Now Dinah the daughter of Leah, whom she had borne to Jacob, went out to visit the daughters of the land. When Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite, the prince of the land, saw her, he took her and lay with her by force. ~Genesis 34:1-2
This is the first documented case of sexual abuse against a woman in the Bible, though not the first case of abuse (how else do you describe both Abraham and Isaac claiming their wives were actually their sisters in order to avoid conflict?).
With the rise of the #metoo movement in the last year, it’s important to realize that this is nothing new. This is something women have been dealing with nearly forever. Current statistics say that between 1/3 and 1/4 of women will be sexually abused by the time they reach college age, but about 1/2 of all women will experience abuse of some sort in their lifetime. I desperately wish I could be on the naive half of the population, but I also have my own #metoo story from long ago.
Dinah hits a nerve for a lot of women. What did she do to contribute to her rape? Nothing. NOTHING. She went out on a girls’ night. She was a young woman who went out to “visit the daughters of the land.” Who doesn’t love a girls’ night? Women have been gathering in social groups since God created us.
Shechem later claims he hurt Dinah because he wanted to marry her. He claimed he loved her. Love is never forced. Was he telling the truth? Probably not, but Scripture doesn’t say. We know that in the previous chapter Jacob and Hamor (Shechem’s father) made a business deal and later in this chapter Hamor seems to be really excited about the possibility of acquiring the possessions of the Hebrew people, so there’s a chance he was looking for further involvement with the Hebrews. But again, we don’t know that for certain. Maybe he was being truthful but had no idea how to go about actually initiating a relationship.
The law of the day said that the rapist was required to marry his victim. Why? That sounds a little crazy. I can’t imagine that she’d want to see him every day. God created male AND female in His image. Both genders matter equally in His eyes, but we live in a fallen world and women have often taken a serious hit. God is slowly elevating women, but we still have a long way to go. Dinah lived 4000 years ago in a truly patriarchal society; women had NO rights. None. A woman was required to be a virgin on her wedding day. If she wasn’t, it was said that she brought shame upon both her own family and the family she was marrying into. As a victim of rape, she was no longer a virgin by measurable standards. A woman who was found to not be a virgin on her wedding day was cast out, homeless, made to live a life of poverty. This law that sounds ridiculous to us was meant to protect the victims of this awful crime. In a world where men often had multiple wives (again, not God’s standard, but a worldly view that often crept into the lives of God’s people), she may never have an actual relationship with her husband, but at least she’d have a roof over her head.
It sounds harsh and graceless. Our world has come a long way. But even there, I have friends who have family in other countries who say this way of thinking still exists. Our world has a long way to go with women’s rights.
Dinah was not at fault. There is no such thing as “being in the wrong place at the wrong time.” She was just trying to have a girls night. Anyone who has been through a #metoo experience will tell you the same thing. She did not dress provocatively; she did not suffer from “lack of prayer;” and she was not hanging out in questionable places. She was a victim. She wasn’t the only victim of a #metoo experience in Scripture, but as we walk through Genesis, she’s the woman mentioned in this first book of the Bible.
Dinah’s brothers took her in and she survived, but she was never able to marry. Her brothers sought revenge in perhaps not the most ethical manner, but they still stood up for her. That goes a long way with being able to forgive. My heart breaks for her. In our world, we can heal, move forward, and still live a full life. For her, that one action cost her a family of her own. But God does heal and in our world of crisis centers, counselors, and good churches, God does provide a way to live again.