THE MESSENGERS RETURNED TO JACOB,

THERE ARE FOUR HUNDRED MEN WITH HIM."

(Bereishit 32: 7)

Your Brother or Esau? – How Does One Interpret the Other's Intentions

in Unclear Circumstances?

We came to your brother Esau – of whom you would say, "He is my

brother", but he treats you as the evil Esau, still harboring his hate.

(Rashi Bereishit 32: 7)

We came to your brother Esau – and you found favor in his eyes, as you had

spoken. And out of joy at your arrival and his love for you, he himself is

coming to you, and there are four hundred men with him, in your honor. That

is the essence of the plain meaning of the verse. And so, too, Even now he

is setting out to meet you, and he will be happy to see you (Shemot 4: 1).

(Rashbam loc cit)

He himself is coming to you – out of great joy to welcome you

And there are four hundred

men with him – to do you

honor.

(Hizkuni loc cit)

A New Reading of the Story of Dinah

Gila Zivan

One

of the freshest and most significant voices in recent biblical interpretation

is that of women who have joined the exegetical beit midrash (house of

study). This beit midrash is essentially male, thousands of years old,

and it is comprised of various strata of scriptural interpretation.

In

the following essay on Parashat Vayishlah, I offer the reader an

opportunity to hear a little of the new voice of Jewish women in exegetical

discussion. This new exegesis places all of us, women and men, before an

exciting challenge, which both forces us to view the canonical textual exegesis

through critical eyes, while also enriching the repertoire of biblical

interpretation with women's voices that have been missing to this day from our Mikraot

Gedolot (traditional collection of commentaries).

A

reading of the story of Dinah, free of interpretive assumptions, leaves it full

of gaps: we don't know how Dinah felt, what she thought, whether she wanted

Simeon and Levi's vengeance and murder of Shechem's family. What did she say

when Shechem son of Hamor raped her? Or was she struck dumb by fear and

surprise? What did she say to her brothers Simeon and Levi as they led her from

the town strewn with corpses to her parent's home? Throughout the parasha,

Dinah's voice is not heard.

This

fact could be easily clarified against the background of patriarchal biblical

society, which tells the story from a male standpoint, but that will not

satisfy later generations of readers. The silencing of Dinah requires

explanation.

Since

the days of the composition of the midrashim, traditional interpretation,

including the medieval commentators, has taken an almost unanimous stance. If

Dinah was raped, it must have been because she comported herself in a way

inappropriate for a modest and proper daughter of Jacob. It couldn't be that

the girl was an innocent victim. Surely her own actions must have brought about

her terrible fate. Let us consider Rashi's comments, which draw upon Midrash

Rabbah. They may serve as one example among many of how Dinah's character is

treated by traditional exegesis.

Now

Dinah, Leah's daughter

whom she had borne to Jacob, went out to visit the daughters of the land. Rashi

explains: "Why does scripture mention that Dinah was Leah's daughter and

not Jacob's daughter? She was so called because of her going out; she was Leah's

daughter, who also a yatzanit [out-going woman], for it says and Leah

went out to meet him (Bereishit 30:

16).

Dinah's

going out to visit the daughters of the land was understood by the authors

of the midrash, and consequently by Rashi, as testifying to Dinah's

questionable character. She was a yatzanit, a wanton woman, like her mother

Leah, who went out to Jacob after she "hired" him for the night from

his sister Rachel, in exchange for her son's mandrakes. Of woman, the midrash

says, the princess's honor is held inside, her place is in the home,

and she who goes out – is a yatzanit, and deserves that he lay with

her by force. In other words, if Dinah was raped, she must have played a

part in the catastrophe that fell upon her. She was the sinner, therefore she

became the victim.

We

had to wait two thousand years for wise, sensitive, and literate women to come

along who would be capable, even afer so many generations had passed, to

understand the heart of their sister Dinah. These exegetes gave Dinah her

voice, which had been silenced through the long years of patriarchal culture, a

culture that usually had difficulty hearing the voice of a blameless

rape-victim.

Dinah's

new voice will now constitute a necessary element in any reading of the story. I

have chosen to give expression to it way of the writings of three women.

