Genesis, kinship and nationalism.

Why were stories produced and included, by whom? why? and when? The framework, the envelope that contains the stories, is from the final writer whose clear purpose was to proclaim legitimate ancestry. The story ends with the exile, which was presumably the period in which the editor worked. The ancestral line was this an issue.  Why? A new community was being formed either in exile or later in which people needed to place themselves within a legitimate family tree.  The Babylonian exile began in 586 BCE and ended when under Persian rule the exiles were allowed home six decades later. In my view, the date of writing was later rather than earlier allowing a period of research and reflection. Whether the narrative reflected a hoe of return or the actual return is not know. Whether Judaean exiles knew their tribal genealogy is also not known.  The narrative was an attempt to unite the people and build a sense of nationhood. Religious unity would cement social cohesion, so a fundamentalist line  was taken, prohibiting genetic and religious mixing, that is intermarriage and syncretism under Ezra the Scribe. Laws were ascribed to Moses, and thence to God – although the actual editors were contemporaries. In this development of national consciousness, Yahweh was the chosen name for God, and war was declared on other deities. History was rewritten to support the new enterprise.

In studying Genesis, we have a glimpse of how a new state wished to write its history. Their political legitimacy was asserted through a twelve tribes system, given fictive kinship relationships to each other and to Jacob, Isaac and Abraham. We hear more about the tribes in settlement texts which defined their tribal boundaries, much loved of mapmakers. Their complex settlement patterns and political organisation have been studied without definitive conclusions. Inappropriate assumptions about the historicity of the narratives have been part of the confusion. We know now that we cannot confirm that the Exodus and conquest of Palestine, actually happened as described. Rather, they seem to be later ideological reconstructions produced for political and theological purposes. So my intention is to study Genesis, and indeed the whole OT history corpus, as  composed for a purpose in a particular point of time. I accept that sources will have been used, but adapted to support the message of the redactor/editor. We therefore start our study from the whole and not the parts. This is not to assume historicity but to set it aside as mostly unknowable. Studying the OT is still a work of history, shedding light on the periods of the writers and their motivation for writing but not necessarily on the periods they were writing about.

Abraham, Isaac and Rebecca.

Isaac is portrayed as the only son of Abraham, the claim of the older Ishmael being rejected. He is described as filial, even to the extent of helping in his own 'sacrifice', an act that would (in terms of the storyline) have wiped out the Israelite line before it began. This sacrifice is described as an instruction by God, then as a test, brought to an end by divine intervention replacing the boy with a ram. The writer uses the story to build the character of Abraham as a chosen ancestor. Earlier stories show him meeting with angels, discussing Sodom's fate with God and making a covenant. Whether or not there were earlier sources, these passages have a key function in the narrative framework. The Hebrews had survived not by accident but as part of a divine plan, in which punishment and testing were part and parcel.

The disapproval of intermarriage with Canaanites is explicit in Genesis 24:3-4: Abraham sends a servant to "my country and my kindred" to find Isaac a wife. He is asked to swear an oath to bring her back, since Palestine had been gifted by God to Abraham and his descendants. The oath is intriguing: the servant has to place his hand 'under Abraham's thigh', possibly on his genitals. Rebecca comes from the family of Nahor, Abraham's 'brother' (v.15). We are introduced to Bethuel her father and Laban her brother. We also learn that Bethuel's mother was Milcah wife of Nahor. The servant prayed for guidance and a sign and when he met Rebecca the sign was granted. The story of the meeting and subsequent marriage are given in detail (Genesis 24), and contain details of Rebecca's family - Laban her brother, Bethuel her father, and Deborah her 'nurse'. The narrative emphasises the authentic bloodline from Abraham to the neo-Israelite community in the writer's own day. 'Authentic' is understood to mean that God has approved, ordered and selected the Israelite people through a series of angelic visitations which represent conversations with God. These establish social, political and religious legitimacy for a community which needed to demonstrate its roots.

The marriage narrative emphasises that close family marriage were an arrangement between families,  celebrated with a feast. Formal documents such as contracts are not mentioned - these are found  at Nuzi (in the Haran area) close to the period being described. Marriage documents (the ketubah) came to be used later when more than family witnesses were required and a written document was necessary. Deuteronomy mentions a 'bill' of divorce, so this legal process was in evidence. Gifts were given to Rebecca, and others to her family. A feast was requested by her family, but the servant asked to leave immediately. When Rebecca arrived and saw Isaac, she veiled herself; then the marriage took place without formality.

Genesis 25 gives a further genealogy of Abraham's descendants, through another wife, Keturah after Sarah's death. These depict other tribes in the middle East, such as Midian. The text affirms that Isaac was the chosen heir, and the others were given presents and sent out of Isaac's way 'eastwards'. This fictional Abrahamic family asserted kinship affiliation across the region, whilst affirming the priority of Isaac as heir and Israelite ancestor.

