Amplified Roles, Idealized Depictions: Women in the Book of Jubileesis followed immediately by reference to the birth of the giants and by a no
tice of the increase of wickedness on earth (Jub 5:1-2; cf. Gen 6:11). The proof
of the problem is to be observed in the offspring. As Loader suggests, the na
ture of the sin, for Jubilees, is that the relations (here fornication, or
zemmut) led to uncleanness (rekws).^33 The sin, essentially, is one of mixing
with inappropriate partners, and such mixing defiles (cf. Jub 4:22). Unlike
the haphazard mixing of the angels, Jubilees stresses that marriages are to be
arranged with great care;^34 for example, the unanticipated meeting between
Isaac and Rebekah of Gen 24:64-67 is omitted in Jubilees, which prefers, in
stead, a brief notice that Abraham brokered the relationship ("he took a wife
for his son, Isaac"; Jub 19:10).^35 Marriages made with less care and unions
with unsuitable partners are reflected in the progeny of such unions, as
noted above in the case of the giants, offspring that can seem determinative
of the nature of an entire generation. The child of Peleg and Lomna, a
woman of uncertain lineage, for example, is named Ragew ("evil"); his birth
coincides with the building of the Tower of Babel (Jub 10:18-26).
While the retelling of Genesis and Exodus affords an opportunity for
"subtle" critique of exogamy by highlighting problematic unions and their
offspring, the prohibition of intermarriage is reinforced through the in
structions of Abraham to his sons and grandson Jacob (Jub 20:3-6, esp. 20:4;
22:20), and of Rebekah to Jacob (Jub 25:1-3). Further, the account of the rape
of Dinah (Jub 30:1-26; Gen 34:1-31) proves the occasion for an explicit de
nouncement of intermarriage. The book of Jubilees omits entirely Hamor
and Jacob's discussion of intermarriage and the proposal of circumcision as
a condition (cf. Gen 34:6-24). Even the prospect of conversion — not simply
intermarriage — in fact, is off-limits for Jubilees.^36 Simeon and Levi are por
trayed unambiguously as heroes, who mete out punishment on the
Shechemites that had been divinely preordained (Jub 30:5). The brothers'
slaughter of the Shechemites is justified by the angel of the presence who
makes clear that no Israelite is to give his daughter or sister to a foreigner,
nor is he to marry a foreign women (Jub 30:7, 11).^37
- Loader, Enoch, Levi, and Jubilees, 126-45, esP-
- Loader, Enoch, Levi, and Jubilees, 156-57.
- Halpern-Amaru, Empowerment of Women, 38,41-42. See also, though, Endres, Bib
lical Interpretation, 21, who understands the omission as related to Jubilees' disinterest in
Isaac. - See, for example, Halpern-Amaru, Empowerment of Women, 129-58; Loader,
Enoch, Levi, and Jubilees, 167. - Though endogamous unions are favored for the patriarchs and matriarchs,