The Bible and (Women's) Consent

The Bible has a very big problem when it comes to consent, especially women's consent.

In fact, in both the old and new testaments, the consent of women in particular doesn't seem to matter very much. I'm going to guess that it's because in these cultures, women were seen as property and property can't consent, right?

Enough blabbing. I'll be looking at some examples of (women's) consent being overlooked or dismissed in the Bible.

The first example is from Genesis 19 where 2 angels pay Lot a visit in Sodom. Remember that story? A mob comes to meet Lot to ask him for the men who came to visit him so that they can have sex with them. 

So what does the just and righteous Lot do? He offers his daughters instead. He says "Look, I have two daughters who have not known a man; let me bring them out to you, and do to them as you please; only do nothing to these men, for they have come under the shelter of my roof.”

Here, Lot's daughters obviously did not and cannot consent to having sex with a mob, but they were the property of their father so it's his consent that matters, not theirs. Their father could offer them to be raped against their wish, because their wish simply isn't important, or at least not as important as their father's wish.

In an interesting turn of events though, after the Sodom and Gomorrah incident, Lot's daughters get him (Lot) drunk and then rape him so they could have children.

Wholesome biblical family values :-)

In Genesis 29, Jacob looks for a wife, he then finds Rachel and falls in love with her. Then what does he do? 

Go to Rachel to ask her to marry him? 

Of course not!

He asks Rachel's father Laban for Rachel's hand in marriage. 

Then Laban and Jacob make a pact that Jacob will serve Laban for 7 years, after which he can marry Rachel.

Except... that's not what happens. Jacob serves Laban for seven years but Laban gives him Leah instead of Rachel, the one he wanted. Why? Because in their culture, the older must marry before the younger, and Leah was the older one so she had to marry first.

So now, what happens? Jacob has to work for another seven years before he can finally marry Rachel. 

Anyone else notice that these marriage processes were governed by Laban (and Jacob, to some extent) from start to finish? The women themselves are never described as being involved in the process, they're not even described as consenting to the marriage.

Even if we're to accept that Rachel consented, could we also say the same for Leah? Leah did not consent to the marriage, she couldn't have. Because the original marriage arrangement did not involve her. It was entirely her father's decision that she (Leah) should be the one to marry Jacob. And Jacob didn't consent to marrying Leah either. 

So the marriage between Jacob and Leah (and possibly, also the one with Rachel) can be described, essentially, as a forced marriage, because neither party consented to it.

But it doesn't end there. In the next chapter, after Jacob had married both Leah and Rachel, god decides to make Rachel barren and give Leah sons, because Jacob loved Rachel more.

And as a way to deal with her barrenness, Rachel gives her slave girl, Bilhah, to Jacob so that she can have a child through her. Then Bilhah gets pregnant and gives birth to a son.

So, Rachel gives Bilhah to Jacob, but does Bilhah ever consent to the affair?

Sure, Bilhah is a "slave girl", but does that mean her consent isn't required? 

This is what also happens in the story of Sarah and Hagar, where Sarah gives Hagar to Abraham to be impregnated.

These girls (Hagar and Bilhah) likely did not consent to having sex with and getting pregnant for their mistresses' husbands.

In Exodus 21, we're told some laws regarding slaves. And verse 7 starts by saying "When a man sells his daughter as a slave..."

Does the daughter consent to being sold as a slave? Highly unlikely!

Also, Deuteronomy 22:28-29 says: "If a man meets a virgin who is not engaged, and seizes her and lies with her, and they are caught in the act, the man who lay with her shall give fifty shekels of silver to the young woman's father, and she shall become his wife. Because he violated her he shall not be permitted to divorce her as long as he lives."

According to this passage, if a virgin is raped, her rapist has to marry her and they can't get divorced. Could we assume that this young woman would have consented to this marriage? What woman would agree to marry her rapist?

This is a disgraceful law which would only have led to very unhappy women and very unhappy marriages.

But beyond that, some men might exploit this law by raping a woman who rejects them so that she's forced to marry them. So, such a law could have led to a rise in sexual assault perpetrated by frustrated incels.

Moving a few chapters forward to Deuteronomy 25. Reading from verse 5, we're told that if a married man dies without any children, his brother has to marry and have sex with his wife (his brother's widow) so as to give his brother a child.

