Women Divination

Womens Divination in Biblical Literature
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Th e Anch or Y al e Bibl e R e f e r e n c e L i b r a ry
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Th e Anch or Y al e Bible R e f e r e n c e L i b r a ry
Womens Divination
in Biblical Literature
Prophecy, Necromancy, and
Other Arts of Knowledge
esther j. hamori
new haven
and
AY B R L london
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Permission to reprint an excerpt from Dumuzis Dream: Aspects of Oral Poetry in

a Sumerian Myth, by Bendt Alster, is granted by Akademisk Forlag.
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Hamori, Esther J., author.

Womens divination in biblical literature : prophecy, necromancy, and other arts
of knowledge / Esther J. Hamori.
pages cm. (Anchor Yale Bible reference library)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 978-0-300-17891-3 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Women in the Bible.
2. Divination in the Bible. 3. Bible. Old TestamentCriticism,
interpretation, etc. I. Title.
bs575.h286 2015
220.8'1333dc23
2014034359
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This paper meets the requirements of ansi/niso z39.48-1992 (Permanence of

Paper).
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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DRH
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He woke upa dream! He shivereda sleep!
He rubbed his eyes, was terried!
Bring, bring, bring my sister!
Bring my Getinanna, bring my sister!
Bring my tablet knowing scribe, bring my sister!
Bring my song knowing singer, bring my sister!
Bring my skillful girl, who knows the meaning of words, bring
my sister!
Bring my wise woman, who knows the portent of dreams, bring
my sister!
Let me relate the dream to her.
Dumuzis Dream, trans. Bendt Alster
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Contents
Preface, ix
List of Abbreviations, xi
part one: womens div inat ion and

t h e a rt s of k now l e d g e
1. Access to Divine Knowledge, 3

2. Setting the Stage, 19
part t wo: biblic al perspect iv e s on

womens div in at ion
3. Rebekah the Aramean, 43

4. Miriam, 61
5. Deborah, 82
6. Hannah, 94
7. The Necromancer of En-dor, 105
8. The Wise Women of 2 Samuel, 131
9. Huldah, 148
10. The Prophet Who Conceived and Gave Birth to a Son, 160
11. The Daughters of Your People Who Prophesy, 167
12. The Women of Joels Radical Vision, 184
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viii Contents
13. Noadiah, 186

14. Rachel, the Mother of Micah, and the Teraphim, 189
15. What a Witch: Divination Imagery and Metaphor, 203
Concluding Reections, 217
Bibliography, 225
Index of Subjects, 247
Index of Ancient Texts, 260
Index of Key Ancient Terms, 270
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Preface
Slim were the chances that my love of the eeriefrom tales of ghouls
and golems to my absolute certainty that there were alligators in the sew-
ers under my grandparents apartment on East Twenty-rst Street in
Manhattanwould somehow come together with my research interests in
ancient Israelite and other Near Eastern religious thought. But what did
the ancients believe was out there in the great beyond, and how did they
imagine the otherworldly entering into their everyday lives? Such were the
ponderings that led to my last several years of immersion into these greatly
varied and complex literary traditions, with their equally varied reections
on how people might contact the world beyond and how its deities, spirits,
and ghosts might communicate with them.
In the spirit of recognizing how we construct our identities through
the narratives of our ancestors, I pause to remember my own: my grandfa-
ther Rezs Saj, killed in a Jewish forced-labor battalion in January 1943;
my grandfather Ferenc Hmori, who mixed his butter and honey together
before putting it on his bread; my grandmother Joln Sznt Hmori, who
lived through everything and then ate o of cheery yellow plates, of which I
have broken only a few; my grandfather Charles D. Enselberg, who xed up
hearts and did silly dances in the living room; and my grandmother Minna
Stitch Enselberg, who played a mean game of bridge and still bought her
candy on the Lower East Side well into her nineties. They raised my par-
ents, Andras Hamori and Ruth Enselberg Hamori, whom I count myself
impossibly fortunate to have and to know. They are exceptional people.
I have beneted from the support, challenges, questions, suggestions,
and musings of many people, including Jonathan Stkl, Ilona Zsolnay, and
the members of my quarterly working group, Karina Martin Hogan, Amy
Kalmanofsky, Adriane Leveen, and Andrea Weiss. I am particularly grate-
ful to several colleagues and friends for their support for this project and for
their encouragement during various stages throughout the writing process:
ix
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x Preface
Susan Ackerman, Mary Boys, John Collins, Daniel Fleming, Martti Nis-
sinen, Mark Smith, Stuart Weeks, Cornel West, and Lauren Winner. Spe-
cial thanks to Carolyn Klaasen, Christopher Hooker, and Ryan Armstrong
for their help in preparing the nal manuscript, to Kate Mertes for her
wonderful indexing work, and to everyone at Yale University Press. And to
Jack, for your support in this, as in everything: thank you.
All translations of Hebrew and cognate languages are my own, except

where otherwise specied.
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Abbreviations
Aes. Aeschylus
Ag. Agamemnon
Ant. Antiquities of the Jews
Aristot. Aristotle
ARM Archives royales de Mari
ASV American Standard Version
BDB Brown, F., S. R. Driver, and C. A. Briggs.
A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament.
Oxford: Clarendon, 1907.
Ber. Berakhot
BHS Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia. Edited by Karl
Elliger and Wilhelm Rudolph et al. 5th rev. ed.
Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft, 1997.
CAD The Assyrian Dictionary of the Oriental Institute of
the University of Chicago. Chicago: Oriental Insti-
tute, 1956.
ch./chs. chapter(s)
Civ. City of God
COS The Context of Scripture. Edited by William W.
Hallo and K. Lawson Younger. 3 vols. Leiden:
Brill, 19972002.
CT Cuneiform Texts from Babylonian Tablets in the
British Museum
CTA Corpus des tablettes en cuniformes alphabtiques
dcouvertes Ras Shamra-Ugarit de 1929 1939.
Edited by A. Herdner. Mission de Ras Shamra
xi
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xii Abbreviations
10. Bibliothque archologique et historique 79. Paris:

Imprimerie Nationale, 1963.
CTH E. Laroche. Catalogue des textes hittites. Paris: Klincksieck,
1971.
Eng. English
ePSD The Electronic Pennsylvania Sumerian Dictionary
ESV English Standard Version
ETCSL The Electronic Text Corpus of Sumerian Literature
Exod. R. Exodus Rabbah
fem. feminine
Gilg Gilgamesh
GKC Gesenius Hebrew Grammar. Edited by E. Kautzsch.
Translated by A. E. Cowley. 2nd ed. Oxford: Clarendon,
1910.
IBHS B. K. Waltke and M. OConnor. An Introduction to Bibli-
cal Hebrew Syntax. Winona Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1990.
JPS Jewish Publication Society
KAR Keilschrifttexte aus Assur religisen Inhalts. Edited by
E. Ebeling. Leipzig: Hinrich, 19191923.
KTU The Cuneiform Alphabetic Texts from Ugarit, Ras Ibn Hani,
and Other Places (Die keilalphabetischen Texte aus Ugarit:
2nd. enlarged ed.). Edited by M. Dietrich, O. Loretz, and
J. Sanmartn. Mnster: Ugarit-Verlag, 1995.
KUB Keilschrifturkunden aus Boghazki, Staatliche Museen zu
Berlin, Vorderasiatische Abteilung. Berlin: Akademie
Verlag, 1921.
Lev. R. Leviticus Rabbah
li. line(s)
LXX Septuagint
masc. masculine
Meg. Megillah
MT Masoretic Text
n., nn. note(s)
NASB New American Standard Bible
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Abbreviations xiii
NIV New International Version

NJPS Tanakh: The Holy Scriptures: The New JPS Translation
According to the Traditional Hebrew Text. Philadelphia:
Jewish Publication Society, 1988.
NKJV New King James Version
NPNF1 Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series 1. Vol. 2. Edited by
Philip Scha. 14 vols., 18861889. Reprint, Peabody, MA:
Hendrickson, 1994.
OB Old Babylonian
Od. Odyssey
Oed. tyr. Oedipus tyrannus
P Penn Tablet, Gilgamesh epic
pi. piel
pl. plural
PN proper name
Pol. Politica
RA Revue dassyriologie et darchologie orientale
SAA State Archives of Assyria
Sam. Pent. Samaritan Pentateuch
SBV Standard Babylonian Version
sing. singular
Soph. Sophocles
Syr. Syriac
Tg. Neb. Targum of the Prophets
Tg. Ps.-J. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan
v./vv. verse(s)
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part
1
Womens Divination and
the Arts of Knowledge
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1 Access to Divine Knowledge
Who has access to divine knowledge?

Biblical traditions are permeated with an interest in the question of
who has special access to divine knowledge and who does not. This distinc-
tion is not only present in the prophetic literature, where it is perhaps most
starkly drawn and best recognized. We also see an awareness of the issue
sprinkled through the stories of the early monarchy, for instance, where it
is one of the dening distinctions between David, who is repeatedly able to
inquire of Yahweh and obtain a clear verbal response (1 Sam 23:24, 912;
1 Sam 30:78; 2 Sam 2:1), and Saul, who is abandoned by the spirit of Yahweh
and thus unable to receive knowledge (1 Sam 16:14; 1 Sam 28:6, 1516). After
unsuccessfully attempting to hear from Yahweh through multiple means
of divination, Saul laments to the ghost of Samuel, whom the necroman-
cer of En-dor has raised: God has turned away from me and doesnt an-
swer me anymore, not through prophets or through dreams! (1 Sam 28:15).
And according to many a narrated comment in the broader tradition, he is
quite correct on this front: Yahweh was with [David], but had left Saul,
-s(1 Sam 18:12). This contrast is also depicted as
a vital distinction among nations and peoples. When Aaron and the Egyp-
tian magicians perform suspiciously similar acts, we see time and again
that unlike the handiwork of the Egyptians, Aarons signs originate in
Yahwehs direct and ongoing verbal instruction to Moses (Exod 6:2814:31).
The question of access to divine knowledge is part of a larger constella-
tion of concerns in biblical literature over who has access: to the temple, to
the people of Israel, to God. Issues of physical proximity and divine-human
contact are particularly evident in legal material (who can enter the holy of
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4 Womens Divination and the Arts of Knowledge
holies? Who can oer a sacrice?), though they appear in prose narrative as
well (who can approach the Ark? Certainly not the Philistines, we nd out
in 1 Sam 56, nor Uzzah, who meets an unfortunate end in 2 Sam 6:67).
Reections on divine-human communication, while also found in a range
of genres, are more concentrated in prose texts. Prophetic oracles and col-
lections are the result of belief in privileged divine-human communication,
but it is more frequently in the narration of divinatory activity that views
on access are revealed.
Divination and the Arts of Knowledge

Until recently, scholars consistently referred to divination as the
counterpoint to prophecy. This was one reection of a scholarly tendency
to accept certain biblical polemics at face value, as if objective and factual:
in this case, polemics referring to divination as false and foreign, even in
spite of other biblical traditions presenting numerous forms of divination as
authentic, Israelite, and legitimate. The acceptance of this polemical posi-
tion stemmed in part from the lingering application of outdated theories
of religion, according to which magic was dened negatively in contrast
to religion. This is now understood to be an articial distinction, based
on a view of magic as Other, such that for virtually any group, ones own
beliefs and practices are considered religious, and those of the Other are
considered magical and illicit. Prophecy was thus accepted as a proper
religious phenomenon, while divination was seen as magical. Now that
the polemical nature of this framework has been recognized, however, divi-
nation is coming to be used as an umbrella term. I will dene it here as
any type of action culturally understood to allow acquisition of knowledge
otherwise restricted to the divine realm. Such actionsincluding prophecy,
necromancy, technical inquiry, and moredier in their details, but not
in their fundamental assumptions and goals. It is increasingly recognized
that prophecy is simply one type of divination.
1. This was recognized already by Long in 1973 (The Eect of Divination upon
Israelite Literature, 48997), and by Grabbe in 1995 (Priests, Prophets, Divin-
ers, Sages, 124, 13941). See next the formative framework of Pongratz-Leisten,
Herrschaftswissen in Mesopotamien, and Cancik-Kirschbaum, Prophetismus und
Divination, 3353; and among several relevant discussions of the issue by Martti
Nissinen, see esp. What Is Prophecy? An Ancient Near Eastern Perspective,
and Prophecy and Omen Divination, 34147. Most recently, see Stkl, Prophecy
in the Ancient Near East, 711.
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Access to Divine Knowledge 5
To some readers, the idea of prophecy may still feel dierent from
technical divinationand to be sure, each form of divination does have its
own unique characteristicsbut prophecy can no more be extricated from
the broader category than any other form of divinatory activity. Attempts
to establish a principled distinction between prophecy on the one hand and
divination on the other have not succeeded, as I discuss in detail in the next
chapter.
Divination, then, refers to a range of means of acquiring privileged
divine knowledge, but gaining such knowledge does not by itself constitute
divination. Divination should include one or more of three elements: in-
tent, interpretation (whether through technical skill or divine inspiration),
or an indication of the special identity of the diviner (whether through
training or divine call). Various aspects of dream divination will illustrate
this. Dream incubation, the inducement of a so-called signicant dream
(that is, one with a divinely sent message), especially through sleeping at
a sanctuary or other sacred place, is a clear example of intent. Gleaning
knowledge from a symbolic-message dream (that is, one that must be
deciphered)whether incubated or spontaneous, and whether ones own
dream or anothersrequires interpretation. Receiving divine knowledge
through a spontaneous message dream (that is, one with a clear verbal
statement) constitutes divination if, but only if, the recipient is depicted as
having a special identity as a diviner, like Joseph. Whether or not a modern
reader would consider a spontaneously received message dream from God
to constitute remarkable, even prophetic, communication, the biblical texts
do not do so. No divination is present when an individual receives a dream
passively and without implication of the character having special access to
divine knowledge (Abimelech, Gen 20:3; Laban, Gen 31:24). Dreams of this
last type are comparable to the patriarchs waking conversations with God,
which, in the biblical authors theologically romanticized view of the past,
are portrayed as everyday occurrences.
Any single one of these three factorsintent, interpretation, or spe-
cial identitymay indicate divinatory particularity: receipt of a prophetic
call constitutes identication as an individual whose divine-human com-
munication is privileged. There is more frequently a combination of these
2. On fundamentals of message and symbolic-message dreams, see S. A. L.

Butler, Mesopotamian Conceptions of Dreams and Dream Rituals, 1519; and on
incubation, 21739. For a more recent and fuller treatment, see Zgoll, Traum und
Welterleben im antiken Mesopotamien.
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elements present: necromancy requires intent as well as possibly the special

identity of the necromancer, but probably not interpretation; extispicy (the
professional reading of the innards of an animal sacriced for this purpose)
requires intent, interpretation of the ndings, and the special identity of
the diviner.
The suggestion that divination consists in having special access to
divine knowledge, and that it should reect some combination of intent,
interpretation, and/or special identity, is not intended to be a hard-and-fast
list of requirements. Ancient authors did not dene divination, were not
restricted to categorizing each act as either divinatory or not divinatory,
and diered in their portrayals of such activity. It does, however, attempt
to explain why some things seem to be portrayed as special access to divine
knowledge and some do not.
By this denition, the type of casual divine-human conversation por-
trayed as common for the patriarchs is excluded: their ongoing conver-
sations include none of the previously mentioned requirements. On the
other hand, while Jonah intends not to prophesy, and Gods statements to
him do not require interpretation, his conversations with God constitute
divinatory activity because he is identied through title and depiction as
an individual with privileged divine-human communication. Most angelic
appearances are not acts of divination, as they require no human intent or
interpretation and assume no special identity of a diviner. Angelic com-
munications should be considered to have a range of types, like dreams,
including direct messages (as in the straightforward communications scat-
tered throughout Genesis) and symbolic messages (as in late prophecy and
apocalyptic literature); only the latter would involve divination on the part
of the human character. In each caseworkaday divine-human conversa-
tions, resisted prophetic messages, spontaneous angelic appearancesa key
factor is whether or not the interaction was understood within its own
sociocultural context to constitute a type of communication from the deity
that was out of the ordinary in form, method, or content.
It is tempting to consider the ability to interpret to be the dening
feature of divination, and indeed, it is often central: the diviner might have
special skills, but certainly has special understanding. It is not the holder of
a message who divines, but the interpreter. For example, it is not necessarily
the dreamer who divines, any more than the sheep examines its own liver
(though the former is perhaps more common). Thus, when the imprisoned
Egyptian butler and baker each have a dream, they are despondent and say
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to Joseph, We each had a dream, but there is no one to interpret them.

So Joseph said to them, Doesnt God have the interpretations? So tell me
(Gen 40:8). They proceed to tell him their dreams, and hethe one with
special access to knowledge from the divine realminterprets. Here the
dreamer is not the diviner. While dreaming itself plays little part in the
present study, because there are no dreams reported for female characters in
the Bible, this example should illustrate the interpretive role of the diviner.
I refer here to the range of methods of divination as the arts of knowledge,
as inspired by the Greek concept of divinatory activity as (art, craft, skill).
The term is sometimes used even to refer to ecstatic prophecy, as in Aristo-
tles reference to Onomacritus practicing the art of prophecy,
(Aristot. Pol. 1274a.28), and Jocastas denial of any human being having pro-
phetic art (Soph. Oed. tyr. 709), both using in
conjunction with . Aeschylus portrays prophecy similarly: at one point in
Agamemnon, as the chorus continues to express baement at Cassandras ecstatic
prophecies, they question what good can come of the wordy arts of prophecy,
(Aes. Ag. 1134). Shortly thereafter, they ask Cassandra if she
had been seized by the prophetic arts, (Aes.
Ag. 1209 [Lloyd-Jones]).
The term lends itself to a range of interpretations, especially when
used in combination with other divination language. The last phrase in the
previous paragraph (Aes. Ag. 1209), for instance, is rendered alternately as pos-
sessed by the skill the god inspires (Collard), possessed by the arts of divine
prophecy (Young), and perhaps best, seized by the inspired arts (Flower). By
the arts of knowledge I mean to indicate the full range of senses of the term:
the array of types of divination, from prophecy to use of technical instruments,
is characterized by the privileged access gained through , through craft,
art, technique, skill.
3. Other examples include the dreams of Pharaoh and Nebuchadnezzar inter-

preted by Joseph and Daniel, respectively, and the charming vignette of Gideon
coming upon two men chatting, one telling his dream and the other interpreting
it ( Judg 7:1315).
4. Lloyd-Jones, Aeschylus: The Oresteia; Collard, Aeschylus: Oresteia; Young, Aeschylus:
The Oresteia; and Flower, The Seer in Ancient Greece. Flower also mentions the
use of together with in his work on Greek divination, and sum-
marizes: What Greeks called the craft of divination (mantik techn) was the art
of interpreting the meaning of signs that were sent by the gods (Flower, The Seer
in Ancient Greece, 72).
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I am primarily interested in ancient Israelite ideas about divination:

how did various authors conceive of who had access to divine knowledge?
Who could gain direct access to such knowledge, when, and how? These
questions of who has access to direct divine-human contact and communi-
cation are the Israelites own, as seen in the examples earlier in this chapter.
In what follows, I ask these questions specically in regard to women.
Why Women?
As we know, most biblical texts are focused on male activity and writ-
ten from a male perspective. This is old news. In addition, most scholarly
attention to divinatory activity has been focused on prophecy. There are
only a few female prophets in the Bible; there are, however, many more
women who engage in other types of divination. This combination of fac-
tors has resulted in a awed picture of the world of Israelite divination. In
current scholarship, the prevailing image is still one dominated by prophets,
almost all male. An examination of the full spectrum of womens divinatory
activity should break this open. What comes into view instead is a world
full of people attempting to access divine knowledge in a multitude of ways.
The focus here on womens divination should provide valuable information
in itself, but it also eshes out the picture of the manifold divinatory roles
in biblical literature overall. My hope in writing this work is not (only) that
it should bring to light the many biblical reections of womens divinatory
activity, but that in doing so, it might color our view of the vastly complex,
rich, and diverse world of ancient Israelite divination.
I noted earlier that the question of who has privileged divine access
is the Israelites own. Questions regarding the status of groups not in the
biblical spotlight (for example, Moabites) are also found in the traditions
themselves. A good deal of biblical writing appears to have been motivated
5. Throughout this book, I use the term Israelite broadly in recognition of a tie
that binds authors and editors from a range of places and periods, those whose
eventually collected writings reect a shared sense of their origins in Israel.
Terms such as biblical authors and biblical thought are imperfect as well,
since in the rst case the concept would be meaningless to the writers them-
selves, and in the second case the phrase is theologically loaded and too often
employed in methodologically unsound ways. Among imperfect ways to refer to
the broad and complex group of thinkers and their written reections, I nd the
term Israelite to be the most logical.
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by issues of communal identity formation in relation to the Other. This

often takes the form of dening Israel and Israelite identity in opposition
to other nations. Upon further reection, though, it is evident that many
texts are concerned more specically with dening Israelite male identity.
This is not only a matter of male authorial perspective in a general sense, but
is frequently a more overt (if unstated) concern. It is patently the case, for
instance, in legal material addressing issues of how to deal with wives and
other women, which female relatives one should not have sex with, and other
matters specic to men. The concern with male identity is also evident in a
structure common to many narrative texts, featuring men who are dened
by their heredity, geographical origin, and deity, and including women who
are dened secondarily as relatives (wife, mother, daughter, sister) of a male
character. In addition to this identity pyramid, the literature often reects
an interest in how the men as primary characters address issues in society
relating to women as secondary characters. The poetic texts describing fe-
male activity are concerned primarily with the dangers posed by women (the
archetypal foreign woman, the evil city personied as a woman, and so on).
Two aspects of Israels self-understanding as reected in biblical texts
are then evident. First, the authors concerns with who has access to divine
knowledge and who does not are fused with broader issues of identity con-
struction in relation to the Other, including individuals (David versus
Saul) and groups (Israel versus Egypt). Second, within many texts, the con-
cern is specically Israelite male identity, and women comprise a signicant
category of Other. It should be of interest, then, to consider how various
traditions conceive of womens access to the divine.
Recent years have shown a growing interest in womens prophecy
throughout the ancient Near East, and including Israel. There has been no
signicant work, however, on the range of womens divination in biblical
literature. The three existing monographs on the subject of the female bib-
lical prophets have been concerned specically with prophecy, and not the
broader phenomenon of divination. Meanwhile, recent inuential works
6. And within that, these texts reect the perspectives and interests of male heads
of household, as opposed to servants, resident aliens, and so on.
7. Fischer, Gottesknderinnen; Butting, Prophetinnen Gefragt; and Gafney, Daugh-
ters of Miriam. All three are interested in the presence or inuence of female
prophets beyond those so titled in the texts, but in no case is this a matter of
exploring the fuller picture of divination (see further discussion in ch. 2 of the
present book).
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on divination have not included particular attention to women. There is

not yet any study of womens divination in the Bible.
The methodological segregation does not stem from the prophetic
side alone, or from scholars focused on biblical texts. Work on ancient Near
Eastern divination tends to focus on technical or academic methods, such
as extispicy and omen compendialogically enough, since these are by
denition the types for which we have the most textual evidence. Because
academic divination was overwhelmingly a male profession, such research
is naturally focused on men. The next step is more problematic: divination
is then circularly dened to be male. (An added factor is that even while we
note that there are many varieties of divination, we tend to have the bar
in mind when we say diviner.) The slippage from discussing technical or
academic divination to divination, thus framing all divination in terms
of the types practiced almost exclusively by men, is often subtle. It occurs
even in the work of scholars clearly familiar with the full range of divina-
tory methods, and even where the possible presence of womens divination
is addressed overtly. Frederick Cryer, for instance, concludes that female
diviners were extremely rare:
Since divination is always held to produce real knowledge, and, as I have also
mentioned, since access to knowledge is invariably restricted in any society
(whether by economic pressures, at, tabu, or whatever is unimportant), one
should note that access to the sort of knowledge produced by divination in
the ancient Near East was also in many ways severely restricted. Thus, for
example, to take only the most obvious point of departure, there were virtu-
ally no female diviners, so that, in spite of the fact that women apparently
could consult the diviner, there was no doubt a good deal they could not talk
meaningfully with him about.
This must be understood in terms of Cryers stated primary interest in

technical, scribal divination (he uses the term divination to mean tech-
nical divination throughout his book), but the broader claim it implies is
more explicit elsewhere. He states, for instance, that Mesopotamian divi-
nation was very much a literate phenomenon (and here divination cannot
be shorthand for scribal divination, since that would result in an absurd
8. The works of Cryer and Jeers both reect the newer understanding of prophecy
as a type of divination, but both focus on male activity (not explicitly), on which
more follows in the text. Cryer, Divination in Ancient Israel; Jeers, Magic and
Divination.
9. Cryer, Divination in Ancient Israel, 213.
Y6621.indb 10 1/27/15 1:07 PM

tautological statement). When we read divination texts, we are seeing evi-

dence specically of scribal divination. The practical result of this, though,
is that divination is then conceived primarily in terms of scribalmale
practices. For example, Cryer acknowledges that every document we pos-
sess of ancient Near Eastern divination derives from the upper echelons of
society, that is, from the tiny literate minority. This implies that many more
types of divination and other magics may have been practised in society at
large than we shall ever have evidence for; nonetheless, his work on biblical
evidence of divination includes no mention of the women of Ezekiel 13.
But if the obstacle is that the practitioners featured in scribal divina-
tion are overwhelmingly male, then what kinds of divination did women
practice, and to what sort of material can we look for evidence? Other types
of divinationthat is, nonscribalwould by denition leave less of a tablet
trail. We do see the activity of women in some texts that are primarily and
overtly about divination, such as the female prophets (with various titles
and untitled) of the Mari letters and the Neo-Assyrian oracles. Within
the Mari letters, we also have reports of female dreamers, and the letter in
which ibtu, the queen, reports practicing a form of technical or ritual divi-
nation: she gives drink to a group of male and female prophets to inquire
about signs (ARM 26 207).
The examination of what we might call divination textsthat is, texts
primarily and overtly about divinationdoes thus yield some information
about female diviners, as does a consideration of particular vocabulary. This
is the case in the study of Israelite texts as well. But if we limit ourselves to
divination texts and texts characterized by a technical vocabulary, we will
only get a partial picture of ancient Israelite ideas about womens divina-
tion. Other kinds of literary texts bear witness that the Israelite cultural
imaginary encompassed more than the practices of academic divination.
Whether these literary texts reect realities on the ground, or only the
web of ideas through which people viewed the world and their relations
10. Ibid., 138. Or similarly, continuing to view divination in terms of academic

methods, Cryer writes (in a section subtitled Unusual Genres) that some
practices, such as necromancy and prophecy, cannot be said to have been cen-
tral to the tradition of Mesopotamian divination (18081).
11. Ibid., 209.
12. For texts, see Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, and Par-
pola, Assyrian Prophecies.
13. Sasson, The Posting of Letters with Divine Messages, 308; Durand, In Vino
Veritas, 4350.
Y6621.indb 11 1/27/15 1:07 PM

to other human beings, is a dierent question. Certainly, literary portray-

als of womens divination (encompassing a range of literary genres) must
be distinguished from historical sources. Depictions in narrative literature
do not expand our knowledge about divinatory practice in a straightfor-
ward way.
We have no information regarding womens divination in Israel except
for what we read in assorted literary texts that went through long processes
of revision. As we approach these texts, it is good to remember that Meso-
potamia, which left us voluminous collections of elite male divination, also
produced literary texts in which women perform acts of divination. Israel is
not set apart by the fact that its cultural imaginary nds female divination
to be a signicant theme. For this reason, literary compositions from other
parts of the Near East provide a more relevant point of comparison than
many historical divination texts. Consider the following three depic-
tions of women as dream interpreters.
The goddess Nane is known for this skill, as seen for instance in The
Building of Ningirsus Temple. Gudea has a dream, but as we are told:
Outstanding though his mind was, the message remained to be under-
stood for him. He says, then:
Profound things (?) came suddenly to me, the shepherd, but I do not un-
derstand the meaning of what the nocturnal vision brought to me. So I will
take my dream to my mother and I will ask my dream-interpreter, an expert
on her own, my divine sister from Sirara, Nane, to reveal its meaning to
me . . . I want to make [your house] perfect for you [Ningirsu], so I will ask
your sister, the child born of Eridug, an authority on her own, the lady, the
dream-interpreter among the gods, my divine sister from Sirara, Nane, to
show me the way . . . Nane, mighty lady, lady of most precious (?) powers,
lady who like Enlil determines fates, my Nane, what you say is trustworthy
and takes precedence. You are the interpreter of dreams among the gods, you
are the lady of all the lands.
14. As noted by Stuart Weeks, By understanding the biblical prophetic literature

principally in terms of Israelite prophetic activity, which may be as egregious a
category confusion as anything ever done to Genesis, traditional scholarship on
prophecy has justied the rejection as irrelevant of texts which could shed much
light on that literature (Predictive and Prophetic Literature: Can Neferti Help
Us Read the Bible? 43).
15. Translation of Black, The Literature of Ancient Sumer, 4452, li. 2332, 4350, and
93100.
Y6621.indb 12 1/27/15 1:07 PM

One would not ordinarily refer to a goddess as performing divination;

a divine being, after all, should not need to do too much to access divine
knowledge. Within the context of the literature, though, this is not a rel-
evant distinction, and Nane is called a dream-interpreter repeatedly.
Note the range of epithets presenting her as a divinerthat is, as having
this special knowledge not because she is a goddess, but because she is
skilled at dream interpretation: she is my dream-interpreter, an expert on
her own . . . an authority on her own, the lady, the dream-interpreter among
the gods . . . lady of most precious (?) powers.
Nane then interprets the dream in detail, and Gudea responds ac-
cordingly, after which he receives a message in a second dream, which he
conrms through extispicy. The two forms of divination in response to the
dreams are treated similarly in the text. There is no indication of a hierar-
chical relationship between divination through dream interpretation and
through extispicy.
This is not an isolated phenomenon. In OB Gilgamesh as well, we
see a goddess portrayed as a dream interpreter. Gilgamesh is disturbed by
strange dreams and tells them to his mother, Ninsun. She interprets each
dream in turn, introduced each time as the mother of Gilgamesh, knowing
everything (P 15, 37).
The third literary reection of womens dream interpretation is found
in Dumuzis Dream, where Dumuzi wakes up from a terrible dream and
turns to his sister Getinanna for an interpretation:
He woke upa dream! He shivereda sleep!
He rubbed his eyes, was terried!
Bring, bring, bring my sister!
Bring my Getinanna, bring my sister!
Bring my tablet knowing scribe, bring my sister!
Bring my song knowing singer, bring my sister!
Bring my skillful girl, who knows the meaning of words, bring my sister!
Bring my wise woman, who knows the portent of dreams, bring my sister!
Let me relate the dream to her.
The series of epithets Dumuzi rattles o is astonishing. He begins by

calling Getinanna my tablet knowing scribe, and then names her abun-
dant other skills. The rst epithet does not indicate formal scribal dream
16. The goddess Gula is also called a diviner, as discussed in a later chapter.
17. Alster, Dumuzis Dream, 55, li. 1925.
Y6621.indb 13 1/27/15 1:07 PM

interpretation. It is, rather, part of an expression of the wide-ranging

knowledge and wisdom of Getinanna. The last lines characterize her spe-
cically as having divinatory abilities. Dumuzi cries: Bring my skillful girl,
who knows the meaning of words! . . . Bring my wise woman, who knows
the portent of dreams, bring my sister! Let me relate the dream to her.
Getinannas extensive wisdom includes the special insight of dream inter-
pretation, as well as insight into the meaning of words. The epithet wise
woman itself, discussed in a later chapter, can also carry a connotation of
divinatory ability.
The portrayal of skillful Getinanna, then, encompasses a range of
types of special insight. She is a dream interpreter, and a tablet-knowing
scribe; she is a wise woman, knowing the meaning of words and the por-
tent of dreams. Note the emphasis on knowledge throughout: Getinanna
does not just read texts, she knows tablets, knows the meaning of words,
knows the portent of dreams. Ninsun is also poetically portrayed as hav-
ing special knowledge, in her repeated epithet: the mother of Gilgamesh,
knowing everything. Nane, similarly, is described as an expert, author-
ity, lady of precious powers, and dream-interpreter. In each case, the
interpretations are shown to be correctnot surprisingly, since the women
are known as dream interpreters and sought out in each story by the hero
for that purpose.
Divinatory skill does not dene the role of the female characters, how-
ever. In the latter two texts in particular, the primary sense of the character
is relational: the epic is about Gilgamesh, and in one scene he is comforted
and instructed by his mother; and the hero of the last text is Dumuzi, who
turns to Getinanna to interpret his dream not only because she is particu-
larly skilled, but because she is his sister. Interpret she does, and her dismay
is greater than his own at the meaning of the dream. The poetic description
of her grief, rst as she interprets his dream and then as he ees for his life,
is as poignant as any moment in Near Eastern literature (and beyond). His
dream begins with an image of rushes and reeds, tearing and shaking, in-
cluding a twin reed being removed from him (li. 29). His sister interprets
and grieves:
My brother, your dream is not favorable, it is very clear to me!
The twin reed of which one was being removed from you (is)
I and youone will be removed from you . . .
My hair will whirl around in heaven for you . . .
I shall scratch my cheeks with my nger nails like a comb for you . . .
Y6621.indb 14 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Getinanna cried toward heaven, cried toward earth.

