Genesis 34:7

_AND JACOB HEARD THAT HE HAD DEFILED DINAH HIS DAUGHTER: NOW HIS SONS WERE WITH HIS CATTLE IN THE FIELD: AND_ _ JACOB HELD HIS PEACE UNTIL THEY WERE COME._ Jacob held his peace. Jacob, as a father and a good man, must have been deeply distressed. But he could do little. In the case of a family by different wives, it is not the father, but the full brothers, on whom the protection of the daughters devolves-they are the guardians of a sister's welfare and the avengers of her wrongs. It was for this reason that Simeon and Levi, the two brothers of Dinah by Leah, appear the chief actors in this episode; and though the two fathers would have probably brought about an amicable arrangement of the affair, the hasty arrival of these enraged brothers, who came home while Hamor was conversing with Jacob (cf. Genesis 34:6 with...

7._And the sons of Jacob came out of the field_. Moses begins to relate the tragic issue of this history. Shechem, indeed, had acted wickedly and impiously; but it was far more atrocious and wicked that the sons of Jacob should murder a whole people, to avenge themselves of the private fault of one man. It was by no means fitting to seek a cruel compensation for the levity and rashness of one youth, by the slaughter of so many men. Again, who had constituted them judges, that they should dare, with their own hands, to execute vengeance for an injury inflicted upon them? Perfidy was also superadded, because they proceeded, under the pretext of a covenant, to perpetrate this enormous crime. In Jacob, moreover, we have an admirable example of patient endurance; who, though afflicted with so many evils, yet did not faint under them. But chiefly we must consider the mercy of God, by which it...

1-19 Young persons, especially females, are never so safe and well off as under the care of pious parents. Their own ignorance, and the flattery and artifices of designing, wicked people, who are ever laying snares for them, expose them to great danger. They are their own enemies if they desire to go abroad, especially alone, among strangers to true religion. Those parents are very wrong who do not hinder their children from needlessly exposing themselves to danger. Indulged children, like Dinah, often become a grief and shame to their families. Her pretence was, to see the daughters of the land, to see how they dressed, and how they danced, and what was fashionable among them; she went to see, yet that was not all, she went to be seen too. She went to get acquaintance with the Canaanites, and to learn their ways. See what came of Dinah's gadding. The beginning of sin is as the letting...

Verse Genesis 34:7. _HE HAD WROUGHT FOLLY IN ISRAEL_] The land, afterwards generally called _Israel_, was not as yet so named; and the sons of Jacob were neither called _Israel, Israelites_ nor _Jews_, till long after this. How then can it be said that Shechem had _wrought_ _folly in Israel_? The words are capable of a more literal translation: בישראל _beyisrael_, may be translated, _against Israel_. The angel had said, _Thy name shall be called no more Jacob _- not _only_ Jacob, _but Israel_. It was this that aggravated the offence of Shechem; he wrought folly against _Israel_, the prince of God, in lying with the daughter of Jacob. Here both the names are given; _Jacob_, whose daughter was defiled, and _Israel_, the _prince of_ _God_, against whom the offence was committed....

- Dinah’s Dishonor This chapter records the rape of Dinah and the revenge of her brothers. Genesis 34:1 Dinah went out to see the daughters of the land. The Jewish doctors of a later period fix the marriageable age of a female at twelve years and a day. It is probable that Dinah was in her thirteenth year when she went out to visit the daughters of the land. Six or seven years, therefore, must have been spent by Jacob between Sukkoth, where he abode some time, and the neighborhood of Shekerm, where he had purchased a piece of ground. If we suppose Dinah to have been born in the same year with Joseph, who was in his seventeenth year at the time of his being sold as a bondslave Genesis 37:2, the events of this chapter must have occurred in the interval between the completion of her twelfth and th

EXPOSITION GENESIS 34:1 AND DINAH THE DAUGHTER OF LEAH, WHICH SHE BARE UNTO JACOB,—if Dinah was born before Joseph (Genesis 30:21) she was probably in her seventh year when Jacob reached Succoth (Genesis 33:17); but it does not follow that she was only six or seven years of age when the incident about to be described occurred (Tuch, Bohlen). If Jacob stayed two years at Succoth and eight in Shechem (Petavius), and if, as is probable, his residence in Shechem terminated with his daughter's dishonor (Lange), and if, moreover, Joseph's sale into Egypt happened soon after (Hengstenberg), Dinah may at this time have been in her sixteenth or seventeenth year (Kurtz). Yet th

AND THE SONS OF JACOB CAME OUT OF THE FIELD, WHEN THEY HEARD [IT],..... Either by a messenger Jacob sent to them, to acquaint them with it, or by some other hand: however, be it as it will, as soon as they heard of the abuse of their sister, they immediately left their flocks to the care of their servants, and came to their father's tent: AND THE MEN WERE GRIEVED AND WERE VERY WROTH; they were grieved for the sin committed against God, very probably, as well as for the injury done to their sister, and they were wroth against Shechem the author of it: BECAUSE HE HAD WROUGHT FOLLY IN ISRAEL, IN LYING WITH JACOB'S DAUGHTER; all sin is folly, being a transgression of the law of God founded in the highest wisdom, and particularly uncleanness, and that branch of it, deflowering a virgin; and this action being committed on Jacob's daughter, whose name was Israel, is said to be "in", or rather...

CHAPTER 34 DEFILEMENT OF DINAH _ 1. The defilement (Genesis 34:1)_ 2. Hamor's proposal (Genesis 34:4) 3. The deceitful answer of Jacob's sons (Genesis 34:13) 4. The males of Shechem slain (Genesis 34:25) 5. Jacob's shame and grief (Genesis 34:30) If Jacob after the Peniel experience had gone to Bethel instead of building a house at Succoth and buying a parcel of a field, perhaps this sad event might never have occurred. God permitted it for the humiliation of His servant Jacob. Again he reaps what

GENESIS 34. SHECHEM'S OUTRAGE ON DINAH AVENGED. It is generally agreed that two sources have been used, but much uncertainty prevails as to their identity and extent, while in view of the priestly phraseology in one of the narratives, it is probable that the compiler has left his mark rather deeply upon it, unless we assign it directly to P, who may have employed an earlier story. According to one story, perhaps J, Shechem seduces Dinah and keeps her in his house. Jacob announces the news to his sons on their return from the field, and they are greatly angered. Shechem offers to accept any financial terms they may impose if only he may marry her. They reply that his uncircumcision is a fatal barrier. He accepts their conditions (not now recorded). Simeon and Levi, however, enter the city, kill him, plunder the house, and take Dinah away. This action arouses Jacob's consternation as to th...

_wrought folly_ The word _nebâlah_denotes "senseless wickedness," an offence against honour and morality: cf. the use of the word in Deuteronomy 22:21; Joshua 7:15; Judges 19:23-24; 2 Samuel 13:12. _in Israel_ The addition of these words (as in Deuteronomy 22:21; Judges 20:6; Judges 20:10;...