The Women of the Old Testament

The stories of the Old Testament often revolve around offering one's daughters to one's guests, or sex with both one's wife and her assistants ...

Few people actually read the venerable book that serves as moral support to the Jewish religion. The Old Testament is an inexhaustible inventory of strange stories which include sodomy, adultery, polygamy, stoning, cruel wars and the list just goes on and on. Today, the attention will be given to the women of the Old Testament, their position in society and the general attitudes to sexuality.

At the time of the Old Testament it was a privilege to have more wives. The best way to find a woman was by purchasing her from the owner, that is, her father. These purchases were quite expensive, so they were made carefully; for example, the purchase of an infertile woman (although the man could be the one who was actually infertile) was bad. If the choice thus seemed wrong, the woman was accused of adultery and, by emergency proceedings, she was stoned. Every purchase of a wife also included a few assistants who were used for sexual adventures. They could also be additionally bought from the wife’s father along with the main purchase. If a man married his cousin, the price was much lower. The highest prices were paid for virgins.

A strange house rule of Israelites is described in the Old Testament: people who came to visit were offered daughters for sexual services. If a guest preferred boys, they supposedly offered a son, although sodomy was strictly prohibited. There is a horrible story in the Old Testament about the master of a house who accepts a man and his concubine under his roof. The house is surrounded by a gang of thugs who demand from the master to surrender to them his guest to “get to know” him (we all know what this means). In exchange, the master offers his daughter, a virgin, and the guest’s concubine. At first thugs reject the offer, but the master simply pushes the guest’s concubine in front of the door. After being raped all night long, the concubine crawls back to the entrance door and waits for her master. In the morning, he finds her dead, and he puts her on a donky and travels to his village. He takes a knife and cuts her into 12 pieces and sends her across the entire territory of Israel. Later this provokes a war. If you're interested, read the story in the Old Testament (Sod 19, 1-30).

Israelites were not familiar with prostitution until they began to meet other tribes, in particular Canaanites. Prostitutes lived in their own houses, where they received men. Canaanites distinguished between two types of prostitutes, the secular (zonah) and the sacred (q'deshah) ones. Israelites didn't retain this distinction as prostitution didn't play such an important role with them, which isn't unusual given their hospitality rules. The most famous prostitute was the alleged concubine of Jesus Christ, Mary Magdalene. We can only wonder what was it like to have sex with the the Son of God. But this isn't the issue of the Old Testament anymore.