(Her) cries covered the horizon completely like a cloth and were spread out
like linen.
She scratched the eyes, she scratched the face,
She scratched the ears, the public place,
She scratched the buttocks, the secret place.
My brother! I will [walk around ] in the streets [ for you]!
If Getinanna had not known where Dumuzi was,
How terribly she would have looked!
How terribly she would have screamed!
This is not a divination text: it is unrelated to the various genres of

historical sources that inform us about divinatory methods, personnel, or
interpretation of ndings. It is also not a ction about divination. It is above
all a work of literature expressing something of the angst of the human
experience. In the course of this literary portrait, we see a girl interpret her
brothers dream. We see similar reections in the other two examples as
well. Gudea knows that the dream is important and that it involves some-
thing preternatural. The text raises his need to know to mythic intensity.
Gilgameshs dreams relate to the coming of Enkidu, who will change his
life, and whose death will lead to Gilgameshs tragic quest. Dumuzi is ter-
ried. In each of the three stories, a womana divine sister, a mother,
and a sisteris called upon to divine something of ultimate concern in the
dreamers life. In the cultural imagination of the Mesopotamians, as in that
of the Israelites, as we shall see, divination by women is a live theme.
The circular denition of divination as a male endeavor is not solved
simply by expanding the source material to include literary texts: certain
presuppositions must also be set aside. In the continuation of his state-
ment on the virtual nonexistence of female diviners (quoted earlier), Cryer,
having briey noted earlier the activities of Getinanna and the mother of
Gilgamesh, still concludes, Admittedly, there was, as we have seen, a female
dream-interpreter (ailtu), but I have argued that dream interpreting was
among the types of divination which became popular in the course of the
rst millennium, and so was of lesser authority. Both of these examples,
18. Ibid., 59, 61, 81, li. 42, 4849, 6769, 24048. The nal couplet also appears in
description of the old woman who briey hides Dumuzi (li. 20515), but in her
case this is all we see; in Getinannas case, it caps the depiction of her grief.
19. Cryer, Divination in Ancient Israel, 213.
Y6621.indb 15 1/27/15 1:07 PM

of course, come from long before the rst millennium, and in both texts,
the womans dream interpretation is treated as authoritative. Even despite
having noted that Ninsuns interpretation of her sons dreams is juxtaposed
with Gilgameshs and Enkidus attempts to interpret one anothers dreams,
when they almost invariably get it wrong, with catastrophic consequences,
Cryer assumes an overall picture according to which womens divination, in
the one form he observes, lacked authority.
The setting aside of womens divination as exceptional, popular, and
lacking authority seems tenuous and based on prior suppositions. In each
of the three examples mentioned, the woman who performs divination is
extolled as an expert. As we see in these literary works, womens dream in-
terpretation had signicant authority for the characters; this reveals some-
thing of the authors world of ideas. There were surely gendered dierences
in society that can be observed, but they must not be assumed. Most ob-
viously, professional academic divination was predominantly male, and in
the parts of society where that had primary authority, womens divination
would presumably have less. We have seen, however, that even the great
literary traditions (that is, of the male scribal elite) reect ideas about sig-
nicant, authoritative, and eective womens divination.
These myths show that womens divination looms large in the mytho-
logical imagination of the Mesopotamians. But the biblical stories are
about human agents, and this can lead to complex questions regarding the
historical accuracy of their portrayals of womens divination during vari-
ous periods. The texts were composed by many hands at dierent times.
Scholars have worked to tease apart the strands, to ascribe motifs in a story
to dierent historical periods, and to interpret texts according to the dates
they assign them. Sometimes this is extremely useful; sometimes it be-
comes circular, and creates an obstacle to understanding what the text may
actually be presenting in its picture of divinatory activity. An additional
problematic aspect of interpreting this literature through the lens of pro-
posed authorial contexts is that it tends to rely on the assumption that we
20. Ibid., 157. Women are also virtually absent in Jeers, Magic and Divination.
21. For example, while the Huldah tradition contains some clear indications that
certain events had not yet transpired, the assignment of the Miriam tradition
to the Persian period (based, in my view, on less solid evidence) can circularly
shape or conrm interpretation of what the texts show of her divinatory role.
Y6621.indb 16 1/27/15 1:07 PM

know what an author set out to do, and what precise knowledge the author
had about the relevant form of divination.
The En-dor story may serve as an example of how the layers of literary
possibilities can render historical conclusions all but impossible. The writer
of the story clearly has a goal that is not simply reporting a set of facts.
The author has something to say about Saul and is turning to the authority
of Samuel for this purpose. But what of the presentation of the divining
woman? On the most basic level, she is simply necessary for the plot. In
order to use the authority of a character who has already died, the character
must be somehow brought back. Does the story of the medium of En-dor
demonstrate that necromancy was commonly practiced in Israel, or might
it just be the authors best means of turning to the authority of Samuel after
he has died? Perhaps necromancy was indeed common but looked nothing
like this (presumably the goal could not have been the visible raising of the
dead, or it would not generally have been seen as successful), and here it is
just a necessary plot device. Or might the author have used a convention of
a certain kind of woman performing a common form of divination, because
he knew it from his day? Or, as suggested earlier regarding the birth omen,
maybe this is how the author imagined things happening in earlier times.
Then again, it could be a throwback, but reasonably accurate. Or was some
form of necromancy common in the authors day, but not the authors social
location? Is it possible that the author drew a somewhat stereotypical and
inaccurate picture of what people did out in the villages, when he himself
had rsthand knowledge only of the religious circles of the elite?
My aim here is to examine the texts that depict womens divination
without depending on specic proposals regarding the authors contexts. I
will try to show that the divinatory activity of women is an important and
enormously varied motif in the Bible; I will try to bring out, without his-
torical or theological preconception, how the texts view the diviners (whom
they often place in tense, dramatic situations), and I will suggest that a
synoptic view of the female diviners allows some interesting patterns to
come to light. I do not take an overall xed position on the epistemological
status of these stories. At a minimum, they make clear that the image of
the female diviner had a notable place in the Israelite cultural imagination.
In my view, a realistic maximalist position would be that actual womens
divination bore some resemblances to its portrayal in literary texts, not par-
ticularly more or less so than with other types of religious activity, and that
Y6621.indb 17 1/27/15 1:07 PM

perhaps under certain circumstances it had as much authority as did other

kinds of divination.
In what follows, I include every biblical text that I see either as reect-
ing a tradition of womens divination or as otherwise signicant for a thor-
ough examination of the subject. I do so sticking closely to the Masoretic
Text, not because no relevant or intriguing emendations could be found,
but because it seems particularly important to be clear that none of the fol-
lowing interpretations are based on emendations or reconstructions.
Divination, as dened in this book, does not privilege one type of divi-
natory activity over another; therefore, the cast of characters will include
women familiar from scholarly discussions of prophecy (where usually a
woman is taken into account because a biblical text labels her a prophet)
as well as others whom the text shows engaging in divinatory activity. As
the reader will see, the activities described in the various texts cannot be
neatly categorized by title. This issue has been observed already in regard
to mens religious activity, and it is unsurprising that it is evident in the
texts depicting womens divination as well. Two women called prophets
may function quite dierently from one another, for example; meanwhile, a
necromancer in one text may resemble a prophet in another text more than
she does another necromancer. For this reason, I treat the various texts in
( Jewish) canonical order, rather than making some contrived eort to cat-
egorize them by type, which would be simplistic and misleading. Modes of
divinatory activity were complex and overlapping, and in regard to types
of divinationas in other ways as wellthese portrayals of divination may
not conform to our expectations.
22. I do not, however, address every text that has been proposed as an example of
womens intermediary activity. In particular, I do not think that there is adequate
evidence to support the theory that the women who serve at the tent of meeting
are acting as cult prophets. For that hypothesis, see Fischer, Gottesknderinnen,
96108.
23. On the common overlap between various roles, in contrast to ideal types, see
Grabbe, Shaman, Preacher, or Spirit Medium? The Israelite Prophet in the
Light of Anthropological Models, esp. 12831.
Y6621.indb 18 1/27/15 1:07 PM

2 Setting the Stage
Prophecy scholarship, as noted in the previous chapter, has been col-

ored by the widespread assumption of a categorical distinction between
prophecy and divination, itself a lingering symptom of the older distinc-
tion between religion and magic. Even when a family resemblance between
prophecy and other forms of divination is recognized, divination in Israel
is still frequently set apart in scholarly literature as a practice relegated to
popular religion and as equivalent to false prophecy.
Outdated approaches to studies involving women in biblical texts also
persist. The transition from womens studies to gender studies (a good
academic expression of the shift from second-wave to third-wave femi-
nism) is most evident in work explicitly on both men and women. Where
it makes sense to focus on womens activity, howeversuch as in a realm
where it has yet to be recognized as existing or signicantit is often still
done as if somehow extractable from a fully gendered society, essentializing
women and ignoring the contextual realities of the social constructions of
male and female identity. A study of the literary portrayal of female di-
viners must be attentive to the layers of gendered assumptions: rst in the
depiction of womens religious activity by men in specic ancient Israelite
cultural contexts, where the authors gendered views are precisely the point,
and then in modern interpretation, where scholarly assumptions regarding
gender are applied to ancient texts.
The articial dichotomies between prophecy and divination, religion
and magic, ocial and popular religion, true and false prophecy, and in-
herently male and female gender roles have each been refuted, but these
methodological corrections have largely remained eld-specic and have
19
Y6621.indb 19 1/27/15 1:07 PM

not yet ltered into other specialized areas. The work of scholars who have
moved beyond the model of magic versus religion, or the work of spe-
cialists in the study of divination, may at times continue to reect outdated
approaches to gender; those with expertise in gender studies may continue
to assume a dichotomous relationship between magic and religion, of-
cial and popular religion; and so on. Across a range of topics relevant
to this study, a good deal of scholarship continues to assume an older, out-
dated model in one or more of these areas. Thus, while it is not new to break
down any particular one of the following pairs, the present work depends
on the integration of more recent approaches in each area. The study of the
literary portrayal of womens divination must be set against the background
of these newer (and changing) ideas.
Religion and Magic

Until relatively recently in the history of scholarship, religion and
magic were generally understood to stand in opposition to one another.
More specically, magic was seen as the negative counterpart to religion.
Early ideas common in social scientic work included, in broad strokes, the
notion that magic is primitive, while religion is advanced and theologically
sophisticated; that magic is peripheral (that is, what outsiders do), while re-
ligion is central (what insiders do); that magic is clandestine, while religion
is public; that magic is subversive, while religion is conventional; that magic
is malevolent and dangerous, while religion is benevolent and safe; that
magic is coercive, depending on human agency, while religion is faith-ful,
depending on divine agency; that magic consists in illegitimate reaching for
power or for the sacred, while religion represents legitimate, proper access;
and so on. The development of these ideas in the formative period of mod-
ern anthropology and the sociology of religion has been traced in detail by
many scholars already and need not be rehashed here.
1. This is in addition to the more deeply awed work lacking contemporary meth-
odology within its own area, such as work on prophets that assumes an objective
opposition between true and false prophecy, or work on women that essential-
izes gender roles.
2. Readers interested in a detailed discussion of the history of these ideas should
see Styers, Making Magic; Cunningham, Religion and Magic; and for a topical
approach, including gender and witchcraft, Bowie, The Anthropology of Religion.
See also the helpful surveys of Stratton, Naming the Witch, ixxi and 118; and
Y6621.indb 20 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Setting the Stage 21
The last several decades have seen a radical shift in this area. Cur-
rent scholarship recognizes the problematic nature of the dichotomy as
based on cultural assumptions according to which ones own beliefs and
practices are considered religious, while those belonging to people(s)
and groups dierent from ones own are then dened as magical. These
skewed views of magic as other, dened negatively in opposition to re-
ligion, characterized by its deviation from the norm of religion (and
thus being deviant), undergird a vast amount of older work in biblical
scholarship and religious studies, and the same assumptions or their in-
uence can still be seen in a surprising amount of current work in biblical
studies. However, modern scholars of religion would at the very least seri-
ously challenge the older characterizations and point out the overlapping
nature of magic and religion, and many would go further, arguing that
religion and magic cannot helpfully be dened as two separable catego-
ries at all. Jonathan Z. Smith has bitingly articulated the problem and his
response to it:
In their turn, these aws [in dening magic] have been brought about by
the fact that in academic discourse magic has almost always been treated
as a contrast term, a shadow reality known only by looking at the reection
of its opposite (religion, science) in a distorting fun-house mirror. Or, to
put this another way, within the academy, magic has been made to play the
role of an evaluative rather than an interpretive term, and, as such, usually
bears a negative value . . . For these (and other) reasons, I see little merit in
continuing the use of the substantive term magic in second-order, theo-
retical, academic discourse.
Klutz, Reinterpreting Magic in the World of Jewish and Christian Scrip-

ture: An Introduction, 111; or Cryer, Divination in Ancient Israel, 4295.
3. An early turning point was Alan F. Segals essay in which he challenged the
scholarly assumption that magic is something specic and distinct from re-
ligion, on the grounds that the meaning of magic is relative, varies by social
context, and in scholarly use reects our own cultural biases (Hellenistic Magic:
Some Questions of Denition, 34975). More recently, see the important con-
tributions of Gager, Introduction, in Curse Tablets and Binding Spells from the
Ancient World, 2225; J. Z. Smith, Trading Places, 1327; J. Z. Smith, Religion,
Religions, Religious, 26981; and Remus, Magic, Method, Madness, 25898.
With direct bearing on biblical and other Near Eastern literature, see many rel-
evant sections of Schmitt, Magie im Alten Testament.
4. J. Z. Smith, Trading Places, 16.
Y6621.indb 21 1/27/15 1:07 PM

The complication, as Smith and others observe, is that the use of

magic as a negative contrast term is not restricted to such second-order,
theoretical discourse, but is used also in rst-order discourse, that is, within
the societies (ancient and modern) that the academic work aims to analyze.
Though there too it is still primarily used in reference to the illicit ritual
activity of the Otherand thus can be used by conicting groups to refer
to one anothers practices, each considering their own to be legitimate
the employment of this language within virtually all societies has had a
signicant impact on scholarly assumptions about magic. It is thus neither
necessary nor possible to throw out the term magic altogether. Newer
scholarship is addressing the necessity of nding ways to discuss magic
while recognizing the inherently problematic nature of the term. The cur-
rent predominant approach is to shift the focus onto the use of accusa-
tions of magic as a means to silence others and to delegitimize positions or
practices contrary to those of ones own social or theological group. Given
these complexities, it is often understood to be more useful to name an act
than a categoryfor example, curse or blessing, without the judgment
of whether a given incidence is a religious or magical curse.
It is untenable at this point to dene magic clearly as a category sepa-
rate from and in opposition to religion. One only need look at Mesopota-
mia or Egypt, where we see magical rituals at the center of the societies
religious systems, to realize the merit of this position. When it comes to
5. See the discussion of the unconvinced J. Z. Smith, ibid., 1720; also Stratton,
Naming the Witch, 138; Johnston, Describing the Undenable, 5054; John-
ston, Ancient Greek Divination, 14648; and Versnel, Some Reections on the
Relationship Magic-Religion, 17797.
6. See for example Stratton, Naming the Witch, who understands magic as a form of
social discourse ( la Foucault), with an interest in the power relations involved
in what was dened as magic in various contexts, and by whom; and the key
discussions she cites of Phillips, The Sociology of Religious Knowledge in the
Roman Empire, 2677773, and Garrett, The Demise of the Devil. As J. Z. Smith
notes, though, this shift begs the question of whether anyone has actually prac-
ticed magic, a point that scholars who agree on the level of theory still debate
regarding contexts from Africa to Salem (Trading Places, 20).
7. See Stratton, Naming the Witch, 89, for further discussion.
8. This is not to suggest that the concept of magic is so clear elsewhere in the
Near East; note particularly van Binsbergen and Wiggermann, Magic in His-
tory: A Theoretical Perspective, and Its Application to Ancient Mesopotamia,
334. See also Ritner, The Religious, Social, and Legal Parameters of Traditional
Y6621.indb 22 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Israelite religion, there is at times more hesitation either to label some prac-
tices magical, or to regard magical acts as legitimate parts of religious
practice. Examples abound, however, of magical practice in Israelite reli-
gion and among major Israelite religious gures.
One might consider the many acts of Elisha, such as when he tosses a
stick into the water to make an iron axhead oat (2 Kgs 6:57), or when he
throws salt into water to make bad water good, an act that is accompanied
by an incantation (2 Kgs 2:1922). Moses, of course, has also been called
a magician. He throws wood into the water at Marah, turning the bitter
water sweet (Exod 15:2225), and strikes a rock with his sta, resulting in a
ow of water from the stone. He makes a bronze serpent, just the sight of
which is said to heal the people who have been bitten by snakes (Num 21:9).
He raises his sta on a hilltop, and keeps it raised all throughout a battle,
in order to bring about victory over the Amalekites. There is a nice detail in
the storytelling that emphasizes the nature of the magical act: Mosess arms
grow tired, but since each time he lowers the sta the Amalekites suddenly
prevail in battle again, Aaron and Hur set up a stone for the weary Moses
to sit on while they hold up his hands, thus bringing about Israelite victory
(Exod 17:913). Joshua directly addresses the sun, telling it to stand still, and
it does ( Josh 10:1214). The list could go on.
The question of the Bibles own view of magic is not a simple one.
While some texts, like many of those just mentioned, do not distinguish
between what have been labeled religious and magical activities, other
Egyptian Magic, 4360. In what is perhaps a telling Freudian slip on someones

part, the header throughout reads Traditional Egyptian Religion.
9. On the use of magic as part of prophets divine-human mediation (i.e., not
separable from their religious activity), with an emphasis on the Elijah-Elisha
traditions, see Schmitt, Magie im Alten Testament, 28994.
10. Vocabulary relating to magic is also informative. See Fritschels analysis of bib-
lical terminology for practitioners of magic and divination, which she catego-
rizes according to terms used for both Israelites and foreigners, and those used
exclusively for foreigners (Women and Magic in the Hebrew Bible, 4062).
A readable collection of biblical magical spells, rites, and objects is available
in Nigosian, Magic and Divination in the Old Testament, 1746. Helpful also is
Jeerss whistle-stop tour of the problems in dening magic in contrast to re-
ligion, and showing so-called magical activity as part of a belief system within
ancient Israelites variety of modes of intermediation with the divine ( Jeers,
Magic from Before the Dawn of Time, 12332; quotation 132).
Y6621.indb 23 1/27/15 1:07 PM

texts certainly do. In a few cases, dierent versions of one story subtly in-
dicate an authors concern with what might be seen as magic, as in the two
texts telling of Moses bringing forth water from the rock. In Exodus 17:16,
Moses strikes the rock at Yahwehs command. Though the text presents the
initiative as divine (commonly seen as a reason to label activity religious),
the magical nature of the actthe rod is used virtually as a wandcan
hardly be countered. In Numbers 20:113, however, Yahweh commands
Moses only to tell the rock to produce water (v. 8) and condemns him after-
ward for using the rod. While these two means of providing owing water
from a rock, the one verbal and the other physical, are equally magical
(or religious) from the angle of modern theory, the presence of the two
distinct versions of the story demonstrates a dierence in the traditions
attitudes toward the physical action involved.
In other cases, a narrator will more explicitly articulate a perceived
dierence between two types of actionsthe dierence being that those
of the Other are magic. In the example cited in the previous chapter of
Aaron and the Egyptian magicians performing essentially identical feats
(the one rod-turned-serpents slightly higher position on the food chain
does not a phenomenological distinction make), Aarons acts are presented
as divinely inspired, and the Egyptians acts are emphatically described as
sorcery: So Moses and Aaron came to Pharaoh, and did just what Yahweh
had commanded. Aaron threw his rod before Pharaoh and his servants, and
it became a serpent. Then Pharaoh also called for the wise men ()
and the sorcerers (), and they too, the magicians of Egypt
() , did the same with their secret arts (( )Exod 7:10
11). This view, whether held by the biblical writers or by the scholars who
accept the biblical perspectives as factual, typies the rule of thumb that,
for any given group, religion is what We do; magic is what They do. As put
by Robert Grant in a now-classic description: your magic is my miracle,
and vice versa.
This captures an interesting moment in the process of communal iden-
tity formation. Religion and magic are both external descriptions, and
the concept of a category of religion is in many ways a modern one. The
11. This theme is not original to the Bible. There is a similar magical dance-o,
for instance, in the Sumerian Enmerkar and Ensuhgirana, in which the wise

woman Sagburu defeats Ensuhgirana in a sorcery contest.

12. Grant, Gnosticism and Early Christianity, 93.
13. See again J. Z. Smith, Religion, Religions, Religious.
Y6621.indb 24 1/27/15 1:07 PM

concept of magic as its perceived point of contrast, however, appears to

precede it. As counterintuitive as that may seem, the principle that reli-
gion is dened according to what it is not is well known. As summarized
by Mark Taylor: If structuralism and poststructuralism have taught us any-
thing, it is that identity is inescapably dierential: there can be no religion
apart from its opposite. So we witness in the writing of Exodus 7 a mo-
ment in Israelite history when the Israelite authors would not yet have de-
scribed their own actions as religion, but already presented the Egyptians
as performing magic.
Having observed this biblical polemic against magiceven where
the actions are identical, and alongside other texts that include no such
polemicit is apparent that academic articulations of a binary opposition
between magic and religion did not come out of nowhere. This articial
dichotomy, as dened in older social scientic theory and still lingering in
biblical studies, may be attributable to two main interrelated factors. First, it
is at times simply a matter of scholars taking biblical polemic at its word
describing the feats of Aaron and the Egyptian magicians as phenomeno-
logically dierent, for example. For a long time, scholars tended to inter-
pret along Deuteronomistic lines (and many still do). This has been true in
many areas within biblical studies, from reconstructions of Israelite history
to views of Canaanite religion. Even where biblical texts oer a range
of perspectivessome texts express discomfort with magicians, but for
example, Elijah and Elisha both raise the dead (1 Kgs 17:824; 2 Kgs 4:18
37)mainstream scholarship used to take the Deuteronomistic party line
(with a little Priestly material thrown in for good measure), assuming that
the authors polemic represented an accurate historical picture. This is a
little like accepting the view that Judah was in fact conquered because the
people turned away from Yahweh, or that worship of Bel and Nebo could
not have been as theologically sophisticated as worship of Yahweh. This
particular type of biblical inuence on Western academia was also at the
root of the anthropological framework that set magic in opposition to re-
ligion more broadly.
Second, the weighty inuence of structuralism across modern academia
cannot be overestimated. The assumption of a world full of clear binary
14. Taylor, Introduction, in Critical Terms for Religious Studies, 7.

15. For a lovely correction to this polemic, see Jacobsen, The Graven Image, 1532.
16. Cryer has made a similar observation, and adds that this was why for so long
scholars did not study Israelite magic (Divination in Ancient Israel, 234).
Y6621.indb 25 1/27/15 1:07 PM

opposites has reinforced the traditional acceptance of selective biblical po-

lemic (even polemic explicitly countered by other biblical perspectives, such
as those that present magical acts without criticism, or acts of ritual power
that blur what would traditionally be called religion and magic). This
is circular, of course: it is surely no coincidence that scholars milk-fed on
the Bible, whether individually or culturally, subscribed to theories dening
clear opposites that reected certain biblical ideas.
While the notion of magic as a category distinct from and opposed to
religion is long since out of date in social scientic theory, and while this
has been recognized by many scholars of Israelite religion, the assumptions
continue to lter through biblical studies in subtle (and less subtle) ways.
This is apparent, for instance, in the overwhelming description of divina-
tion as something separate from and opposite to prophecy.
Prophecy and Divination

It is still quite common in biblical scholarship (unlike in the study of
other ancient Near Eastern and Greek divination) to see prophecy under-
stood as a religious phenomenon, and divination as magic, with all of the
negative connotations generally attached to the term. Biblical traditions,
however, are replete with examples of types of divination other than proph-
ecy that are presented as indigenous, authentic, and eective.
Dream divination is among the most widely recognized types and in-
corporates a range of activities, including the reception of certain dreams,
dream interpretation, and dream incubation. In addition to the individuals
who receive message dreamsthough these dreams too may be signi-
cantthere are gures known for their divinatory skill as dream inter-
preters. Joseph, who is rst depicted as a dreamer himself (Gen 37:511),
is then revealed to have the insight of dream interpretation (Gen 4041).
17. In the Mari letters, the evaluation of a dream as signicant refers to its legiti-
macy as a divined dream; I import this concept here because biblical authors
express similar judgments through narrative.
18. The implication in the former narrative, in which Josephs brothers are angered
by the young whippersnappers dreams, is not that they too have any particu-
lar interpretive ability, but that the dreams Joseph has (and feels compelled to
share) have a painfully obvious meaning. The distinction between message
and symbol dreams is a modern scholarly one, and a gray area of intersection
between them exists.
Y6621.indb 26 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Daniel too combines these roles: he makes his name as a diviner by inter-
preting Nebuchadnezzars dream, but only after its contents are revealed
to him through his own dream (Dan 2). Daniel, the chief magician
( , Dan 4:6), also has special interpretive abilities extending be-
yond dreams, as evidenced by his understanding of the mysterious writing
on the wall (which he is beckoned to read because of his reputation for
insight and interpretation, as emphasized repeatedly in 5:1116). Solomon
engages in dream incubation: he makes a monumental sacrice to Yahweh
at the shrine at Gibeon, immediately after which at Gibeon Yahweh ap-
peared to Solomon in a dream (1 Kgs 3:415).
Other forms of divination are presented as equally valid, including
methods utilizing tools (which would likely be considered magical objects
in the hands of a non-Israelite). When Joseph has his silver goblet planted
in Benjamins bag, he instructs his accomplice upon search and seizure to
emphasize the special value of the object, telling him to exclaim, Isnt this
the one my master drinks from, and with which he practices divination?
(Gen 44:5). David twice uses the ephod as an instrument of divination, both
times provided for him by the priest Abiathar (1 Sam 23:9; 1 Sam 30:7). The
Ark serves either as an instrument of divination or, more likely, as a mobile
sacred place allowing access to divine knowledge, thus working on the same
principle as dream incubation: the Israelites inquire of Yahweh before the
Ark ( Judg 20:27). We read also of the casting of lots to identify (accurately)
a guilty party ( Josh 7:1020; 1 Sam 14:3743); the priestly use of the urim
(Num 27:21); and so on.
These various types of divination are interrelated, and many gures
who engage in one engage in others as well, as seen in the examples of
Joseph and Daniel. There is not one person who divines by dreams and
a dierent person who uses instruments of divinationor another who
prophesies. Some individuals are associated with one particular method of
divination, to be surethe prophet (), the dreamer or dream inter-
preter ( , as in Gen 37:19)but just as we would not articially
19. Two texts ring of accidental incubation: Jacobs dream at Bethel is attributed to
the sacred locationit is the house of God and the gate of heaventhough
Jacob has said he did not know it (Gen 28:1617). Samuels visual and auditory
visions of God occur as he is lying down in the temple of Yahweh, where the
Ark of God was (1 Sam 3:3), but neither he nor Eli initially understands what
is happening.
Y6621.indb 27 1/27/15 1:07 PM

separate the one who interprets dreams from the one who uses a goblet or
the ephod as a divinatory tool, it would be equally contrived to remove the
one who prophesies from the overall category of divination. We see indi-
viduals with prophetic titles engage in forms of divination other than pro-
phetic utterance (Elisha uses music to induce spirit possession, 2 Kgs 3:15;
Ezekiel has elaborate visions and out-of-body experiences), and we see
untitled people prophesy (such as Saul, who also attempts multiple other
forms of divination, 1 Sam 28:6). This cannot be explained solely in terms of
changing constructs and titles over time (and perhaps location). All of these
overlapping roles and activities demonstrate the impossibility of extracting
any one method and classifying it as qualitatively dierent from the others
and separate from the general category of divinationincluding prophecy.
Furthermore, even those individuals who are known as prophets are
often said to inquire of or consult ( )Yahweh. This is recognizable
divination terminology. We read of inquiring of the dead (Deut 18:1011;
Isa 8:19b), mediums and spiritists (1 Sam 28:7; Isa 8:19a; Isa 19:3b), idols
(Isa 19:3a), the Ark (1 Chr 13:3), and other gods (2 Kgs 1:2; Jer 8:2; 2 Chr 17:3;
2 Chr 25:20). In several texts, we see this terminology used in reference to
inquiring of Yahweh and other entities in parallel: mediums, spiritists, God
and the dead (Isa 8:19), a ghost and Yahweh (1 Chr 10:1314), and
God (2 Chr 17:34). Even when an authors polemics express the view that
these other objects of divination are improper, the statements themselves
reect the concept of the methods as parallel. Thus, when a prophet in-
quires of Yahweh, or people inquire of Yahweh through prophets, it is
not an abstract theological notion of seeking God, but a use of the same
divination terminology that is used in reference to other objects (1 Sam 9:9;
1 Kgs 22:58; 2 Kgs 3:11, 8:8, 22:13 and 18; Jer 21:2, 37:7; Ezek 14:3 and 7; 20:3
and 31; 21:1).
This language alone is enough to refute another common misunder-
standing. In the older (and persisting) framework, many assumed that
prophecy and divination reected a dierence in agency, as in the old
notions of religion as a matter of divine initiative and magic as human:
God gives true prophecy and dreams, while humans fruitlessly examine
kidneys, livers, and stars. In the future, the dichotomy between prophecy
and divination will likely fade from academic discussion; however, newer
20. The range of accompanying prepositions is enormous, and the choice is not
specic to the object.
Y6621.indb 28 1/27/15 1:07 PM

academic binary distinctions still serve to separate prophecy and dreams

from other divinatory methods, even when all are recognized as forms
of divination. For example, the distinction between divine and human
agency (or one might say, inspired and induced revelation) used to consti-
tute a basic assumption regarding prophecy and divination; it lingers
on in subtler form, still separating types of divination essentially along
the lines of the traditionally highlighted biblical polemic. The identical
language for consulting or inquiring of the dead, mediums, idols,
ritual objects, and Yahweh demonstrates the identical human initiative of
each method. If prophets often inquire of Yahweh, then human agency
cannot be seen as a means to distinguish prophecy from other forms of
divination.
There are other methods of inducing prophecy as well. When Elisha
wants to make divine contact in 2 Kings 3:15, he orders: And now, get
me a musician! And as the musician played, the hand of Yahweh came
upon [Elisha], and he prophesied. Elishas use of music to cause the hand
of Yahweh to fall upon him constitutes technically induced prophecy as
clearly as ibtu giving drink to the prophets in ARM 26 207. Dream incu-
bationthat is, instigating receipt of a divine messageis similarly treated
as eective in biblical texts. Conversely, there are types of divination tra-
ditionally seen as false that cannot possibly be initiated by humans, such
as celestial divination. It would be dicult to justify separating the inter-
pretation of astrological omens from the interpretation of dreams on the
grounds of agency. There is divination that is initiated by humans, and some
that is clearly seen as initiated by God; there is also a spectrum between the
inspired and the induced.
If we feel compelled to replace the old framework of prophecy ver-
sus divination with another binary distinction within divination (for ex-
ample, inductive versus deductive, technical versus intuitive, direct versus
indirect), there are others to be had: perhaps practiced versus spontaneous,
independent versus mediated. Each of these may be a helpful distinction
in some context, each may oer insight into a particular actbut none of
21. Thus, while I concur with most of Stkls new discussion of prophecy as a type
of divination, I disagree somewhat with the extent of his distinction between
technical and intuitive divination, such that, for example, a dream interpreter
falls under the heading of technical diviner, while a dreamer falls under the
heading of intuitive (Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, 711).
Y6621.indb 29 1/27/15 1:07 PM

them is a basis for sustained categorical distinction. Prophets and dreamers

spontaneously receive inspiration and induce it; they receive divine words
and interpret mysterious symbols and events, as one might an astrologi-
cal omen. Omen readers slice up animals to nd meaning, read entries in
academic omen compendia, and interpret celestial signs thrown in their
paths. Perhaps it is best to refer to an individual divinatory act as induced
or inspired, technical or intuitive, and the likeor in many cases, some
combination of theseand to be more precise in describing the various
components of specic acts as well as entire methods. Elishas act in 2 Kings
3:15, for instance, is technically induced; the state he falls into would qualify
as divinely inspired; the message he receives is direct; and so on. Some of
the distinctions are dicult to apply to all scenarios: Is Elishas divination
independent or mediated? As a diviner, he receives a message directly from
Yahweh, that is, unmediated; his receipt of the message is dependent on
the participation of the musician, who sparks the mantic state. This type
of description is not nearly as convenient as, for example, inspired. It is,
however, preferable to err on the side of precision. Terminology relating to
divination is very new to biblical studies and not yet used clearly and pre-
cisely. While we continue in the joint eort to nd appropriate language
for the many moving parts of the complex world of ancient divination, we
ought also continually to be aware of when our instinctive binary distinc-
tions align with biblical polemics, and when they do, to be very sure of
whether this is more than theological habit.
The attempt to distinguish authentic and inauthentic forms of divina-
tion is not unique to the Bible. Sarah Iles Johnston notes that the Greek
diviner Artemidorus lists many methods of divination in his dream book,
about half of which he says are unreliable (including divination from
cheese, whatever that is). There are dierences between the many forms
of divination referenced in biblical texts, and it is not surprising that the au-
thors were concerned with which were legitimate and authentic and which
were not, but from the perspective of a historian of religion, this is not
phenomenologically dierent from the list of Artemidorus. On the same
principle as that prompting the shift in the study of magic to a focus on
the social realities behind accusations of magic and witchcraft, we cannot
take Israelite condemnation of certain practices at face value as objective
22. Johnston, Ancient Greek Divination, 8; Artemidorus, Interpretation of Dreams

