The preacher at my church offered an interesting belief. Look at Genesis chapter 1 and chapter 2 as being in chronological sequence instead of chapter 2 being a repeat or detailed description of chapter 1. You see that man AND woman were first created at the same time in chapter 1. In chapter 2, Adam is created and given a living soul and then Eve is created from his rib.
Genesis 1:27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.
Genesis 2:7 And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.
The most prevalent myth about Cain’s wife is that he and Abel were each born with a twin sister to marry. The names vary from account to account, but generally Cain’s sister is known as Ke’lem’ath, while his brother’s twin is known as L’ebo’da. Each was to marry his twin upon maturity, but Cain fell in love with his brother’s twin. In some accounts this was the reason for his hatred of his brother, and the renunciation of his sacrifice was the catalyst that inspired him to murder. When he left, he took with him his own twin, Abel’s eventually marrying Seth. Adam went on to sire 30 additional sons (not including Seth) and 21 additional daughters. http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/cain.html
An alternate is that Cain’s sister was Aclima and Abel’s was Jumella, and each was to marry the other’s twin. The rest is the same: Cain fell in love with his Abel’s betrothed, etc. etc.
IIRC, men were required to marry the wife of a brother who died. (For example Ruth and Boaz.) This might be confused with brother sister incest, but was certainly considered a kindness. Just a speculation, but it could explain the wording.
What you are referring to is the mitzvah of yibum (levirite marriage).
In short, one is forbidden to marry one’s brother’s wife. However, if a man dies without children, then his (paternal) brother may marry his widow. However, they are not required to get married and there is an “opt-out” ceremony available (chalitzah). In any event, if this was the cause of the word chesed, then it would have been used in the verse prohibiting marriage to one brother’s wife, not the verse prohibiting marriage to a (biological) sister.
So all throughout my very fundamentalist Protestant upbringing I heard that masturbation was a sin and that in fact Onan was killed for this. This is also taught in Catholic schools.
1- Wasn’t Onan killed not for his early withdrawal (which is of course already different from masturbation) but for his refusal to impregnate his brother’s widow, Tamar?
2- Was Tamar’s later impregnation by her father-in-law a violation of Hebrew law?
3- What, if anything, does Jewish law say of masturbation? Is it a sin?
No, he was killed for what he did, not for refusing to impregnate Tamar. If he chose not to marry her altogether, he would have been OK.
**
As with Moses’ parents’ marriage, this is something that became forbidden with the giving of the Torah at Sinai. Previously, any close (non-blood) relative was able to perform yibum. After the law was codified in Dueteronomy, it was restricted to the brother–in-law.
Yes, it is; mainly derived from the actiions of Onan.
Who wasn’t even masturbating. This boggles my mind also. Just like the folks who point to Sodom as proof that God Hates Fags, yet Isaiah and Ezekiel both list injustice, violence and neglecting the widows and orphans as the sins of Sodom.
It was the act of needlessly spilling seed, not masturbating. Perhaps I should have been more specific.
Indeed, Jewish commentators, when talking about Sodom and Gommorroh talk far more about the lack of kindness to strangers in the city, their mistreatment of the poor, and the city’s perverted sense of justice rather than homosexual activity.
The only homosexual activity mentioned in connection with Sodom was a possible threat of raping two male visitors, which is not the same as general gaiety. The OT states that they called for Lot to bring his guests “that we might know them”, and not always is the word “know” used in the sexual context.
A part of that story that never made sense to me is why Lot’s daughters thought they were the only people left on Earth. They passed through other people on the way to the cave where they conceived their brothers/sons/nephews/stepsons.
They could have thought that they were destroyed too, or they were simply not thinking clearly in face of what happened and did not rationally think the matter through.
Well, having your virginity offered to an angry mob by your dad, seeing your home destroyed by fire from heaven, and seeing your mom turned into salt would probably try even the talents of Dr. Phil.