The

first is the American-Jewish writer, Anita Diamant, whose book, The Red Tent,

found its way into the hearts of many readers. Dinah's voice is returned to her

in a long novel which is related entirely in her own first-person narration. It's

impossible to begin quoting sections from the book or to analyze it in the

space permitted by a parashat hashavua sheet. I will only say that Diamant

takes up Shechem's love for Dinah, and his regret at having raped her. She

allows Dinah to gradually fall in love with Shechem, and represents Simeon and

Levi as bullies, whose action was motivated not by love for their sister, but

rather by aggressive, extrinsic interests. Diamant's Dinah is angry at her

father Jacob, the leader of the family, and blames her situation on him. She

flees to Egypt, leaving her family and her bloody memories of Shechem behind in

Canaan.

The

second exegete I would like to mention is the Israeli writer, Mira Magen (see Korot

Mibereishit, Ruth Ravitzky, editor, pages 275-79). Magen also chose to

write in the first person, as if she were Dinah. Like Diamant, she recovers

Dinah's lost voice twice: first, by revealing Dina's missing (perhaps better,

silenced) words, second, by retelling the biblical story from Dinah's personal

standpoint.

In

her short and wonderful story called, "I am Serah's Aunt, and Rachel was

My Aunt" (note that the story is not titled, "I am Dinah"!),

Megan expresses the notion that that someone who has lost the right to cry out,

the right to belong, and the right to hope becomes nameless. Her identity is erased;

her name is erased from Israel. Megan tells the sad tale of the aged "Shemisha"

Simeon and demands that they return to her that which they have robbed her of,

before the eyes of the entire family. .

That

is, the personal honor that had been stolen from her at the moment in which her

marriage to Shechem became impossible [with his death]. (The only way to redeem

a raped woman in the biblical period was to have the rapist marry her, as is

explained in Devarim 22: 28-9. In Dinah's case, Shechem had spoken to her

tenderly and agreed to pay whatever bride-price might be asked of him in

order to marry his beloved Dinah.)

Her

voice, which she had been robbed of, and her name.

Simeon

and Levi cannot help her, that which has been done cannot be undone. Dinah – Shemisha

– must suffice with a walk to the goat herd, where, against their bleating she

lets escape the cry hidden in her throat so many years;

"…They

called me Dinah, daughter of Jacob, when I was a girl like Serah.

…When

Shechem arrived and did what he did, I had no goat's wool to bite, and the

shout that I had choaked escaped and was great and strong.

'Don't

cry, girl,' said Shechem. 'I love you, I will wed you, no matter how much

bride-price they demand, I will marry you.'

I

pray so much that the only cry that I cried out will return to me, and I will

cry it out once more…

Now

that Simeon and Levi have reached the end of their days, I shall demand of them

my name. They should stand in the center of town, and frighten the youths,

announcing before family and community; "She shall not be called Shemisha,

but rather Dinah , daughter of Jacob.'

…Simeon

takes a break from his reaping and asks me, 'Why today?'

'Because

the time has come to return the name that was stolen from me.'

…'If

you hadn't gone out to visit the daughters of the land, that heathen wouldn't

have seen you, he wouldn't have desired you and done to you what he did.'

…'Simeon,

you were a youth and have grown old, and gained nothing of wisdom…I was an

only daughter and you were twelve sons. There was no one to understand me. Who

appointed you to chastise me? After all, if you were an only son with twelve

sisters, you also would have gone out to find friends among the sons of the

land.'

'But

you were a girl. Your honor resided inside the home.'

'My

honor? My honor was torn from me with my virginity, and repaid in love…I ask

nothing of you but my name…'

…'Once

you were Dinah, until you were used by a heathen, and you became Shemisha.'

…'That

man loved me and paid you for me with his foreskin, and you came upon him treacherously

and plundered his life.'

…'He

made you into a whore and you grieve for him?' Levi asks..

'But

that man loved me, and you and your brother killed him because his passion preceded

his love'…

Levi

rose up from the weeds, wiping the sweat from his face with his forearm….He

said, 'Just as the sun does not spin around at noon to return to its origin in

the east, deeds also may not be undone. Go home, woman!'

…I

leave, throat full of cries yet choked.

…My

feet clear themselves a passage among the piles of breathing wool, they walk to

the place of screaming,…I walk to them to raise my voice among the noise of

the multitudes, which will blot out the cry that I shall to return to myself."

