Ancient Practices: Misidentifying Wives; Determining Heirs

For Shabbat, October 31 2020

Genesis 12-17 Lekh Lekha

By Irv Jacobs, MD

Irv Jacobs

LA JOLLA, California — This parasha is about the aging Abram’s blessing and chosen status by God, followed by his travels, exploits-both good and bad, rescue of Lot, concern for an heir with Sarai, and the group circumcision of his entourage.

I have chosen three passage groups for comparison, via the internet, with writings by ancient Israel’s neighbors.

  1. Genesis 12:10 “There was a famine in the land (Canaan), and Abram went down to Egypt to sojourn there…

    From the internet, I found a list of numerous recorded famines, including many during the ancient years 2200 BCE-800 CE. [1]

Of interest, Egypt’s culture, so keen on recording events, recorded few references to famine. However skeletal remains do suggest at least some evidence of starvation. [2]

As to migrations of ancient Middle East People in the face of famine, there is nothing on the internet, despite multiple variations in my wordings of inquiry.

In answer to : “Did ancient people people migrate during famines?” Google responded ‘No, found from 65,100,000 inquiry results.’

In answer to: “Travels during famines-ancient?” Google responded ‘No, found from 8,310,000 inquiry results.’

In answer to: “Ancient Middle East emigres to Egypt in famines?” Google responded: ‘No, found from 2,500,000 inquiry results.’

I found one paradoxical result from my inquiries. The Hyksos, who controlled Lower Egypt as the 15th Dynasty (c. 1630-1523 BCE), arrived in Egypt as immigrants beginning c. 18th Century BCE. They brought new technologies, including the horse and chariot, the compound bow, and improved metal weapons. They mostly settled in the eastern Nile Delta, their most prominent city being Avaris.

Some scholars believe they achieved power because the 13th and 14th Dynasties in that region had weakened and disappeared, believe it or not, because of famine in the Delta!

Ultimately, a revolt out of Thebes, farther up the river, ended the short Hyksos Dynasty. [3]

As an interesting aside to this subject, there was a seven-year famine in the Third Dynasty (c. 2700 BCE), due to low Nile flow. The kingdom faced insufficient grains, dried up seeds, chaos from citizens robbing each other, and closed temples. Consultation with the prime minister resulted in the King’s dream, in which he was visited by the god Khnum. Khnum promised to restore Nile flow in return for the king’s restoration of Khunum’s degraded temple. [4]

As to actual migrations secondary to a famine, history had to wait till the Great Irish Potato Famine (1845–1849 CE) for a record of this phenomenon on the internet. It was due to a fungus called Phytophthora infestans which spread rapidly throughout Ireland and ruined that staple crop. [5]

II.  Genesis 12:12-13 “If the Egyptians see you, and think, ‘She is my wife,’ they will kill me and let you live. Please say that you are my sister, that it may go well with me…'”

Inquiries to the internet of such a recorded incident among pagans yielded none, no matter how delicately I worded the question.

In answer to: “Ancient claims of sister rather than admit she’s his wife?

Google responded: ‘No, found from about 31,800,000 results.’

In answer to: “Ancient claims of sister rather than admit his wife?”

Google responded: ‘No, from about 126,000,000 results.’

However, my inquiries yielded the following somewhat paradoxical information. King Tut, very young when his father, King Akhenaten, died, was not crowned until age 9. He died at 19, having ruled only 10 years  (c. 1334-1324 BCE).

According to an intensely controversial interpretation of records. preceding him to the throne was one of his sisters, age 12, likely at first disguised as a male. There was another sister, who transiently served as her ‘great royal spouse,’ only soon thereafter for them to share the kingship as a pair.

Archaeologists have assessed King Tut’s tomb to be originally designed for a woman.

The king who ruled after Tut likely didn’t approve of the co-female rule, and so destroyed traces of the sisters’ reign. This has added to the dearth of clear information, and the need for today’s detective work.

There were seven female Pharaohs in Egypt’s history. However, this particular incident theory has no parallel to anything happening in Egypt either before or afterwards. [6]

III.   Genesis 15:3-5: Ch. 16:2-4 “Abram said…(with) no offspring, my steward will be my heir…the Lord..in reply, ‘That one shall not be your heir’…Sarai said…’consort with my maid (concubine), perhaps I shall have a son through her’…Abram…cohabited with Hagar and she conceived…”

I checked the internet for pagan stories of substituted heirs:

In answer to: “Ancient substitutions in event of no heir?”

Google responded: ‘No, from 4,250,000 results.’

In answer to: “Ancient substitutions in event of no biological heir?”

Google responded: ‘No, from about 2,440,000 results.’

In answer to: “Ancient substitution heirs in event of no biological heir?”

Google responded: ‘No, from about 738,000 results’

In answer to: “Ancient reliance on concubine to produce heir?”

Google responded; ‘No, from about 680,000 results.’

In many ancient cultures, elites had both wives and concubines. A concubine served to both increase a man’s prestige and to allow indulgence in sexual desires. Such women variously were slaves, priestesses, and prostitutes.

Concubines received neither a betrothal nor a marriage contract. In Greece, a concubine’s children were not granted citizenship.

Under Roman law, concubinage was tolerated, though with a lower social status. A concubine could be a young male slave used as a sexual partner. The term homosexual was not used, and such persons played a secondary role in the master’s marriage.

In China, a concubine could improve her situation by producing an heir, though such sons were inferior to legitimate children. Some did rise in social status in unusual circumstances, e.g. if the legal wife died.

Chinese Emperors could keep thousands of concubines, in the Forbidden City. They were guarded by numerous eunuchs, to ensure they couldn’t be made pregnant by other than the Emperor.

Concubines there had a limited useful life, e.g. five years declared by a certain Emperor, after which they might be released to pursue a normal life.

One of the more frightening aspects of their lives was that a dying ruler could take them into his tomb…to his afterlife. [7]

NOTES

[1] List of famines, Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[2] Famine in Ancient Egypt (and Nubia): what is the evidence? by Joyce Filer, Dept. of Ancient Egypt & Sudan, British Museum, January 16, 2013

[3 Hyksos Egyptian Dynasty, by the Editors of Encyclopedia Britannica

[4] Famine Stela: A piece of Pharaonic diary, by Samar Samir, Egypt Today, The Magazine of Egypt, Sun. 15 July 2018

[5] Migration as disaster relief: Lessons from the Great Irish Famine, Cormac O Grada & Kevin H. O’Rourke, European Review of Economic History, Vol. 1, No. 1, April 1997, pp. 3-25, Oxford University Press,

https://jstor.org/stable/41377786

[6] King Tut’s Sisters Took the Throne Before He Did, Controversial Claim Says, Live Science, Laura Geggel, May 08, 2019

[7] The Secret Life of an Ancient Concubine, Ancient Origins, Joanna Gillan, 9 March 2019

*
Irv Jacobs is a retired medical doctor who delights in Torah analysis.  He often delivers a drosh at Congregation Beth El in La Jolla, and at his chavurah.