Remember, though, they were told to leave BEFORE the cataclysm began, and not to look back (they obviously didn’t become pillars of salt). So they did not necessarily see that there was anyone else still on Earth after Sodom was destroyed.
Chapter 20, The Deluge, gives:
“(a) Noah was so loth to lose his innocence that, though often urged to marry, he waited until God found him Naamah, Enoch’s daughter”
Although both these sections are listed under a single “Naamah” in the index, it appears that these are not supposed to be the same person/being.
Zev Steinhardt
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Thanks, Jabba. I havent’ been able to find my copy- I think it’s one of those “loaned out and wandering in the wilderness” books. Evidently, I was confused by the multiplicity of names. Does the book mention the Cain and Abel and their twins myth?
One account of the “Solomon and the two harlots” legend hypothesized that it was a parable. Solomon, as the illegitimate claimant to the throne, represented the false mother, the family of Ishbosheth represented the true mother, and the baby was the nascent kingdom of Israel; Solomon was prepared to hack it apart rather than surrender it. I don’t know the origins of this, but thoughts?
(1) Ishbosheth was long dead by the time Solomon assumed the throne - he was David’s rival (II Sam. chs. 2-4), and there’s no indication that his descendants were still attempting to force the issue in Solomon’s days.
(2) Solomon was indeed opposed by his half-brother Adonijah, who was older; but that would hardly make Solomon the illegitimate claimant, since it was his father and predecessor David who confirmed him as his heir (I Kings ch. 1).
(3) There’s a serious logical inconsistency here: on the one hand, Solomon is being identified with the false mother, who would have seen the baby cut up rather than given to her rival; on the other hand, he goes ahead and gives the baby to the true mother after all.
If anything, the last two points would suggest that the metaphor might be reversed, with Ishbosheth (or Adonijah) as the false mother, and David (or Solomon himself) as the true mother.
WPS: You are entirely welcome. In turn I would like to thank you for ignoring the obvious typos in my previous post. Normally I do not appreciate opening a long thread to find that the only new contributions are corrections of trivial mistakes. However since in this case they relate to quotations from a published book I feel obliged to make them: firstly the book in question is of course Graves & Patai, Hebrew Myths: The Book of Genesis ( not Geneis as I posted). Secondly, my first quotation should read ( italics mine to indicate previous omissions):
“this demoness [Lilith], and another like her…”
To turn to your more substantial point: I do not recall your exact point about Cain and Abel ( and the search engine is playing up), so:
Chapter 14, The Births of Cain and Abel:
“(a) Some say that Samael disguised himself as the Serpent and, after vengefully persuading man to eat from the Tree of Knowledge, fathered Cain upon Eve; thus defiling all the offspring of her subsequent union with Adam”
The reference given for this is PRE [Pirqe Rabbi Eliezer] ch. 21, with textual comments by Luria; Mid. Hagadol Gen. 88-89 and 105; B[avli] Shabhat 146a; B[avli] Yebamot 103b; B[avli] Abodah Zarah 22b; Targum ad Gen. IV. 1 and V. 3; Gen[esis] Ra[ba] 182
and also
“(g) Others again hold that the first act of love between Adam and Eve produced at least four children: Cain with his twin sister, Abel with his; or even with two twin sisters”
Reference: Gen[esis] Rab[ba] 205, 214, 662; B[avli] Yebamot 62a; Yer[ushalmi] Yebamot II.4; B[avli] Sanhedrin 38b; Targum Yer[ushalmi] ad. Gen. IV 1-2; PRE [see above], ch. 11 and 21; Abot diR. Nathan 1.6; Mid. Hagadol Gen. 106; Yalqut Reubeni 35; Yalqut Psalms 840
[Aplologies to those who found the list of references boring. If they were tedious for you to read, they were at least as tedious for me to type]
When you type as many homonyms as I do (“I am righting this because…” “come hear, you gotta here this”) ewe don’t dare correct the typos of others (it’d be like that pointing out the splinter in the minds eye of others while you have Plank’s constant in your own, or however it goes).
I think Gaiman did a splendid job with those two.