The birth of the twins Esau and Jacob is similar to the birth of Perez and Zerah to Tamar in Genesis 38, both with a 'red' theme, Esau being red and hairy, and Zerah having a red cord tied around his wrist. A prophecy said "Two nations in your womb, two peoples, going their own ways from birth. One shall be stronger than the other, the older shall be servant of the younger" (Genesis 25:23). The peoples were Israel through Jacob, and Edom through Esau. The Edomite genealogy is given in Genesis 36. The narrator is clearly Israelite, stressing the divine gift of the land (e.g. 26:1-5).

The Sons of Jacob: Tribal Eponyms.

These stories are a device to place the Israelites in Egypt prior to the exodus. A younger son, Joseph, is rejected by older brothers and sold to be a slave in Egypt, where he rises to political power. His hostile brothers have to approach him (without recognizing him) during a famine to beg for food. They are apparently punished but this is a device to bring Joseph's father Jacob to Egypt. Since Jacob was clearly not called Israel, God renames him Israel to provide appropriate legitimacy. 'Israel' as an entity does not refer to the 8th century BCE Omride dynasty  in opposition to the kings of Judah in Jerusalem, but to all the tribes, listed as tribes in Genesis 49, the ‘Blessing of Jacob’. Narrative cycles read this greater Israel back into the reigns of David and Solomon, but with no historical or archaeological evidence to support this.

What is simpler than assuming that the tribal ancestors were a family of brothers whose father was renamed 'Israel'. The brothers were not equals. Not only was there a firstborn with privileges, but they had four different mothers whose status differed enormously, two mothers being slaves, and one a hated wife. Of Jacob's  two wives, Rachel was loved and Leah hated. Rachel and Leah are first cousins to Jacob. Their father, Laban, was said to be the brother of Rebecca Jacob's mother. The marriage was arranged without consulting the girls. Jacob acquired his birthright by trickery, and in turn was tricked finding Leah in his bed the morning after the wedding consumation, and not Rachel as he expected. The story shows girls manipulated by their father Laban in order to force Jacob to work for him. In a competition for children each wife presented a slave woman to bear children on her behalf. Maintaining a fiction of monogamy was clearly difficult, but an attempt was made. In the genealogy of Gen 46, only Rachel is called ‘wife’, the others are described as having born him children.   Thus the brothers formed a kinship network, to become allies but not without family tensions. Only Joseph does not bear a tribal name - this goes to his sons Ephraim and Manasseh to became northerly tribes, formally adopted by Jacob/Israel. Levi, through a tribe, held no territory but were itinerant priests.

Polygynous family experienced jealousies between the mothers and children. Joseph, son of Rachel, was perceived to be a favorite, wearing his coat of many colours.  Jacob asked to marry Rachel and worked for seven years to pay the bride price, but was tricked, given Leah instead since she was older. After negotiation, he married Rachel shortly after but working a further seven years. Marrying cousins is not uncommon, even today, as a means of keeping girls within the wider family so that by bearing children they build up their own family and not someone else's. Laban was based near Haran in the distant north, and not in Palestine. Jacob did not marry out and kept the chosen family pure. The patriarchs and tribes were 'sojourners' (as said about Abraham) in a foreign land. Archaeology does not prove this, but it is true that pig bones are not common in the bronze age settlements in the north Galilee hills, whatever that may mean.  Joseph, and through him the tribes of Ephraim and Manasseh, are dominant, representing the northern tribes, or in the writers day, the Samaritans. The descendants of Benjamin, Rachel's other son, would prove troublesome in later narratives, as we will see in due course. By the time of final redaction  Of Leah’s children, Reuben the firstborn was condemned for raping Bilhah; Simeon and Levi were condemned for killing the Shechemites. Judah, the next son, was 4^th best, and, notably in the narrative is made to bow to Joseph. Judah is ancestor of southern Hebrews and gave his name to the southern kingdom. But he is criticised over his treatment of Tamar and his humiliated in admitting "you are more righteous than I" (Gen 38).

Reuben
The narratives criticise the eldest four of Leah's sons, the first three of whom were insignificant as tribes. Reuben was the firstborn but he, perhaps anticipating his father's death or weakness, had sexual relations with Bilhah Jacob's concubine/slave-wife. In a story set later, Absalom took over King David's concubines to mark a coup d'etat (which failed). In Reuben's case this act was not forgiven. This cost him his blessing and therefore firstborn status.

