From: Nichael Cramer (nichael@sover.net)
Date: Thu Oct 02 1997 - 11:27:59 EDT
F. Holly Mitchell wrote:
>
> > Bathsheba was as guilty as David; it takes two to tango.
>
> Is this position really defensible? The power disparity between these two
> was tremendous. When she is summoned into the presence of the king, (who
> has the power of life and death over both herself and her husband) can
> we actually expect her to "Just say no"?
To our modern ears, perhaps not; but such a position clearly made sense to
the authors in the period in which this was written. Compare, for
instance, the actions taken against a rape vicitm as described in
Leviticus. As I recall it, if she is attacked "out in field" --where
presumably no one could hear her if she cried for help-- then she has
recourse against her attacker. Whereas if she is raped closer to town
--i.e. where she could, at least in principle, have cried for help-- she
is essentially guilty of adultery.
Needless to say, such despicable views are not unique to ancient times...
N
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