But what if the woman doesn't like him?

What if she has no interest in marrying her dead husband's brother?

Well, who cares? Not the Bible writers.

Later in verse 7, we're told of what the wife should do if her husband's brother does not desire to marry her (which is to spit in his face).

The woman's wishes or desires are not mentioned, because again, they don't matter.

Now, to a very interesting (read: depraved) and well-known story in Numbers.

In chapter 31, Moses's people (the Israelites), under god's direction, defeat the Midianites.

Moses's army kill all the men but keep the women and children captive. 

Moses hears this and is angry. He tells them to kill the women and (male) children, but the young girls who have not had sex with a man "keep alive for yourselves."

Because it is emphasized that these girls should not have had sex with a man, we have good reason to suspect that they were taken to be wives or concubines. Either way, sex would be involved. 

Now could these girls have consented to be the wife or concubine of someone who killed their family and abducted them? Of course not.

So, these young girls would -- after experiencing the trauma of being abducted and witnessing their entire family killed and community burnt down -- have been raped.

There's a very similar story in Judges 21.

After the Israelites heard the Levite's story (Judges 19), they went to war against the Benjaminites, killing most of their people; and they also vowed not to "give" (see?) their daughters to the Benjaminites. But now the Benjaminite men who survived had no women left since the Israelites had killed all their women (Judges 20:48).

So what do the Israelites do to make sure the Benjaminites don't become an extinct race? They sent their soldiers to Jabesh-gilead (because no one from there showed up to their meeting) and told them to kill all the men, children and women who had had sex, but to keep the women who had not had sex to be wives to the Benjaminites.

They abducted 400 virgin girls and took them to their camp.

But they weren't enough. The virgins were 400 and the Benjaminite men were 600, which means that 200 men were still without wives. So what do they do?

More abduction! 

They were informed of a dancing festival that was taking place at Shiloh, and they instructed the Benjaminite men to lie and wait in the bushes for the young girls who would be coming out to dance. And that was what they did. The men waited in the bushes and when the girls came out dancing, each of the Benjaminite men took a girl for himself to be his wife.

Here again, as with the last story, we see the Israelites abducting virgin girls from another community or tribe and making them their wives, usually after murdering their families. Again, these girls could not have consented to marrying men who kidnapped them and killed their families. Which means that whatever union those virgin girls had with those men would have been forced. 

In verse 22 of this same chapter in Judges, the Israelites say this: "Then if their fathers or their brothers come to complain to us, we will say to them, ‘Be generous and allow us to have them; because we did not capture in battle a wife for each man. But neither did you incur guilt by giving your daughters to them.’ ”

So the Israelite men told the Benjaminite men that if after abducting the virgin dancers, their fathers or brothers came to complain, they should simply beg them to allow them keep their daughters.

What this curious passage implies is that it's the consent of the men (the virgins' fathers and brothers) that matter, not that of the virgins themselves.

The virgin girls are never asked if they want to be the wives of the Benjaminites, they're simply abducted and forced to marry them. We're not told about their complaints, we're only told of the possible complaints of their fathers and brothers.

So, the Benjaminite men abducted virgins from two different communities to marry and everyone lived happily ever after :-)

This last example is from the New testament. The very beginning of the New testament.

In Matthew 1, we're told the story of how the holy spirit impregnated Mary to give her Jesus. But did she consent to being impregnated? No, at least according to Matthew, Joseph was simply informed later that god impregnated his fiancée and that he shouldn't call off the marriage.

We see a similar situation in Luke 1. Although in Luke, Mary seems to consent when she says: “Here am I, the servant of the Lord; let it be with me according to your word.” (Luke 1:38). 

But does she really consent? In this passage, Mary wasn't asked if she wanted to be impregnated by god, she was simply told. God had already decided before telling her that she would be the one to birth Jesus. So  in Luke 1:38, Mary was merely submitting to god's decision (like she had a choice), not consenting.

So, even Mary, arguably the most important woman in Christianity, didn't get to consent before god decided to use her. 

Perhaps, it's clear now that the Bible writers (and god, by extension) did not take women seriously enough to ask for their consent, even in matters relating to their own bodies. But what else should we expect from a barbaric bronze age book?