2.69.
Y6621.indb 30 1/27/15 1:07 PM

statements about divination, but we can glean useful information about

underlying social realities.
Cryers etymological examination of the terminology for practices that
Deuteronomy 18:914 bans and attributes to foreigners should illustrate
this. Of the relevant vocabulary (, , , , ,
- ,) , he nds that there is no record of a cog-
nate term in the literature of the surrounding peoples attested as early as
the Deuteronomic use for almost any of the words. On the other hand,
cognates of , to see, are well attested in reference to prophecy. He
summarizes, the only conclusion historical linguistics permits is that pro-
phetic terminology, if not the phenomenon itself, was derived from Israels
neighbours, whereas Israels various forms of magic were in all likelihood
domestic.
So we have seen that biblical characters engage in a variety of types of
divination, and that prophecy is no more separable from the whole than any
other method. While some texts display a polemical view that one method
is superior to another, or that some methods are illicit and foreign, other
texts and traditions seem completely comfortable with a range of means of
divination and are not polemical in the least.
Official Cult and Popular Religion

It is also not the case that divination can be relegated to the private
sphere, to the realm of so-called popular religion. Many forms of divina-
tion are evident in the public cult, as seen in the examples cited earlier, and
for that matter, there is ample indication in the Bible that prophecy had a
place in local religious activity unconnected to the cult. Nonetheless, the
assumption that divinatory activity other than prophecy is a phenomenon
of popular as opposed to ocial religion lingers on. Both the method
and the consequence of this will be familiar from the above discussions: it
has rst required the selective highlighting of certain biblical polemics, and
has then had the advantage for some scholars of distancing what is seen
as magical, foreign, or false from biblical religion. As with the articial
23. Cryer, Divination in Ancient Israel, 262. He notes the cognate for , and the
attestation of the practice of inquiring of the dead, both in Mesopotamia, and
the possibility that may have a cognate if related to , but no attestations
otherwise of cognates in Israels surroundings older than the relevant biblical
texts (25662).
Y6621.indb 31 1/27/15 1:07 PM

contrasts discussed earlier, the faulty framework of this model has been
recognized in many areas of biblical study, but continues to surface in state-
ments concerning divination.
There was not a single form of ocial religion surrounded by separate
and subversive forms of popular religion. Religious belief and practice var-
ied according to contextwhether urban or rural, royal complex or farm-
ing family, temple or household, Jerusalem temple or other temples and
sanctuaries (in addition to region and date). There are also inescapable
overlaps between these categories, and forms of religious activity presented
as illicit in some traditions appear in other texts without comment. The
story of Michal, for instance, prominently displays teraphim in the royal
palace, a fact toward which the authors seem neutral. Is this then ocial
and royal religion, or popular and household? What about Passover,
which is an ocial household ritual? Then there is Saul and Samuels par-
ticipation in the cultic activity at a local shrine (1 Sam 910); Davids divi-
nation by ephod, brought to him by the priest Abiathar (1 Sam 23:912); or
Elisha directing King Joash in a Yahwistic magical ritual that included the
king shooting an arrow, the prophet speaking an incantation, and the king
striking the ground with arrows a certain number of times to bring about
corresponding victory over Syria (2 Kgs 13:1719).
Some will extend the question of ocial and popular religion to
that of Israelite and foreign inuence. This is usually shorthand for Is-
raelite and Canaanite, with the diculty being that, although Israelite
religion obviously took on its own characteristics, it is not clear exactly at
what point and in what ways it becomes appropriate to distinguish between
Israelite and the broader environment, particularly the Canaanite. The
hard distinction between the two at an early date has been corrected in
many areas of the eld. Though we continue to see divination referred to
24. As Stavrakopoulou and Barton point out, the plurality of religious views and
practices in ancient Israel is so emphasized in current scholarship that it is re-
ected even in the titles of many recent works on the subject (Introduction:
Religious Diversity in Ancient Israel and Judah, 1 n.1, noting for example Ze-
vit, The Religions of Ancient Israel; Hess, Israelite Religions; and Edelman, ed., The
Triumph of Elohim: From Yahwisms to Judaisms.
25. See esp. Lemche, The Canaanites and Their Land; M. Smith, The Origins of Bibli-
cal Monotheism; M. Smith, The Early History of God; and Niehr, Israelite and
Canaanite Religion, 2336.
Y6621.indb 32 1/27/15 1:07 PM

in terms of folk religion, popular religion, or foreign Canaanite religion, it

is abundantly clear that many types of divination were very much at home
throughout Israelite religion.
True and False Prophecy

So prophecy and divination are not phenomenologically dierent,
and prophetic and other divinatory methods do not belong to separate
spheres of activity. They also do not represent true and false mediation,
although that is how some biblical texts present it and how traditional
biblical scholars used to understand it. At this point, however, it has been
widely observed that there are no great dierences between the true and
false prophets of the Bible. The criteria for true and false prophecy
vary between texts and are sometimes contradictory. For example, if the
criterion is that the prophecy must not lead people to other gods (as in
Deut 13:2), this does not explain the false Yahwistic prophets of the Bible.
If the criterion is that the prophecy must come true (as in Deut 18:22), we
must consider that Deuteronomy 13:13 allows for false prophecy to come
true. For that matter, we might also note the prophecies of true prophets
that are not fullled.
The classic example of the social reality behind biblical claims of
true and false prophecy is the conict between Jeremiah and Hananiah
in Jeremiah 28. Both men are called prophets of Yahweh, and they each
consider the other to be a false prophet. While we might instinctively be
persuaded to Jeremiahs sidethrough only having access to it, and not
to a book of Hananiah reecting a somewhat dierent perspectivewe
can see that there is no particular dierence between the two aside from
their conict (and that Hananiahs prophecy even bears a resemblance to
other biblical prophecy). It is now preferable in the eld to frame the is-
sue as anthropologists do, in terms of prophetic conict, indicating that
there is not true and false prophecy, but conict between representa-
tives of dierent groups or viewpoints. The anthropological approaches
of a few scholars of biblical prophecy have helped to shed light on this.
Lester Grabbe has shown that the dynamics that biblical texts describe
as rivalry between true and false prophets are common to many other
societies. His discussions of the Wana shamans of Sulawesi, Indonesia, the
26. See esp. Long, Social Dimensions of Prophetic Conict, 3143.
Y6621.indb 33 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Mongol shamans, and the case of Alice Lakwena of Uganda are particularly
illustrative.
As with the previous false binaries, this shift in scholarly understand-
ing has been important in its most immediate area of the eld but has been
slow to trickle out. The connection of divination to false prophecy is not
academically defensible, but it is still commonly assumed.
Public Men, Private Women

While there is no existing work on womens divination in the Bible, it
seems likely that misconceptions that have inuenced other work on women
in biblical texts and in ancient Israel could color ideas in this area as well. One
assumption with particular potential to shape readers expectations regarding
divination is that men operated in the public sphere, while women were gen-
erally active in the private sphere. There were of course authoritative public
roles held exclusively or overwhelmingly by men (consider kings, priests, and
judges), but the assumption of a general public/private divide is faulty.
Carol Meyers has demonstrated that the picture of public men and
private women stems from the inappropriate superimposing of models and
theories from other contexts. She argues that the gendered public/private
dichotomy known from some other texts and societies, periods, and reli-
gious groups has been wrongly applied to ancient Israel, and that as a conse-
quence, many scholars have assumed that women had limited involvement
in the public life of their communities. As she observes, in agrarian Israelite
society, home and work were not generally separate spaces. Womens roles
were crucial for the economic well-being of each household and, thus, of
the village. Women may also have been central in the religious and politi-
cal activities of the community, including, for instance, arranging strategic
marriages. In this society, connections between households and kinship
groups were a key aspect of political activity, and women, who often worked
in groups spanning multiple households and through this could even have
networks with more villages, may have had the information necessary to
make such connections. In addition to kinship and social networks, some
skilled women also had professional networks that took them beyond the
27. Grabbe, Shaman, Preacher, or Spirit Medium? The Israelite Prophet in the
Light of Anthropological Models, 11732. See also the brief earlier discussion
in Wilson, Prophecy and Society in Ancient Israel, 24751.
Y6621.indb 34 1/27/15 1:07 PM

household and village. Meyers discusses examples of professional women,

including musicians, women serving in the sanctuary (Exod 38:8 and
1 Sam 2:22), weavers, bakers, prophets, and more. In short, the gendered
division between public and private spheres characteristic of industrial-
ized society should not be anachronistically applied to ancient Israel.
Specically, such ideas should not predetermine readers interpretations
of the divination texts. Should we assume that the men in the rst oracle
of Ezekiel 13 act in public, while the women in the second oracle of the
chapter act in private? Surely not. And how exactly would one categorize
the spheres of activity of Miriam in the desert, or a wandering man of God;
Huldah, prophesying in her home at the request of the king, or the divining
priest in the private sanctuary? There is no clear pattern, and in many cases
the categories private and public do not seem apt.
Male and Female

In identifying male and female as another articial dichotomy that
has colored biblical interpretation, I do not refer to the ongoing discus-
sion within modern gender studies (and ltering outward) regarding to
what extent male and female are absolute categories. Rather, I mean
that culturally specic assumptions regarding dierences between men and
women have been layered onto biblical stories in ways that obstruct our
view of what might be presented in the texts themselves. The authors had
their own preconceptions, not ours.
Now, clearly there were many ways in which men and women had
dierent roles in ancient Israelite society. However, some assumed dier-
ences have been translated from other contexts or exaggerated, as with the
gendered public/private division addressed earlier, and at some points, we
see that women and men could function in the same roles and in the same
ways. Meyers has provided several examples of this in various parts of Is-
raelite society.
28. Meyers, In the Household and Beyond: The Social World of Israelite Women,
1941. Ebelings work on the daily life of village women in the central highlands
in Iron I Israel also illustrates the intersection of spheres (Womens Lives in Bibli-
cal Times).
29. See, classically, J. Butler, Gender Trouble, the inuence of whose understanding
of gender as performative cannot be overestimated.
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While the relationship between mens and womens roles in Israelite

society is relevant background for the present study, choices regarding lit-
erary portrayal are of more immediate interest. These are not unrelated,
naturally, but neither should they be equated. As in other subject areas, in
work on women in biblical texts, clear distinctions between analyses of lit-
erature and of history are often lacking. Statements about women in a bib-
lical story transition almost imperceptibly, without comment, to statements
about women in Israelite culture; gender roles in stories are taken to be
accurate reections of the historical situation, with no room for the authors
particular elite perspective, imagination, assumptions, or wishes for society.
Gendered assumptions come in many forms. Scholars from a range
of perspectives continue to assume that biblical texts must portray women
dierently from men, and then read accordingly. Some traditional scholars,
for their part, have focused on the power structures that were dominated by
men and have therefore seen the lack of women in those particular areas.
Some feminist scholars, for their part, have taken traditional gendered as-
sumptions and looked at them belly-up, reading subversivelybut assum-
ing the reality of the same underlying dichotomies.
For example, it has become commonplace to interpret stories about
many women in the Bible in terms of a trickster motifthat is, that women,
lacking social power, use subversive means to accomplish their goals. The
tone of such interpretation is positive, reecting the view that even through
the fog of how a storys author has presented a woman, it is just barely vis-
ible that it was in fact courageous, clever, and so on, for her to gure out
how to accomplish her goals and then act accordingly (note the blurred line
between literature and history in this common approach). Here is the prob-
lem: with the exception of a very few male characters, women who gure
out how to achieve their goals are seen as tricksters, while men are seen as
strategists. Granted, the trickster theme is based on the recognition that
subversive action is necessary for those lacking the social power required
for eective conventional action, but male characters in the Bible also very
30. There are exceptions to this approach; see Niditch, Samson as Culture Hero,
Trickster, and Bandit, 61012. However, the most common male character fre-
quently read as a trickster is Jacob, for reasons that may have more to do with
older Christian attitudes toward Jews and Judaism ( Jacob is Israel, after all)
than with gender issues.
Y6621.indb 36 1/27/15 1:07 PM

often lack power in relation to those with whom they are in conict. David,
for instance, is not frequently characterized as a trickster, though he uses
subversive strategies to remain safe from the more powerful Saul. Some
feminist biblical scholarship also reects an inclination to categorize and
label female characters in other ways that are not frequently seen for male
characters.
For a long time, it was not uncommon to hear such approaches re-
ferred to as the celebration of women and female characters. This ap-
proach is sometimes overt, but at times less so, taking the form of blanket
positive statements about women in the Bible, and in doing so falling
into the trap of hypercorrection and essentializing. Frymer-Kensky, for
instance, claims that until the inuence of Hellenism, there is no real
woman question in the Bible, and oers as an example, There are no
evil mother-gures in the Bible. On the contrary, mothers are always sup-
portive of their children and loyal to them. While this may describe
the majority of presentations, the story of the two mothers and the boiled
son in 2 Kings 6:2829 is enough to belie the claim. For that matter, Re-
bekah might have been a supportive mother to Jacob, but Esaus perspec-
tive would have been a bit dierent. The problems of older interpretive
trends cannot be solved by trying to cast all women in a positive light.
Depictions of female characters in the Bible run the gamut, as depictions
of male characters do.
Each of these types of approaches has appeared in work on the female
prophets. There is no shortage of traditional work on prophecy and the
prophets that fails to mention most or all of the titled female prophets.
Then, as the female prophets have come into focus in recent study, some
feminist approaches have focused on redeeming them, either from invis-
ibility or from a negative assessment they attribute to the ancient authors.
In some cases, modern theological (and practical) problems associated
31. Note the title of Belliss Helpmates, Harlots, and Heroes: Womens Stories in the
Hebrew Bible; and in Frymer-Kensky, Reading the Women of the Bible, the sec-
tion headings Victors, Victims, Virgins, and Voice.
32. Frymer-Kensky, In the Wake of the Goddesses, 121.
33. Fuchs, for instance, sees the female prophets as silenced, limited, and sup-
pressed, and argues that their presentation reects reluctance on the part of the
narrator to admit or reveal the extent of womens prophetic activity (Prophecy
and the Construction of Women: Inscription and Erasure, 57).
Y6621.indb 37 1/27/15 1:07 PM

with the lack of recognition of female prophets are explicitly at stake.

Others focus on developments in postbiblical interpretation of the female
prophets.
The three monographs on the female prophets, though dierent in
many ways, all reect an interest in expanding the number of female proph-
ets. Butting focuses on the titled prophets but notes the possibility of
womens prophecy recorded in the books attributed to male prophets.
Fischers main interest is in how the authors conceived of various women
as true or false prophets in the succession of Moses and according to
the legislation in Deuteronomy 18:914, which she sees consistently in the
background. Her discussions of each woman and each text are thus all
framed in these terms. She adds to the list of titled female prophets in three
ways: she observes that the plural is not gender-specic and should
be read as potentially including both male and female prophets; she consid-
ers the women who serve at the tent of meeting to be cult prophets; and she
discusses the story of the medium of En-dor, which she sees as a presen-
tation of false prophecy by an author who had Deuteronomy 18:914 in
mind. Gafney attributes her interest in adding more biblical women to the
list of prophets to the theological issue mentioned earlier. She addresses
the problem by explicitly using a loose denition of prophecy. She follows
34. Gafney begins her book by noting the modern restriction of womens religious
authority on what some traditions see as biblical grounds. In addition to her
explicit acknowledgment of this concern, it is implicit in her framing of her
book with blessings upon the reader (Daughters of Miriam, 1, 21, 165).
35. Bronner, From Eve to Esther: Rabbinic Reconstructions of Biblical Women, 16384;
and Elior, Changing Perspectives: Female Prophets in the Bible and Rabbinic
Perspective, 1521. Gafney also gathers some of these sources, in addition to
early Christian traditions surrounding the female prophets.
36. Butting, Prophetinnen Gefragt, 9. Butting devotes more of her attention, how-
ever, to constructing a model according to which the titled female prophets
reect the relationship, as she sees it, between Torah and prophets.
37. Fischer, Gottesknderinnen, 1819, 96108, 13157. Overall, Fischer uses the term
prophecy broadly, seeing the legislation in Deut 18 as demonstrating that
various other practices were understood to stand within the general range of
prophecy but were seen as objectionable (4449). Her use of the term proph-
ecy is thus close to the way most now would use the term divination. How-
ever, I nd this a bit imprecise, since Hebrew terminology relating to prophecy
and other forms of divination is specic.
Y6621.indb 38 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Fischers rst two additions, and then includes several more women and
groups of women for whom, in her terms, she will construct a prophetic
identity. This is tting for Gafneys stated goal; it does mean, however,
that she is invested specically in looking for women she can identify as
prophets, and establishing that they are portrayed positively.
One primary way in which my approach diers from these contribu-
tionsin addition to the central issue of examining all types of divination
togetheris that I see no systematic presentation of female diviners and
no consistent authorial concern behind the texts. This is the case among
the titled prophets, where I see a range of depictions and attitudes toward
the characters and their activities, as well as among the women engaging in
other forms of divination.
Some scholars have recognized that the female prophets are not de-
picted particularly dierently from the male, and have their positive and
negative portrayals. Ackerman, for example, has found nothing inherently
dierent in the depictions of the female prophets, though she considers
them anomalous. Grabbe noted already in his work on the major religious
specialists of ancient Israel that in both behavior and message, the female
prophets are no dierent from the male, and that there is no bias shown
in the texts. Stkl has reached the same conclusion in regard to female
38. Gafney, Daughters of Miriam, 1718, 165. Gafneys use of the term prophet is far
broader than Fischers, and not based on the practices associated with divination
in Deut 18. She thus includes not only the temple personnel of 1 Chr 25:16,
for example, but also female mourners, and the mother of Lemuel in Prov 31:1.
Cf. the list of the range of activities she includes as prophetic; Daughters of
Miriam, 15152.
39. Fischer sees the women portrayed both positively and negatively, but because
she sees each text as reecting the authors judgments regarding true and
false prophecy in light of the legislation of Deut 18, her work is necessarily
dened around each womans relationship to this standard of true prophecy;
hence, she argues that Huldah is presented positively as a true prophet, and
the woman of En-dor is presented negatively as a false prophet.
40. Ackerman, Why Is Miriam Also among the Prophets? 4780. Others have
made related, if more general, statements, such as A. Brenners conclusion
that although the prophetic activity of women appears in most respects to be
like that of men, the female prophets were much less signicant (The Israelite
Woman, 5758; 66).
41. Grabbe, Priests, Prophets, Diviners, Sages, 115.
Y6621.indb 39 1/27/15 1:07 PM

prophets elsewhere in the Near East. I concur with these analyses; what
I nd beyond this is a surprising spectrum of viewpoints within biblical
literature in regard to a range of womens divinatory activities.
It is with these provisos in mind that I approach my subject. As I exam-
ine the stories in which female diviners play a role as primary or secondary
characters, I hope to bring into relief, by studying them individually, the
nuanced attitudes toward such gures and to show, by studying them side
by side, where patterns emerge and where they do not.
42. Stkl, Female Prophets in the Ancient Near East, 4761.
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part
2
Biblical Perspectives on
Womens Divination
Y6621.indb 41 1/27/15 1:07 PM

3 Rebekah the Aramean
The story of Rebekah is written as a conjuring of a former time, ancient

already to the author. It is no coincidence that a somewhat hazy picture
of divinatory activity is canonically the rst. The Genesis stories envision
a world far removed from that of their authors. They imagine the distant
past, reecting impressions of the ways of the ancestors as simultaneously
foreign to the author and pointedly proto-Israelite. This is perhaps espe-
cially evident in the stories of Rebekah of Aram-naharaim, who must be
brought in from the old country to be a suitable wife for a patriarch in a
land later called Israel. These impressions of olden times, somehow before
the authors own worldof Israel back in a day when people had easy ac-
cess to God, and perhaps also of ancient Syria, reecting a more positive
version of the sense that divination was foreigncolor the story of the
ancestress who inquired of Yahweh and interpreted an omen.
The tale of the matriarchs divination in Genesis 25:1926 comes on the
heels of the picture of Rebekah at home in Syria in chapter 24, which is
where we must begin.
In Her Mothers House

Rebekah is strongly associated with the land of the ancestors from the
moment of our introduction to her. Abraham sends his servant back to
1. The traditions emphasize that Rebekah is rooted in this area, whether called
Aram-naharaim or Paddan-aram. I nd it appropriate to identify her as Re-
bekah the Aramean, to signify that she is portrayed this way as much as Laban
the Aramean. The term Syria will be employed here as a useful anachronism.
43
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44 Biblical Perspectives on Womens Divination
Aram-naharaim (to my land, to my birthplace, Gen 24:4) to nd a wife

for Isaac. Rebekah enters the scene, beautiful and kind, pictured from the
rst as the ideal young woman of that faraway land. After meeting Rebekah
by the well, the servant visits her family, who hesitate to let her go: the
poignancy is palpable. After Rebekah leaves, we continue to see her ties
to her homeland. Later, long after the divination scene, when the boys are
all grown up, Rebekah will be the oneshe, and not Isaacto send Jacob
back to Laban in her motherland (Gen 27).
There are three main Rebekah stories: those of her last days in her
mothers house before emigrating (ch. 24), her pregnancy and the birth of
her twins (ch. 25), and her strategic role in acquiring preferential status and
security for the son she favors (ch. 27). Recognizing the authors portrayal
of Rebekah as decidedly Aramean in both the rst and third of these nar-
ratives, as noted above, may later illuminate how this theme also colors the
story in between, that of her divination related to pregnancy and childbirth.
The other theme present throughout the three Rebekah stories is the
matriarchs singular personality, which comes through vividly with just a
few brushstrokes: in each of the three episodes, she acts with notable au-
tonomy, making key decisions for herself and her family, and thus for the
future of Israel. Again, a moment of attention to this theme in the Rebekah
narratives preceding and following the divination text will be helpful later
in examining the divination story itself.
In the rst story, after her odd encounter with the servant at the well, we
nd Rebekah running home to her mothers house ( , Gen 24:28).
When her mother and brother ask Abrahams servant to let her stay with them
for another few days, the servant initially refuses, but they respond by calling
Rebekah and asking her to say for herself what she wants (- ,
24:57). They ask, Will you go with this man? and she decides, I will go.
We are set up for this crucial exchange already in Genesis 24:58, where
we see the agreement between Abraham and his servant in which if the
woman whom the servant meets is unwilling to leave with him, he will be
released from his obligation to bring back a wife for Isaac. Much is at stake
in the question of whether Rebekah will agree to leave her homeland. Her
(surprisingly) autonomous decision is pivotal here.
2. It is a touching note that when Rebekah does nally leave her mothers house,
Isaac takes her back to his mothers tent ( ;) and thus he was
comforted after the death of his mother (Gen 24:67).
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Rebekah the Aramean 45
We see Rebekahs initiativeagain in combination with her ties to her

homelandalso in chapter 27, when she orchestrates Jacobs blessing and
then sends him back to Laban in Haran. The degree to which she oversees
the activity is almost funny: she does not merely tell Jacob to disguise him-
self as Esau, but in fact dresses him in Esaus clothing herself, and puts the
goatskins on his hands and on the smooth part of his neck (27:1516). Three
times she tells Jacob to obey her ( , Gen 27:8, 13, 43). The rst two
are during the planning phases of securing the blessing for her preferred
son. The third occurrence is when she instructs him to ee to Haran. Note
the shift in agency from the model of the previous generation: Abraham
sent his servant to nd a wife for Isaac, but it is Rebekah who sends Jacob.
This seems in line with her agency in chapter 24, where it is highlighted
that she herself chooses to emigrate.
This combination of traitsRebekahs close ties to the old country,
and her independent and decisive action in family matterscolors the two
narratives of the matriarch before and after the divination text. This char-
acterization of Rebekah has a role in shaping the story of her divinatory
activity as well.
Isaac Prays; Rebekah Divines

The story of Rebekahs divination in Genesis 25:1926 comes in be-
tween these other two stories, both of which reect her Aramean identity
and her independent actions. Rebekahs act of divine-human communica-
tion is not the rst one we see here, though. As the story begins, Isaac and
Rebekah have been married for some time, and she is said to be infertile.
Isaac prays, and in the next verse, Rebekah inquires of Yahweh. The juxtapo-
sition of these two acts of divine-human communication is telling. Within
the world of the story, the acts are separated in time by several months
(from the time of conception until Rebekah can feel the twins harming
each other inside her), and there is no reason to assume a similarity to the
3. Isaacs blessing may not be the only one at stake here. Perhaps Rebekahs inter-
est is equally in seeing her own family blessing, the one she received from her
mother and brother upon leaving her ( Gen 24:60), passed on to her pre-
ferred son.
4. When Isaac sends Jacob at the beginning of the next chapter (explicitly to go to
Rebekahs family, Gen 28:12), this is at the behest of Rebekah, who has already
ordered Jacob to ee and then speaks to her husband about it (27:43, 46).
Y6621.indb 45 1/27/15 1:07 PM

types of activity. Within the literary form of the story, the two types of
divine-human communication are separated by just a few words, and there
is good reason to consider their contrasting features.
Isaac makes supplication: ( Gen 25:21). The verb
has a bit of a cultic feel to it, with its origins in making supplication with
oerings. While the verb in biblical Hebrew no longer carries this precise
meaning, related nouns still hint at it. We see the of incenseeither
the smell or the smoke, but either way, the cloud that rises from the ritual
burningin Ezekiel 8:11, and a similar noun referring to the supplicant(s)
bringing an oering in Zephaniah 3:10. The verb does not imply sacrice, but
does connote a type of supplication not evident from the generic English
verb to pray. Isaac did not pray (, as used for example of Abraham
in Gen 20:17); he made supplication, and with a whi of the cultic about it.
After this, Rebekah engages in a type of divine-human communication
that diers in both its form and its goal: she went to inquire of Yahweh
(- , Gen 25:22). The form of Isaacs communication is en-
treaty: he asks for an event to occur, and it occurs. The form of Rebekahs
communication is inquiry: she requests knowledge from God, and she re-
ceives it. He seeks an outcome; she seeks knowledge. We see this clearly in
the description of each act, but it is also evident from the vocabulary itself,
from the juxtaposition of and .
5. Cognates such as Arabic atara, to slaughter, sacrice, and Ugaritic gtr, to

slaughter, reect this original sense as well. The lingering connotation in Gen
25:21 is evident in the other biblical texts mentioned here, however, and does not
depend on the etymology.
6. Isaac makes supplication in front of Rebekah: the use of to mean on behalf
of would be quite exceptional. Moreover, the verb is often used without
a beneciary, and among uses that specify for whom the entreaty is made, the
preposition is virtually always a lamedas in the second half of this very verse:
, and Yahweh was entreated for him (Gen 25:21b). Isaac requests
ospring, but there is no reason to assume that this is a prayer for his wife (to
conceive) any more than for himself (to have an heir), or for them together (to
have children), or more realistically, for the family line (to continue and be re-
membered). All the text tells us is that Isaac entreats God, in whatever precise
formulation, in front of Rebekah. Given the plot, the scene, and the use of ,
it is tempting to imagine that Isaac is performing some sort of ritual common to
household religion; cf. Danils sacrices in supplication for an heir at the begin-
ning of Aqhat.
7. Westermann argues that vv. 2223 are a later insertion, but this does not work
well on several levels. First, he makes a circular argument on the grounds that Re-
Y6621.indb 46 1/27/15 1:07 PM

The verb , while usually understood correctly to refer to divination

by inquiry when used with potential sources of divine knowledge other
than Yahweh (for example, to inquire of the dead, Isa 8:19), is often taken
in a more Deuteronomically approved fashion when referring to inquiring
of God (that is, as seeking God). The word is indeed at times used as a
general expression of seeking God (occasionally in parallel with , for
example, Deut 4:29), but the choice to take this abstraction as the default
meaning is a historically and theologically skewed one. As discussed in
chapter 2, one can inquire of the dead (Deut 18:1011; Isa 8:19b), idols
(Isa 19:3a), the Ark (1 Chr 13:3), and so on. When someone inquires of
Yahweh, this is not suddenly a picture of the person seeking God in some
abstract sense, but a use of the same terminology as when a person divines
by inquiring of other divine sources and objects.
In any case, the word cannot have the sense of seeking God in this
context. Rebekah inquires of God, and God responds. Given the explicit na-
ture of the question-and-answer format (the question itself is not reported,
bekahs inquiry presupposes the institution of consulting an oracle which arose

only in the sedentary period (Genesis 1236, 413). In other words, Rebekahs act
must reect a particular later institution, and thus the text must be a later inser-
tion. There is no reason to assume that Rebekahs inquiry is reective of a specic
institution, when the phenomenon of inquiring of a deity is known from a very
early date, and this text oers quite a general picture of inquiry. Second, I see no
reason to identify any part of the text as pre-sedentary, and thus even if vv. 2223
are identied as stemming from the sedentary period, this does not indicate that
they are a later insertion. Third, the excising of these verses from the surrounding
text eliminates what otherwise appears to be a clear literary deviceIsaac and
Rebekah are presented with a problem, Isaac asks God for something, and God
responds (in action); this creates a new problem, Rebekah asks God for some-
thing, and God responds (in words). If Westermanns circular argument and his
assumptions regarding divine consultation are excluded, then his only remaining
argument is that v. 24 must follow directly v. 21 (Genesis 1236, 41112). While
skipping the scene of Rebekahs divination would still leave a readable text, this
is a shaky reason to excise part of a story that is also perfectly readable as is, and
an especially shaky choice when doing so actually dismantles the story structure.
With all of this said, I should add that if indeed the story of Rebekahs divination
were a later insertion, that would be fascinating. What would that indicate about
this later view? What would this tell us about the author, or about the context
of the author, who chose to put this oracle dening the Jacob-Esau relationship
within a tale of Rebekahs divination, instead of simply tacking it on as a verbal
response to Isaacs prayer?
Y6621.indb 47 1/27/15 1:07 PM

but the fact of the inquiry is), the verb has been understood as referring
to divination in this text perhaps more than in some others, though still not
in the majority of readings. Most scholars who recognize this as divination
language, however, still assume that Rebekah went to inquire of Yahweh
means that Rebekah went to some third party so that he could inquire of
Yahweh for her.
The assumption that Rebekah goes to someone else who can communi-
cate with God on her behalf depends circularly on whether the interpreter
begins with the notion that Rebekah could conceivably inquire directly or
not. The Genesis narratives envision a world in which the ancestors (male
and female) had ongoing direct access to God. Part of this picture of the
days of yorethis glowy-edged impression of how the ancients livedwas
an idealized image of their communication with God, back when it was
unnecessary to use intermediaries.
8. Hamilton observes the dierence between Isaac and Rebekahs approaches

and identies Rebekahs act explicitly as divination and, moreover, as direct
consultation, that is, without an intermediary (The Book of Genesis, 17677).
Cryer also explicitly refers to Rebekahs activity as divination (Divination in
Ancient Israel, 229). Even without using the term divination, those who re-
fer to Rebekah consulting an oracle thus understand this to be some sort of
divinatory practice. Coats, for instance, refers to Rebekahs complaint as a
formal request for an oracle on the basis of the verb ( Genesis, 184). Fok-
kelman identies the phrase as a technical term to indicate the consulting of
God by means of an oracle (Narrative Art in Genesis, 88 n.4). Cotter observes
more generally, There is no indication that Isaac heard anything back from
God as a result of his prayer. Rather, it is Rebekah who seeks and receives an
oracle from God (Genesis, 189). Gafney also sees the signicance of the verb
here, and on this basis identies Rebekah as a prophet. Even recognizing
Gafneys choice to treat the category of prophecy loosely, this label seems
dicult. The core statement in her paragraph on Rebekah is a denition with
which I do not quite agree: Rebekahs intercession on her own behalf is pro-
phetic, as are all such acts using the verb d-r-sh, whether the prophets inter-
mediary work is on behalf of an individual or group, for the benet of others
or oneself (Daughters of Miriam, 153).
9. Vawter, for instance, writes of Rebekahs inquiry, We are at some sacred place
where prophet or priest mediates divine revelation to the clients of the local
deity (On Genesis, 287). Van der Toorn similarly claims that when Rebekah in-
quired, it was no doubt through the mediation of a man of God (From Her
Cradle to Her Grave, 82). Cryer also refers to Rebekahs consultation with the
diviner (Divination in Ancient Israel, 320).
Y6621.indb 48 1/27/15 1:07 PM