To

conclude, I will mention Rivkah Lubitz's midrashim ("Sippur Dinah: Scripture,

the Sages, and Ourselves," in Avi Sagi and Nahum Illan, editors, Tarbut

Yehudit B'ein Hase'ara – Sefer Hayovel Le'Yoskeh Ahituv,

pp. 742-753). She chose not to write a novel, as did Diamant, nor a short

story, as did Magen. Rather, working from the perspective of a religious

feminist, she composes midrashim in the classic style. Her work engages in an

exchange with the midrashim of the Sages of many years ago. By adopting the

classical midrashic genre, it is as if Lubitz is saying that a contemporary

feminist reading takes a place of honor among the myriad interpretations of

scripture written across the generations.

"From

reading the biblical text," Lubitz writes, "one gets the feeling that

Dinah's story has yet to be told. The Sages told a particular story, but it is

possible to tell a different one. This possibility is a necessity for our

generation" (op cit pg. 752).

From

all of Rivka Lubitz's collection of midrashim, I have decided to bring here the

one relating to the words now Dinah went out, which is clearly engaged

in an exchange with the midrash from Bereishit Rabbah and with the quote from

Rashi that opens this article.

Now

Dinah went out

There

are those who explained, "like mother, like daughter," and others

said "like father, like daughter."

Like

her mother, for it is said and Leah went out to meet him; just as one

went to meet her husband in order to fulfill a mitzvah, so this one went to

find a husband.

Like

her father, for it is said and Jacob went out; just as the one went

because of his brother, so this one went out because of her brothers, to find

herself a place.

We see

that Rivka Lubitz interprets the word vateitzeh (and [she] went out) in the

manner of the Sages, but to a completely different purpose. She overturns the

midrash that criticizes Dinah for learning from her out-going mother, as if to

say: if "like mother, like daughter," why see something improper in

Leah's going out to meet her husband? Is this going out for harlotry? After

all, she was his wife, and she set out o perform a mitzvah! Not stopping at this,

Lubitz reminds the Sages and the readers of midrash that the verb "goes

out" was applied also to Dinah's father, and not only to her mother (and

Jacob went out, see Rashi there and which midrash he chose to cite

regarding the exit of a righteous man from the town). In Dinah's case, going

out is not deemed a negative action, but rather an understandable and natural

act, given the preponderance of boys in the family.

Finally,

I will mention Lubitz's marvelous midrash that relates to Dinah's voice, which

is missing from the biblical story. Dinah's "silence" is taken by Lubitz

as evidence of her vulnerability. It is not clear, she comments, "whether

Dinah's silence is born of the pain…caused her by Shechem, or whether born of

the injury inflicted upon her by her father and brothers in their lack of

consideration for her wants and needs (loc cit).

And

he lay with her by force yet

it does not say and Dinah cried out. Is it even imaginable that Dina did

not cry out? Rather, she became like a mute. The pain and humiliation silenced

her.

Rivkah

Lubitz gives Dinah back her scream, she sounds the voice that the Torah had

hidden. As is written in the end of her midrash, "Dinah's silence

resonates from one end of the world to the other, it is the cry that is in the

heart."

In

our new reading of Dinah's ancient story, we listen to the cry of Dinah's

heart. Perhaps from this reading we will learn to listen to the cries of the

suffering women who are around us.

Dr. Gili Zivan is the director of the

Yaakov Hezog Center for Jewish Studies in Kibbutz Ein Tzurim.

And Esau Ran…and Hugged Him…and Kissed Him…and They Wept

The words "and they cried"

give reliable evidence that we have here a manifestation of pure human emotion.

A person can kiss without his heart being in it, but the tears that break forth

in such moments can only originate in the depths of the heart. This kiss and

these tears reveal to us that Esau is also of the seed of Abraham our father. He

is not just a wild hunter, for how could he have risen to the rank of a leader?

The sword alone and sheer material power cannot prepare a man for that.           

(R. Samson Raphael Hirsch on

the Torah)

And they wept – they both wept. This comes to teach us that

at that moment, Jacob's love of Esau was also awoken. And so for all

generations: In the hour that Esau's descendants awaken in a pure spirit to

recognize Israel's seed and their virtues, and then we also awaken to recognize

Esau, for he is our brother. As Rabbi truly loved Antoninus – and there are

many other examples.

(From The Netziv's commentary, Ha'Emek Davar)

Editorial Board: Pinchas Leiser

(Editor), Miriam

Fine (Coordinator), Itzhak

Frankenthal and Dr. Menachem Klein

Translation: Kadish Goldberg

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