Unholy Word: Rape My Daughter

Today's Unholy Word is one of the most disturbing stories I've ever heard. It can be found inside a book that Presidents place their hands on as they swear to uphold the values of our country. This same book is read to children as bedtime stories, and then to adults as a fountain of good moral character. This book is a backbone to the three biggest religions on the planet; millions seek guidance and wisdom from it. Here's a taste of what's in the Holy Bible.

Where You Goin', Woman?!
If you open to Judges 19, you'll read tell of a Levite who had a concubine (that's a woman who lives with a man and takes care of, other than his wife). She gets mad at him for some reason and wants to go back home to her father. Women, huh.

Sorry for the joking. It's the only way I've found to dull the appallingly sick feeling I get when I read this tale.

Anyway, the man goes after her and chases her to her father's house. The Levite brings with him another servant girl -- 'cause hey, I guy can't travel without his servants. When they arrive, her father welcomes the Levite and his servant girl in to stay for a while.



They stay for three nights and on the morning of the fourth day, as they were planning on leaving, the father insisted that they stay longer. Poor guy...maybe he just liked having company? So they stayed. Even on the fifth day they're trying to leave and the man is asking them to stay and rest and eat. They agree to eat dinner, but then they finally leave afterward, even though it is sunset and the man asked them to stay, again. Maybe he was having fun helping smooth things out with his daughter and her pimp?

Okay, up to this point all seems fairly okay. But now things get interesting.

What's for Dinner? Gang Rape? Oh...Okay
As I said, they set out around sunset after dinner, and as it got dark the man's servant asked if they could stop at the approaching Jebusite city and spend the night there. The Levite says that he doesn't want to stay "in a city of foreigners with people who are not Israelites" (19:12), and that they'll stop in Gibeah instead. Racist prick.

They trudge on and get to the city square of Gibeah, and eventually an old man offers to take them in for the night. He's real nice to them -- he takes them in, feeds their donkeys, washes their feet and gives them food and drinks. As they were enjoying themselves, the bible says "some worthless men of the town surrounded the house and pounded on the door, saying, 'Bring out the man who came to your house so we can have sex with him!' " I guess not everyone in the city was as courteous as the old man. Or perhaps they were a little too courteous, hmm?

The owner of the house comes out and says "No, my brothers, do not be so wicked! This man is my guest, so do not do such a shameful thing!" Finally, some sanity here.

"Here is my virgin daughter and [my guest's] concubine. Abuse them and do to them whatever you wish, but do not do such a disgraceful thing to this man!" Oh. Never mind.

The book relays that the Levite had to physically drag his concubine outside. Judges 19:25 says "The men raped her and abused her all night." Thanks, God!

Special Delivery
As dawn comes, they finally let her go and she crawls up to the door of the house and falls down. When her master awakes and goes outside, he sees her and tells her "Get up. Let's go!" but there was no response. So he put her corpse on his donkey and headed home.

Now, if you're any sort of dignified, sane, moral human being, you should be disgusted by what you've just heard. It should have curdled your stomach and made you second-guess reading a book like this to children. But oh no folks, it doesn't end there.

Chapter 19, verse 29 says that when he reached his house, the Levite took a knife and carved up his concubine and mailed the pieces all over the land of Israel. We're not told why or if anyone was damned or punished in any way for the events in this story.

God's a Terrible Editor
In fact, many feel that the story in Judges is actually a retelling of Lot's adventures in Genesis 19. The story is almost identical, except Lot's daughters (whom he gave to the angry mob for raping) weren't hacked up and sent around the coasts at the end. The story is most likely a retelling that got edited and added on to and mixed up during copying. This of course doesn't excuse any deity from wrong-doing either. On the one hand, if the story is accurate, gang rape and dismemberment is a sick way to provide moral guidelines, especially if this Levite was on God's team. On the other hand, if this story was a mistake, then you must admit that the bible contains errors. Either way, God doesn't look like a very respectful guy.


-STA