The tradition gives us no indication that we should be adding a si-

lent player to the Rebekah story, and we have every reason to assume that
we should not. There is not one single reference in Genesis to any proto-
Israelite gure needing an intermediary to converse with God, from Adam,
Eve, Cain, and Noah, to Abraham, Sarah, Jacob, and Joseph. In fact, the
only Genesis narratives in which anyone requires an intermediary are the
stories of the various Egyptians who need Joseph to interpret their dreams.
Even Josephs brothers and father understand his dreams without requir-
ing any explanation from him (Gen 37:8, 10). We should read the Rebekah
story in light of this: the ancestors had rather casual conversations with the
Almighty; the Genesis narratives include stories of women as well as men
speaking directly with God (for example, Sarah outside the door of the tent
in Gen 18); and other biblical texts provide examples of women performing
divination. It is far more betting the ethos of these narratives to under-
stand the matriarch as having direct divine access.
The term itself is not specic: one can independently or through
an intermediary. Sometimes when a person is said to go inquire of God, an
intermediary is then mentioned: in 1 Samuel 9:9 the person who wants to
inquire goes to a seer (), and in 2 Kings 22:13 and 18 the men Josiah sends
to inquire go to the prophet Huldah. However, in many cases it is apparent
that the person inquiring is doing so directly. Two related texts in Jeremiah
illustrate the point. In both texts, King Zedekiah sends men to Jeremiah to
inquire of God, and in both cases the verb is used with the clear mean-
ing of divinatory inquiry. In Jeremiah 21:2, when the king sends his men to
the prophet to ask him to consult on their behalf, the prophet is the one to
;in Jeremiah 37:7, it is the kings men who have been sent to inquire,
and they by going to the prophet. We see direct inquiry in other cases
as well (that is, where the person who is said to is the one who consults
directly), for example when the people consult the Ark, and in the classic
statement against diviners of dierent kinds in Deuteronomy 18:1011, where
one of the diviners is the one who inquires of the dead (-) .
In an article focused on establishing that Rebekah engages in inde-
pendent divination (that is, without an intermediary), Erin Fleming has
demonstrated that the use of the term in this text does not match the
narrative pattern in descriptions of inquiry through an intermediary. She
10. E. Fleming, She Went to Inquire of the Lord: Independent Divination in

Genesis 25:22, 36. See Flemings details as well on the prominence of direct
Y6621.indb 49 1/27/15 1:07 PM

then oers several examples of independent divination, such as the dream

incubation of Solomon at Gibeon in 1 Kings 3:315, the story of Gideon
and the eece in Judges 6:3640, and the repeated references to Davids
direct inquiries of God in 1 Samuel 23:2 and 4, 1 Samuel 30:8, 2 Samuel 2:1,
and 2 Samuel 5:23 (using the verb ). As noted on page 3 of this book,
these stories of David inquiring of God, in which God always responds,
are reective of one of the dening distinctions between David and Saul:
that where Saul repeatedly fails in his attempts to access divine knowledge,
David consistently succeeds. In that narrative battle, every round goes to
David. As stated at the outset, questions regarding who has divine access
permeate biblical traditions. If we appreciate the narrative signicance of
David always receiving a clear verbal response from God in the Samuel
texts, we should likewise recognize the signicance of Rebekah receiving
a direct verbal response from God here. In this case, the successful diviner
is not paired with an unsuccessful one, but with a successful supplicant,
Isaac. The highlighted contrast is not between the ability to divine and the
inability, but between divination and supplication, or specically inquiry
and entreaty.
There is nothing unique about Rebekah as an untitled woman engaging
in independent divination. In the broader literary realm, recall Getinanna,
the sister of Dumuzi, discussed in chapter 1. She is her brothers dream in-
terpreter of choice, whom he calls my wise woman, who knows the portent
of dreams. Nor is this a phenomenon restricted to the literary imagination.
We see the independent divination of laypeople in the Mari letters, and this
includes women as well as men. There are untitled women who have dreams
and visions (see, for example, ARM 26 227, 229, and 236), and one letter re-
ports that a servant girl went into a trance and prophesied (ARM 26 214).
divine access throughout Genesis; she notes that virtually every chapter be-
tween Genesis 2 and 35 involves some sort of direct communication between
YHWH and a particular human being, whether through a divine speech or
dialogue, vision, dream, or theophany (p. 5).
11. Ibid., 78. As E. Fleming observes, where Abiathar the priest appears in
1 Sam 30:7, it is only to bring David the ephod; David then inquires of God
directly in v. 8.
12. ARM 26 227 and 229 report dreams. ARM 26 236 seems to refer to a vision,
rather than a dream: in her report regarding what the untitled woman Kakka-lidi
has seen, ibtu states only that she saw (mur) certain things, with no reference
to a dream (uttum). It is possible, however, that ibtu simply does not feel the
Y6621.indb 50 1/27/15 1:07 PM

One untitled woman, Zunana, reports her own dream, and species that
Dagan appeared to her in a dream even though nobody had performed
an incubation ritual on me (ARM 26 232). Even if we assume that her
intent in stating that no one performed an incubation ritual on her is to
emphasize the signicance of the dream by highlighting its spontaneity,
this also has the eect of emphasizing for us her independent divination,
especially in combination with what follows. After reporting the content of
her dream, Zunana tells Zimri-lim how to comply with Dagans message
to him; her dreaming, reporting, and interpreting all demonstrate aspects
of her independent divination. With the references to untitled womens in-
dependent divination among both literary gures and historical ones, with
no indication in the Genesis text that Rebekah visits an intermediary, and
with the positive evidence that God speaks directly to her in the text as to
other ancestors throughout Genesis, we should recognize this as Rebekahs
own action and not try to supply a missing intermediary.
In the juxtaposition of Isaacs entreaty and Rebekahs inquiry, the an-
cient author makes no judgment regarding relative value: there is no as-
sessment of the greater worth of either act, no greater esteem for either
character. The acts are dierent because the needs are dierent. The story
is structured around these two consecutive responses to two consecutive
problems. The rst problem (which Isaac and Rebekah share, though it is
presented from Isaacs perspective) is a concrete lack; Isaac asks God for
something (ospring), and God responds by giving it. This creates a new
problem, Rebekahs physical struggle in pregnancy, which sparks her exis-
tential struggle; Rebekah asks God for something (knowledge), and God
responds by giving it. These two types of divine-human communication,
serving dierent functions, are depicted in the same matter-of-fact way as
other interactions between God and the ancestors. For our purposes here,
it is particularly noteworthy that the female characters divination is por-
trayed as simply and bluntly as the male characters supplication. It is in
one sense a nonissue: the author gives no indication that the roles in the
entreaty/inquiry pairing have anything to do with gender (except insofar
need to clarify the precise form of divination for our sake. On the complexity of
the distinction between dreams and visions, see Zgoll, Traum und Welterleben im
antiken Mesopotamien, 164; and Stkl, Prophecy in the Ancient Near East, 7981.
13. Translation of Martti Nissinen (Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near
East, 61).
Y6621.indb 51 1/27/15 1:07 PM

as the subject of this particular inquiry relates to pregnancy). At the same

time, between Isaacs entreaty and Rebekahs inquiry, there is a narrative
emphasis on the latter. Isaacs supplication is mentioned almost in passing,
in just a few words, and with no insight into his internal world. When it
comes to Rebekah, we hear of the physical struggle she feels following con-
ception, the depths of her despair, Gods full response, and the conrmation
of the oracle in the birth of the twins.
Having explored the closeness of Rebekahs ties to Syria and noting the
absence of other similar inquiries among the ancestors, one must wonder
whether these two features of Rebekahs portrayal are connected. It may not
be coincidental that the only woman in the ancestor narratives who explic-
itly engages in divinatory activity is also depicted pointedly as being from
the land of the ancestors. The notion that divination is foreign to Israel is
mistaken wherever it occurs, even if the association is positive; but histori-
cal accuracy aside, it may be that, in the authors imagination, Rebekah the
Aramean still exhibits the ways of the old world.
Oracle and Omen: Divination in Pregnancy

and Childbirth
When Rebekah went to inquire of Yahweh, Yahweh spoke directly
to her concerning the destiny of her two sons and the nations they would
father. In addition to the oracular content of Gods response, the poetic
form of Gods speech here is indicative of an oracle, and not casual (divine-
human) conversation. Now at this point in the story, Rebekahs pregnancy
is in crisis. She had been infertile and has nally conceived, but the boys
crushed one another ( )within her (Gen 25:22). This word does
not mean they struggled, as it is frequently rendered; it means they
crushed, and in no other text do translators habitually soften it so. Verbs
derived from the root are translated in the harsher sense in references
to crushing the heads of Leviathan (Ps 74:14), crushing the skull of Abime-
lech with an upper millstone dropped from a tower ( Judg 9:53), crushing a
golden bowl (Eccl 12:6), and metaphorical references to being crushed with
oppression (for example, Am 4:1; Hos 5:11). When the twins are crushing
14. The other woman who is explicitly brought in from the old country is Rachel.
Perhaps it is not a coincidence that Rachel absconds with a divinatory object
from home: Is the association with divination an image the authors had of these
ancient women from the old country?
Y6621.indb 52 1/27/15 1:07 PM

one another within her, Rebekah is portrayed as being desolate to the point
of having lost the will to live. She is not merely worried about the mean-
ing of the twins strife, as might be assumed from Yahwehs response to
her divinatory inquiry. Whether or not she knows yet that she is carrying
twins (Yahwehs response could be taken to introduce this information or
just to give a glimpse into their future lines), she feels mortal danger and
despairs of the worth of her own life. This reaction would be neurotically
out of proportion for a concern over the meaning of the boys ghting;
on grounds logical and philological, it is evident that Rebekah thinks at
the very least that her pregnancy may be ending. While scholarly com-
mentary on Jeremiahs longing to die aboundsinterpreters regularly note
the gravity of the prophets emotional trauma in his many laments, and
consider the same in Job and even Jonahthere is not to my knowledge
any equivalent work on Rebekah despairing of life itself. Her tormented
question, If it is like this, why am I even alive? ( -),
should be read in the same light as Jeremiahs, Why was I even born?
( , Jer 20:18).
This is not the question she asks Yahweh; it is also not the question
Yahweh answers. She utters the anguished rhetorical question (, not
). How poignant this one line isa remark so brief, and apparently
asked of no one in particular. It is only after this that Rebekah goes to in-
quire. What she does then ask Yahweh we do not get to see, though if we
err on the side of assuming his answer will relate in some way to her ques-
tion (not an area of perfect consistency for him, but of some reliability), we
can surmise that it had more to do with the fate of the infants than with the
value of her own life. Each part of this one verse, then, reveals a fullness of
experience not always recognized in the character:
.- . . . - . . .
15. As in Pseudo-Jonathan, the twins pressed in her womb as men doing battle.
16. Even if one reads Rebekah as given to hyperbole (Gen 27:46)not unlike Jer-
emiahthere is still explicitly cause here for her despair.
17. The verb does at times introduce a question posed to another character, but
the combination of , the absence of another character (human or divine),
and the unanswerable nature of the question indicates that it is rhetorical, as in
Gen 21:7, : She said, Who would have
said to Abraham that Sarah would nurse children?
18. In addition, the phrasing of her despairing rhetorical question is not what one
would expect of someone posing an oracular inquiry.
Y6621.indb 53 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Yahweh then responds directly to Rebekah: Two nations are in your

womb, and two peoples will be separated from your body; one people will
be stronger than the other, and the older will serve the younger (Gen 25:23).
The oracle that Yahweh gives Rebekah is conrmed: when it was time for her
to give birth, sure enough, there were twins in her womb ( ,
Gen 25:24). The presence of twins veries the rst divine message; the un-
usual birth appearance of the twins is then received as a second.
The rst boy was born red and covered with hair, and the second was
born holding on to the heel of the rst (Gen 25:2526). If one pretends for
a moment not to be blindly familiar with the story, this is a bit startling.
The unusual birth events are then interpreted: Rebekah and Isaac name the
twins based on their odd appearance and behavior, and these names (on
which more below) point to the boys future traits. And indeed, we see soon
afterward that the interpretation expressed in the naming of the twins is
conrmed: Jacob grabs Esaus inheritance, and Esau tries to crush Jacob, or
at least so Jacob fears.
The interpretation of newborn appearances is well known from Baby-
lonian, Hittite, and other contexts, and is represented for example in the
series umma izbu. It is dicult to know to what extent birth omens were
actually used even where we know they existed. In the case of umma izbu,
given the preponderance of unrealistic images (for example, If a woman
gives birth to a lion . . . to a wolf . . . to a dog . . . to a pig, I 58), it is clear that
much of the series was not used for interpretation of actual events. How-
ever, many omens in the series do concern realistic appearance (If a woman
gives birth, and both ears [of the child] are [abnormally] small, II 7) or
19. Leichty, The Omen Series umma Izbu, 720. Translations of umma izbu here
are Leichtys. The passing suggestion that the birth of Rebekahs twins consti-
tutes an omen has been made before: Westermann notes simply that there was
an omen in the birth of twin boys (Genesis 1236, 413). Erin Fleming also men-
tions the possibility that Rebekah wants to know whether her pregnancy with
twins is a good or bad omen, citing an example of a negative omen regarding
twin boys and a positive omen regarding twin girls (She Went to Inquire of the
Lord, 9 n.21, citing in turn Leichty, The Omen Series umma Izbu, I 83 and I 100,
pp. 39, 42). Cryer includes this story among several he sees as demonstrating
that the tradition of physiognomic and diagnostic omens was known in Israel,
and in this case particularly misbirth-omens: The phenomenology should be
clear in this instance: Rebekah has felt or heard some inexplicable sign in her
innards, and accordingly visits the appropriate specialist to secure its interpreta-
tion (Divination in Ancient Israel, 320).
Y6621.indb 54 1/27/15 1:07 PM

disability (If a woman gives birth to a deaf childthat house will prosper
outside [of its city], I 63). While Leichty may overstate the case with the
claim that the overwhelming majority of omens in the series umma izbu
actually do occur in nature, his primary arguments for the historical use
of the series are the higher rate of birth anomalies in the ancient world,
and the preponderance of similar types of birth divination among the Hit-
tites, Etruscans, and Romans. Remembering especially that such birth
anomalies include miscarriages, the range of fetal appearances must have
been broader than we might care to imagine (perhaps, for example, II 19).
Several factors thus suggest the omens use to some degree in actual birth
divination (if one disregards the zoological diversity). More to the point,
the omens demonstrate an interest in birth appearances as divine signs
meriting interpretation, just as astrological omenswhich include realistic
and unrealistic occurrencesdemonstrate such a view of celestial events.
Among the more realistic omens in umma izbu are those regarding
multiple births (I 83131). Most of these concern twins. The rst of these
omens, for instance, reads: If a woman gives birth to two boysthere will
be hard times in the land; the land will experience unhappiness; there will
be bad times for the house of their father (I 83). Elsewhere, four omens in
a row concern newborns with unusual hair: one covered with wool, one
already bearded, one already covered with goat hair, and the last, If a
woman gives birth, and at birth (the child) already has (a head of ) hair
hard times will seize the land (IV 3134). The physiognomic handbook
Alandimm also contains interpretations of a persons hair, including, for
instance, If the hair on his head is red, (variant) he is trustworthy (II 87).
There are also omens based on a persons behavior.
20. On the attachment of extrinsic meaning to disability and other physical dif-
ferences in umma izbu, see Schipper, Disability Studies and the Hebrew Bible,
7173.
21. Leichty, The Omen Series umma Izbu, 20.
22. Rochberg explains the impossibility of some astrological omens (The Heavenly
Writing: Divination, Horoscopy, and Astronomy in Mesopotamian Culture, 6768).
23. Translation of Mladen Popovi, Reading the Human Body, 69. Bck, Die
babylonisch-assyrische Morphoskopie; Bck, Physiognomy in Ancient Mesopo-
tamia and Beyond, 199224.
24. For behavioral omens, see Guinan, A Severed Head Laughed: Stories of Di-
vinatory Interpretation, 15, 2428. This type of physiognomic omen interpre-
tation should not be confused with some notion of primitive medicine; it is
distinct from medical approaches to physical symptoms. Heeel, Diagnosis,
Y6621.indb 55 1/27/15 1:07 PM

This is not to imply that Rebekah engaged in formal omen interpreta-

tion (that is, based on traditionally identied omens, whether oral or writ-
ten). Rather, what this may illustrate is that elsewhere in the Near East,
unusual birth events were taken seriously in the interests of divination, and
that while the realism of the omens varies, those likely to occur in reality
include the birth of twins and the unusually hairy appearance of a baby. The
Genesis text ts well into a world in which such birth events would have
been considered signicant and worthy of interpretation. Rebekah has just
gone to inquire regarding the fetal violence she is experiencing, so we are
already in the realm of birth divination; in the next verse, we are told of
the unusual appearance of the twins at birth. As it happens, while almost
all of umma izbu concerns newborns (of humans or animals), the rst
four omens concern fetal activity (If a woman is pregnant, and her foetus
criesthe land will experience misfortune, I 1). The logical relationship
between pregnancy omens and birth omens seen there is apparent also in
the Genesis text, as Rebekahs divination while pregnant is followed by the
observation and interpretation of the unusual appearance and behavior of
the newborns.
The interpretation is obvious in the naming of Jacob, who is born hold-
ing on to his twins heel. I propose that Esau is named for his (pre-) natal
character as well: that Esau, , is derived from ( pi.), meaning to
press or squeeze (all three biblical uses refer to squeezing body parts, in
those cases breasts; Ezek 23:3, 8, 21). The twins crushed one another in
Divination, and Disease: Towards an Understanding of the Rationale Behind

the Babylonian Diagnostic Handbook, 97116.
25. It is not entirely clear who interprets through naming; it appears that Rebekah
and Isaac participate in this together. They named Esau (), and the sin-
gular is accordingly corrected to a plural for Jacobs naming as well.
26. In the Biblical Hebrew corpus (as also in Aramaic) this verb is attested only in
the piel. Its Arabic cognate gaiya (with gawa as one of its verbal nouns) is
however quite common in the qal. Possibly, goes back to a qital form from
a root ( as , friend, likely goes back to a qital form from root ;GKC
84a, p. 231). Arabic gaiya has the basic meaning cover, conceal, but also has
the meaning come upon or rush at. Lane cites classical lexicographers as fol-
lows: it came upon [or invaded, so as to surprise and so as to overwhelm . . .]. He
includes among his examples the Quranic phrase describing the overwhelm-
ing of Pharaohs troops: fa-gaiyahum min al-yammi m gaiyahum. As trans-
lated by Yusuf Ali: Then Pharaoh pursued them with his forces, but the waters
Y6621.indb 56 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Rebekahs womb, and they came out doing such and such; she essentially
names the rst Presser and the second Grabber. The common attempt to
connect the naming of Esau to the noun ( hair) is based, quite reason-
ably, on the authors explanation of the name: the baby came out red and
hairy, so they named him Esau. I see two options here. One, we should
translate and they named him Esau, without assuming that the name is
based on the rst part of the verse. Twoand I nd this hypothesis most
plausiblethe text as it stands does assume the connection, but just
as we see in the explanation of Samuels name that there must have been
confusion with an earlier tradition (in that case with another specic char-
acter), we see here indication of an original tradition dierent than what
the author implies. In storytelling terms, the child could be named after the
crushing of verse 22 or the hair of verse 25a, but the name can plau-
sibly be etymologically related to , and not to . There are certainly
names that depend on wordplay rather than direct etymological connec-
tion, but where we have a choice between the two, both of which suit the
story, the latter is preferable.
There are many biblical narratives in which women name their children
based on their own experience (Cain, Gen 4:1; Isaac, Gen 18:13, 15; 21:6), or
on Gods actions (Ishmael, Gen 16:11). It is less common for texts to explain
childrens names according to their birth appearance or actions. Even where
this does happen, the naming of children after birth traits does not neces-
sarily constitute the interpretation of a birth omen. In Genesis 25, the
completely overwhelmed them and covered them up (Surah 20:81, according to

Lane; = 20:78 in Yusuf Alis translation). Lane, Arabic-English Lexicon, 2261.
27. Older articulations of this remain inuential but unsatisfying. Driver assumed
that the description of Esau as hairy was a play on Seir, and thought that the
meaning of the name Esau was not discoverable from Hebrew but that given
the context it should be taken to connote hairiness (The Book of Genesis, 246).
Speiser followed suit and called the naming of Esau an indirect word play,
adding, To make the aetiology explicit, the text should have said they named
him Seir, since only this synonym for Edom, and not the eponym Esau, is at all
evoked by sear hair (Genesis, 195.) Similarly Sarna, Genesis, 180, and others.
28. It is conceivable that the unusual birth of Tamars twins is also interpreted as
a sign of their future. One of the twins starts to appear, and the midwife ties a
scarlet thread around his exposed hand, saying, This one came out rst. But
then his twin somehow comes out before him, and the midwife continues: How
have you broken through? A breach be upon you, and she gave him the name
Y6621.indb 57 1/27/15 1:07 PM

narrative context is relevant: Rebekah inquires once while pregnant and

receives an oracle about her twins destinies. She then engages in divinatory
activity a second time (now together with Isaac) in her interpretation of
their unusual birth appearance. The initial oracle is conrmed by the birth
of twins, and the birth omen, as interpreted in the twins names, is con-
rmed by the subsequent events of the story.
Embodying, Inquiring, Interpreting:

Rebekah as Diviner and Divined
Perhaps it is part of the authors romanticized impression of the old
country that Rebekah engages in these types of divinatory activity. There
are other oracles and omens related to pregnancy and childbirth in the
Bible, but nothing as reminiscent of other Near Eastern birth omens as
this. Moreover, hints of Rebekahs association with divination appear as a
thread through each of her three narratives.
Rebekah does not only inquire and interpret signs; from the moment
of her entry onto the scene, Rebekah embodies a sign. When Abrahams
servant goes to Aram-naharaim, he asks Yahweh to give him a sign of
which girl to bring home for Isaac, through her specic response to his
request for water from her jug: when I say x, let her say y (Gen 24:1014).
Rebekah comes along and enacts the basic content of what the servant has
requested, but not the form. Humorously, at least to this reader, Rebekahs
response thus leaves the servant a bit stumped: the man stared at her dumb-
founded, trying to gure out if Yahweh had made his trip successful or not
(- , Gen 24:21). Literary
charm aside, the servants hesitation further demonstrates that he is look-
ing for a particular interpretable sign. Had he prayed for general guidance,
Perez (Gen 38:29; read in both vv. 29 and 30 with some manuscripts of
Sam. Pent., Syr., Tg. Ps.-J.). Zerah, who had started to appear rst, is named on
the basis of his birth, but there is no indication that the name has anything more
than symbolic signicance (i.e., it may only commemorate his birth and not be
meant to represent anything in his personality or life looking forward). Perez
too is named for his birth attributes, but in this case the name is explicitly meant
to have ongoing signicance. Whatever precisely means, it appears to
be a statement about a lasting trait or future event. It is intriguing that it is the
midwife who names him and pronounces this blessing or curse.
29. Hamori, Heavenly Bodies: Pregnancy and Birth Omens in Israel, 47999.
Y6621.indb 58 1/27/15 1:07 PM

he would now have no reason to remain unsure: he had asked for the right
woman to oer a drink to him and to his camels, and this one did. Why
then his lingering doubt? Reading the scene in light of the particularity of
omens and omen interpretation, it makes sense: he had asked for the sign
of the specic response, Drink, and I will also give water to your camels,
and this woman said, Drink, and then he drank; after that, she oered to
give water to his camels, at which point she went back to the well to draw
more water for them. How awkwardly close to the requested sign, without
actually quite matching itno wonder he stared at her dumbfounded.
We soon nd out, of course, that this is indeed the fulllment of the
requested sign. Rebekahs family also understands this to be the case: when
Abrahams servant tells them the whole story and asks if they will let Re-
bekah go, they acknowledge that the matter has been decided by Yahweh,
so it is not for them to say whether it is good or bad (Gen 24:5051). (The
servant has made matters easier for them in the retelling: note his adjust-
ment of Rebekahs language in v. 46 to match his own.) From her rst ap-
pearance in the story, Rebekah is a walking omen.
At the beginning of the divination scene in Genesis 25, Rebekah again
embodies a sign. It is the physical tumult within her own body that leads
her to inquire of Yahweh. If she was a passive sign to be interpreted in
chapter 24, she is now active in seeking the interpretation of the sign she
carries in her body. Later, when the twins are born, Rebekah moves from
embodying signs and inquiring about signs to interpreting them: now it is
the next generation that embodies the omen.
In the third and nal scene featuring Rebekah, the matriarch acts on
the knowledge she received through her divination, through both Gods re-
sponse to her oracular inquiry and the conrmation of it that she interprets
in the unusual birth appearances of her children. Knowing that the descen-
dants of her younger son are to be served by those of the elder, she arranges
for Jacob to acquire the blessing of the rstborn from his father. This scene,
30. I use sign and omen somewhat interchangeably, and intentionally so: we are
accustomed to seeing sign used for biblical examples and omen for Mesopo-
tamian, and this creates an inaccurate sense of an inherent dierence between
the phenomena. On the widespread notion of signs and omens in Near Eastern
literature, including in the Bible, see Annus, On the Beginnings and Conti-
nuities of Omen Sciences in the Ancient World, esp. 913; and Noegel, Sign,
Sign, Everywhere a Sign: Script, Power, and Interpretation in the Ancient Near
East, 14362.
Y6621.indb 59 1/27/15 1:07 PM

in all of its wonderful detailfrom her strategizing to her dressing of Jacob

in Esaus clothing and goatskinsis all a result of Rebekahs earlier divina-
tory activity.
The character of Rebekah the Aramean incorporates every facet of the
divinatory process: she has been the sign, the inquirer, and the interpreter.
In the end, it is her action againbased on her divined knowledgethat
brings Jacob back to Syria, where he will encounter another Aramean
woman, who will be the subject of another chapter.
Y6621.indb 60 1/27/15 1:07 PM

4 Miriam
Unlike Rebekah, who is portrayed engaging in divinatory activity but is

not a titled diviner, Miriam is called a prophet but is never said to prophesy.
She is the canons rst titled female prophet (), and the sister of Mo-
ses; as such, she has not infrequently been viewed as the paradigmatic
and the female counterpart to Mosess role as chief among (male) prophets.
While some nd this idea hermeneutically useful, its underlying assump-
tions are problematic, as it rst presupposes that male and female prophets
should be understood according to dierent models, and, second, frames
Miriams activity in particularusually her singing and sometimes her op-
position to Mosesas archetypal for female prophets. Huldah, meanwhile,
1. This takes a variety of forms. Trible presents Miriam as the archetypal female
prophet in her inuential article, Bringing Miriam Out of the Shadows, 182.
Fuchs remarks that she agrees with Trible only on one part of this: Miriam pre-
gures a succession of woman prophets in the Hebrew Bible, but in my reading
she pregures their erasure, not their authority (Prophecy and the Construc-
tion of Women, 60). Gafney, introducing the various women she will choose to
identify as prophets, writes: Each of them is a daughter of Miriam, the mother
of all women-prophets (Daughters of Miriam, x). For others, it is more a matter
of positing an ancient perspective: Butting sees Miriam as the embodiment of
prophecy in the Torah (Prophetinnen Gefragt, e.g., 10, 77), following generally
Kesslers view of Miriam as the post-exilic symbol of prophecy, noting Mic 6:4,
where he sees Moses, Aaron, and Miriam as standing for Torah, cult, and proph-
ecy (Miriam and the Prophecy of the Persian Period, 7786). Of course, even
the view noted earlier of Moses as the paradigmatic male prophet is based only
on certain biblical sources and not others.
61
Y6621.indb 61 1/27/15 1:07 PM

delivers an oracle to the king; should we really consider Miriams role to be

paradigmatic? Male prophets dier radically from one another, and while
Moses might be called chief among them, it is evident that this does not
refer to paradigmatic behavior. This is not the case in discussion of female
prophets, where more homogeneity is often assumed. Perhaps it is not so
hermeneutically useful after all to refer to a woman who sings, but does not
prophesy, as the female prophet par excellence.
Portrait of the Prophet as a Young Girl

In a surprising coincidence, this character too is pictured at home in
her mothers house, in her younger days. Of course, the original story of
Mosess older sister in Exodus 2 has nothing to do with Miriam. A separate
tradition names her as the sister of Moses (Num 26:59), and only when
these came together could the story of the young girl who rescues her baby
brother at the Niles edge be associated with the Miriam we meet later.
Nonetheless, the joining of these traditions reects an early view of Mir-
iam that may color our view of the character as an adult. This connection
does not only lend greater signicance to the girls actions in this story;
the later Miriam-Moses story is also altered through the addition of this
introduction.
Young Miriam (or the girl in this tradition who comes to be associated
with Miriam) is credited with rescuing her infant brother, thus paving the
way for the rest of the story of Moses. But is Miriams behavior so clearly
benevolent, or might she have some sense of conict? Mosess mother has
protected her son for as long as she can. When he is three months old, she
exposes him. Miriam hides and watches, and when the Egyptian princess
discovers the baby, Mosess quick-thinking sister oers their own mother
as a nurse. This is a brilliant response to the sight of the Pharaohs daughter
saving Moses, but what if the princess had not come along just then? Surely
babies do not generally live long on the banks of the Nile. A basket on the
Niles edge does not protect an infant from crocodiles, and if the basket
were well enough sealed with bitumen and pitch (Exod 2:3) to keep the
water from ooding in, the infant would suocate. The reader knows the
child will survive, but the character in the story does not: the suspense is
2. On the development of texts through added introductions, see the useful ap-
proach of Milstein, Reworking Ancient Texts: Revision through Introduction
in Biblical and Mesopotamian Literature.
Y6621.indb 62 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Miriam 63
derived from the expectation that the infant will surely die, whether by
ood or fang.
So from a literary perspective, the Pharaohs daughter was always go-
ing to come save the boy and the day, but young Miriam is not there to
fend o crocodiles until a princess appears: she is watching Mosess basket
at a distance, to see what would happen to him (
-, Exod 2:4). This sounds more like morbid curiosity than hero-
ism. The narrator introduces a miraculous rescue by the princess, and with it
an opportunity for the older sister to act strategically, but within the world
of the story, this cannot be what she is expecting. Once this tradition is
joined with that of Miriam as Mosess sister, the tension as she stands at a
distance, waiting and watching him, may even foreshadow the conict to
come.
Is the Song of Miriam Prophetic Activity?

