NOT ALLOWED TO RAPE....BUT

by tijkmo 36 Replies latest watchtower bible

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  blondie

  Just my impression from previous research on this subject re women.

  Women were regarded as property.

  That is one reason women were not able to divorce their husbands and could not inherit property; because they were property themselves.

  It also explains why in Deuteronomy that if a man raped a married or engaged woman, he was put to death; but if she was unmarried, he was forced to marry her. Not because it was sex was immoral but because the first 2 women were considered the property of other men.

  Even if a single woman had been raped, she was considered damaged goods. No man would want to marry her and in Israel, women's lives had meaning only if they married and had children. Notice how Hannah, Rachel and other women in the Bible were desperate to marry and have children. It was considered a great sacrifice for Jephthah's daughter to remain single and childless all her life, something very unusual.

  So this captive woman, although let go by this Israelite man, had very little future in a country where she was viewed as a foreigner, having no parents as they had been executed by the Israelites, perhaps even no city or country to return to. What choices were open to her? Marrying a foreigner? But then virginity was valued even these men. Become a prostitute?

  Did you know that it was not considered adultery if a married man visited a prostitute unless she was married herself? But that's another point.

  No matter what situation, women had little choice in their lives. Can you imagine that Rachel did not know her father was going to trick Jacob by substituting her sister Leah? Why did Leah allow it? Because her marriage prospects would evaporate if her younger sister married before her? This captive woman knew that this was the best of a bad situation. The Israelites had routinely executed women in other cities. In some cases only letting women live that had not been married and were possibly too young to have had sex yet with a man. How young would would that have been?

  The WTS today still supports (but regulates??) bride-price marriages in many countries only being concerned if the father is so greedy that he sells his daughter to the highest non-JW bidder.

  I'm so glad to be out of an organization that regulates itself by the laws of ancient Israel.

  Blondie
• 

  diamondblue1974

  No matter what situation, women had little choice in their lives.

  Agreed Blondie; its staggering that the womens movement only really came into effect relatively recently...speaking hypothetically it makes you wonder whether the WTS will revert to this form in their so called new system. Wouldnt surprise me in the slightest.

  DB
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  IT Support

  tijkmo,

  i just think its a bit rich making a big deal about not being like pagan nations who did rape.....and then offering this as an alternative

  There's no denying they were brutal times. It's debatable which was the worse fate: being spared for forced marriage (which still happens today) or being slaughtered with the rest of the city...
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  tijkmo

  i get that even in this day and age a victorious army will rape the women and then just leave them endeavouring to impregnate them so that children born will be of the winning armies race and certainly the mosaic law condemned the jewish soldiers from doing that...but i had to come up with that line of reasoning to satisfy myself cos all the wts does is emphasize the so-called merciful action without explaining the other verses...i never noticed this before and it is beginning to annoy me more and more
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  Euphemism

  IT Support:

  While what you say is a not unreasonable interpretation of the words, my only point is that it's not an essential one.

  I would respectfully disagree. My point was that the phrase is an idiom, similar to 'sleeping with' in contemporary English.

  I'm sure you could find plenty of uses of the term 'sleep' that had no sexual significance. And yet, if I wrote "John wanted to marry Susan, and so he slept with her", no one would reasonably argue that 'sleep' did not signify sex in this case.
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  Scully

  10 "In case you go out to the battle against your enemies and Jehovah your God has given them into your hand and you have carried them away captive; 11 and you have seen among the captives a woman beautiful in form, and you have got attached to her and taken her for your wife, 12 you must then bring her into the midst of your house. She must now shave her head and attend to her nails, 13 and remove the mantle of her captivity from off her and dwell in your house and weep for her father and her mother a whole lunar month; and after that you should have relations with her, and you must take possession of her as your bride, and she must become your wife.

  It sounds like the raping and pillaging have already happened. Shaving her head and cutting her nails (by today's standards = getting rid of DNA evidence!) were outward symbols of a woman who had been shamed. Jehovah's Loving Kindness TM allowed for her to take an entire month to grieve over her family. How generous of him!! A WHOLE month!! And then she gets to be married to the warrior dude rapist for the rest of her life. Jehovah's Loving Kindness TM never ceases to amaze me.
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  peacefulpete

  I wonder if there is a better way to translate that passage. The month period to "grieve" for the Cannanite parents seems very odd given they were not to grieve for their own children if they were killed for some 'uncleanness'.
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  Lehaa

  Shaving her head and cutting her nails (by today's standards = getting rid of DNA evidence!)

  funny i had exactly the same thought

  tijkmo

  is not rape and forced sex one in the same
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  blondie

  *** g76 1/22 p. 27 Why Was Polygamy Allowed? ***

  . (Deut. 21:10-14) Allowing soldiers to marry captured virgins was a blessing to these girls, because they would otherwise have no homes or friends.

  ***

  Draw Close book chap. 13 pp. 134-135 "The Law of Jehovah Is Perfect" ***

  Unlike many soldiers throughout history, men in Israel?s army were not allowed to rape women or engage in wanton slaughter.

  14

  And all the spoil of these cities and the domestic animals the sons of Israel plundered for themselves. It was only all humankind that they struck with the edge of the sword until they had annihilated them. They did not let anyone that breathed remain. JOSHUA 11:14

  34

  And we went capturing all his cities at that particular time and devoting every city to destruction, men and women and little children. We left no survivor. 35 Only the domestic animals did we take as plunder for ourselves, together with the spoil of the cities that we had captured. DEUTERONOMY 2:34-35

  And now kill every male among the little ones, and kill every woman who has had intercourse with man by lying with a male. NUMBERS 31:17
• 

  Insomniac

  Raping, pillaging, forcibly "marrying" a woman who's family you slaughtered- that is, unless you decided to kick her out once you were done with her; Israelite soldiers had some pretty f***ed up perks to their jobs.

  With stuff like this in the Bible, is it any wonder so many of us have rejected Christianity?