(BA) Genesis 19

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Picking up where Genesis 18 left off, Genesis 19 tells from J's perspective the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Or, at least, almost entirely from J's perspective: both Driver and Friedman (Who Wrote the Bible?) identify all but verse 29 as coming from J.

Two angels, coming to investigate Sodom, arrive and are persuaded to stay the evening with Abraham's nephew Lot. The men of the city arrive, intending to rape the angels, but are supernaturally repelled with blindness. The angels then announce Yahweh's intention to destroy the city, and evacuate Lot, his daughters, and his wife toward a nearby town, which acquires the name of Zoar from the incident, and is spared the catastrophic destruction that befalls the other cities. However, during the escape Lot's wife disobeys the divine instructions by looking back and Sodom, and is turned into a pillar of salt, in a scene reminiscent of Orpheus' wife looking back toward Hades and losing her life.

Lot flees again, this time to a mountain cave, where in a stunning reversal the man who had offered up his daughters to a crowd of rapists is raped by his daughters. They give birth to two boys, the ancestors of the Ammonites and Moabites, in a dark literary move that portrays two of Israel's neighboring peoples as products of incest.

(19:1) "and the two angels". Combined with the details of chapter 18, this would seem to be claiming that of Abraham's three mysterious visitors, one was Yahweh and two were angels.

Instead of two angels, Kittel suggests that perhaps we should read "two men", citing in support 12 and 16, where the two characters are referred to simply as "men".

(19:1) "in the gate". In the Bible, important public business was conducted in the city gate -- a city being a walled-in settlement -- and to sit in the gate suggests a position of authority. Thus verse 9's "now he would be a judge" fits with verse 1's presentation of Lot as sitting in a gate.

Driver explains the function of gates in these words: "the gate-way (including the passage under the city wall, with seats arranged on each side), -- a common place of meeting in the East, for conversation or business, including even the administration of justice." Driver then lists a number of passages involving gates: Ruth 4:1ff, 11; Deuteronomy 21:19, 25:7; Job 5:4; Isaiah 29:21; Amos 5:10, 12, 15; and Psalm 127:5.

(19:2) Driver compares Abraham's living in a tent to Lot living in a house. The last explicit word on Lot's living situation has in dwelling in a tent near Sodom (Genesis 13:12), so at some point he has taken up a residence in a house inside the city itself.

(19:2) "street". The ASV reads "street", but as Driver points out "broad-place" or "square" is more appropriate.

(19:3) "unleavened cakes". According to Driver, "a kind of biscuit, which could be baked rapidly.

(19:4) The text goes to lengths to make clear that the whole town was involved (Driver), so that this verse answers Abraham's questions from chapter 18 about whether there were any righteous people living in Sodom, for whom the city might be spared.

(19:5) "know them". An idiom for sexual relations.

(19:6) "and shut". The Samaritan Pentateuch reads, "and they shut" (Kittel).

(19:8) Compare 2 Peter 2:7, in which Lot is referred to as "righteous". A fair bit of ink has been spilled by apologists over this.

(19:9) "And they said" (second occurrence) is omitted by the Septuagint (Kittel).

(19:9) "sojourn". In the Hebrew Bible, sojourn and sojourner refer to the status of someone living in an place that is not their own, something like a "resident alien".

(19:11) "blindness". Driver: "Not the usual word, and found otherwise only in 2 K. vi. 18; though in what respects the 'blindless' denoted by it differed from ordinary blindness is not certain."

(19:12) "Son-in-law, and". Kittel says we should omit these words and just begin the sentence with, "Your sons". Kittel says 37 Masoretic manuscripts and the Samaritan Pentateuch omit the "and" before "your sons". The Peshitta reads, "Your sons-in-law".

(19:12) "the place". The Samaritan Pentateuch and Septuagint read, "this place".

(19:13) "Yahweh has sent us". As Driver points out, this claim necessarily implies that the two men are not Yahweh.

(19:13) "to destroy it". Kittel says we should read "to destroy them", citing the Vulgate for support.

(19:14) "married". ASV note: "Or, were to marry. As Driver notes, it is possible to take the Hebrew participle either way.

(19:15) "the angels". Kittel thinks we should perhaps read, "the men", as in verse 1.

(19:15) "Arise". Kittel says we should add, "and get out", following the Septuagint.

(19:15) "iniquity". ASV marginal note: "Or, punishment".

(19:17) "he said". He? Does that mean one of the angels in particular? So reads the Masoretic Text. The Septuagint, Peshitta, and Vulgate read, "they said" (Kittel).

(19:18) "to them". So in 17 he says to Lot, but Lot replies to them. This is odd. Kittel thinks we should perhaps read, "to him".

(19:18) "my lord". ASV note: "Or, O Lord".

(19:19) "the disaster". I think the reading is clear -- Lot is talking about the coming disaster he knows will come. The KJV reads, "lest some evil overtake me", as if Lot has no particular idea what he is afraid of.

(19:20) "a little one". Hebrew mṣʕr, an explanation for the name "Zoar" (ṣwʕr).

(19:22) "Zoar". ASV note: "That is, Little". The Codex Alexandrinus, Itala, and Vulgate read Segor, while Ephraim the Syrian's commentary on the Hexapla reads Zaari (Kittel). So also in vs. 23.

(19:24) "brimstone and fire". Driver says, "Most probably in an eruption of petroleum". Perhaps there was some such incident in the background of this text, but as the text stands the "brimstone and fire" are sent not up from the ground, but down from Yahweh in the sky.

(19:24) "from the sky". According to Kittel, these words are a later addition to the text. Due to the laconic nature of BHK, he does not explain how he came to this conclusion, but I'd wager the apparent redundancy has something to do with it.

(19:27) Here Kittel says we should insert, "and went".

(19:28) "the land of". Kittel says we should omit these words).

(19:29) "God". According to Kittel, the Septuagint here reads "the Lord", but according to NETS it reads simply, "God".

(19:30) "Lot went up". The Samaritan Pentateuch, Septuagint, and Vulgate read, "And Lot went up with him" (Kittel).

(19:31) "there is not a man on the earth". According to Driver, the concern was that no one would want to marry the "sole survivors of an accursed city". But there is another interpretation (where I learned it, I do not remember): that for some reason, living in the mountains, they thought the destruction had destroyed the whole world and that they were the last remaining humans.

(19:31) "to us". Following the Septuagint, Vulgate (Kittel). The Masoretic Text has an unexpected form that would usually mean "upon us".

(19:34) "my father". The Septuagint reads, "our father" (Kittel).

(19:37) Here the Septuagint inserts, "Saying, From my father". The point, either explicit as in the Septuagint or implicit as in the Masoretic Text, is that the author is relating the term "Moab" (moʾab) to "from father" (meʾab).

(19:28) "Ben-ammi". Hebrew for "son of my people". The point is to relate both the Ammonites and Moabites to terms suggesting incest. The Septuagint calls the infant "Amman" instead of "Ben-Ammi".

(19:28) "bnei Ammon". Literally, "sons of Ammon", the usual biblical term for the Ammonites. The Septuagint reads "Ammanites" instead of "bnei Ammon" (Kittel, Brenton).

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