It is frequently assumed that Miriams song constitutes either some
or all of her prophetic activity. This view is generally based on the fact that
Miriam and Deborah both sing, and thus that their songs must be their
prophecy; the further conclusion is sometimes drawn that womens proph-
ecy in general involved singing. There are, however, several problems with
the idea that Miriams song has to do with prophecy at all. I will rst address
the contents of the Song of the Sea as a whole, and the question of whether
3. Williamson associates the songs of Miriam and Deborah and suggests that
this could be why they were considered prophets; he states later, Probably the
most consistent element in the portrayal of the prophetess is the association
with inspired singing with accompanying instruments and dancing, suggestive
of feverish enthusiasm if not necessarily ecstasy (Prophetesses in the Hebrew
Bible, 6970, 73). Meyers sees Miriam as having an archetypal role, and pre-
pares the reader considering female prophetic traditions for the presence of a
gender-specic tradition, grounded in musical performance (Miriam, Music,
and Miracles, 2728). Gafney too sees this as central: Miriams prophetic iden-
tity is revealed in the text at the moment she and her dancing disciples perform
the song of thanksgiving that she choreographed to celebrate salvation through
the waters of the Sea of Reeds (Daughters of Miriam, 8081). Fuchs also con-
nects Miriams and Deborahs songs to their prophetic titles (Prophecy and the
Construction of Women, 5758). Butting sees Miriams song as an example of a
connection between music and prophecy as well, but not one that is specic to
women (Prophetinnen Gefragt, 4344).
Y6621.indb 63 1/27/15 1:07 PM

the association of similar songs with both Miriam and Deborah indicates
anything about prophetic status; I will then discuss the vexed question of
how much of the song should be considered the Song of Miriam; and -
nally I will consider some scholars intuition that something in the nature
of poetry itself points to prophetic inspiration.
Nothing in the contents of what is sung in Exodus 15:121 looks espe-
cially prophetic. The Song of the Sea is explicitly a psalm of victory against
the enemy (Horse and rider he has hurled into the sea . . . This is my
God and I will praise him, the God of my father and I will exalt him . . .
You stretched out your right hand, and the earth swallowed them up,
Exod 15:1, 2, 12). Even those who consider Miriams song to be her pro-
phetic activity do not do so on the basis of its content, but of its form: it is
the very fact that it is a song, and the coincidence of the prophet Deborah
participating in a song as well, that leads to this assumption. There is, how-
ever, a better explanation. The Song of the Sealike the song in Judges 5, to
be discussed lateris a clear example of the victory song tradition.
This is not simply a loose term for a celebratory song that might some-
how also be prophecy. It is a narrowly dened category, identiable by its
specic literary form and narrative contexts, religious and military con-
tent, and even musical terminology, with related examples from other Near
Eastern contexts as well.
The particularity of this genre also explains the attribution of such
songs to both Miriam and Deborah. It is not because the songs are some-
how mysteriously prophetic, in spite of their apparently nonprophetic con-
tent; it is because such victory songs are especially associated with women.
In 1 Samuel 18:67, for instance, a group of women from all of the towns
of Israel come out to greet Saul and David after battle, singing a song and
playing hand drums and dancing ( and , as also in Exod 15:20).
In that context, the women have no prophetic role, and the victory song is
clearly just that. The tradition appears again in Judges 11:34, where Jeph-
thahs daughter comes to welcome him home from battle with hand drums
4. See especially Poethig, The Victory Song Tradition of the Women of Israel.
The literary genre had been recognized previously by many other scholars; Poe-
thigs primary contribution is the addition of solid evidence that the victory
song is also a specic identiable musical tradition.
5. On the and tradition and its signicance in the womens victory song
genre, with attention to both philological and archaeological evidence, see ibid.,
3168.
Y6621.indb 64 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Miriam 65
and dancing (again and ), in a victory celebration she might

later come to regret. That the victory songs of Exodus 15 and Judges 5 are
(partially) attributed to women is not such a coincidence after all, and
should not be linked articially to the womens prophetic titles.
Scholars have disagreed on how much of the song was originally as-
sociated with Miriam. The Song of the Sea is introduced as one that Moses
and the Israelites sing to Yahweh (Exod 15:1), and it closes with an ascrip-
tion of at least one line to Miriam, who leads with singing and beating on
drums (Exod 15:2021). The relationship between these two elements has
been much debated: whether they represent two separate traditions of the
same song, one ascribing the whole to Moses and the other to Miriam;
whether they are two separate songs, rst the much longer Song of the
Sea (that is, Mosess) and then the brief Song of Miriam; or whether it is
one tradition of one song, with sections sung in turn by dierent parties.
Each major category here has its divergent subtheories: for instance, in
the last category, the older assumption was that Moses and the Israel-
ites (that is, men) sang, and Miriam and the women responded antipho-
nallyan idea perhaps more rooted in musical traditions from other places
and times, for which there is no evidence in the Hebrew Bible (antiphony,
6. Meyers points out that the victory song genre is logically female when the tra-
dition is for the people who are at home (women) to come greet the return-
ing soldiers (men) (Exodus, 11718). This is not the only reason, though, since
other such singing and drumming is also specic to women. On the broader
traditions of womens singing and drumming, see Meyers, Miriam, Music, and
Miracles; Paz, Drums, Women, and Goddesses, esp. 86101; Meyers, Guilds and
Gatherings, 16667; and Meyers, Miriam the Musician, 20730.
7. On the correction of the usual translation tambourine to the more accurate
drum, see Meyers, Miriam, Music, and Miracles, 3136.
8. Classically, Cross and Freedman, The Song of Miriam, 23750; and Cross and
Freedman, Studies in Ancient Yahwistic Poetry, based on their 1950 joint disser-
tation at Johns Hopkins University. They made no claim about actual author-
ship, but only about the superiority of the tradition (E?) which associates the
song with Miriam rather than with Moses (Cross and Freedman, The Song of
Miriam, 237).
9. A recent prime example: Dozeman, Exodus, 32643.
10. E.g., Houtman, Exodus. Houtmans argument against the two-song theory is
especially sharp (Exodus, 2:24041). M. Brenner sees a male chorus and a danc-
ing female chorus, and views the whole as a post-exilic retrojection of cultic
psalm performance in the model of Levitical singers (The Song of the Sea, 4046).
Y6621.indb 65 1/27/15 1:07 PM

yes; arrangement by gender, no). In recent decades, some have argued that
Miriam leads all of the people in singing (on which more below), and oth-
ers have argued for the model of a group round. I will not detail the vari-
ous arguments here; for clear summaries, readers may consult Dozeman,
who gives particular attention to the history of various generic identica-
tions, and Meyers, who focuses on work from dierent approaches that
highlights the role of Miriam, including that of Phyllis Trible, J. Gerald
Janzen, Susan Ackerman, and others. Some see Miriams role as having
been unfairly diminished through the editorial process; others defend her
as especially highly extolled, even in the current text.
There is some indication that Miriam may have had more of a hand
in leading the song than it rst appears. Moses and the people begin with
I will sing (, or cohortative, Let me sing), and Miriam begins in
15:21 with the imperative Sing! (, masc. pl.). It is tempting to see these
as belonging in the other order. This is by no means certain, though, and
would not exclude the possibility of a song sung back and forth. Further-
more, we must keep in mind that we know extremely little of ancient Isra-
elite musical styles, and we should not assume that this song matches a pat-
tern we know. Additionally, I nd it suspicious that the models articially
retrojected generally happen to match styles especially common in white
Western contexts. Even among group song patterns we might articially
export, the models of a round, or of song leader and chorus (Sing! And the
people sang . . .), are no likelier than the model of singers and respondents
11. Houtman pictures the song sung in rounds, with some verses sung by Moses,
then some by various choirs, then the key verse by Miriam (Exodus, 2:24546).
12. Dozeman, Exodus, 32633; and Meyers, Miriam, Music, and Miracles, 2831;
Trible, Bringing Miriam Out of the Shadows; Janzen, Song of Moses, Song
of Miriam: Who Is Seconding Whom? 21120; Ackerman, Why Is Miriam
Also among the Prophets? 4780; Brooke, The Long-Lost Song of Miriam,
6265.
13. Fuchs sees Miriams song as a poor replacement for actual prophetic speech
(Prophecy and the Construction of Women, 5758). Hamilton proposes that
Exodus 15, far from demoting Miriam, instead puts her on a pedestal (Exodus,
235). I do not see that it must be one extreme or the other; perhaps its just that
shes no Moses. Who is?
14. So also Janzen, Song of Moses, Song of Miriam, 216; Hamilton, Exodus, 234
35; van Dijk-Hemmes, Some Recent Views on the Presentation of the Song of
Miriam, 200.
Y6621.indb 66 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Miriam 67
(The people sang; one or more responded, Yes, sing!). I am not suggesting
that Miriam actually responded by calling out, Sing it! (Preach it!), but
this example should demonstrate that there is more of a breadth of pos-
sibilities than is customarily acknowledged, and the range of options along
with the distance and inaccessibility of the musical tradition leave us no
clearer on the extent of Miriams role than when we began.
What we do know is that Miriam took up a drum and sang out to the
people () . The use of is often understood as referring
to Miriam answering the men, but this is not a good reading, since the
verb also means sing. The two meanings of come from separate
proto-Semitic roots, and are found as separate lexical entries (for example,
BDB 777a). There are many texts in which the verb clearly means sing.
Signicantly, these include all references to the womens victory song when
David returned after killing the giant. To celebrate this improbable victory,
the women came out drumming and dancing, and they sang ( ,
1 Sam 18:67, and as referenced again in 1 Sam 21:12 [Eng. 21:11] and 29:5). The
context is reminiscent of the victory song scene in Exodus 15.
Other uses of this verb also carry a connotation of either particularly
celebratory singing, or battle cries, or both. In Ezra 3:1011, the song is joy-
ful and raucous, accompanied by trumpets and cymbals and great shouting.
In Isaiah 13:22, the verb refers metaphorically to jackals that will sing, paired
with the image in the previous verse that the goats will dance (13:21). In
Exodus 32:18, the verb is used to describe both the sound of battle cries and
the sound of singing; they are so similar that Joshua initially mistakes the
peoples singing for the sound of either victory or defeat. This sheds light on
the way the verb is used twice in Jeremiah: in Jeremiah 51:14 it refers to the
peoples battle cry, and in Jeremiah 25:30, to Gods battle cry, used in parallel
to God roaring ( ) and uttering his voice () . This collec-
tion of uses is telling: victory songs and raucous celebrations, calls to sing,
battle cries, and the paired usage for battle cries and victory celebration. The
verb which perhaps we should render sing outfurther reects the
15. Contra Fischer, who does see the song as demonstrating Miriams prophetic
activity, but not because she is singing: rather, she answers on behalf of the
people as a whole, thus mediating divine-human communication by represent-
ing the group in her response to divine acts (Gottesknderinnen, 6667).
16. E.g., Ps 88:1; 119:172; and 147:7 (where it is used in parallel with , sing);
Num 21:17, to a well, and Isa 27:2, the call to sing to the vineyard.
Y6621.indb 67 1/27/15 1:07 PM

nature of Exodus 15 as a victory song, used of Miriam in this text as it is of

the women in 1 Samuel.
Whatever the extent of Miriams role, she was participating in a victory
song, not an act of prophetic speech. Even if she is interpreted to have led
the whole song, this does not suddenly constitute prophetic activity: it only
aligns the text more closely with the other victory songs led by women (for
example, 1 Sam 18:67).
Yet the instinct to connect the song to Miriams prophetic title is
understandable. There seem to be three main reasons for it. She is rst
called a prophet in Exodus 15:20, when she picks up her drum; two of the
ve female prophets sing; and there is some broader connection between
prophecy and poetry. However, her introduction as a prophet in 15:20
need not be connected to the song, since this is also her introduction as a
character in general, the rst mention of her name, and comes alongside
her other descriptor, the sister of Aaron. Two female prophets sing, but
three do not, and the songs of the rst two are better explained by the
victory song tradition than by the womens prophetic titles. I will return
to that argument in the next chapter; for the moment, note simply that in
neither case is the pattern related to prophecy. The third reason, the no-
tion of a close relationship between prophecy and poetry, warrants more
attention here.
This is an assumption that comes in many forms. Some are appropri-
ately cautious, seeing a possible connection between Miriam as prophet and
poet but drawing no rm conclusion. Others, as noted previously, assume
that the song in which Miriam participates must be prophetic activityat
least for her, if not for Moses and the Israelites (15:1). For some, this is
clearly a matter of gendered interpretation. For others, however, it seems to
17. Sarna observes that in Exod 1415 and Judg 45, the recounting of a battle scene
in which a historic prose account is followed by a triumphal ode extolling the
victory is a literary pattern also known from New Kingdom Egyptian texts
(Exodus, 75).
18. Propp considers various possibilities: In Numbers 12, Miriam will claim pro-
phetic powers like those of Aaron and Moses himself. Why is her vocation
mentioned already in 15:20? Perhaps her prophetic oce is directly related to
her musical performance. Deborah, too, is singer and prophetess . . . Perhaps
certain singers were considered inspired, like the Greek bards (Odyssey 22:349).
But most likely, Miriam the prophetess, Aarons sister is simply Miriams full
title, used here upon her rst appearance (Exodus 118, 54647).
Y6621.indb 68 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Miriam 69
stem from a general sense of a link between prophecy and poetry. In some
cases, this is built on an antiquated model, whether found in older sources
or more recent ones. Robert Lowth saw the prophets as singing or chanting
to music; more recently, Joyce Rilett Wood has imagined the early biblical
prophets as performing poets, relying on the tradition of Greek poetic
performance. In other cases, scholars with no such overall views still see
Miriams verse as the expression of her prophetic role. What is there, then,
to this assumption of a link between prophecy and poetry, found in so many
forms, in the work of such a diverse group of scholars?
It is well established that there is a close relationship between prophecy
and poetry, various aspects of their interplay in many periods and contexts
having been explored, with attention to spontaneous mantic verse and to
written oracle, to both the religious concepts and the social realities behind
the relationship. On the most basic level, one might suggest that poetry is
somehow speech on a higher plane (though a writer of prose might object),
speech meant to elicit a pause, provoke a response on what might be con-
sidered a mystical or spiritual level. While poetry is notoriously dicult to
dene, and thankfully doing so is not necessary here, it seems clear that
poetic speech is commonly received dierently than prose is, inviting special
19. Lowth, Lectures on the Sacred Poetry of the Hebrews; Wood, Prophecy and Poetic
Dialogue, 309; see also M. Brenner, The Song of the Sea, 44.
20. In addition to those cited above, see, e.g., Dozeman, who suggests that Miriams
prophetic identity provides guidelines for interpreting her song. It is more than
an antiphon to the Song of the Sea; it contains its own prophetic interpretation
of the exodus, refocusing the readers attention on the events at the sea, and so
her prophetic song provides a countervoice to the prophecy of Moses in the
Song of the Sea (Exodus, 343).
21. See especially the range of collected essays in Kugel, ed., Poetry and Prophecy.
On the relationship between poetry and prophecy in a range of cultural con-
texts, see, e.g., Nishimura, Retrospective Comprehension: Japanese Foretelling
Songs, 4566; Shaughnessy, Arousing Images: The Poetry of Divination and
the Divination of Poetry, esp. 6773 on Chinese divinatory poems; Menden-
hall, Prophecy and Poetry in Modern Yemen, 34043; Muessig, Prophecy and
Song: Teaching and Preaching by Medieval Women, 14658. See also Leavitt,
ed., Poetry and Prophecy: The Anthropology of Inspiration, a compilation of essays
representing many dierent cultures and periods, from Mayan divination to
Himalayan ritual discourse, as well as a range of methodologies.
22. See, e.g., Eagleton, How to Read a Poem, 2547; Kugel, The Idea of Biblical Poetry,
5995.
Y6621.indb 69 1/27/15 1:07 PM

attention not only to its ideas as expressed through intentional and mean-
ingful wording (as is the case with prose), but lending greater weight to the
signicance of each word and phrase; perhaps in some way the weight is
shifted in poetry even more toward the import of each word choice and the
resulting combinations, interactions, jarring juxtapositions. The signicance
of specic wording and phrasing should be present in prose, but it is the
essence of poetry. In the reception of prophetic speech, too, special signi-
cance and theological import is attached not only to the underlying ideas
of the message, but to the particularity of its wording.
Many explanations for the relationship between prophecy and poetry
begin with a theological version of this sense of the special nature of po-
etic languagethat poetry is, or is commonly seen as, inspired. Poetic
speech is thus seen as an indicator of inspiration. This is the approach, for
example, of Freedman, who concludes his exploration of the relationship
between prophecy and poetry with the suggestion that poetic speech served
the purpose of helping to conrm authentic revelation, when other stan-
dards (such as the conicting and otherwise dicult ones in Deuteronomy)
did not work: Instead of trying to decide the ultimate issues of truth and
falsehood, which are best left to the eschaton and to the Almighty, we may
examine the more immediate question facing Israel: the test of a prophet
was the presence and power of the Spirit in his message, what he said, and
how he said it. Since the Spirit was the direct source of both prophecy and
poetry, they were the basic indicators and primary evidence of its presence
and activity.
The sense that poetic form lends an air of authenticity to an oracle
is seen elsewhere as well. The correspondence is by no means absolute or
consistent, however, and should not be exported to the biblical context.
In addition to the wide range of perspectives on the relationship between
poetry and prophecy in dierent historical and cultural contexts, there can
be signicant variation within a given context. The spectrum within Greek
society may serve as an example: In some cases, poetry could be seen as
indicating inspiration specically because it lay beyond the human beings
normal power of speech. There was in some contexts a preference for an
uneducated person to serve as an oracle, speaking in verse or singing, be-
cause such a person might not be thought to have composed the verse
autonomously. The Clarian Oracle, for instance, was uneducated, and thus
23. Freedman, Pottery, Poetry, and Prophecy, esp. 1526; quotation 25.
Y6621.indb 70 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Miriam 71
his poetry indicated the authenticity of his message. Johnston notes that
according to Tacitus, the prophet at Claros would drink from the sacred
water there and answer questions posed by visitors (without knowing what
they had asked, as further conrmation of authenticity; cf. Dan 2), and, as
Johnston writes, The man was usually illiterate and ignorant of poetry, but
managed nonetheless to compose his replies in good meter. Even among
the Greek oracles, however, poetry could be seen instead as a reection of
the human speakers agency. The Oracle at Delphi demonstrates the range
of views within Greek society: some Pythia spoke in poetry, and some in
prose, depending on each womans education and ability. It was recognized
that the Oracle had agency in the expression of the inspired message. So
there was real variety even among the Greek oracles (and granted, there is
a signicant time span in this context, but so is there in biblical prophecy).
Poetry could be taken as a sign of inspiration, but it could also be under-
stood specically as a reection of the prophets own abilities. At least at
Delphi, these could be seen as compatible; a poetic oracle could reect the
prophets own background as well as its inspired character. This is not al-
ways the case.
The strongest statement of the incompatibility of human creative
agency and divine inspiration is found in Islam, where the recognition of
poetry as a sign of human agency is utterly counter to any notion of poetry
as indicating authentic inspiration. Within the Quran itself and through-
out the tradition, it is maintained that Muhammad was no poet and that his
prophecy was not poetry. To make the point, the prophet and his authentic
revelation are juxtaposed with the kuhhn (traditional diviners) and their
short rhyming oracles. And yet, for all this, apparently the distinction
24. Johnston, Ancient Greek Divination, 77. Johnston notes variations both in the
ancient tradition and in modern scholarly interpretation: some scholars would
argue that the messages were only put into verse after the original delivery, but
Johnston (while acknowledging that there may have been changes through the
period of the Oracles existence) concludes the above.
25. Ibid., 5051. Here Johnston is rmer than in regard to the Clarian Oracle: the
old scholarly notion that the Oracle would spout divine messages in an ecstatic
frenzy that would then be translated into poetry by the priest is not supported
by the evidence.
26. Zwettler, A Mantic Manifesto: The Sra of The Poets and the Qurnic Foun-
dations of Prophetic Authority, 75119. For examples, a few of which Zwettler
addresses, see 21:5; 36:69; 37:3637; 52:30; 69:4043.
Y6621.indb 71 1/27/15 1:07 PM

must be strenuously asserted because otherwise a person might indeed look

at the Quran and call it poetry.
With just these few examples, we have on one end of the spectrum the
sense that poetry is a sign of inspiration (especially when delivered by the
uneducated, so high is it above common speech), and on the other end,
precisely the opposite: the sense that poetry is a human creation and thus
indicates the lack of authentic revelation. Somewhere in between these,
we have the world of thought expressed in the biblical context. It is surely
no more uniform in Israelite thought than in Greek. As seen above, even
where there is a close association between prophecy and poetry in Greek
society, it is not at all consistent, and not remotely in the sense of a one-
to-one correspondence. In the biblical context, we see a far closer link
between prophecy and poetry in late material. Earlier on (to varying de-
grees), prophets are not known for poetry and song (for example, Elijah,
Elisha), and several signicant songs are associated with characters who
are not prophets (for example, Jacob, Barak, David). No particular corre-
spondence should be assumed, especially for material as early as the song
of Exodus 15.
The picture in early Israel is more like what we have in other parts of
the ancient Near East, where there is no particular connection between
prophecy and poetic speech. The prophets speech in the Mari letters is
entirely prose, and almost all of the Neo-Assyrian oracles are prose. In
the latter corpus, there are a few texts one might imagine could be con-
sidered more poetic (for example, SAA 9 1.6), but even this might be a
27. Freedman, for instance, writes that the words of Muhammad in the Quran
are all considered poetic . . . prophet and poet are one, and the two categories
are coterminous. In the Quran, poetry and prophecy are the same (Pottery,
Poetry, and Prophecy, 24). This is certainly the impression a reader might get,
but vehemently not the view within the tradition.
28. See Flower, The Seer in Ancient Greece, 5865, on the relationship between seers
and oracle-singers; and for another approach, Nagy, Ancient Greek Poetry,
Prophecy, and Concepts of Theory, esp. 56.
29. On the early date, see Russell, Images of Egypt in Early Biblical Literature,
12776.
30. See also Stkls demonstration that there is no particular connection between
music and prophecy in other Near Eastern literature; Prophecy in the Ancient
Near East, 21115.
Y6621.indb 72 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Miriam 73
stretch. Interestingly, among these texts, as well as in the Zakkur stela and
the Deir Alla texts, when prophets speak their own words and the words
of deities, the latter are more likely to seem poeticthat is, the words at-
tributed to deities at times reect more features of poetic language than
the words only attributed to the prophets. Even allowing for this possible
pattern, however, the Song of the Sea would not look like prophecy, since it
is about divine action and does not convey divine speech.
All in all, the association between poetry and prophecy is far too sim-
plistic. While the two are related in a few senses and in a variety of his-
torical and cultural contexts, the relationship is complex and inconsistent,
and neither the biblical traditions about early prophets nor the other Near
Eastern prophetic material supports the theory of a close relationship in
this particular setting.
One additional consideration is whether a female prophet might be es-
pecially likely to use the medium of song. Any suggestion of this that rests
on some notion that womens modes of expression dier from mens can be
discarded without further comment. There is one issue, however, that may
lend some support to the theory. Where poetic form is understood to point
to authentic inspiration, this can be seen either in terms of reception (an
oracles content being conrmed by its form), or in terms of exploitation
(poetic form being utilized in order to signify an oracles import). Which of
these is in play in a given context is a matter of perspective. If poetic speech
is seen as a strategy for the one delivering an oracle, the use of poetic form
then serves those with limited social power. Where poetry carries a sense
of inspiration and thus implies the authenticity of an oracle, it would allow
those with limited social power to make pronouncements with authority.
However, this would only apply to a social context in which poetic form
was indeed seen as linked to prophetic authority. This may well have been
the case in some Greek contexts, as in some other cultural contexts. It was
not, however, the case with early Israelite prophecy.
There is no reason left, then, to associate the Song of Miriam (whether
contained in v. 21 or even comprising the whole Song of the Sea) with
prophecy. Nothing in the songs form, content, setting, or performance
31. For text and translation of SAA 9 1.6 (formatted as prose, but it could be a
poetic exception), see Nissinen, Prophets and Prophecy in the Ancient Near East,
1068.
Y6621.indb 73 1/27/15 1:07 PM

indicates that it is prophetic; each one of these indicates instead that it is a

classic example of the victory song tradition. Whatever prophetic activity
Miriam engaged in, this song is not a reection of it.
The Prophetic Conflict of Numbers 12

We come, then, to a text that directly addresses the question of Mir-
iams ability or right to speak for Yahweh. Some see the conict in Num-
bers 12 as only about Miriams opposition to Mosess marriage, using the is-
sue of prophecy as a red herring; others see the text as a denial that Miriam
is a prophet. It is neither. The story is explicitly about prophetic authority:
Miriam and Aaron contend that Yahweh speaks through them as well as
through Moses; Yahwehs response is an explanation of how he speaks to
prophets in comparison to how he speaks with Moses; and then Miriam
is punished. When the tradition openly reects on Miriams claim to pro-
phetic status, the aim may be to highlight the special nature of Yahwehs
communication to Moses (and its later written form), but an additional
consequence is that it reveals that the tension surrounding Miriams status
as a prophet is not a by-product of modern ideologically driven concerns,
but an ancient conict buried in the heart of the tradition itself.
As the story begins, Miriam and Aaron are displeased with Mosess
marriage to a Cushite woman, and they speak against him. They ask,
Has Yahweh indeed spoken only through Moses? Has he not spoken also
32. As Wilson summarizes, in identifying this as a dispute over prophetic author-

ity . . . The problem which gave rise to the original story thus seems to have been
one which plagues any society containing more than one intermediary: how are
the authority claims of the intermediaries to be adjudicated, particularly when
they bring conicting messages from the divine world? Prophecy and Society in
Ancient Israel, 15556.
33. Knierim and Coats suggest that Miriams challenge is directly related to Mo-
sess marriage to the Cushite, and that it is thus about the right to dene the
nature of the family (or tribal) group. Signicantly, the attack results in leprosy
for Miriam and her subsequent exclusion from the tribe (Numbers, 181). Some,
such as E. Davies (Numbers, 11314, 120) and Robinson, conclude that we have
two interwoven stories here (with Robinson seeing the result as more success-
ful). As Robinson points out, it is poetic justice that Miriam is excluded from
the community after having wanted the Cushite wife excluded (The Jealousy
of Miriam, 432).
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Miriam 75
through us? Yahwehs response to this is a resounding, Sort of. He has

overheard their question and responds directlybut not before the nar-
rator interjects the reminder that Moses was the humblest man on earth.
Yahweh calls to Moses, Aaron, and Miriam, saying, You three come out to
the tent of meeting. He then comes down in a pillar of cloud and stands at
the door of the tent. After having called to the three of them together, he
now singles out Miriam and Aaron and rebukes them. In front of Moses,
highlighting the distinction between them, Yahweh has Miriam and Aaron
step forward. He tells them in no uncertain terms, Now hear my words: if
there is a prophet among you, I, Yahweh, will make myself known to him in
a vision, I will speak with him in a dream. Not so my servant Moseshe is
the most trusted in all my houseI speak with him mouth to mouth, vis-
ibly, and not in riddles, and he gazes upon the form of Yahweh. Why were
you not afraid to speak against my servant, against Moses?
Yahweh leaves angry. The pillar of cloud lifts, and Miriamonly
Miriamhas been struck with a skin disease. The repetition in verse 10
emphasizes this: when the cloud disappeared, Miriam was diseased, and
Aaron turned to Miriam, and , she was diseased. Even here, we do not
have Miriams perspective, but Aarons. He turns to face Miriam (and bam!
Diseased! ) , and then looks to Moses for help, rst begging
mercy for the two of them, and then voicing a plea on Miriams behalf:
Do not let her be like one stillborn, half of whose esh is eaten away when
it comes out of its mothers womb (Num 12:12). The chain of authority
34. In 12:1, Miriam and Aaron speak , against Moses; their question, which re-
fers to Moses in the third person, makes evident that it is not spoken with him.
In 12:2, they ask whether Yahweh has spoken only , through Moses, and
not also , through us. The preposition here clearly means through, and
not only with; there is no conict over whether Yahweh speaks with them, as
he does in fact in the very next verse. That the preposition in v. 1 means against
and in v. 2 means through is clear also from Yahwehs response in vv. 68. On
these meanings here, see Milgrom, Numbers, 9394, and many others; Levine,
Numbers 120, 32833; Knierim and Coats, Numbers, 180; Budd, Numbers, 136.
35. The traditional rendering of as leprous (i.e., having Hansens disease) is
probably not accurate. On this particular skin disease, see esp. Levine, Numbers 120,
33233 and 18486; E. Davies, Numbers, 124 and 4446; and Budd, Numbers, 137.
36. Milgrom sees Aarons actions here in light of his priestly role: Since Aaron
was a priest, his seeing her condition conrmed the diagnosis (cf. Lev. 13:217).
Y6621.indb 75 1/27/15 1:07 PM

continues as Moses then turns to Yahweh and prays for Miriam to be

healed. Yahweh respondsto Mosesthat if Miriams father had spit in
her face she would bear the shame for seven days, so she should now be
shut out of the camp for seven days and then brought back in; and so she
was. This is a particularly shameful punishment, consisting not only of the
skin disease itself, but of the shame it represents, requiring exclusion from
community.
Read in isolation, this story would seem to condemn the claim to pro-
phetic status. Read as it stands, however, in tandem with the story in chap-
ter 11, the picture begins to look dierent. Yahweh has instructed Moses
to bring seventy elders to the tent so he can put his spirit on them and let
them share Mosess burden. The result of this is that all of the gathered
elders prophesy. When it is reported that Eldad and Medad also received
the spirit and prophesied, although they had not gone to the tent, Joshua
asks Moses to make them stop. Mosess response is not what Joshua ex-
pects: Are you jealous on my behalf? Would that all of Yahwehs people
were prophets, that Yahweh would put his spirit upon them! (Num 11:29).
Mosess explicit statement that the prophecy of others is not only accept-
able but desirable, and the more the better, sets the stage for the conict
with Miriam. The editorial choice to present the story of chapter 12 in light
of the events of chapter 11 aects the sense of the text. When Miriam and
Aaron voice their complaint right after this scene, including Mosess dec-
laration above, we should not assume that the problem is a general claim
Milgrom, Numbers, 97. See also Kessler, Miriam and the Prophecy of the Per-
sian Period, 78.
37. The comparison to spitting highlights the punishment through shame (cf.
Deut 25:9 and Isa 50:6; Milgrom, Numbers, 98). According to Lev 13:4, the ini-
tial quarantine period for a person who appears to have this ailment is seven
days, after which the priest checks for signs of improvement or ongoing symp-
toms and acts accordingly. For somewhat dierent interpretations of how Mir-
iams exclusion relates to Levitical requirements, see Milgrom, Numbers, 98, and
Levine, Numbers 120, 333.
38. I nd myself unconvinced by various expressions of the argument that Mir-
iam is identied in the Persian period as the symbol of prophecy (see Kessler,
Fischer, and Butting, as noted previously), and though I agree that the perspec-
tive of Num 12 diers from the full embrace of prophecy in Num 11, I am more
struckas will become evident belowby the ways in which the text does not
restrict Miriams authority.
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Miriam 77
of prophetic ability. Rather, they suggest that Yahweh speaks through them
just as he speaks through Moses. They claim equality.
The position of this story is that Yahweh does communicate with the
prophets, but that this hardly compares to his direct appearance and speech
to Moses. Had Miriam and Aaron prophesied, they presumably would have
been ne. Instead, they gave Yahweh a reason to draw a very clear dis-
tinction between mere prophets, with whom he communicated through
dreams and visions, and Moses, with whom he spoke visibly, and directly.
The aim of the story is not to deny Miriams prophetic authority, but to
place thisand all prophetic authorityclearly and rmly below the au-
thority of Moses. Yahweh does speak to Miriam and Aaron even in this
moment, but he does not do so face-to-face (lit., mouth to mouth).
This story is about the uniqueness of Moses, not the insuciency of
Miriam in particular. This is illustrated as Yahweh calls all three to come
to the tent, and then has Aaron and Miriam step forward so he can rebuke
them in front of Moses. This demonstration of preferential communication
embodies the public statement of Mosess unique status.
The central question, then, is why Miriam is singled out for punish-
ment. Aaron too has implied that Yahweh speaks through him as he speaks
through Moses. Why is Aaron not punished? Some have assumed that the
consequences to Miriam must be related to gender, such as Graetz, who
suggests that Miriam was punished with leprosy because women in the
39. The position of Burns, that Miriam was not a prophet but a cultic leader, is not
supported by the evidence, and such a position renders this scene unintelligible
(Has the Lord Indeed Spoken Only Through Moses?). For a strong concise argu-
ment against Burnss major theses, see E. Davies, Numbers, 11516.
40. For various takes on how the story juxtaposes prophetic authority and Mosaic
authority, see, e.g., Kessler, Miriam and the Prophecy of the Persian Period,
7786, esp. 78, 84; Fischer, Gottesknderinnen, 7379; Budd, Numbers, 135, 13839;
and Sperling, Miriam, Aaron and Moses: Sibling Rivalry, 3955.
41. Milgrom considers Yahwehs response to Miriam and Aaron here to consti-
tute direct discourse, which provides an ironic twist. The Lord declares that
He speaks directly only to Moses (v. 8) but here He avoids Moses and speaks
directly to Aaron and Miriam (Numbers, 94). See similarly Sperling, Miriam,
Aaron and Moses: Sibling Rivalry, 54. By the terms of the story, though, it is
not directi.e., even if Miriam and Aaron see the cloud, Yahweh does not
speak with them visibly, as this story denes it, i.e., mouth to mouth.
42. Levines reection on Mosess prophetic leadership in Num 1112 together is
particularly insightful (Numbers 120, 33843).
Y6621.indb 77 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Biblical world were not supposed to be leaders of men, and that women
with initiative were reproved when they asserted themselves with the only
weapon they had, their power of language. This lacks evidence and should
not be read into the text.
The question of why Miriam alone is punished may have a simpler
answer: this tradition recognizes that Miriam is known as a prophet and
Aaron is not. Since the oense in question is the claim that prophets have
authority equal to that of Mosesand judging by Yahwehs detailed re-
sponse in verses 68, this is the contested assertionthen the greater of-
fender in making such a claim would be the prophet, the one who stands
to gain. Perhaps Yahwehhere detective as well as judgeconsiders who
benets from this crime, and the answer is evident. When the challenge to
Mosess unique authority is raised, the potential threat must be put down,
and that realistic threat is not Aaron or the siblings together, but Miriam the
prophet. The verb in Numbers 12:1 is feminine singular: she spoke ().
This does not mean that the words were Miriams aloneAaron is immedi-
ately named as a participant, after allbut the initial feminine singular verb
may already indicate that this story does not haphazardly, alarmingly, have
Miriam unfairly punished for an oense equally attributable to Aaron, but
that this story focuses on a claim that is in some sense specic to Miriam.
Even if the underlying concern is to establish Mosaic authority as it
pertains to a later time, the author frames this story as one of prophetic
conict. Miriam contests the supposition that Yahweh speaks only through
Moses, claiming that he speaks also through her; the storyteller has Yah-
weh respond in terms of divinatory communication. The text, even if meant
to temper aspects of Numbers 11, must allow for the fact that Moses has
just repeatedly been said to have the spirit of Yahweh upon him (Num 11:17
and 25). Unless we posit an unthinking redactor, the story of Numbers 12
must reckon with the implication of divinatory activity on both sides of
this conict. We should not overlook, then, how the story as it is framed
43. Graetz, Miriam: Guilty or Not Guilty? 184.

