is the leader and founder of Ruach HaYam.

Mimi Yasgur is an expressive arts therapist and mental health counselor who enjoys integrating her passions for art, creativity, Judaism, and spirituality to create vibrant community.

** Logistics**
Study starts promptly at 7:15 pm. We open the doors at 6:45 for schmoozing. Feel free to bring your own veggie snack for the early part. A parking consideration is in effect for the three blocks around EC during all regularly scheduled events. It is a good idea to put a note in the windshield that you are attending an event at EC.   You will find a note here if you wish to print one out.
Accessibility information: all gender/accessible bathrooms, entry ramp.

Ruach HaYam study sessions provide a queer Jewish look at text, but are welcoming to any learning or faith background, to all bodies, and friendly to beginners.

Parashat Vayeira (Genesis 18.1-22.24) Radical Hospitality and the Sanctuary Movement

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Those of us who have an opportunity to participate in giving sanctuary to refugees in crisis know how critical it is to provide a safe haven for a person at risk of deportation to certain physical danger.  As volunteers providing round the clock witness, we are sometimes daunted when months stretch into years while our guests await relief in the courts.  Yet we know that the difficulty of our task is not to be compared to the discomfort of being confined day after day in a small space, not knowing when/if release will come.  Our job is to make the environment as hospitable as we can.

This week’s Torah portion, Vayeira (Gen 18.1-22.24) teaches us about hospitality.  As the parsha opens, YHWH appears to Abraham as he sits by his tent in the midday heat.  When Abraham looks up, he sees three men, not immediately obvious as messengers of God.  Nevertheless, Abraham rushes to bring them water to wash their dusty feet, invites them to rest in the shade under the tree and brings them bread.  Abraham further prepares a tender young calf with curds and milk – a feast for the visitors.  The radical hospitality of Abraham is well known.  And what accompanies this hospitality is the pronouncement that Sarah will bear a child in her old age, an occasion for laughter and joy (and some trepidation).  This would be enough to teach the virtues of hospitality on its own.

However, our parsha goes on to additionally warn us of the drastic consequences of radical inhospitality.  In a master stroke of point and counter point, the narrative switches immediately from Abraham and Sarah and the message of new birth, to God sharing with Abraham that God will visit Sodom and Gomorrah to see if they are indeed as sinful as God has heard.  Implied is that God will sweep away the inhabitants of that land.  Abraham bargains with God to save Sodom from destruction if there are even ten righteous persons there.  Now certainly identified as malachim, (messengers/angels) of God, two men, presumably two of Abraham’s guests, go to Sodom.  Lot, nephew of Abraham, greets the malachim by falling on his face, with an offer of shelter and a place to wash their feet.  Lot, like Abraham, prepares a feast for his guests.

Lot is not a native of Sodom.  He is newly arrived, considered a ger, a resident alien, not permanent. Lot’s new neighbors do not hold to the same high standard of hospitality as do he and Abraham.  The men of the city, young and old, encircle Lot’s house and demand that he bring the visitors out so that they may know them.  While “knowing” here may have sexual overtones, and from this text for many centuries fanatics have claimed that the sin of Sodom is homosexuality, the sin is not homosexuality.   Whatever the neighbors want to do to the visitors has nothing to do with same sex love (or any love), and everything to do with force and violence.  Lot refuses to allow wickedness to be done to the men.  Unfortunately, Lot’s hospitality (and humanity) breaks down, as he offers up his virgin daughters to the neighbors.  Would there have been a better outcome if Lot had not offered up his daughters?  Perhaps the 10 righteous would have been found and the city saved.

Lot leaving Sodom, Woodcut from the Nuremberg Chronicle

In the event, YHWH rescues Lot and his daughters, turns Lot’s wife into a pillar of salt, and reigns brimstone and fire down on Sodom.  The conflagration is horrific.  The Genesis text is not specific about what the sin of Sodom is, but coming on the heels of Abraham’s welcome to strangers, we understand it may be in  refusing friendship to resident aliens (Lot and family), and threatening to swallow up strangers in violence.

The prophet Ezekiel gives us insight into the underpinnings/ background to the cruel way in which those of Sodom treat strangers.

This was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: pride, surfeit of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters; and she did not strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. Ezekiel 16:49–50

Rabbi Steven Greenberg gives an overview of rabbinic commentary:

Among early rabbinic commentators, the common reading of the sin of Sodom was its cruelty, arrogance and disdain for the poor. The sages of the Babylonian Talmud also associated Sodom with the sins of pride, envy, cruelty to orphans, theft, murder, and perversion of justice. While the event which sealed the fate of the Sodomites was their demand for Lot to bring out his guests so that the mob might “know” them, this still was not seen so much as an act of sexual excess, but as hatred of the stranger and exploitation of the weak. Midrashic writers lavishly portray Sodom and the surrounding cities as arrogant and self-satisfied, destroyed for the sins of greed and indifference to the poor. https://www.myjewishlearning.com/keshet/the-real-sin-of-sodom/

Not to take in the sojourners or travelers crossing the desert in those days could doom them to great suffering and even death.  This is the action of a community which indeed practices cruelty, perversion of justice, greed and indifference to the poor.  The flaming destruction of an entire people is terrifying in our eyes, yet the symbol remains as a warning of the dire consequences of radical inhospitality.

The news these days is full of cruel practices and perversion of justice.  We hope and pray that there is a just reward to the perpetrators.  Meanwhile, like Abraham and Sarah, we can hold our sanctuary guests in warm embrace, assuring them of clean water, abundant food, and safe shelter.  And we can work against the real sins of Sodom in our present society, by standing up for the rights of transgender people, immigrants, people of color, and other marginalized groups.

May the pleasure and laughter of Sarah be our reward.  “And Sarah laughed.”  Genesis 18:12