{"id":86718,"date":"2021-01-17T00:29:37","date_gmt":"2021-01-16T22:29:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/?p=86718"},"modified":"2021-01-17T00:29:37","modified_gmt":"2021-01-16T22:29:37","slug":"a-disturbing-discovery-in-sodom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/a-disturbing-discovery-in-sodom\/","title":{"rendered":"A Disturbing Discovery in Sodom"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[281],"tags":[],"acf":{"old_id":"86718","type":"no","iframe":"","writer":34243,"related_cahpter":"656","type_929":"2","show_author_image":false,"old_create_date":"","old_url":"","post_main_content":{"description":"Ruth and Naamah make a midrashic appearance\r\n\r\n","content":"

Our psalm has three parts: a song of praise to an omnipotent God (2-19), a description of His promise to maintain a Davidic dynasty (20-38), and a prayer on behalf of that dynasty that appears to be deteriorating\u2014in contradiction to the promise (39-53). With this chapter, the third of the five \u201cbooks\u201d of Psalms comes to its conclusion (see <\/span>our comments to Psalm 72<\/span><\/a>), with the closing formula \u201cMay the Lord be blessed forever, Amen and Amen.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

The middle part opens with the following divine declaration:<\/span><\/p>\n

Then You spoke to Your faithful ones in a vision and said, \u201cI have conferred power upon a warrior; I have exalted one chosen out of the people. I have found David, My servant; anointed him with My sacred oil\u201d (20-21).<\/span><\/p>\n

A midrash asks: Where did God \u201cfind\u201d David? Its answer, however, is both surprising and remarkable:<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cAbraham had sheep, cattle, and tents\u201d (Gen. 13:5). R. Tobiah b. Yitzhak said, two tents, Ruth the Moabite and Naamah the Ammonite\u2026 R. Yosi b. Yitzhak said: [God] found two things, Ruth the Moabite and Naamah the Ammonite. R. Yitzhak said: \u201cI have found David My servant;\u201d Where did I find him? In Sodom.<\/span><\/p>\n

The reference to Ruth and Naamah makes it clear that the midrash is addressing the matter of David\u2019s ancestry, on the one hand, and progeny, on the other. Ruth, wife to Boaz, was his great-grandmother and Naamah was one of his daughters-in-law\u2014a wife to King Solomon. The context in which this verse appears is the prelude to the split between Abraham and Lot that brought Lot to Sodom, from which he was eventually rescued.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is in the context of that rescue and the ensuing confusion over the extent of the devastation that Lot\u2019s daughters slept with their father and gave birth to two illegitimate children: Moab, the ancestor of Ruth, and Ammon, the ancestor of Naamah. Combining these details yields the following conclusion: David owed his existence to the incestuous relationship between Lot and the mother of Moab (as well as to a dubious relationship between Boaz and Ruth), and King Rehoboam (son of Solomon) owed his to a similar relationship involving the mother of Ammon.<\/span><\/p>\n

The moral: The Messiah son of David might very well owe his existence to acts that under ordinary circumstances might disqualify their participants from holding public office but which, implicitly, will have sufficiently redeeming value that God will declare: \u201cI have exalted one chosen out of the people.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

image: Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld: Ruth in Boaz’s Field, 1828 \/ wikimedia<\/p>\n","image":{"ID":56394,"id":56394,"title":"jud19-Julius_Schnorr_von_Carolsfeld-_Ruth_im_Feld_des_Boaz","filename":"jud19-Julius_Schnorr_von_Carolsfeld-_Ruth_im_Feld_des_Boaz.jpg","filesize":0,"url":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/jud19-Julius_Schnorr_von_Carolsfeld-_Ruth_im_Feld_des_Boaz.jpg","link":"https:\/\/wp.929.org.il\/en\/from-hostility-to-hospitality\/jud19-julius_schnorr_von_carolsfeld-_ruth_im_feld_des_boaz\/","alt":"","author":"7","description":"","caption":"","name":"jud19-julius_schnorr_von_carolsfeld-_ruth_im_feld_des_boaz","status":"inherit","uploaded_to":56393,"date":"2019-05-29 18:29:49","modified":"2021-05-13 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