44. Similarly Budd, Numbers, 138; and Robinson, who observes that Miriam the
prophet was in a position to question any idea that Moses had a monopoly of
divine guidance; but Aaron could not with credibility make such a claim on his
own account, since he was not a prophet of God, only of Moses (Ex 7,1) (The
Jealousy of Miriam, 43031). He goes further, though, and argues that the fem.
sing. verb indicates that this was really all Miriams doing, and Aaron is merely
Miriams stooge (p. 432).
45. As opposed to the plural in v. 2.
Y6621.indb 78 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Miriam 79
presents the prophetic conict. And Miriams challenge is not treated like
other challenges to preferred prophets.
This is a spin on the classic prophetic conict. Instead of prophets who
represent dierent social groups or positions claiming that their counterparts
are falsewhether within Yahwism, as in the conict between Jeremiah and
Hananiah, or between Yahwists and others, as in the conict between Elijah
and the prophets of Baalwe have here two prophets of Yahweh, working
together but in conict over their relative authority. Neither one suggests
that the other is a false prophet. Miriam objects to the notion that Moses
alone has access to divine knowledgeapparently Mosess behavior sparks
this (Num 12:1)and the opposing position in the text upholds the reality
of Miriams prophetic access to divine knowledge, but tempers it with a
conversation-stopping conrmation of Mosess unique access.
A few elements of this brief interaction stand out. First, the favored
prophet is relieved of the responsibility of defending himself. The rhetorical
impact of this is signicant: whereas Jeremiah had to prophesy in opposi-
tion to Hananiah and then wait for the course of events to prove him right,
and Elijah had to set up an elaborate demonstration, directly and repeatedly
challenging his opponents and waiting for the re from heaven to prove
him right, Moses says nothing. Moses does nothing. Yahweh, unprompted,
having overheard the challenge to Moses, swoops in and defends his man.
In any story of prophetic conict, such an unprompted and sudden divine
act (Yahweh even broke in , Num 12:4) would command special at-
tention. In this text in particular, it has a dual function. It not only conrms
who the favored prophet is, it enacts its own specic point: Yahweh will go
above and beyond for Moses. Mosess innocence and goodwill is further
emphasized by his prayer for Miriam to be healed of the disease with which
Yahweh has just stricken her: this prophet, the humblest man on earth
(Num 12:3), tries to help his challenger. (It is the readers choice whether to
see this as a demonstration of Mosess humility or as a suspicious insistence
on his wide-eyed innocence.) However, the fact that Yahweh speaks on
Mosess behalf creates the risk that the most signicant dierence between
this and other stories of prophetic conict will be obscured.
Yahweh does not actually disagree with Miriam. Miriam challenges
the notion that Moses has exclusive access to Yahweh, and Yahweh responds
by explaining that Moses has superior access to him. In a scene oddly like
46. Contra Kessler, who argues that Num 12 is a countertext to Mic 6:4, which
in his view places Miriam as an equal to Moses, and that here we see that
Y6621.indb 79 1/27/15 1:07 PM

telling two ghting children that they are each right in their own way, Yah-
weh explicitly conrms that he really does speak to the prophets, and that
there really is a unique character to his communication with Moses.
A writer wanting to dismiss Miriam would have, or should have, gone
to greater lengths to do so. Miriam, as a prophet of Yahweh, challenges
Moses by insisting that Yahweh speaks through her too, and the writer,
far from attacking Miriams legitimacy as a prophet, conrms that Yah-
weh really does communicate with prophets, with an important caveat (the
divine Sort of ). Compare the outcomes of other prophetic conicts, in
which the prophets not preferred by the author fare less well. Hananiah
drops dead, just as Jeremiah warned him he would as a direct result of his
rebellion, and Elijah has every last one of the prophets of Baal seized and
slaughtered ( Jer 28:1617; 1 Kgs 18:40). Miriam, in contrast, receives a slap
on the wrist. As grave as her public denigration is, her disease and her
shame are temporary.
It is not surprising that the tradition favors Moses; what is surpris-
ing, what is so unusual that we should sit up and take notice, is that in a
story framed as prophetic conict between these two, the tradition also ac-
knowledges the legitimacy of Miriams role as a prophet of Yahweh, whose
authority is diminished only in comparison to the unsurpassed authority of
Moses. Where the biblical tradition would usually portray the one oppos-
ing the favored prophet as a false prophet (even in the case of a prophet of
Yahweh, as in Jer 28), Numbers 12 uses the very validity of Miriams claim to
prophetic status as the way to establish that Mosess claim to divine access
lies even beyond prophecy.
The tradition thus preserves a conicted sense about Miriam, remem-
bering her as a prophet but not recalling any of her prophetic words or
activity. Moreover, when she herself complains of being undervalued as
a prophet, she is punished with a skin disease and its associated shame.
Her disease is remembered again in Deuteronomy 24:9, and some read-
ers see an added emphasis on Miriams rebellion. However, the context
prophecy besides Moses prophecy or, worse, against him is a form of blas-
phemy (Kessler, Miriam and the Prophecy of the Persian Period, 78).
47. This problem is solved in rabbinic tradition by attributing to young Miriam a
prophecy about the birth of Moses (Exod. R. 1:13; Sot.ah 12b). For further discus-
sion, see Bronner, From Eve to Esther, 16770.
48. Burns, for example, reads into the text an admonition to remember what hap-
pened to one of our ancestors when she questioned the authority of the Levites
(Has the Lord Indeed Spoken Only Through Moses? 106).
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Miriam 81
is a list of assorted regulations: what to do if two successive men divorce

a woman, what to do if you catch a kidnapper, what to do in cases of this
particular skin disease, . The statement regarding such skin disease
is a stern reminder, stated emphatically, to be very sure to do everything
the Levitical priests instruct. This is followed by the remark, Remember
what Yahweh your God did to Miriam on your way out of Egypt. Not
Remember what Miriam did to Moses, and not Remember how God
punished that damned rebel, but Remember what God did to Miriam in
her case of , referring to the fact that he temporarily exiled her from
the community. The point is either that even Yahweh did what the Leviti-
cal priests instruct in cases of , or that this was done even to Miriam.
In any event, the statement relates to how one should respond to a case
of , not to how Miriam became . By contrast, the extremely
similar phrase in Deuteronomy 25:17, Remember what Amalek did to you
on your way out of Egypt, relates to the oense of the character named
and incites a reaction against him. In comparison, the lack of any blame on
Miriam whatsoever is striking.
Though some would argue that Miriams role as a prophet is sup-
pressed, it seems noteworthy that in both of the two primary stories in
which she is named (Exod 15 and Num 12), she is remembered as a prophet.
In the rst, she is called a ;in the second, she makes a claim regard-
ing her prophetic authority, and while Yahweh reprimands her for think-
ing herself equal to Moses, he arms that he does indeed speak to the
prophets, conrming the legitimacy of her prophetic claim while limiting
its authority. Miriam is thus primarily remembered in connection to her
role as a prophet, if in a deeply conicted fashion.
By the time the tradition of the prophet Miriam has come together
with the genealogical material (Num 26:59; 1 Chr 5:29 [Eng. 6:3]), the char-
acter has a rich history. The connection to the story in Exodus 2 now adds
another literary dimension to the prophetic conict in Numbers 12. All of
a sudden, Miriam is the older sister who had saved Mosess life, paving the
way for all that followed. What new tension this lends to the story! Here
she is, angry that her prophetic authority is being overlooked in comparison
to that of Moses, that infant who owed his very life to her strategy. Who
wouldnt object?
Y6621.indb 81 1/27/15 1:07 PM

5 Deborah
The inclination to connect Deborahs prophetic role to Miriams on

the basis of their songs is apparently quite strong. Assumptions about their
similarity are so common as to make citing examples here an absurd en-
deavor. The instinct is understandableonly a few women in the Bible are
given the title , and two of them singbut the similarity ends right
about here. Deborahs role in society is dierent from Miriams, as is her
role in her song. The traditions remember these two quite dierently.
The Song of Deborah and Barak

Only a few points need be added to the previous chapters arguments
regarding the lack of any association between the Song of the Sea and
prophetic activity. The Song of Deborah and Barak too is a victory song.
Some analyses of the genre imply that drumming (which does not appear
in Judg 5) is a necessary component, but this surely misses the point: generic
assignments are scholarly creations, and it is one thing to recognize a pat-
tern among victory songs, but another thing entirely to exclude an obvious
example from the category on the grounds that drums are not mentioned.
1. Paz falls somewhere in the middle, observing that although there is no refer-
ence to drumming in Judg 5, the songs structure and content indicate a connec-
tion to the victory song genre (Drums, Women, and Goddesses, 90). Meyers had
gone further, seeing implied drumming in the song (Of Drums and Damsels:
Womens Performance in Ancient Israel, 22). Beyond the matter of drumming:
although some earlier commentators had posited a precise and consistent set
of elements for victory songs and their contexts (e.g., Noth, Exodus, 122), more
82
Y6621.indb 82 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Deborah 83
I argued that the Song of the Sea is not Miriams prophetic activity; neither
is the victory song in Judges 5 an example of Deborahs prophetic activity.
As a reminder, it has been established that victory songs are primarily asso-
ciated with women, so the partial attribution of these two songs to women
is not coincidentalit is just not about the fact that each woman is at some
point called a .
The notion that Deborahs song is indicative of her role as a prophet
is problematic for other reasons as well. Deborah does not sing alone. She
sings this song with Barak, who is not a prophet. If for Barak, leading this
victory song is not a sign of prophetic identity, it is safe to assume that it is
not for Deborah either.
In addition to the fact that the songs of Exodus 15 and Judges 5 belong
to a particular genre that has examples elsewhere and is demonstrably not
associated with prophecy, and the fact that Deborahs coleader in song is
not a prophet, one must consider how the womens specic singing roles
relate to one another. Deborahs role is not the same as Miriams. In the
song of victory over Sisera, Deborah and Barak sing ( Judg 5:1), and the
people come in with an exhortation to them: Arise arise, Deborah! Arise
arise, sing a song! Get on up, Barak! Take your captives, son of Abinoam!
( Judg 5:12). Depending on how one understands the background of Exo-
dus 15, Miriam may participate in leading the song that Moses and the
Israelites sing together (15:1), or she may have a special role in one part of
the song, where she exhorts others, Sing to Yahweh! (15:21), or, as some
recent work has demonstrated the internal diversity of the victory song. See
especially Hauser, Two Songs of Victory: A Comparison of Exodus 15 and
Judges 5, 26584. Brettler objects to the identication of Judg 5 as a victory
song and strongly criticizes Hauser for overreachingand indeed, for example,
Hausers notion of the water motif as a key component is untenablebut Bret-
tlers alternative explanation that Judg 5 was a poem recited before war has its
own challenges (The Book of Judges, 6669, quotation 69). Overall, if one lands
on a denition of the victory song genre that does not allow for inclusion of
these military chiefs singing a song about their victory, then that denition is
too narrow.
2. In Judg 5:1, as in Num 12:1, a fem. sing. verb is followed by the names of both the
female and male speakers. In Numbers, however, the text goes on to reveal that
the greater accountability was Miriams; in Judges, the text goes on specically
to arm the participation of both characters ( Judg 5:12, quoted above). Per-
haps the fem. sing. verb in Judg 5:1 is used simply because Deborah is the main
character.
Y6621.indb 83 1/27/15 1:07 PM

have reconstructed it, a whole song may originally have been attributed to
Miriam alone. In no case is the picture of Miriams role parallel to Debo-
rahs in Judges 5, where Deborah and Barak sing together and the people
respond, exhorting the leaders to sing. The fact that Miriam and Deborah
take dierent roles in their songs should present a signicant problem for
those claiming that the womens roles in singing are due to their prophetic
identities.
Just as the Song of the Sea does not reect Miriams prophetic role,
the Song of Deborah and Barak does not reect Deborahs prophetic status
simply by virtue of her being one of its singersany more than it would
show Barak to be engaging in prophetic activity. In this case, however, the
victory song will be seen to contain an allusion to the prophets function.
A Mother in Israel
In the prose story of Judges 4, Deborah is remembered as a prophet and
a judge. In the poetry of Judges 5, she is called something else: a mother
in Israel ( , Judg 5:7). This is not a sudden non sequitur de-
ning Deborah by the existence of children who are mentioned nowhere
in the poetry or prose; it is an epithet referring to her advisory role. The
epithet occurs one other time, in the speech of the wise woman of Abel
(2 Sam 20:18), where it is sometimes taken to refer to the city, but more
straightforwardly should refer to the woman herself.
The sense of as referring to some sort of advisory role has
been observed before, in Judges 5 alone, 2 Samuel 20, or the two together.
Boling reads the phrase a mother in Israel as praising Deborah for her
oracular consultation and prophetic speech. Lindars sees it more gener-
ally as most likely a reference to Deborah as a prophet. Ackerman has
discussed the phrase as it is used in both Judges 5 and 2 Samuel 20, and
3. Though not a crucial matter for the present discussion, the verbs in v. 7b are best
read as second person (until you arose, Deborah); Lindars, Judges 15, 238.
4. Targum Jonathan of Judg 5 adds explicit and repeated references to Deborah
prophesying, but interestingly leaves out the phrase altogether. This
is particularly intriguing since, as Harrington points out on this text, the Targum
includes almost every word of the biblical version (The Prophecy of Deborah:
Interpretive Homiletics in Targum Jonathan of Judges 5, 439).
5. Boling, Judges, 99, 109.
6. Lindars, Judges 15, 23839; he sees her specically as a war prophet, p. 182.
Y6621.indb 84 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Deborah 85
concludes that in both contexts the term refers to a woman who func-
tions as a wise counselor. Olson also sees that the phrase is probably more
than just an endearing title, and suggests, based on Judges 4, Judges 5, and
2 Samuel 20 all taken together, that the epithet may represent
the place and oce of a wise woman prophet who delivers divine oracles
to resolve disputes (see 4:5; 2 Sam 20:1619). (The divinatory role of the
wise woman of Abel will be detailed in the chapter devoted to her and her
Tekoan counterpart.)
In a signicant footnote, Block reads dierently: This af-
fectionate title conjures up notions of warmth and security (one could
imagine Olsons statement above as a direct response to Blocks). How-
ever, he then oers a list of masculine counterparts to the phrase, which
I believe actually provides strong support for the reading of
as a divinatory epithet. He includes Micahs priest and father, who later
defects to become a priest and father to the Danites ( Judg 17:10, 18:19),
and who engages in oracular inquiry (18:5); Elisha calling to Elijah, My
father, my father! (2 Kgs 2:12); and Elisha in turn being called father twice
explicitly (2 Kgs 6:21, 13:14) and once implicitly when Hazael refers to the
king of Aram as Elishas son (2 Kgs 8:9). Block observes that the use of
this language for the prophets is the closest to the sense of the phrase in
Judges 5, but he still sees it as identifying a sense of security.
Almost every one of these masculine counterparts shows metaphorical
parent language applied to a prophet; the exception is a priest. The language
does not just connote a sense of warmth and security. These examples
demonstrate that such terminology refers to religious intermediaries and,
most commonly, to prophets. Additionallythough this is not crucial
the only one of the list who is not a prophet, the priest of Micahs home
7. Ackerman, Warrior, Dancer, Seductress, Queen, 3843.

8. Olson, Judges, 787.
9. Block, Deborah Among the Judges, 24647 n.67. (He also mentions Job as a
father to the needy [ Job 29:16], as a secondary level of comparison.) Fischer also
notes the use of as an honoric parallel to the one used of Elijah (and
only Elijah; Gottesknderinnen, 118). Gafney adopts the Elijah model broadly,
positing that most female prophets worked in guilds, some of which were led by
mothers, but where the phrase is actually used, she sees it as part
of Deborahs portrayal as a warrior for God. . . . As a mother, Deborah provided
military and political security for all of her children (Daughters of Miriam, 92;
cf. 108, 113, 116).
Y6621.indb 85 1/27/15 1:07 PM

sanctuary, is associated with Micahs teraphim (ancestor gurines some-

times used for divination, as discussed in a later chapter). The metaphorical
parent language is specic to intermediaries and, overwhelminglyor pos-
sibly exclusivelythose with divinatory roles.
While it may not be possible to pinpoint precisely what the poet of
Judges 5 had in mind using the term , we can gather its rough
outlines. Given its use in 2 Samuel 20, where it refers to a wise woman
( ) but not a prophet, I would go less far than Boling in deeming
it specically prophetic in Judges 5. Because it is used in these two texts
to describe dierent types of diviners, I would also go less far than Olson
in proposing a formal oce. Judging by its use in both cases to refer to a
woman with a divinatory role, but not the same roleas well as the use of
comparable father language overwhelmingly for intermediariesthe epi-
thet appears to be broad enough to encompass dierent types of advisory
roles, but specic to those with a divinatory facet.
Deborah, Prophet and Judge

The prose narrative eshes out the picture. The writer introduces Deb-
orah as a prophet who was judging Israel ( Judg 4:4). Since the terms
and each signify dierent things during dierent periods and are thus
both shifting targets, pinpointing the relationship between them is com-
plicated. The salient matter here is that during the period described in the
story, these are not entirely separate roles, but neither are they synonymous.
The connection between these functions is evident in Mosess initial
description of his role as judge. We are told that he is acting as a judge for
the people, who inundate him with their needs from morning till night.
When Jethro asks Moses why he is sitting all day surrounded, Moses ex-
plains, Because the people come to me to inquire of God (;)
they present their issues, and he judges between them and makes known to
them the instructions of God (Exod 18:1516). The logical overlap between
going to inquire of Yahwehs judge and going to inquire of the prophet is
clear.
The relationship is not an easy one, however, and not only from the
perspective of the modern scholar. The story of the seventy elders is tell-
ing. Moses needs help leading Israel; or, put a little more colorfully in
classic Moses style, he would rather Yahweh just kill him dead right then
and there than have to lead the people by himself anymore (Num 11:
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Deborah 87
1115). Yahweh instructs Moses to gather seventy elders, and tells him
that he will take some of the spirit he had put on Moses and distribute it
among them (11:1617). Moses complies, but when Yahweh does his part,
there is an intriguing detail: when the spirit came upon the elders, they
prophesiedbut they did not do it again ( , 11:25). The
bestowing of Yahwistic spirit that gives the elders the ability to judge also
causes them to prophesyonce. Immediately after this comes the conict
over whether Eldad and Medad really ought to be prophesying ( Joshua:
Stop them! Moses: Now, now, would that all the people of Yahweh were
prophets!). This is part of a larger series of conicts over who among Is-
raels leaders can claim prophetic authority.
So the relationship between judging and prophesying is a close but
tense one. In Exodus 18 and the scenes from Numbers, the roles explicitly
overlap but are not identical. Then we come to the book of Judges, where
the role of the judge changes dramatically, becoming centered almost ex-
clusively on military leadership. One would expect less of an overlap with
prophecy here. The area of intersection is again evident, though, in dier-
ent forms. Throughout the book of Judges, the spirit of Yahweh repeat-
edly comes upon people, either to inaugurate them as judges or to assist
in special circumstances, such as giving Samson bursts of superstrength
( Judg 3:10, 6:34, 11:29, 13:25, 14:6 and 19, 15:14). This particular type of in-
spiration from Yahweh creates the capacity to succeed in battle, just as it
did to judge between concerned parties and to prophesy.
And yet, the only two gures aside from Deborah who are said to be
both prophet and judge are Moses, the rst judge (or proto-judge), and
Samuel, the last. That Deborah is called a prophet while other judges are
not may be related to the fact that Deborah is a judge in the model of Mo-
ses. While she is strongly associated with military victory as well, she is in-
troduced as a judge in the other sense, as the leader to whom the people go
for consultation: She would sit under the Palm of Deborah . . . and the Is-
raelites would come up to her for judgment ( ,
Judg 4:5).
One approach that scholars have taken to Deborahs dual role as prophet
and judge is to excise one element or the other. Some remove the legal
function, which requires providing a dierent explanation for the meaning
of . In Bolings view, the term here refers to oracular decisions. He sees
the delivery of oracles as part of Deborahs role as a military chief, reect-
ing a time when such leaders were responsible for oracular inquiry before
Y6621.indb 87 1/27/15 1:07 PM

battles. While this sounds plausible in theory, there is a certain paucity of

evidence. He cites as examples Gideon in Judges 68, Micah in Judges 17
18, and the birth of Samson in Judges 13; of these, only the rst actually
presents the picture he is describing. The lack of other examples is not in it-
self decisiveafter all, I too am proposing that Deborah served a combined
function that only two others shared, though these two characters seem to
me to be signicant ones. The more decisive factor is that verse 5 does not
say that Deborah handed down before battle. It says that she would
sit under the Palm of Deborah, and the people, the Israelites, would come
up to her for . This is not a picture of ad hoc martial divination, but of
ongoing negotiation for all of the people who would come to her.
Others remove the role of prophet from the description of Deborahs
functions. With baing frequency, interpreters question whether Deborah
was really a prophet. Some who take the designation seriously still suggest
that it did not quite mean prophet in the sense of one who delivers mes-
sages from God. Matthews, for instance, understands Deborahs prophetic
role to be limited to the specic duty of mobilizing the military chief. By
his summary, Deborah is then not quite a prophet and not quite a chief:
Deborahs status as a prophet as well as a judge is found in this portrait
of her summoning a military leader. Similar scenes for other prophets are
found in Deut 31:7, where Moses summons Joshua . . . and in 1 Sam 15:23,
where Samuel summons Saul. It is unclear why her status as a prophet
could not equally parallel other activities of Moses and Samuel, and ones
10. Boling, Judges, 95, 99100.

11. Other readings arguing against the most straightforward meaning of in
Judg 4:5 seem more forced. Block takes the fact that other judges are not de-
picted as serving a legal function as an indication that Deborah must not be
either, and so reads as referring to oracles rather than legal matters: in
other words, if Deborah seems to be unlike others in the book of Judges in this
way, then the reading must be wrong. He argues on other grounds as well, no-
tably that in the present context it is dicult to see a connection between such
a judicial function and her role in the rest of the narrative; in other words, the
judicial role must be separate from the rest, so we must not be seeing them to-
gether in this text. Block, Deborah Among the Judges, 23644, quotation 237.
Further aeld is Spronks suggestion, using as a springboard, that Judg 4:
45 is repressing an original tradition according to which Deborah practiced nec-
romancy (Deborah, a Prophetess: The Meaning and Background of Judges 4:
45, 23242).
12. Matthews, Judges and Ruth, 65.
Y6621.indb 88 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Deborah 89
that are a bit more characteristic of their broader functions as prophets,

even allowing for dierences among all three.
It is not necessary to explain away either part of Deborahs role. The
description is straightforward, and with both the lack of specic evidence
to the contrary and the precedent of the same dual roles attributed to Moses
and Samuel before and after her, we should assume that here refers
to some actual prophetic role and that refers to the legal judgments
for which the people would come to her. Some do read the text this way,
of course, but it is surprisingly rare. Soggin, for example, who understands
Deborah as a prophet, takes issue with Bolings reading of and argues
that the term refers here, as it does elsewhere, to the administration of
justice in general and all the problems connected with it. He adds later,
though, that the story of Deborah is the only instance in which the forensic
function of the judge coincides with the exercise of a prophetic ministry.
In fact, that Deborah combines these roles is not unique. Her role as a
judge in the forensic sense is related to her role as a prophet, because these
functions have a natural overlap, as seen in Mosess description to Jethro in
Exodus 18. However, these overlapping roles are also distinct, as seen in the
tensions regarding the claim to prophetic authority among Mosess judging
assistants in Numbers 11. It is therefore not surprising that the explicit com-
bination occurs, but infrequently. For whatever reasonthe text does not
specify, and to search for cause at some point becomes articialDeborah
is seen as having a legitimate claim to prophetic authority, along with only
Moses and Samuel among the judges.
The denitive statement of Mosess prophetic role in Deuteronomy 34:
912 encompasses the traits and actions of both prophet and judge, and
judge in the senses of both advisor and chief. He had wisdom (by impli-
cation, since Joshua becomes full of the spirit of wisdom because Moses
laid his hands on him), he knew Yahweh face-to-face, and he performed
signs and wonders against Pharaoh in Egypt. Hoseas reference to Moses
includes the roles of prophet and of judge in the latter sense: By a prophet
Yahweh brought Israel up from Egypt (Hos 12:14 [Eng. 12:13]). Like Mo-
ses, Deborah is remembered as a prophet and a judge, and the latter in both
an advisory role as the people come up to her for , and a martial role
as she (with others) frees her people from an oppressor.
13. Soggin, Judges, 64.

14. Ibid., 71.
Y6621.indb 89 1/27/15 1:07 PM

I argued above that the frequent reexive comments that Deborah is

like Miriam are incorrect, based as they are on the faulty assumption that
their prophetic roles are enacted in the songs of Exodus 15 and Judges 5. We
have seen so far that, in fact, Miriams claim to prophetic authority comes
in her own statement in Numbers 12 that Yahweh speaks through her. I add
to this now that Deborahs prophetic authority is connected to her role as
judge, as was Mosess. Miriams prophetic role is overtly contested within
one story (resulting in the unpleasantness at Hazerot), and the accumulated
tradition is conicted, here preserving her title as , there limiting her
authority. Deborah, in contrast, is remembered as an esteemed prophet and
judge, without any sense of conict. It is not Miriam whom Deborah re-
sembles, but Moses.
The presupposition that Deborah is similar to Miriamwhich then
obscures her actual presentation and rolenaturally stems in large part
from a sense that gender is somehow key to her depiction. This is not so.
Most scholars who approach the text this way focus on the narrative of
Judges 4. And to be sure, that text is highly gender-consciousbut the
gender in question is not Deborahs. An eyebrow is raised at the masculin-
ity of the male characters. Deborahs gender is not really an issue, except
insofar as it serves to make Barak look the fool. It is noteworthy, given
the prominent role of women and the raised eyebrow at the men, that the
depiction of Deborah does not reect any correlative criticism. One could
easily imagine a narrator pointing to the weakness of the male characters by
overdrawing the female, but in this story, Deborahs gender only highlights
that Barak cannot man upeven a woman can do what he cannot. This
15. Fischer sees Deborah framed as a successor to both Miriam and Moses. She
notes that Deborahs song is usually compared to Miriams, and draws an in-
teresting comparison instead to the song of Moses, but then concludes that
Deborahs military role (e.g., her divine command to Barak) and her literary
position as the rst titled prophet after Moses depict her in Mosaic succession,
while her song identies her with the prophetic role of Miriam (Gottesknderin-
nen, 12023). Fischer also sees a line of succession from Moses to Deborah to
Samuel, based in part on their shared combination of roles, but also on other
literary details she sees linking the stories (pp. 12627).
16. As summarized well by Lindars: In general, the characterization of both Deb-
orah and Jael shows an absence of stereotypes and presupposes a freedom of
action which suggest a greater degree of social equality of women and men in
old Israel than obtained after the rise of the monarchy (Judges 15, 172).
Y6621.indb 90 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Deborah 91
obviously reects the authors sense of normative gender roles, but this is
dierent than an author aiming to depict a particular female character in a
certain way. The authors goal is to illustrate that the men are not living up
to gender norms and that this reects on Israel, but even throughout the
rest of the story, the narrator does not do the same with the women. The
portrayal of Deborah herself is just not strongly gendered, either negatively
or positively.
Among those who understand the story of the female prophet and
judge to be about the fact that she is female, some are moderate. McCann,
for example, reads the line introducing Deborah as an expression of amaze-
ment at her gender, and as the authors further illustration after Judges 3
that Israel lacked suitable male leaders: Ehud was a clever left-handed
trickster; Shamgar may not even have been an Israelite; and now, the next
judge is a woman! This is a reasonable suggestion, but I see no more
indication that the present story is about Deborahs gender than that the
previous story is about Ehuds left-handedness. The introductory line may
emphasize gender: Now Deborah, a female prophet, the wife of Lappi-
dot, she was judging Israel at that time ( Judg 4:4). If it does, this is only
through the phrase ; but as Williamson has observed, the paral-
lel phrase occurs in the introduction to the next story ( Judg 6:8).
Even if the line emphasizes gender, this still does not indicate surprise at
the existence of a female prophet and judge; it sets the scene for the mock-
ery of Barak, and later Sisera.
Butler also focuses on this verse, stating repeatedly that Deborah
is rst and foremost a woman. After the second statement of this, he
adds, As such she holds oces most commonly held by menjudge and
prophetwhile also conforming to expectations as a wife. The emphasis
on her gender points to the lack of men to ll such roles and to Deborahs
extraordinary talents. She points away from herself to the surprise hero,
Jael. He concludes later that the rst part of the text focuses only on a fe-
male judge, prophetess, wife far removed from the enemy leaders. While
Butler reasonably objects to some overly positive views of Deborah (Com-
mentators easily make too much of Deborah), he may then go a bit far
17. McCann, Judges, 49.

