Let Us Give

“These men are at peace with us. Therefore let them dwell in the land and trade in it. For indeed the land is large enough for them. Let us take their daughters to us as wives, and let us give them our daughters. Genesis 34:21

In Christ we want to do what is right, and so we study the Old Testament looking for those concrete, letter-of-the-law stories that make every decision obvious to us. And we come to the Dinah Incident. Everything in this is crystal clear, good guys vs. bad guys, um, yeah. Let us give them our daughters?

It would later be set down by God that Israel was not to intermarry with the tribes and nations around them in the Promised Land. Before that though came the Dinah Incident. To make the long story short, at least until you read it in Genesis 34, it is enough to know that one sin begets another and another, and Jacob's sons are not without their own guilt in this incident. Fornication, deceit, murder, and perhaps what we call statutory rape in our time, all combine to make a rather sordid story; one that is unfortunately so very fallen human in its scope.

Giving your daughters or some other sacrifice of value after the sin has been done just doesn't make up for the unrighteousness committed (and what did the daughters do wrong to deserve this fate?). Deceit and murder does not wipe the slate clean either, even if it is in response to a sin. This and other stories show that we are just pretty lousy at trying to save ourselves. As fallen humans, we don't really know how to make up for sin. It is a good thing for us that God sent to us a Savior!

Rejoice in the Lord!

Bucky