Genesis34chapter 34

Genesis 34:8-10

Hamor asks for the girl and then widens it to marriage between the two peoples, land to settle in, free movement and property. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown mark what the offer leaves out, that no regret is spoken and Dinah is not sent home. The talks open with a proposal and no apology.

Intermarry with us: Deuteronomy 7:3 forbids this very exchange with the peoples of Canaan, daughters given and daughters taken. Isaac had sent Jacob away at Genesis 28:1 to keep him from a Canaanite wife. The Hebrew verb is chatan, to become a son-in-law.

Move about freely renders sachar, to travel as a trader, the root behind the Midianite traders who carry Joseph off at Genesis 37:28. Hamor offers as a favor the land God had already promised Jacob at Genesis 28:13. Israel acquires property with the same verb in Goshen at Genesis 47:27.

Genesis 34:11-12

Shechem speaks for himself and offers to pay whatever they name, a high dowry and an expensive gift. Money is his answer to what he has done. His own city will be answered in that currency at verse 28, when its flocks and herds and donkeys are carried off. The chapter records no word from Dinah while the terms are set.

Demand a high dowry and an expensive gift: The dowry is the Hebrew mohar, the bride-price paid to the bride's family, and the gift is mattan, a present besides. Exodus 22:16 to 17 later lays this payment on a man who seduces a virgin. Jacob paid his own in years of labor.

Genesis 34:13-14

Jacob’s sons answered him and his father Hamor deceitfully: Jacob's sons answered deceitfully, and the verse says so before the speech begins. The Hebrew is mirmah, the same word Isaac used of Jacob at Genesis 27:35, and the root Jacob threw at Laban at Genesis 29:25 for the switch of Leah for Rachel. The sons answer in their father's own vocabulary. Their ground is stated in verse 14, a disgrace in giving their sister to an uncircumcised man.

an uncircumcised man would be a disgrace: Disgrace is the Hebrew cherpah, reproach, the word Rachel used of her barrenness at Genesis 30:23. At Joshua 5:9 the LORD rolls away the reproach of Egypt on the day Israel is circumcised at Gilgal. Goliath is called uncircumcised in contempt at 1 Samuel 17:26.

Genesis 34:15-17

The condition they set is that every male be circumcised, the sign of the covenant given to Abraham at Genesis 17:10. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown observe that nothing in the terms brings these men to the God of Jacob. One people is what verse 16 offers, and Hamor repeats it at the gate in verse 22. The daughters go both ways in the bargain.

become one people: One people is am echad in Hebrew, the phrase the LORD spoke over the builders of Babel at Genesis 11:6. Esau had taken wives from the daughters of the land at Genesis 26:34, and they grieved his father Isaac. Jacob's sons offer the same road as bait.

The Hebrew has bittenu, daughter, where the Berean gives sister, so the brothers speak as heads of the family. Jacob, her father, says nothing through the whole exchange.

Genesis 34:18-19

Their offer seemed good to Hamor: The terms seem good to both men, and Shechem does not hesitate to fulfill the request. Verse 19 calls him the most respected in his father's household, which stands beside what he did in verse 2. Genesis states both and leaves the strain standing.

who was the most respected: Most respected renders nikbad, from kabed, to be heavy, the root of kavod, glory. A man of that weight carries the men at the gate in verse 24. Delighted is chaphets, a word for strong desire.

Genesis 34:20-23

went to the gate of their city: The gate is where a city's public business was done, and the speech made there never mentions Dinah. Hamor and Shechem sell the plan on profit, that the livestock and possessions and animals of these men will become the city's. Wesley reads it as a good return promised to neighbors. The word used of Jacob's household, at peace with us, stands on the root Jerome traced at Salem in Genesis 33:18.

it is large enough for them: Large enough renders a Hebrew idiom, wide on both hands, for a land with room for livestock and trade. The same words describe the land of Laish at Judges 18:10. Simeon's clans find such pasture at 1 Chronicles 4:40.

only on this condition will the men agree: The verb for agree is the rare Hebrew ut, to consent, found in verses 15, 22 and 23 and elsewhere only at 2 Kings 12:8. Hamor gives the brothers' condition to the city almost word for word. At the gate the covenant sign becomes a term of trade.

their livestock, their possessions, and all their animals: To Jacob at verse 10 Hamor promised that the family could acquire property in the land. To the city he promises that the same property will become theirs. Each hearer is told what he wants.

Genesis 34:24-25

every male of the city was circumcised: A whole city takes the covenant sign on the word of its chief, which Clarke reads as either strong attachment to the ruling house or the obedience an eastern prince could expect. Three days later, while the men were still in pain, Simeon and Levi took their swords and killed every male. At Genesis 49:5 to 7 Jacob curses their anger and says he will scatter them in Israel.

went into the unsuspecting city: Unsuspecting renders the Hebrew betach, in security, and the city lay open to them in its trust. Judges 18:27 uses the same root of Laish, struck by the Danites while it lived secure. Two brothers strike a whole city.

Genesis 34:26-29

took Dinah out of Shechem’s house: Dinah has to be taken out of Shechem's house, which tells the reader where she had been since verse 2. Jacob's other sons then loot the city, and Gill marks the turn in it, that men who accepted circumcision to gain Jacob's livestock lost their own. The flocks and herds and donkeys go, and so does everything in the houses. The women and children are carried off.

came upon the slaughter and looted the city: The Hebrew gives defiled a plural subject, the townsmen, and the brothers lay the deed on the whole city. Defiled is tame, the word of ritual uncleanness in Leviticus. It stands in verses 5, 13 and 27.

They took their flocks and herds and donkeys: The word for donkeys is chamor, the name of the prince whose city is being stripped. The same animals are listed at Genesis 12:16, when Sarai is taken into Pharaoh's house. Here they are taken by the sword.

They carried off all their possessions: Children is taph, the little ones of a household. The women and children of Shechem now live inside Jacob's camp, with the goods of their houses. At Genesis 35:2 Jacob orders his household and all who were with him to get rid of their foreign gods.

Jacob speaks at last, and he names the danger to himself: they have made him a stench to the people of this land, and his household will be destroyed if the land unites against him. Jamieson, Fausset and Brown read the argument as the one likely to reach sons in this state. Henry takes it as a father seeing the ruin his children cannot.

Simeon and Levi have the last word of the chapter, and no answer from Jacob their father is recorded. Clarke notes that the word they use for prostitute stands here for the first time in Scripture. It comes next over Judah at Genesis 38:15, where he takes his own daughter-in-law for one. Their question about their sister is left standing.