18. Williamson, Prophetesses in the Hebrew Bible, 68. Williamson sees Debo-
rahs introduction as something of an editorial catch-all; p. 69.
19. T. Butler, Judges, 92, 94, 95.
Y6621.indb 91 1/27/15 1:07 PM

in the other direction. The focus on this verse is puzzling, since the rest
of the story is much more concerned with Deborahs various actions: de-
livering , summoning Barak and telling him what Yahweh has com-
manded of him, instructing him in the specics of what he should do on
the battleeld, joining him in battle, and commanding him once more in
the eld in the name of Yahweh.
On the optimistic end, some read the introductory verse as describing
Deborahs personality. The character is introduced as
. Even taken alone, should be taken as a reference to
Deborahs husband (though see Niditch on Vaticanus, noted below). Given
the parallel with Huldah, who is introduced as , it is
unlikely that the phrase in Judges 4:4 means anything dierent. Nonethe-
less, many scholars suggest for some version of ery woman,
which does not work well grammatically and has no precedent. Finally,
there are those who see in the depiction of Deborah overall a celebration,
defense, or vindication of womankind.
There is no good indication that the ancient author was preoccupied
with Deborahs gender or intended to write a story about Deborah as a
woman, let alone a story about womankind. As to Deborahs role as judge,
we should not be amazed to see a woman portrayed in a leadership position
in Iron I Israel, as Meyers has established. As Ackerman has observed,
the story of Deborah reects what one might expect from the archaeologi-
cal and ethnographic data supplied by Meyers. There are certainly both
20. Ibid., 91.

21. E.g., Schneider (a ery one; Judges, 66); McCann (Torch Lady; Judges,
5152); Niditch (a woman of re; Judges, 60); and others. Niditch considers
several possibilities, and points out that Codex Vaticanus translates a woman of
Lappidoth, i.e., a location (Judges, 62), but in the end prefers the re reading
(p. 65). Gafney writes: Her appellation woman of Lappidoth does not clearly
indicate that she is married; there is no role in her judicial administration, nor
in her military campaign or prophetic compositions, for a spouse (Daughters of
Miriam, 116).
22. E.g., Bal, Murder and Dierence: Gender, Genre, and Scholarship on Siseras Death;
Yee, who reads the story as entirely about gender, and lauds Deborah for her
strategic guerilla warfare, which in her view includes Jaels actions (By the
Hand of a Woman: The Metaphor of the Woman Warrior in Judges 4, 11314).
23. Meyers, Discovering Eve, and Meyerss later works.
24. Ackerman, Digging Up Deborah, 17577.
Y6621.indb 92 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Deborah 93
positive and negative depictions of female characters in Judges, but these

match the range of depictions of men in Judges. As to her role as prophet,
in some biblical texts about female diviners, gender is certainly an issue; in
others, it is not. The story of Deborahprophet and judge, more like Mo-
ses than like Miriamfalls into the latter category.
25. See similarly Olson, Judges, 78283.
Y6621.indb 93 1/27/15 1:07 PM

6 Hannah
Hannah does not prophesy in the Bible, but she is considered a prophet
in later tradition. In Targum Jonathan, her poem is overtly and emphati-
cally portrayed as a prophetic oracle, beginning with the introduction:
Hannah prayed in a spirit of prophecy and said . . . The content is then
structured around a series of future kings and kingdoms: Concerning Sen-
nacherib the king of Assyriashe prophesied and said . . .; concerning
Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylonshe prophesied and said . . .; and
so on, through Greece and Rome, as well as those walking in darkness in
Gehenna. Hannah is also included in the list of seven female prophets in
the Talmud, in Megillah 14a. The brief discussion there cites the opening
verse of her psalm, My heart rejoices in Yahweh, and my horn is exalted in
1. Harrington and Saldarini, Targum Jonathan of the Former Prophets, 1056. While
the additions to the text are remarkable, they are not unique to Hannah in
Tg. Neb. The only other long additions are also made to poems: the song of Deb-
orah and the song of David in 2 Sam 22 are expanded in a mode Harrington and
Saldarini call interpretative homiletics, and the poem of 2 Sam 23:17 becomes
prophetic apocalypse (pp. 1012). On the early interpretation of Hannah, see
Cook, Hannahs Desire, Gods Design: Early Interpretation of the Story of Hannah.
2. The list in Meg. 14a (with continued discussion in Meg. 14b) includes Miriam,
Deborah, and Huldah, and adds Sarah, Hannah, Esther, and Abigail, but leaves
out the unnamed female prophet of Isa 8:3 and Noadiah. I treat Hannah here
and not the other rabbinic additions because it is only in her case that specic
features of the biblical text beg the question. For more on each of the others, see
Bronner, From Eve to Esther, 16384, and Elior, Changing Perspectives: Female
Prophets in the Bible and Rabbinic Perspective, 1521.
94
Y6621.indb 94 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Hannah 95
Yahweh (1 Sam 2:1), explaining that this refers to the kingdom of David,
who was anointed with a horn.
The interpretation of Hannah as a prophet in Christian tradition is also
based on her poem. In the New Testament, Marys psalm includes strong al-
lusions to Hannahs, making Hannahs look like fullled prophecy (Luke 1:
4655). The nal line of Hannahs poem becomes central in later Christian
interpretation. Augustine devotes an entire chapter in City of God to an ex-
planation of Hannahs words as prophecy, which he bases largely on the ref-
erence to the king as Yahwehs anointed, or for Augustine, His Christ.
This remained an explicit factor in later Christian formative interpretation
of the poem as prophecy.
The question, then, is whether the later traditions that see Hannah as
a prophet are picking up on anything in the biblical text itself that indicates
that the character is meant to be understood this way. Indeed, Hannahs
psalm does in some ways resemble a prophetic oracleunlike, for exam-
ple, the Song of the Sea. It includes a series of reversals of fortune of a fa-
miliar prophetic type (for example, Isa 35:110, 54:1), and then there is the
nal verse, in which Hannah proclaims that Yahweh will give strength to
his king, and raise the horn of his anointed ( -,
1 Sam 2:10), having only just weaned the boy who would anoint the
rst king.
However, the psalm is not original to the story of Hannah. At whatever
point it was written, as an independent poem it would not constitute proph-
ecy. It is the editorial act of placing it in Hannahs mouththe mother of
Samuel, speaking of the anointed kingthat gives it its prophetic tone.
What are we to make of this? Should we assume that the redactor saw the
general appropriateness of the psalm and threw it in in spite of the anach-
ronistic line about the monarchy? This hardly makes sense; the reference to
3. An interesting choice of a verse to cite, considering the reference to the king in

the last line of the poem.
4. Augustine, Civ., 17.4.
5. E.g., from Matthew Henrys introduction to 1 Samuel: The song of Hannah
concludes with a prophecy of our Lord, in which He is, for the rst time, pre-
dicted expressly as the Messiah, the Anointed of God (The Comprehensive Com-
mentary on the Whole Bible, 2:19).
6. For dierent views on the dating of the song and its insertion into the text, see
McCarter, 1 Samuel, 75; Klein, 1 Samuel, 1415; and Willis, The Song of Hannah
and Psalm 113, 13954.
Y6621.indb 95 1/27/15 1:07 PM

the monarchy is more likely part of what makes the poem relevant to Han-
nah as she gives thanks for the birth of Samuel. Whatever the redactors
thought process here, the choice to attribute this psalm to Hannah upon
the birth of her son forms the beginning of her association with prophecy.
We are dealing with three stages of development, then: the original
Hannah narrative, the addition of the poem, and later Jewish and Christian
interpretation naming Hannah as a prophet. At which stage did Hannahs
association with prophecy become deliberate? Was there a hook already in
the narrative, leading the redactor to respond to the existing story by plac-
ing a psalm in Hannahs mouth that rings of the prophetic? Or if nothing
in the original story points to this, is the poem itself prophetic enough to
warrant identifying Hannah as a biblical prophet? Or, if neither of these is
the case, what was it in the combination of the poetry and prose that led to
such a strong trend in later interpretation?
Hannahs Story
The story of Hannah is primarily the story of her struggle with infer-
tility and the conicts and frustrations this brings. The rst thing we are
told about Hannah is that, unlike Peninnah, she has no children. Peninnah
already has at least four children, referred to as all of her sons and daugh-
ters (1 Sam 1:4). We do not know for how long this situation lasted, but we
know that it was signicant in both time and trauma. We hear that Yahweh
has closed Hannahs womb, and Peninnah angers her on account of her
barrenness; year after year, whenever they went up to Shiloh, she would
make Hannah angry, and Hannah would cry and not eat (v. 7).
Hannah is then said to be bitter of spirit, ( 1 Sam 1:10); one
naturally thinks here of Hushais warning to Absalom, mid-usurpation
attempt, that David and his men are embittered, like a bear robbed [of
her cubs] in the wild ( , 2 Sam 17:8). Note
that in that context is often translated as erce (NASB, NIV )
or enraged (NKJV, ESV ). And indeed, Hannah too is enraged. Verbal
and nominal forms of the word occur four times in the rst section
of this story: her rival angered her, such anger (-;
assuming the emphatic use of , 1 Sam 1:6); year after year she made
her angry (, v. 7). The verse is not generally rendered this way:
translators and other interpreters would have Peninnah taunt (NJPS),
7. Or as Rashi understands: :-.
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Hannah 97
irritate (NASB), or provoke (NKJV ) Hannah. This is not what the text
says. We are told only that Peninnah angers Hannah; perhaps she does
something, but for all we know, it is the mere sight of the innocent but
fortunate wife that makes Hannah angry, just as Saul will become angry
at the innocent but frustratingly successful David. The assumption that
Peninnah taunts Hannah is laden with gendered stereotypes of female
competition. It is not what the verb means, and I have not found it trans-
lated as such in any other context.
The fourth use of , the one in Hannahs own voice, provides a vivid
picture of the scene. When Eli accuses Hannah of drunkenness, she pro-
tests that she has been speaking out of the greatness of my complaint and
my anger ( , v. 16). This too is softened in translation, or
perhaps feminized, as various renditions make Hannah speak out of her
anguish and distress (NJPS), concern and provocation (NASB), com-
plaint and grief (NKJV), and so on. But no: Hannah is not sad, she is
angry. This also sheds light on Elis reaction. It is not that no one had ever
silently mouthed prayers before, as is sometimes suggested, but that Han-
nah is silently pouring out [her] soul in complaint and rage. What must
that have looked like? No wonder Eli thinks she is drunk.
So Hannah prays and sobs ( , v. 10) in her anger, makes
her vow to Yahweh, and explains to Eli: I am a hard-spirited woman
( - , v. 15), again softened to unhappy (NJPS) or sorrowful
(NKJV). It is unclear what particular brand of misery this expresseswhat
it means to be hard, severe, harsh of spiritbut unhappy seems mild. We
read that she and Elkanah went home and had sex, and Yahweh remembered
her. The text continues to give unusual attention to Hannahs inner world,
not just labeling her barren (or infertile), but oering a window onto her
experience of and feelings about childlessness. Once Samuel is nally born,
we see Hannahs reluctance to give up the boy too soon: when Elkanah and
the household go back up to Shiloh, she does not go with them, telling her
husband, Until the boy is weaned ( !) Then I will bring him; for
when he appears before Yahweh, he will stay there forever (1 Sam 1:22).
8. According to Ber. 31a, Hannahs silent prayer is a model for all; by my reading,
this would make for quite a global scene.
9. And little does he know: she indeed is no -( 1:16), unlike his sons,
soon shown to be quite the ( 2:12).
10. The phrasing is adjusted to work in English in all sorts of ways, many of which
are perfectly reasonable (e.g., Not until the boy is weaned). My rendering
here is direct and perhaps too literal, but the abbreviated insistence expresses
Y6621.indb 97 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Each detail lingers on Hannahs attachment to her son. Having already

witnessed the conversation between Hannah and Elkanah agreeing to keep
Samuel at home until he is weaned (with this phrase repeated a second
time), we now hear again, So she nursed her son until she weaned him
( - - , 1 Sam 1:23). And then a fourth time: So, she
brought him up with her when she had weaned him (v. 24). Here again,
we cannot escape how young he is: Hannah nally brings little Samuel to
Shiloh, and the boy was just a boy ( , 1:24). If the Akedah fa-
mously shows Abrahams tenderness toward Isaac through such repetition
(my son . . . my only), this story reveals Hannahs toward Samuel. Just
as that story is not about Isaac but about Abraham, torn as he is between
his devotion to his beloved child and his devotion to Yahweh, this story is
about Hannahs dual devotion as she comes to terms with giving up her son
to Yahweh. The poignant details continue after the inserted prayer also, as
the author notes how every year Hannah would make Samuel a new little
robe (1 Sam 2:19).
The whole story to this point has centered on Hannahs inner world: rst
her anger and pain, then her poignant attachment to her child
and reluctance to let him go. Finally, Hannah and Elkanah make their sacrice
and turn the boy over to Eli. Yes, Eli: the very man who had insulted Hannah
when he mistook her impassioned prayer for drunken raving. She remembers
this accusation: she tells Eli that she is the woman he saw praying that day, that
this is the boy she had prayed for, and that Yahweh answered her prayer and
gave her what she had requested. This is the moment of her vindication
and it is at this juncture that the redactor inserts Hannahs prayer.
Hannahs Prayer
The poem of 1 Samuel 2:110 is usually referred to as a song, pre-
sumably by analogy with other inserted poems where the vocabulary of
something otherwise lost: a tone of urgency? A hint, even, that this is not the rst
occurrence of the conversation? Perhaps: Elkanah agrees, but adds, May Yahweh
nevertheless conrm his word (- , v. 23), i.e., to take Samuel
as a Nazirite. In other words, Okay, but I hope Yahweh will still want him.
11. This phrase may well be corrupt, but it does also make good sense, as it must
have at some point to an ancient eye.
12. For dierent takes on 1:20, in which Samuels name is explained using the verb
, see McCarter, 1 Samuel, 6263; Hertzberg, 1 and 2 Samuel, 2526; and Gor-
don, 1 and 2 Samuel, 2324.
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Hannah 99
song is used (for example, , Deut 31:30, 32:44; ,, and so on,

Exod 15:1; , Judg 5:1; ,i2 Sam 22:1). This is not a song, however,
but a spoken prayer: Hannah prayed and said . . . (. . . ,
1 Sam 2:1).
The terms psalm and song are used imprecisely and inconsistently in
scholarly discussion of biblical texts. We can refer to Hannahs words as a
song if by this we mean that it is a sudden inbreaking of poetry, but this ter-
minology is misleading, since the narrative does not present it as sung. The
word song is at times used this way in the eld, but not in normal English.
What distinguishes a poem from a song is that the latter is sung, and by
this very basic standard, the prayer of Hannah in 1 Samuel 2:110 is not a
song. If Eli has mistaken Hannahs rst prayer as one kind of outburst, we
have mistaken her second prayer as another.
The risk here is that the image of a woman singing a song could
create an unwarranted association with Miriam and Deborah, the two
women given the title , to whom songs are attributed. Even if
Hannah were said to sing, this would not constitute a reason to con-
sider her a prophet. As discussed in the previous two chapters, the songs
partially attributed to Miriam and Deborah do not reect these womens
prophetic status. To move ahead under such a misapprehension here, and
then draw a conclusion regarding Hannahs role as a prophet based on a
mistaken view of her prayer as a song, would be wrong on any number
of levels.
If the designation of the poem as a song leads to an overemphasis on
its hypothetical nature as prophecy, it also leads to an underemphasis on its
nature as prayer, which is how it is explicitly described. It matters that this is
13. The form may be used to introduce the words of a song where it is speci-
ed through the primary verb that it is in fact a song ( . . . , Judg 5:1),
but in 1 Sam 2:110, there is no song terminology used at all; the primary verb in
the introductory phrase implies speech, and the form of has the connota-
tion of actual speaking ( . . . ).
14. The general association is common. Fischer understands the connection in a
more specic, albeit complex, way. As noted earlier, she sees Deborah depicted
as a successor both to Miriam (in her song) and to Moses, and then Samuel
as the successor to Deborah. She describes the prophetic succession as passed
through Hannah (in literary terms). In Fischers view, Hannahs song reects
her prophetic function in the model of Miriam, and she passes on this role to
her son Samuel, who, as prophet, judge, and military leader, stands in succession
to both Deborah and Moses (Gottesknderinnen, 12527).
Y6621.indb 99 1/27/15 1:07 PM

a prayer: read this way, it is utterly in line with the characterization of Han-
nah so far. This is her second prayer, and in several ways it mirrors her rst.
Beginning with the more obvious mirroring, the two prayers are a
please and thank you. Hannahs rst prayer (1:1011) was a request; this
one is now its counterpart, her prayer of thanksgiving after the request has
been granted. Then there is the reference in the second prayer to the barren
woman bearing children, which addresses the specics of Hannahs request
(and is the clear hook for the redactor in attributing the poem to Hannah).
The mirroring extends considerably beyond this. The prayer in 1 Sam 2:
110 reects Hannahs experience and her strongest feelings, which were
emphasized in the original narrative. This is evident in verse 5, where Han-
nah does not celebrate only that the barren woman gives birth to seven,
but also that the mother of many pines away () . The sec-
ond phrase does not automatically go with the rst; consider Psalm 113:9,
where Yahweh is praised for making the barren woman a joyful mother of
childrenand that is all. In contrast, the ill wishes here against the mother
of many are striking. Since when does thanking Yahweh involve such
schadenfreude? Of course, Hannahs bitter anger is nothing new. Just as her
rst prayer was introduced, She was embittered of spirit and she prayed to
Yahweh, sobbing, her second prayer reects her embittered spirit as well.
The core of the poem is a series of great reversals of fortune at the hand
of Yahwehthe strong warriors and the weak, the rich and the poorand
so the inclusion of the barren womans counterpart makes sense in this
context, even apart from any correlation to the Hannah story. But the con-
nection to Hannahs experience should not be downplayed for this reason.
Whether because the redactor found an extremely relevant t or did some
writing of his own here, the points of connection are surprisingly close. The
poem does not contain a stock reference to the peculiar biblical category
of the post-barren woman, but a strikingly relevant contrast between two
women. As with each other reversal of fortune, the second part is as im-
portant as the rst. If we understand that the post-barren mother of seven
in the poem alludes to Hannah, we can equally assume that the mother of
many alludes to Peninnah.
Hannahs rst prayer was a focal point in the authors portrayal of
her distress: she prayed with such bitterness and sobbing that Eli thought
her a lush; she explained to him that she was not drunk, but hard-spirited.
Her anger was also emphasized over and over again in the narrative. Now, in
her second prayer, Hannah celebrates not only that the barren woman has
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Hannah 101
borne children, but that her counterpart, the mother of many, languishes.
Apparently she is not quite over her anger.
The poems points of connection to the story of Hannah are not limited
to the line juxtaposing the post-barren woman with the mother of many.
Framing the series of reversals that comprises the core of the poem (1 Sam 2:
48), there are two more lines that are germane to Hannahs experience. Just
before this core section is the line, Do not keep talking so utterly proudly,
with arrogance spilling out of your mouths (1 Sam 2:3), and just after it,
The wicked will be silenced (2:9). Though we do not know that Peninnah
taunted Hannah, we do know that the narrative frames her as Hannahs
adversary at whom she is deeply angry. Eli has certainly spoken wrongly to
Hannah, falsely accusing her of drunkenness when she was in fact praying.
This episode is particularly relevant, since the poem is inserted just at the mo-
ment of Hannahs vindication before Eli. The paired lines in the poem about
silencing the arrogant seem to suit the narrative as well. In addition, part of
the opening line of the prayer is about the speaker smiling over her enemies.
The poem is not a reexive insertion that hinges solely on one allusion to
motherhood. From its opening on smiling over ones enemies and its theme
of silencing the smug, to the speakers satisfaction at the mother of many lan-
guishing, the prayer ties into Hannahs experiences throughout the story. This
poem works extremely well as the prayer of a woman who is described re-
peatedly as angry and angered (with four uses of in one short narrative),
, and -, contrasted with Peninnah and in conict with Eli.
There is still the matter of the last line. The nal couplet of the poem
refers to the king, who does not yet exist. While this line is not directly rel-
evant to the story of Hannah as presented in 1 Samuel 1, it could easily be
another hook for the redactor, who sees the bigger picture of Hannah giv-
ing birth to the new order. The Hannah story points to the monarchy, as she
bears the child who will anoint the rst kings. The reference in the poem
to Yahweh exalting the horn of his anointed then comes across as a matter
of literary foreshadowing. There is no indication that it goes beyond this,
that it is intended to be a sudden prophetic utterance. All signs point to the
contrary. The poem is rich with themes relevant to Hannahs personal expe-
rience, and thus appears more as a prayer of praise and thanksgiving than as
a lead-in to a prophetic outburst. There is also no hint of earlier divinatory
activity that would lead to an oracle here: what Hannah asks for in the nar-
rative is a son, and not knowledge, and the redactor inserts this prayer as her
response to receiving what she requested. The theme of reversals of fortune,
Y6621.indb 101 1/27/15 1:07 PM

while also present in some prophetic texts, is not automatically an identier

of prophecy (for example, Ps 20:89 [Eng. 20:78]). The theme is a natural
t here, in the context of Hannahs psalm of vindication.
Even the nal couplet rings of Hannahs own vindication. The poem
closes with the declaration that Yahweh will exalt the horn of his anointed
() , but this parallels the opening verse, in which it is the
speakers horn that is exalted () . The poem vindicates the
speaker from start to nish.
As noted earlier, the explanation of Hannahs prophetic role in Megil-
lah 14a rests on the exalted horn image, though interestingly it is the rst
line of the poem that is cited, rather than the last. The horn is explained
thereeven in the rst line, about the speakeras a symbol of the Davidic
dynasty. Note that although the last line explicitly mentions the king, the
phrase itself need not refer to the horn of anointing. In Psalm 75, for ex-
ample, the psalmist tells the fools not to exalt their own horns in arrogance
(75:6 [Eng. 75:5]) and then concludes with the proclamation that he will cut
o the horns of the wicked, but the horns of the righteous will be exalted
(75:11 [Eng. 75:10]). This is also the sense of the idiom in the rst line of
Hannahs prayer.
It is hard not to notice a generally chiastic structure to the poem:
A: Horn (of speaker) is exalted
B: Vindication over enemies (smiling over them)
C: Stop speaking in arrogance!
D: Series of reversals of fortune at the hands of Yahweh
C: The wicked will be silenced
B: Vindication over adversaries (they are broken)
A: Horn (of anointed) is exalted
Identifying this structure is useful for highlighting themes and for clar-
ity of discussion, but these themes are present whether or not one views
the poem as a chiasm. The speaker emphasizes her vindication before her
15. This structure suggests that the nal couplet regarding the king is not a later
addition, as is sometimes proposed. For other arguments that the couplet is
original to the poem, see Lewis, The Textual History of the Song of Hannah:
1 Sam II 110, 4344.
16. I am generally suspicious of interpretations that purport to work in the other
directioni.e., that supposedly begin with an objectively observed chiastic
structuresince it is possible to delimit texts in a variety of ways according to
ones view of what the pinnacle of the chiasm should be. I am therefore of the
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Hannah 103
enemies, who have spoken smugly but should be silent and will in fact be
silenced, while her horn and the horn of Yahwehs anointed will be exalted.
Hannahs prayer does not reect prophetic activity by virtue of being
a womans song, nor by virtue of its nal line regarding the king. On the
rst issue, even if a womans song were in fact an indicator of her prophetic
role (and it is not), this poem is explicitly not a song, but a spoken prayer.
On the second issue, the mention of the king is not central to the poem and
not the main hook for the redactor. If it was part of the redactors rationale
in inserting the prayer, it was due to Hannahs literary position and her
role as mother of the new order, not because of any intent to depict her as
a prophet. Had that been the redactors aim, he could have done far better.
This is a psalm of vindication, with themes from Hannahs experience
reverberating throughout, and the redactors choice to attribute the poem
to Hannah must be based on its close relevance to her (or includes addi-
tional editing that makes it so). The nal line is a moment of literary fore-
shadowing, not a portrayal of a person engaging in divination. Even that
line parallels the speakers own exaltation: it is Hannah who is exalted and
vindicated here. In the end, it is not about Samuel, David, or anyone else,
but about Hannah.
Whence Hannah the Prophet?

Coming back to the three stages of development, we can see rst that
there is nothing in the original narrative portrayal of Hannah that should
associate her with prophecy. Her dening traits and experiences are her
conict with Peninnah, her anger about this, which is emphasized repeat-
edly, and her prayer, which she utters with such bitter sobbing that Eli takes
her to be drunk. Unlike Rebekah, who requests knowledge about the twins
she is carrying, Hannah only requests a child.
Second, there is also nothing in the form or content of the inserted
prayer to suggest that the redactor intends to depict Hannah as engaging in
prophetic activity. The matters of the song and the foreshadowing of the
king have been covered. The theme of reversals of fortune appears in some
prophetic texts, but also appears elsewhere. For that matter, if the reversals
are not prophetic for their overarching theme, they are even less so for
their particulars. As Randall Bailey points out, through the rest of Samuel,
opinion that noting a chiastic structure may be helpful for discussion, but not
denitive for interpretation.
Y6621.indb 103 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Yahweh does not in fact raise up the poor from the dust or the needy
from the ash heap.
So it is only in the third stage, that of Jewish and Christian interpre-
tation after the period of the writing of the Hebrew Bible, that Hannah
comes to be associated with prophecy. The reasons for this association in
both Jewish and Christian traditions are understandable, but this is quite
dierent than the character actually being portrayed as engaging in divi-
natory activity. There is nothing either in the original narrative or in the
inserted psalm of vindication that would register as an act of divination in
any sense native to the ancient framework.
Seeing Hannah as a prophet (which requires seeing her poem as proph-
ecy) is not a harmless expansion of her role. In addition to being imprecise
regarding textual details and matters of what constitutes divinatory activity,
it also takes away from the actual depiction of the character by reading her
prayer as being about some later gure, rather than about Hannah herself.
She utters this prayerinserted at the moment of her vindication before
Elistill bitter enough to exhort her enemies to stop being so arrogant,
to celebrate the silencing of her adversary, and to take satisfaction in the
languishing of the mother of many. This prayer is about her.
With this said, there is one line in the poem that I do like to read
as an allusion to a future event, though it is certainly not intended that
way. Among the series of reversals of fortune, one is particularly intrigu-
ing. What does it mean to say, Yahweh kills and makes live, brings down
to Sheol and brings up ( ,i1 Sam 2:6)? To
kill and to make live, sure; but if Yahweh is bringing some people down to
Sheol . . . whom is he bringing up? With full acknowledgment that this is
not the redactors goal, I like to see in this a hint of another story, which is
the topic of the next chapter.
17. Bailey, The Redemption of YHWH: A Literary Critical Function of the Songs
of Hannah and David, 11718.
Y6621.indb 104 1/27/15 1:08 PM

7 The Necromancer of En-dor
The story in 1 Samuel 28 of the necromancer of En-dorall too of-

ten referred to as the witch of En-doris the Bibles only narrative de-
scription of necromancy. Perhaps no other text discussed in this volume
has had a history so thoroughly colored by the misconceptions discussed
in chapter 2. The woman has been viewed as practicing dark magic rather
than engaging in religious activity; as performing a type of divination that
must be either foreign or idolatrous, and in either case is certainly false; as
working the shady back rooms of popular religion; and so on. At the same
time, perhaps no other story of a female diviner so fully exhibits the range
of perspectives on divinatory practices among biblical traditions.
The -
The character is not a witch. This is not simply a matter of interpreta-
tion. The word , sorceress or witch (as in Exod 22:17 [Eng. 22:18]),
does not appear here; nor does a feminine form of , the spell
caster who follows the in the list of magicians and diviners in Deu-
teronomy 18:1011. The term , sorceress (Nah 3:4), could have
been used here and was not. The woman is instead called an - ,
a woman who is a ghost-diviner. The technical terminology matches the
description of the womans actions: she does not practice witchcraft or cast
a spell, but acts as an intermediary between the living and the dead.
The vocabulary used throughout the rest of the text also consistently
points to the womans role as a necromancer, and not to witchcraft. Saul is
not looking for someone to cast a spell, but to raise a ghost (). The setup
to the story prepares the reader for the irony of Saul resorting to this type of
105
Y6621.indb 105 1/27/15 1:08 PM

diviner: he has exiled the mediums and spiritists (-) , then

seeks out an - , and says to her, Divine for me by a ghost
( -).
The term - does not appear elsewhere in the Bible, but
the implication is that, at least within the world of the story, it is a recog-
nized role. Saul asks his servants to nd him an - , and they
do not cock their heads and look at him funny: they reply that there is an
- in En-dor (1 Sam 28:7).
The construction of the term has been treated as odd or even mys-
terious, but it has clear relationships to other divinatory titles. To begin
with - by itself: the formulation x- to refer to a diviner appears
elsewhere as well. In Genesis 37:19, Josephs brothers mock him, saying,
, Oh look, here comes that dream-diviner! As Jo-
seph is characterized by his dreaming, the - is characterized by her
aliation with ghosts: as he is a dream-diviner, she is a ghost-diviner.
The construction - is analogous to the Akkadian term for
necromancer, a et.emmi, which is the lexical equivalent of L GIDIM.
MA, as seen in the Sumerian-Akkadian lexical lists of professions (OB Lu
A and B-C). The use of L=a in these titles is the semantic equivalent of
the Hebrew use of x- in the sense of person of x; one who possesses
x; one characterized by x. The performance of the role need not be the
same across such a span of time and space, but the analogous terminology
demonstrates further that - is not merely a description, but a title.
The overall form - is similar to the construct chain
--, a sti-necked people (Exod 32:9), where the second and
1. Ketiv ;Qere . On the verb , which may originally have had to do

with drawing lots but came to be used more broadly for any type of divination,
see Jeerss study of Hebrew and other Northwest Semitic vocabulary relating
to divination (Magic and Divination, 9698), as well as Cryer, Divination in
Ancient Israel, 25563.
2. In contrast with McCarters ghostwife, which reects a choice of the sym-
bolic marital sense of [ ]rather than the sense of being characterized
by or having mastery over something (McCarter, I Samuel, 41723). Kleins
translation, a woman dealing with ancestral spirits, may reect the latter
sense of the phrase (1 Samuel, 267).
3. OB Lu-azlag A 356 and OB Lu-azlag B-C, Seg. 6, 3; in the latter as a
itemmi. CAD E 401a, ePSD; also see Civil, ed., The Series l = a and Related
Texts, 168:356 and 226:148. I see that the same point has been made by Tropper,
Nekromantie, 225.
Y6621.indb 106 1/27/15 1:08 PM

The Necromancer of En-dor 107
third terms form one construct (-, sti-of-neck, and -,

ghost-diviner), and that unit together with the rst term form another
construct. In both cases, the rst term refers generically to a person or
people and is understood as relative to the second unit: a people who are
sti-necked and a woman who is a ghost-diviner, so a stubborn people
and a necromancer.
The term is not without its complexities. The word has multiple
meanings, including ghost (or spirit of the dead), the practitioner who
consults the dead, and images of the dead, and it is not always clear which texts
reect which meanings. By my reading, of the sixteen uses of the word, nine
refer to spirits of the dead (with a possible tenth, mentioned below). In eight
cases, this is certain: Leviticus 20:27 ( - -) ,
Deuteronomy 18:11 ( used in parallel with -) ,
4. The constructs formed by the second and third terms (B+C) are of dierent
types- is essentially an attributive construct, and - is epex-
egetical, i.e., the direction of modication is reversed (see both as discussed in
IBHS 9.5.3c)but the unusual chains A+(B+C), both meaning A=(B+C), are
of the same type. It is not necessary to posit a conation of two terms,
and -in both occurrences of the full phrase in the textas McCarter
does (1 Samuel, 418). The LXX should not have priority here.
5. The words notoriously unclear etymology has bedeviled scholars and led to an
array of propositions, which have at times been too quick to correlate a precise
meaning in rst millennium Hebrew texts to those in second millennium Hit-
tite, Sumerian, Akkadian, and Ugaritic. A prime and inuential example of this
would be the ritual pit theory of Honer, Second Millennium Antecedents
to the Hebrew -b, 385401, based largely on Hittite api, pit, as well as other
cognates. Other chief theories of derivation include Arabic ba, to return
(Schmidt, Israels Benecent Dead, 151; Lewis, Cults of the Dead in Ancient Israel
and Ugarit, 113 n.36); and , father, so ancestor spirit (Lust, On Wizards
and Prophets, 13342; Tropper, Nekromantie, 19192). See Troppers overview
of arguments regarding the and ( pp. 189204), and his own argument
that the biblical texts do not always make a precise distinction between
and ( 31216). For a very brief summary, see also Tropper, Spirit of the
Dead, 8069; and for a lengthy discussion of relevant issues and full bibliogra-
phy, see Kleiner, Saul in En-Dor, 57184.
6. There is no uniformity in the use of the terms spirit of the dead and ghost in
English. The former better reects the ancient concept in its overlap with deity
language, but in modern parlance the latter may better connote a being that can
appear, visibly. The concept does not translate. I will use both of these two clos-
est equivalents here.
Y6621.indb 107 1/27/15 1:08 PM

