Biblical Hebrew Forum

[Niels Peter Lemche <npl AT teol.ku.dk>]

> Well roared, George! This verse (RSV "But Rahab the harlot, and her
> father's
> household, and all who belonged to her, Joshua saved alive; and she dwelt
> in
> Israel (watteshev beqerev Yisrael) to this day, because she hid the
> messengers whom Joshua sent to spy out Jericho") is indeed remarkable in
> the
> context of this expression. Are there any more such cases?
> 
> A second thought about the same verse: maybe some sort of midrashic
> reflection (qerev Yisrael for the Davidic dynasty? or as an indication of
> conversion of Rahab alone? cfr. verse 23) on this problematic verse
> ultimately provided Rahab with her surprising place among the ancestors of
> Jesus. (Matthew 1:5)
> 
> Jan-Wim Wesselius, Hoekenes 26A, 1068 MT Amsterdam
> Tel. 020 - 619 1535; fax 020 - 619 1636; e-mail jww AT xs4all.nl
> 
> 
> 
        A remarkable sequence of ladies in that family, however. Tamar
(maybe a Canaanite woman) becoming pregnant with her father-in-law
pretending to be a whore. Ruth, a Moabite woman getting close to the noble
Boaz in the middle of the night, and Bathsheba--married to a Hittite, if not
herself a Hittite, starting an afair with David. Midrash or not Midrash,
there seems to be a lind of narrative pattern here.

        NPL