Dinah

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For the 1970s talk show hosted by Dinah Shore, see Dinah!

Dinah (Hebrew: דִּינָה, Standard Dina Tiberian Dînāh ; "Judged; vindicated"), mentioned in the Book of Genesis as the daughter of Jacob and Leah. She is also described as the full sister of Reuben, Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, and Zebulun, and the half-sister of Dan, Naphtali, Gad, Asher, Joseph, and Benjamin.

[edit] Biblical story

Dinah is alluded to only briefly in the Bible; a passing mention in a couple of locations, and in a story known as The Rape of Dinah. When Jacob returns to Canaan with his wives and children, he buys a piece of land in Shechem . Dinah goes out to see the other young women in town and is spotted by the prince of the region, who is also called Shechem. He takes her to his palace and "defiles" her. The question of whether she gives consent is not explicitly resolved in the Biblical text, and some commentators regard it as an immoral seduction rather than a rape in the modern sense. Afterwards Shechem is so smitten by her that he begs his father, named Hamor, to ask for her hand in marriage from Jacob. Jacob withholds judgment about the incident until his sons return from the field and hear of it.

Dinah's brothers are outraged by what has happened. Hamor and Shechem try to suggest a proper wedding, a huge dowry, and a permanent treaty benefitting both peoples, with the privately stated aim of assimilating Jacob's household. Dinah's brothers feign agreement on condition that they and all the men of the city agree to be circumcised. The condition is agreed to and Shechem and his people are circumcised en masse.

Three days later, two of Jacob's sons, Simeon and Levi enter the city and slaughter all the male inhabitants, including Hamor and Shechem. The men are unable to fight back because they are all weakened from the pain of circumcision. Simeon and Levi plunder the city completely, taking all the cattle and flocks in the field and all the possessions in their homes, as well as taking all the women and children captive. Afterwards Jacob criticises them, and points out that their rash act will put him and his family in danger. A man of his word, he fears that his sons' violation of their promise of marriage will anger the surrounding Canaanite nations, and lead them to gang up on him and destroy him. The brothers, however, defend themselves by stating, "Should he make our sister a harlot?"

[edit] Elaborations in the Midrash

According to the Midrash, Simeon and Levi were only 14 and 13 years old, respectively, at the time of this event. They possessed great moral zealousness (later, in the episode of the Golden Calf, the Tribe of Levi would demonstrate their absolute commitment to Moses' leadership by killing all the people involved in idol worship), but their zealotry was misdirected here. On his deathbed, Jacob cursed their anger and divided their tribal portions in the land of Israel so that they would not be able to regroup and fight arbitrarily. The Tribe of Simeon received land within the territory of Judah and served as itinerant teachers in Israel, traveling from place to place to earn a living. The Tribe of Levi received a few Cities of Refuge spread out over Israel, and relied for their sustenance on the priestly gifts that the Children of Israel gave them.

When Jacob's family prepares to descend to Egypt Genesis 46:8-27, the Torah lists the 70 family members who went down together. Simeon's children include "Saul, the son of the Canaanite woman." According to Rashi, this is Dinah's son by Shechem. After the brothers killed all the men in the city, including Shechem and his father, Dinah refused to leave the palace unless Simeon agreed to marry her and remove her shame. (According to Nachmanides, she only lived in his house and did not have marital relations with him.) Therefore Dinah's son is counted among Simeon's progeny, and he received a portion of land in Israel in the time of Joshua. The list of the names of the families of Israel in Egypt is repeated in Exodus 6:14-25.

[edit] Origin

Bible scholars believe that the story of the rape of Dinah exists to establish a claim to Shechem, as well as to explain why Simeon and Levi have very little territory of their own. A majority of scholars of Biblical criticism believe that Dinah is an invention, designed only to fit the politically motivated story of her rape ^[1]; likewise, Shechem the person is an eponym for Shechem itself ^[2]. This interpretation is supported by the idea that Dinah, alone among Jacob's known children, does not beget a tribe of Israel; others claim that this could more obviously be due to the fact that she is a daughter instead of a son^{[citation needed] [3]}; - though this implies that women are unable to have children, or rather, serves as another example of gender differentiated rights.

Moreover, in the list of the individuals who went to Egypt with Jacob, Dinah is mentioned as if an afterthought^{[citation needed]}. Rashi cites the discrepancy between the number of names present in the text (70) and the figure the Torah claims was the number that went went down to Egypt (69) by explaining that the seventieth person was Jochebed, who was born as the family passed over the border to Egypt, though this would be impossible with many traditions: Jochebed is said to have been born when Levi was 64, but he was 57 at the time of the descent. Which tradition is true, if either is, is unclear.

Another story of how Shechem is obtained occurs in the Bible, but in that tale, it is simply purchased by Jacob from its occupants Genesis 33:19. In the documentary hypothesis, the rape story belongs to the Jahwist source, and it fits the pre-occupation of that source with tales concerning the southern tribes, while the he just bought it account comes from the Elohist source, which is more complementary towards the later history of Shechem in general ^[4].

[edit] Non-biblical uses of the name Dinah

• Dinah was a generic name for an African-American slave woman, as in the lyric "Someone's in the kitchen with Dinah" from the folk song "I've Been Working on the Railroad".
• Dinah is the main character in The Red Tent by Anita Diamant, a novel based on the biblical story.
• Dinah is the name of Alice's cat in Alice in Wonderland.
• Dinah is the main character in George Eliot's Adam Bede.
• Dinah is the name of a mecha in the game Xenosaga.
• Dinah is the name to the Black Canary from DC Comics.

[edit] References

• Scherman, Nosson (1993). The Chumash. Brooklyn, N.Y.: Mesorah Publications, Ltd. ISBN 0-89906-014-5

1. ^ Richard Elliott Friedman, Who wrote the bible?; also Jewish Encyclopedia on Shechem
2. ^ ibid
3. ^ Numbers 27:1-11
4. ^ ibid, et al.

[edit] External link

• Dinah's Abduction from a Jewish perspective at Chabad.org