Biblical Hebrew Forum

["biblical hebrew" <jcr.bhebrew AT gmail.com>]

And you point is?...

That Abimelech had a thing for pensioners? Let's not jump to conclusions
based on modern observations of age. It had already been commented on
Sarah's beauty earlier in Abraham's travels and for this reason they agreed
to announce that Sarah was his sister in every place they stopped off. Why
would they continue this practice if Sarah was wrinkly old granny? Was
granny snatching a common practice in the ANE? We need to keep in mind that
people lived a lot longer back then and not make any assumptions about how
withered people were and by what age based on modern observations. All the
text says is that she was shocked she could still bear a child.

The facts remain that Abimelech seized Sarah and that she and Abraham still
felt the need to announce they were brother and sister and Yhwh felt the
need to intervene before Abimelech did anything untoward. How do you
reconcile these facts with your assumption that Sarah was already 'old'?

James Christian Read - BSc Computer Science
http://www.lamie.org/hebrew       Thesis 1 - Aleppo codex machine translation
http://www.lamie.org/lad-sim.doc  Thesis 2 - language acquisition simulation




On 10/18/07, Shoshanna Walker <rosewalk AT concentric.net> wrote:
>
> Sarah was 65 at the time
>
> Shoshanna
>
>
>
> Hi Isaac,
>
> while your theory on Sarah is amusing, yet plausable, don't you think your
> theory could be subject to criticism that it stems from your own personal
> preferences. How do we know that Abimelech didn't have a thing for dark
> skin, plump bottoms and curly hair? Or maybe he had a thing for the
> oriental
> AV model types?
>
> Anyway, seriously, while you do have a point that Abimelech possible had a
> harem full of beautiful women to choose from and that what catches the eye
> is something new what you have overlooked is the 'new' factor. Abimelech
> may
> have already had his full of the present selection offered by his local
> harem. Sarah was something new. He hadn't seen her before and this
> combined
> with natural beauty of whatever complexion and hair colour she happened to
> be was enough to get him interested.
>
> James Christian Read - BSc Computer Science
> http://www.lamie.org/hebrew       Thesis 1 - Aleppo codex machine
> translation
> http://www.lamie.org/lad-sim.doc  Thesis 2 - language acquisition
> simulation
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