Levi and Simeon Kill Shechem
A note about Genesis 34, where the prince of Hivite Shechem rapes or seduces Dinah daughter of Jacob in the countryside and asks to marry her. The main issue is that sex has taken place, and that intermarriage should not happen. A theme throughout the Jacob cycle is trickery, and this leads to the wiping out of the Hivite city in an action led by Levi and Simeon. The main condition of the marriage is that all Shechem's men are circumcised, so that kinship is created. Shechem here represents the indigenous settled population. After the circumcision, when they were feverish, the Israelite troups massacred them. As Laban tricked Jacob, so the Israelites tricked Shechem. The story serves two purposes. On legitimacy, intermarriage into a local indigenous tribe  would have polluted the Israelite. The name Dinah means 'justice' race. Further exploration of this comes in later narratives and laws. Intermarriage was specifically disallowed after the exile to keep the nation pure, leading to the dissolving of existing intermarriages. Genocide is an unsettling response to this national neurosis.

Judah and Tamar
In Genesis 38, Judah becomes the focus. Tamar becomes a young widow when her new husband dies suddenly. According to the law of levirate, she married the next brother Onan who refused to father a child for his dead brother, and then e died suddenly. The story focuses  on Tamar wanting to marry the third brother Shelah and being refused.    Tamar using subterfuge dressed as a sacred prostitute and slept with Judah her father-in-law after taking his seal as collateral. Now pregnant, she could prove paternity. Her behaviour was deemed legitimate because it was not only her right but the family duty to arrange for her to have sons who would continue the name of her first husband. Her child was legitimate, and her behaviour had protected the legitimate line. Deuteronomy  levirate law (chapter 24) is discussed later. The Genesis redacter is not promting the position of the tribe of Judah but supports Joseph and his two sons Ephraim and Manasseh. Jacob  made Ephraim (the younger son) firstborn in place of Manasseh, so giving the patriarchal succession to the northern kingdom. The poetic blessings of Jacon (Gen 49) tip the balance firmly in Judah's favour repesenting a time when the north had been defeated and Judah continued alone (after 721BCE).

Kinship

In Genesis national kinship is fictive - an artificial construction for political purposes. Kinship itself is more messy than this tidy family, and has been a key topic within social anthropology throughout the 20th century. A key issue is to decide who is in our 'in' group and who is in the 'out' group. In some societies, anyone in the 'out' group is an enemy and can be killed, so this is a crucial concern throughout human evolution. Blood ties, (consanguinity) can be augmented by marriage ties (affinity) so kinship systems use intermarriage (exogamy, marriage out) as a means of widening kinship relations. Political marriages are examples of the same idea as ways of minimising conflict. Cousin marriage (endogamy, marriage 'in') consolidates the clan but narrows the kinship range. It is a feature in circumstances where there is lack of mobility to meet outsiders. There are advantages - the productiveness of daughters is retained, and their safety more easily assured. The main disadvantage is a slight risk of birth defects. Most groups ban sex between siblings or parents with their children through incest rules.

The current interest in research one's ancestors to build a family genealogy is mirrored in many societies, including the Old Testament. Today we have the benefit of paper records, not usually the case in less technological and literate communities. Word of mouth with families covers a few generations back, but is not totally reliable. In pre-bureaucratic and pre-literature communities, oral tradition is said to be more reliable than in the modern day, because there are presumed to be checks on accuracy between tradition-tellers. This is to some extent true but people in positions of power can change emphases and even invent propaganda when politically useful. True, when a story is well established and the audience know it in detail, divergence is more difficult and corrected by the audience. Yet storytellers tend to be artists who give stories their own emphases and smart turn of phrase. There are pre-literature communities studied by anthropologists whose oral tradition has been collected and studied to illuminate this point. Such a people are the San or Bushmen of the Kalahari about whom I have written elsewhere.

The Hebrews returning from exile had little continuity with the past or their new land. They arrived with no remembered history of place. The land had been given to them, although it was not an empty land, it could be gifted at the whim of a despot. Gift may be too strong a word, for their sending there may have been an exile rather than a return. The concepts of return and gift may be construction rather than reality, for some at least. Given the three or four generation time gap between exile and return, Palestine as a former home lay before living memory. All the "returners" had been born and bred in Babylon and had experienced nothing else. So, the circumstances in Palestine required the creation of an identity which the political and intellectual elite were determined to fill.

Genesis was part of their literary tradition. An exilic redaction made it relevant to the new circumstances, promoting Judah in esteem (Gen 49). Genealogies are socio-political documents which needed to be accepted even if inaccurate. They served a social purpose; the enhanced people's understanding of status and identity. They needed to be believable, even if untrue or at least uncheckable. The Genesis genealogy (I express this in the singular as overarching) traces Israelite identity back to the first couple, and thence to God through the notion of God's image. There are key bifurcations - farmers versus pastoralists; Noah's family versus the rest; Shem favoured over Ham and Japheth; in turn, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob favoured as ancestors rather than the eponymous ancesters of neighbouring tribe. Real life is not so simple. Eponyms suggest that the genre is folktale and not history. Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are not eponyms so there may have been legends in which they featured. Please note that there are major disagreements between scholar concerning most things in the OT, not least on reading the texts as history or literature. I favour the latter in the absence of proof about most things historical. There was a section on genealogies below from my 1974 thesis.