There is no biblical Hebrew word for “rape.” The absence of God in the narrative rape scenes in Genesis 34, Judges 19, and 2 Samuel 13 combined with the lack of a definition for biblical rape inspired the genesis of this study. Rape scenes or imagery are present in several biblical books, and yet the majority of biblical scholarship does not consider them together. Some attempt to identify thematic links between two or three rape narratives, but the absence of a definition firmly rooted in the biblical text itself for what constitutes biblical rape means at least one rape narrative is usually excluded.
I set out to develop and apply a definition for biblical rape that would address the unexplained absence of the Israelite deity (God) in these stories and include in its application the three narrative rape scenes. Once the four-part definition of biblical rape was applied to these three narratives, however, a new paradigm emerged that necessitated a diachronic reading of these scenes within each biblical book. As a result, this study demonstrates how rape is used as a literary tool in the biblical text as the climax of Israel’s persistent covenantal rejection. Who abandons whom? In the books of Genesis, Judges, and Samuel, the Israelites repeatedly turn away from their covenantal relationship with their deity, so God’s absence in the narrative rape scenes of the Hebrew Bible functions as a climactic character metaphor for the divine-human covenantal relationship in crisis. The crisis in each book has a direct impact on the early political formation of Israel.
What Is Rape?
What is rape? On the surface this seems to be a simple question, easily answered by legal definitions, collected experiences, and medical reports. However, countless recent examples in popular media demonstrate how confused the American public is with regard to a universal definition of rape, and how misguided and even complacent authority figures fail to adjudicate rape. This confusion regarding definitions of rape helps explain the confusion biblical scholars have when discussing rape scenes and imagery in the Hebrew Bible, since several scholars rely on modern definitions or categories to guide their interpretations of the text.
The hit HBO show Game of Thrones, based on George R. R. Martin’s novel series A Song of Ice and Fire, has faced controversy surrounding its multiple depictions of rape. Although the show is unapologetically violent in general, viewers and critics alike have highlighted the “recurring” presence of rape as “background noise: a routine and unshocking occurrence.” In defense of his novels, Martin commented, “Rape and sexual violence have been part of every war ever fought, from the ancient Sumerians to our present day.” Many fans are troubled by the graphic depictions of rape on the show and have utilized social media to voice their concerns. Missouri Senator Claire McCaskill took to Twitter to comment, “Ok I’m done [with] Game of Thrones....... Gratuitous rape scene disgusting and unacceptable.” The sexual violence and popularity of Game of Thrones demonstrates how fans have become desensitized to rape—it is no longer shocking or sensational but rather acceptable “background noise.”
“Rape culture,” a term first used by American feminists in the 1970s, sought to describe a cultural construct in which sexual violence is not only condoned but also accepted by both men and women as the norm. Television, movies, literature, advertising, political discourse, euphemistic language choices (“nonconsensual sex” vs. “rape”), and humor are all part of this construct. Jessica Valenti, writing for the Washington Post, notes that the term “rape culture” was reintroduced into the American vocabulary due to the 2012 Steubenville, Ohio, rape case, in which a witness testified he was unaware it was a rape. The witness claimed rape is a “violent” act, but in this situation his friend was not forcing himself on the unconscious victim. This type of perpetuated misunderstanding of what constitutes rape has led to more and more news articles and conversations about what rape is and the need to educate the public against the construct of “rape culture.”
In the midst of the 2016 presidential election, a video from 2005 emerged in which Donald Trump bragged that his celebrity enabled him to “Grab [women] by the [genitals].” After his statement was condemned as bragging about sexual assault, Trump defended himself, claiming the words were just “locker room banter.” Author Kelly Oxford invited her social media followers to share their stories of sexual assault and did not expect much of a response. However, within three days, “nearly 27 million people had responded or visited” the author’s page, using the hashtag #NotOkay to give “often-explicit, first-person accounts of molestation.” Trump’s comment and subsequent defense condones the nonconsensual use of female bodies as sexual objects for male gratification. As a result, rape survivors, feminist activists, and feminist scholars have pointed to the 2016 election as an example of the prevalence of rape culture, since using the language of sexual assault was not enough to disqualify Trump as a presidential candidate or deny his campaign’s success when he was elected president of the United States.
In January 2014, President Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden announced a White House task force to address sexual assault on college campuses, since one in five women in college experience sexual assault. Three years previously, the administration had warned every academic institution receiving federal funding to evaluate its reporting practices, yet the persistent presence of campus rape in recent news articles demonstrates university compliance continues to fall short.
A Stanford student, Brock Turner, sexually assaulted an unconscious woman beside a dumpster on January 18, 2015. The twenty-three-year-old survivor read a letter to Turner in court, a letter that has been widely circulated and read aloud in news reports on the case. The public outrage following Turner’s lenient sentence of six months in jail plus three years of probation, for three felonies that carried a maximum possible sentence of fourteen years, “pushed [this] California case to the forefront of a national conversation about sexual assault.” Some point to white privilege or leniency granted to star student athletes to explain the light sentence. In fact, a petition and monetary campaign continues to seek a recall for Judge Aaron Persky, who claimed a longer prison sentence would have a “severe impact” on Turner. In a written response to the Stanford rape survivor, titled “An Open Letter to a Courageous Young Woman,” Vice President Biden wrote in part, “I am filled with furious anger—both that this happened to you and that our culture is still so broken that you were ever put in the position of defending your own worth.” He added, “Like I tell college students all over this country—it’s on us. All of us.” While college campuses responded to urging from the White House in 2014 to address the campus rape epidemic, the recent Stanford case has demonstrated how responses to rape on campus and in the courts still are not enough.
An NPR news report from June 2014 addressed the issue common to many college campuses: how sexual assault is defined, investigated, and punished. The increase of reported cases on college campuses is at the crux of this push by the US government to get colleges to be more precise and proactive about rape. The Obama White House was encouraging a move toward a “yes means yes” concept of consent instead of the old “no means no.” Some schools, such as Claremont McKenna College, stipulate that consent must be “active, not passive,” so a student who is intoxicated or unconscious cannot give consent. Requiring consent to be active and conscious seems obvious, and yet, as noted above, it was not clear to the witness in the Steubenville rape or the Stanford perpetrator. Recognizing the ambiguity of consent given in the heat of the moment, one college handbook even requires students to obtain verbal consent before proceeding with any level of sexual activity; if the student making “sexual advances” does not receive a verbal “yes,” then that is a “violation of [the] policy.” This confusion among college students as to what constitutes rape makes it clear how rape culture has impacted us—overly sexualized media contributes to confusion over what “counts” as sexual violence.
In a 2014 campus rape, the University of Kansas charged a male student with “nonconsensual sex” because apparently the circumstances did not fit a “rape” paradigm: the female student was intoxicated and had initially consented to intercourse but during the act told him “no, stop” repeatedly; the male student “continued intercourse with the woman until he reached orgasm.” The male student made a full confession, but the district attorney handling the case refused to press charges, claiming “a less than 1 percent chance a jury would convict.” Again, we...