1 Samuel 28:7 (-, twice) and 28:8 ( -), Isaiah 8:19

(- , used in parallel with both and ), and Isaiah
29:4 () . In two more cases, the word is at times translated dif-
ferently but must also refer to spirits of the dead, rather than necroman-
cers: Leviticus 20:6 ( - -) ,
because in the sexual idiom characterizing idolatry, one does not
prostitute oneself after people, only after deities; and Leviticus 19:31
( - - - -), which, given its
proximity to Leviticus 20:6 and shared language, should have the same
meaning.
Three uses refer to the human specialists who divine by these types of
spirits: in 1 Samuel 28:3 and 28:9, Saul removes the and from
the land. Where the story is encapsulated in 1 Chronicles 10:13, the phrasing
implies the same usage () . In three texts, the term refers
to a physical object, apparently a cultic representation of a spirit (that is, an
ancestor). In 2 Kings 23:24, Josiah burns along with other cultic items
(- - - -). The other two (nearly)
parallel texts refer to Manasseh having made an , after which he places
in the temple an image of Asherah that he has also made (2 Kgs 21:67
2 Chr 33:67; Chronicles has an unnamed idol). The nal reference, in
Isaiah 19:3 (- - - -) , could be
understood as images of the dead or the dead themselves.
The term thus most often means ghost or spirit of the dead. This
meaning should be considered primary, with the less frequent meanings of
image of the dead and ghost-diviner derived from it. The usage of the
term to mean image of the dead is comparable to the use of words for
god to refer to the statue of a god. The use of the term to mean ghost-
diviner could conceivably have been based on a notion that the spirit of
the deceased could enter the necromancer, though that is certainly not
what happens in this narrative. See Leviticus 20:27, though, where it is
7. Tropper and Loretz both see the plural references to and at the
beginning of 1 Sam 28 as images as well, but this seems a dicult reading. I do
not see that in the present context we are meant to think that Saul could have
had all such images removed from the land; would this then include household
images of the dead? They do both see in the singular later in 1 Sam 28 as
referring to the spirit of the dead. Tropper, Nekromantie, 22325; Loretz, Nek-
romantie und Totenevokation in Mesopotamien, Ugarit und Israel, 3089.
Y6621.indb 108 1/27/15 1:08 PM

deemed necessary to stone the man or woman who has an or in

them ( - -) .
( or )is frequently used in parallel with , which has
a similar range of meanings (a knowing spirit, the spiritist who divines
through it, and a cultic object representing the spirit in some way). Given
the feminine and masculine forms of the plurals, some have suggested that
and refer to female and male necromancers, respectively. Oth-
ers understand these as female and male practitioners of dierent kinds:
Jobling, for instance, refers to the women mediums of Israel . . . paired
with a male group, the wizards. However, the evidence does not suggest
that necromancers were more likely to be female (as I will discuss). More-
over, the grammatical gender of a plural ending does not have to indicate
actual gender. There is a further logical problem in this instance: only
occasionally and secondarily refers to necromancers, and primarily means
ghosts, where the grammatically feminine plural ending clearly does not
specify the sex of the ghosts.
Some view the terms and as synonymous, but if this were the
case, one would have to wonder on what basis entirely dierent terminol-
ogy developed, and why the terms would regularly be used in tandem.
8. Loretz understands this as a late reference to divination by means of ventriloquism

(Nekromantie und Totenevokation, 311), but note Lees observation of the lan-
guage in Lev 20:27 in relation to the surrounding physical descriptions of people
with skin disease and other ailments in or on them. She also suggests that the
term - may indicate a greater level of agency or control than the phrase in
Lev 20:27, where such possession could be seen as accidental. Lee, Embodiment
of a Spirit and Pronouncement of Its Words: Necromancers in Leviticus 20:27.
9. In eleven of its sixteen occurrences, is paired with . In six cases, both
terms are in the plural, in three cases both are singular, and twice one is singular
and the other plural. There is no correspondence between the range of meanings
and the sing. and pl. uses.
10. Lewis, Cults of the Dead, 114.
11. Jobling, 1 Samuel, 18586.
12. If those who see as etymologically connected to are correct, this would
provide another obvious reason not to read too much into the feminine plural.
13. Jeers considers the terms synonymous, on the grounds that it is hard to
prove . . . that the two terms are distinct (Magic and Divination, 172). Lewis
suggests that it may have been a common hendiadys (Cults of the Dead, 114).
If the pairing is a hendiadys representing dierent aspects of the same spirit,
with the second term as an interpretation of the rst, in complete harmony
Y6621.indb 109 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Without evidence to the contrary, we should assume that the dierent vo-
cabulary is indicative of dierent concepts; these nouns are no more likely
to be synonymous than and , which follow them in 2 Kings
23:24. While we cannot be certain based on the data available, it is conceiv-
able, for instance, that refers to a spirit of the dead, and refers to
a knowledgeable spirit, but not one of a dead person. People might inquire
of or , but a necromancer (- )divines by an ( as Saul
specically requests). This is conjecture, though, and narrow and systematic
denitions should not be assumed at all, let alone based on the amount of
evidence available.
In 1 Samuel 28, then, we have a ghost-divinera woman whose title
is recognized by the characters in the story, and unlikely to be a sponta-
neous ction, analogous as it is to the professional title a et.emmi (and
its lexical equivalent L GIDIM.MA). This woman is, by implication,
one of the Saul aimed to throw out of the land in verse 3. In this
story alone, the expansive vocabulary for the world of spirits and their
diviners reects a breadth of necromantic activity: the and
have been exiled; one of the comes into view, now called by the
title - ; she is asked to divine ( )by an ;she complies,
raising an .
In addition to ghost-diviner, I use both the terms medium and
necromancer here, in order to convey the presence of a combination of
elements in the text that do not line up with the modern Western usage
of either term alone: the woman seeks divine knowledge from the spirit
of the dead (the act of a necromancer), and creates a way for the speech of
the deceased to be heard, though Saul sees nothing (typically the modern
Western understanding of the role of the medium).
Foreignness, Idolatry, and Sexual Deviance

in Interpretation of the Necromancer
I will, in the following sections, be arguing for quite a positive reading
of the necromancer. This is not a modern ideologically driven phenom-
enon. Some ancient and medieval commentators oered strongly positive
interpretations of the character. Josephus, for instance, wrote: Now it is but
with the usages of Hebrew parallelism, as suggested by T. Davies, one would

still need to account for the wholly dierent vocabulary (Magic, Divination, and
Demonology among the Hebrews and Their Neighbours, 8889).
Y6621.indb 110 1/27/15 1:08 PM

just to recommend the generosity of this woman, because when the king
had forbidden her to use that art whence her circumstances were bettered
and improved . . . she still did not remember to his disadvantage that he
had condemned her sort of learning . . . but she had compassion upon him,
and comforted him . . . It would be well therefore to imitate [her] example
( Josephus, Ant. 6.14.4 [Whiston]).
However, several particular negative images dominate scholarly inter-
pretation of the woman. The most basic of these is the (mis)labeling of
the woman as a witch, as has been common from ancient and medieval
commentary through modern scholarship. Some who do not use the word
witch nonetheless hold to the traditional view of the woman as wicked.
This line of interpretation can also be seen in a plethora of artistic rendi-
tions of the episode, from the grotesque portrayal of the witch by William
Sydney Mount, to the dark, threatening landscape of the story for Gustave
Dor, and the (wonderful) bacchanalian revelry imagined by Jacob Cor-
nelisz van Oostsanen.
It is frequently assumed that the woman must be either an idolatrous
Israelite or a Canaanite. It is not generally imagined that she could sim-
ply be an Israelite woman practicing Israelite religion. Many presume that
14. See the useful survey of Smelik, The Witch of Endor: 1 Samuel 28 in Rabbinic
and Christian Exegesis till 800 A.D., 16079, though Smelik is more interested
in the question of which interpreters were willing to take the texts portrayal of
necromancy at face value. Among modern scholars who have noted that nega-
tive views of the woman are more attributable to interpreters than to the narra-
tor, see esp. Jobling, 1 Samuel, 18589.
15. Examples are too abundant to list, but include even scholars discussing nec-
romancy (e.g., Schmidt, Israels Benecent Dead, 20120), and those interested
in positive readings of the character (Reis, Eating the Blood: Saul and the
Witch of Endor, 3). See also Simon, who refers to the woman consistently as
a witch, but as alternately sinful and kind (A Balanced Story: The Stern
Prophet and the Kind Witch, 15971).
16. This too comes even from surprising sources, such as Frymer-Kensky, who in-
cludes the woman of En-dor in a discussion of the evil women of the Bible (In
the Wake of the Goddesses, 12627).
17. On musical interpretations, see Leneman, Love, Lust, and Lunacy: The Stories of
Saul and David in Music, ch. 7, and Angert-Quilter and Wall, The Spirit Wife
at Endor, 5572. On modern creative interpretation, note the role of Endora on
the classic television show Bewitched. There is such a thing as a good witch on
the show, and Endora is not it.
Y6621.indb 111 1/27/15 1:08 PM

the story tells of foreign practice. Cogan, for instance, claims that the text
is evidence for Israelite aversion to Canaanite divinatory practices, and
sheds light on the injunction in Deut 18:913 prohibiting the adoption by
Israel of foreign divinatory practices. Even Schmidt, who argues that the
attribution of necromancy to the Canaanites is an Israelite polemic, sees it
instead as a Mesopotamian form of divination. We see similar references
to the womans pagan religion and to the woman as an idolatrous sha-
man and a polytheist, even though the man she raises is the prophet of
Yahweh and the message she divines is overtly Yahwistic. Such readings
seem to try hard to dissociate necromancy from Israelite religion.
Some point to the location of En-dor as a sign of the womans foreign-
ness. A diculty with this approach is that we do not know the location
of En-dor. In addition to the fact that nothing in the text suggests that
the woman is not an Israelite, it should be recalled here that the narrative
setup for the irony of Saul consulting a necromancer is that he has exiled
the from the land. The implication is that she is from the landshe,
along with many other necromancers and spirit-diviners.
The impetus to read the character as foreign is the assumption that
such religious activity must not be Israelite. That is to say, the concern is
18. Cogan, The Road to En-dor, 31926, here 326.

19. Schmidt, Israels Benecent Dead, 13843; on the En-dor story in particular as
a late composition reecting Mesopotamian ideas about necromancy, since he
sees no evidence for necromancy in the immediate region, 20120; and in an es-
say focusing on this argument, Schmidt, The Witch of En-Dor, 1 Samuel 28,
and Ancient Near Eastern Necromancy, 11129. Schmidts argument regarding
necromancy is part of his broader argument that there was no ancestor worship
in Israel; responding to him, see Nihan, 1 Samuel 28 and the Condemnation
of Necromancy in Persian Yehud, esp. 2526 n.7, and Scurlock, Ghosts in the
Ancient Near East: Weak or Powerful? 7796.
20. Beuken, 1 Samuel 28: The Prophet as Hammer of Witches, 10. Although the text
itself describes Samuel as an , Beuken must argue around this: the woman
expected a ghost but saw a divine being, divine in terms of her pagan religion.
21. Reis, Eating the Blood, 4, 21.
22. E.g., Jobling, 1 Samuel, 186.
23. On the diculty of locating En-dor, see, e.g., Cogan, The Road to En-dor,
319, and Margalith, Dor and En-Dor, 109111, focused on his critique of the
geographic identication of En-dor by Brown, The Mediterranean Seer and
Shamanism, 374400. For a concise summary of etymological arguments and
bibliography, and the tentative suggestion that the name itself rang of the ritual,
see Lewis, Cults of the Dead, 113 n.34.
Y6621.indb 112 1/27/15 1:08 PM

that she is a woman who is a necromancer. Another widespread theme in

commentary on the text has more to do with the fact that she is a woman
who is a necromancer. It is the readings of sexual activity into the text that
particularly reect interpreters gendered preconceptions. It has not been
infrequent to interpret the actions and intentions of the woman sexually,
although there is no basis for this in the text. Such readings range from
Matthew Arnolds salacious comments about the dark age of unbridled
ecstasy symbolized by the Witch of Endor, which might be termed sexual
horror, to the milder suggestion that the woman may have made sexual
advances. Many interpretations lie somewhere in between, such as that
of Reis, who argues that the woman volunteered her sexual services to the
king and his men. She claims, for reasons unclear, that the woman takes
the rst desperate action that occurs to her, and, hoping to buy her life with
her body, approaches Saul sexually.
Many interpretations are less blatant but employ suggestive language.
Pigott, for example, calls the woman a mistress of necromancy (a lady of
the night if you will!), and Schmidt, in addition to assuming the woman
is foreign, refers ambiguously but provocatively to Sauls rendezvous with
the Canaanite woman of En-Dor.
Jobling captures well the power dynamic between the medium and the
king in the story, noting that the peril is hers: there does not seem to be any
penalty for consulting a medium, just for being one, and here he too hints
at a sexual element, suggesting that the dynamics of this story have much
in common with those of a meeting between a prostitute and a john. This
is perhaps an understandable leap for an interpreter of our times, reading
the story of an illicit nocturnal encounter between a woman and a man. It
must be remembered, though, that night was also an appropriate time for
necromancy. In addition, as I will argue, the judgment of the author is in
24. On Arnolds discussion of sex and polytheism, see esp. Jobling, 1 Samuel, 210,
217. On the notion that the woman made sexual advances, see Edelman, King
Saul in the Historiography of Judah, 250.
25. Reis, Eating the Blood, 13, 18. This is not a passing suggestion: Reis oers a
detailed, if implausible, argument for this view.
26. Pigott, 1 Samuel 28Saul and the Not So Wicked Witch of Endor, 438;
Schmidt, The Witch of En-Dor, 1 Samuel 28, and Ancient Near Eastern Nec-
romancy, 128.
27. Jobling, 1 Samuel, 187 and 187 n.14.
28. Some have argued that necromancy was generally practiced at nighttime
and have suggested specic conscious rationale for this, most realistically the
Y6621.indb 113 1/27/15 1:08 PM

fact the opposite of what Jobling suggests: the woman in this story is never
condemned, in stark contrast to the desperate king.
Logic notwithstanding, the interpretive tendency is to read into the
story things exotic and erotic. This is not warranted by anything in the text
itself. Despite traditional and scholarly assumptions that the woman must
be a witch, a foreigner, a polytheist, a sexual deviant, or all of the above,
there is no indication in the text that she is anything other than a Yahwistic
diviner providing her services of religious access for the king.
Sauls Impotence, Davids Rise

The story is focused, quite noticeably, not on the medium but on the
presentation of Saul, who at times lacks power and at times wields it poorly.
This is clear from the content of the passage as well as from its context.
David, the up-and-comer, has spared Sauls life twice in the previous few
chapters, culminating in Saul humbling himself before the young upstart,
weeping, apologizing, and acknowledging that David was more righteous
than he and would succeed him, and asking for his future mercy (1 Sam 24:
1621, 26:2125). The reader, knowing the arc of the longer story (because
epics are not aimed at rst-time readers), already sees Davids trajectory as
he overtakes the weaker Saul. We have also already seen Sauls histrionics
when the spirit of God leaves him and the harmful spirit of God falls upon
him; Saul is, by the time we reach chapter 28, in dismal shape.
As the chapter begins, battle is warming up with the Philistines. More-
over, as is emphasized twice in verses 12, David himself would be ghting
association between darkness below and darkness above (e.g., Lewis, Cults of the
Dead, 12, 114, 14243). Whether or not this is provable as a consistent pattern,
there is surely an element of human instinct here: ghouls like night.
29. This does not imply exclusive Yahwism. Her divination does, however, serve
Yahweh. Note that the verb is used both negatively and positively (see, e.g.,
the list of respected roles in Isa 3:2, including the judge, prophet, diviner []
and elder). Fischer too sees the woman as acting in the name of Yahweh, and
thus calls her a prophetonly a false one. She reads the text as a deliberate
commentary on the perils of false prophecy, with Deut 18 consciously in the
ancient authors mind (Gottesknderinnen, 50, 131, 139). In this case, she sees
the character herself as aware of the specic legislation (pp. 14748, 15354). In
Fischers view, even though the woman passed on a true message, her method
makes her a false prophet; moreover, even the true message is not a new one,
and it is thus portrayed as being of no value, and even absurd (pp. 131, 14750,
153, 221).
Y6621.indb 114 1/27/15 1:08 PM

alongside Achish, that is, against Saul. In verse 4, the Philistines march
against Israel, and Saul gathers his army (lit. all Israel) and they encamp at
Gilboa. In the next verse, we nd out that Saul is terribly afraid (he feared,
and his heart trembled greatly). Tellingly, this is the Bibles only descrip-
tion of an Israelite king being afraid before battle. It is in this moment that
Saul seeks divine knowledge. It was common throughout the Near East for
a king to consult a diviner on the eve of battle: here, though, Sauls moti-
vation is portrayed not as custom, but as palpable fear. The odds for suc-
cess are immediately stacked against him, since he has already removed the
mediums and spiritists from the land. The thrust of the storyemphasized
repeatedly within this text, and utterly characteristic of the entire arc of the
Saul storyis Sauls constant capacity for self-defeat.
And alas, his rst eorts are not successful: Saul inquired of Yahweh,
but Yahweh did not answer himnot by dreams, or by urim, or by prophets
(1 Sam 28:6). These various forms of divination are listed together: indepen-
dent dreaming, use of a magical object, and consultation of approved inter-
mediaries. When these methods failor more pointedly, when Saul fails
to hear through these methodshe turns to a nonapproved intermediary.
30. Many scholars still adhere to the customary delimitations of the text that ex-
clude these verses, preferring to see the story as beginning in v. 3, but this misses
the pointed opposition between David and Saul, as expressed here in the an-
ticipation of literal battle. Since vv. 12 are also not necessarily connected to
the previous chapter, I see no reason to prefer excluding them from this one.
Campbell also suggests that it is unwise to associate these verses with ch. 27
(1 Samuel, 280).
31. Sauls expressions of fear provide further contrast with David. Saul will cry out
to the ghost of Samuel, I am greatly distressed! The Philistines are attacking
me, and God has turned away from me, and doesnt answer me anymore, not
by prophets or by dreams, so I called you to tell me what to do! (1 Sam 28:15).
His concern is clearly for himself. Soon afterward, David, in contrast, laments
for Jonathan, I am distressed over you ( -,i2 Sam 1:26). Saul says only
-, and continues, The Philistines are attacking me, and so forth. Saul acts
out of fear, and more for himself than for Israel. Once again, the depiction of
Saul reveals that he does not hold a candle to David.
32. Although there are other Near Eastern examples of divination through sev-
eral means in turn (Cogan, The Road to En-dor, 32125), in this context the
string of failed attempts at divination clearly reects Sauls inability to hear
from Yahweh.
33. The use of the verb in v. 6 ( ) should not be taken as representing
something phenomenologically distinct from in v. 7. Although an author
Y6621.indb 115 1/27/15 1:08 PM

While it is clearly characteristic of the awed king that he resorts to a

type of divination he has prohibited, we should not assume that his attempt
to get rid of mediums reects poorly on the medium. After all, Saul has also
just slaughtered eighty-ve priests of Nob (1 Sam 22:1718), and had an ir-
revocable falling out with Samuel (1 Sam 15:3335), thus cutting o all sorts
of intermediaries. Finally, of course, the person Saul has most persistently
tried to get rid of is David. The irony of Saul exiling and then consult-
ing a medium reects primarily on the wisdom and leadership abilities of
the king, who has shot himself in the foot, once again, by having just re-
moved the mediums and spiritists from the landand then nding that he
needs one.
The point of the story is that Saul needs the necromancer to mediate
the message; he has tried more direct means of divination and failed. This
illustrates the extent to which Saul is removed from God, or vice versa. This
is the primary point of contrast between him and David in the story. Four
surrounding texts show Davids successful divination (1 Sam 23:24 and
912 before this text, and 1 Sam 30:78 and 2 Sam 2:1 shortly after it). In all
four, he simply asks Yahweh questions, and in two of them he also uses an
ephod as an instrument for divination (1 Sam 23:9 and 30:7); he does not in
any of these texts need to use an intermediary. He himself addresses Yah-
weh, and every time, Yahweh answers him immediately and directly. Al-
though it is often claimed that negative comparison of Saul to David is im-
plied in the En-dor story because of the great evil of necromancy, this is not
what the text indicates. What the narrator, Saul, and Samuel all say is
might have chosen to use the verb in any case (as in several texts below),
the alliterative eect should not be underestimated.
34. This should pose a problem for those who see the portrayal of Sauls generally
erroneous ways as implying a condemnation of the necromancer; e.g., Nihan,
1 Samuel 28 and the Condemnation of Necromancy in Persian Yehud, 2354.
Note that the end of ch. 15 has a marvelous eect when read with ch. 28 in mind:
Samuel left for Ramah, and never saw Saul again until the day of his death
though he did see him after that.
35. Arnold, for example, also sees the intentional juxtaposition of Saul and Davids
modes of divine communication, but argues that the Deuteronomists point is
to show Davids superiority through his use of prophecy rather than magic,
concluding: In Sauls moment of crisis, he turned to the deplorable necroman-
tic option, whereas David consistently and commendably relied on the pro-
phetic word of Yhwh, as discerned through cleromancy (Necromancy and
Cleromancy in 1 and 2 Samuel, 199213, quotation 213).
Y6621.indb 116 1/27/15 1:08 PM

that Yahweh had stopped communicating with Saul. The point in the story
is that Saul does not hear anything from Yahwehthat is, until he con-
sults the medium. Picture the hierarchy: David inquires of Yahweh directly,
and always receives a clear answer. Other kings often inquire successfully
through prophetsalready intermediariesand hear responses. Saul tries
inquiring through multiple means, including dreams, urim, and live proph-
ets, but gets nothing, and so he requires one intermediary to reach another.
David has Gods ear; other kings are once removed; Saul is twice removed.
In a classic storytelling style, the narrator has set up the story with the
foreshadowing note that Samuel was already dead and buried, and that Saul
had removed the mediums and spiritists from the land. The king is in a
bind, then, when all else has failed, and he wants to turn to Samuel. In spite
of his earlier action in banishing these diviners (and Saul so frequently acts
in spite of himself ), he tells his servants to nd him a necromancer. It is in
the context of this focus on Sauls impotence and ineective divination that
we come upon the story of the necromancers eective divination.
Divine for Me by a Ghost

What do we know, then, of this particular diviner and her necroman-
tic activity? I noted above that, within the world of the story, the term
- represents a recognized role. It is also evident from the ser-
vants response that this particular woman is a known quantity. Sauls ser-
vants know immediately where to nd her. This may well be a humorous
depiction of a court scene. The king has removed the mediums from the
land . . . but his servants know just where to go to nd one.
It is unclear why Saul specically seeks a female diviner. I used this
text as an example in chapter 1 to demonstrate the diculty of deriving
historical evidence about diviners from these narratives. (For example, does
the story indicate that necromancy was a common practice? Or that a later
author thought it had been in Sauls time? Or that it happened but looked
nothing like this? And so on.) The same issues hold for the matter of Sauls
specic request for a female necromancer. Were necromancers more likely
to be female? Or was the idea of a female medium out in the sticks a picture
in the mind of an urban, scholarly author?
The scant evidence seems to me to suggest the latter. There is no reason
to think necromancy was uncommon in Israelindeed, the collection of
biblical allusions, proscriptions, and descriptions, in combination with its
practice throughout the broader region, would suggest that necromancy
Y6621.indb 117 1/27/15 1:08 PM

was as common a type of divination in Israel as it was among its neigh-

bors. Recognizing that this is one authors story, rather than the sole and
thoroughly characteristic representation of necromancy, there is no reason
to assume that the form of divination itself was specic to women. There
was certainly no such restriction among necromancers in Mesopotamia.
The dierence between a tale about a necromancer and texts presenting
formal necromantic rituals must be taken into account here, given the pre-
dominance of men in scribal divination. Even so, biblical allusions to necro-
mancers also refer to both men and women. References to people inquiring
of the dead cannot be considered in this regard, since these may refer to
visiting a necromancer or to consulting ones ancestors directly. Consider
Isaiah 8:19, however, where hypothetical necromancers are addressed in
the masculine plural. The writer begins by condemning the people who re-
quest necromantic divination, those who say to the necromancers: Inquire
( )of the ghosts and spirits that chirp and moan . . . So we are left
with a smattering of indications that both men and women could function
as necromancers in Israel. This cannot answer the question of why Saul
specically requested a woman; it rather begs the question. Had he simply
gone to a necromancer who happened to be femalethe way Josiahs men
consult Huldah, whose sex is immaterialthat would be a dierent story.
In this case, Sauls request is specic. My inclination is to attribute this to
a stereotype in the mind of a culturally distant author. Literary stereotypes
of female witches, discussed in a later chapter, may also be a relevant point
of comparison here. Then again, perhaps the author is simply making a
conscious choice that will serve to heighten the power dynamics later in
the story.
The rst few lines that Saul and the woman exchange are lled with
lovely allusions of what is to come. Saul arrives incognito and begins with
36. See esp. Nihan, 1 Samuel 28 and the Condemnation of Necromancy in Persian
Yehud, 2354; Loretz, Nekromantie und Totenevokation, 309, 313.
37. Tropper, for example, observes that the presence of a female necromancer in
this text is not surprising, since women were prominent in Near Eastern magi-
cal activity, but that one cannot conclude that it was exclusively women who
practiced necromancy; rather, what we see here is that women also could act as
necromancers (Nekromantie, 22526).
38. Note the practitioners in the necromancy texts discussed by Jo Ann Scurlock,
Magical Means of Dealing with Ghosts in Ancient Mesopotamia, esp. 10319,
and Finkel, Necromancy in Ancient Mesopotamia, 117.
Y6621.indb 118 1/27/15 1:08 PM

an overt request: Divine for me by a ghost, and raise for me the person I tell
you to (1 Sam 28:8). The woman, noting the ban on her kind, is well aware
of the dangerous nature of her work. She asks Saul, Why would you entrap
me, to get me killed? Her question uses entrapment imagery associated
with necromancy in other textsonly with herself as the symbolic dead.
Saul convinces her to proceed, swearing to her that all will be well. His
rst words to her are to divine for him ;next he swears to her .
These are not framed in opposition. We still have no indication that this
activity is anything other than Yahwistic; Sauls back-to-back references to
these divine beings seem all of a piece.
The description of the womans actions is unfortunately brief, and we
learn only a little about the (meta)physics of necromancy. Saul makes his
request and his oath, names Samuel as the man to raise, anddisappoint-
ingly, for the interested readerthe next thing we know, the necromancer
has raised him. The fact that the crucial act is skipped over entirely suggests
that the authors interest is not primarily in the necromancer or necro-
mancy itself. (It may also indicate the authors lack of familiarity with actual
necromantic practice, as noted earlier.) So we learn nothing from this about
the mechanics of raising a ghost.
We do, however, get to see one. Verse 3 reminds the reader that Samuel
was buried in Ramah, so it is certainly a ghost the necromancer raises and
not the dead body itself. The ethereal gure, called an in anticipation
of the conjuring, is now called an . Saul, though, sees nothingbut
when Samuel asks Saul a question, Saul can hear and answer, and a con-
versation ensues between the two. The rabbis tried to sort out the principle
behind this: the midrash on Samuel says, Three things are told about how
a conjurer raises a ghost. He who conjures him up does see him but does
not hear his voice. He who needs him does hear his voice but does not see
him. He who does not need him does not hear him nor see him. Those
acquainted with modern popular images of the medium who enables others
to hear the voice of the dead will not be surprised by the portrayal of Sauls
39. As summed up in Lev. R. 26:7, She did what she did, and she said what she
said, and raised him. Contra Fischer, who sees in the plural form of a
reference to multiple spiritsand possibly foreign godsrising up from the
earth, who help her to raise Samuel (Gottesknderinnen, 140).
40. Compare the parallel uses of and in Isa 8:1920. As in Mesopotamia,
it is on occasion possible to see an ilu.
41. Beuken, 1 Samuel 28: The Prophet as Hammer of Witches, 7.
Y6621.indb 119 1/27/15 1:08 PM

ability to hear the ghost whom he does not see. What is more surprising
is the interpretation that the medium, who does see the ghost, cannot also
hear him.
The oddity of the necromancers recognition of Saul upon seeing Sam-
uel has been discussed interminably and without solution. Saul has dis-
guised himself, and the woman initially does not know him. After the ini-
tial exchange discussed above, Saul asks the woman to raise Samuel (v. 11).
The next line appears to say that the woman saw Samuel and cried out, at
which point she identied her client as Saul (v. 12). Some have argued that
the oddity of this is due to a redactional layer, most notably McCarter,
who claims that the diculty is a consequence of the incorporation of the
gure of Samuel into the story of Sauls interview with an originally anony-
mous ghost. It remains unclear what function that would have had. Klein
prefers instead to see the text as an original unity, over against this proposal
and the common emendation of Saul to Samuel in verse 12, which, as he
points out, still would not explain why the medium did not recognize Saul
until then. He suggests charmingly, Perhaps his appearance was more awe-
inspiring than the usual . Many have attributed the necromancers
recognition of Saul to something in his request itself. McCarter suggests
that in the text as we have it, the woman recognizes Saul because he speaks
with authority as only the king could. Klein notes that there could be
only one person who would want to see Samuel in these troubled times,
though this would not explain why it took seeing Samuel, and not only
hearing the request to raise him, for the woman to react. Others explain
it on the basis of something Samuel says or does. Beuken suggests that
it is because it is the role of prophets to expose kings, and Reis claims that
Samuel would only allow himself to be raised for Saul. Fischer explains
42. McCarter, 1 Samuel, 421.

43. Klein, 1 Samuel, 269.
44. McCarter, 1 Samuel, 421, 423.
45. Klein, 1 Samuel, 271.
46. There is a long-standing tradition of such explanations. According to Ginzberg,
In necromancy the peculiar rule holds good that, unless it is summoned by a
king, a spirit raised from the dead appears head downward and feet in the air.
Accordingly, when the gure of Samuel stood upright before them, the witch
knew that the king was with her. Ginzberg, The Legends of the Jews, 900; as in
Lev. R. 26:7.
47. Beuken, 1 Samuel 28: The Prophet as Hammer of Witches, 9; Reis, Eating
the Blood, 910.
Y6621.indb 120 1/27/15 1:08 PM

it quite dierently: she suggests that it is the presence of the ghost that
causes the woman to become clairvoyant, and so when the ghost appears,
she knows who Saul is. Campbell, meanwhile, concludes that the text is
puzzling and that no previous readings have helped.
One very small adjustment would actually allow the rest of these details
to fall into place: if we emend the pointing of in verse 12 to match that of
in verse 5, everything suddenly works. In verse 5, we were told that Saul
was afraid , spelled defectivelyand it is possible that verse 12 should
not read -( and the woman saw Samuel and cried
out), but -( but the woman feared Samuel and
cried out), again spelled defectively. Her fear of Samuel would be warranted,
given the prophets nal diatribe to Saul condemning his disobedience re-
garding Agagrebellion is like the sin of divination! ( - ,
15:23)after which Samuel died, and Saul expelled the mediums and then
came to her with the request to divine by Samuels ghost. Moreover, af-
ter Samuels invective, Saul repented, but Samuel refused to forgive him,
slaughtered Agag himself, and never spoke to Saul again. No wonder she
fears Samuel and not Saul! According to this reading, the necromancer
realizes it is Saul from his request to raise Samuel (that is, the prophet who
used to advise the king), and not somehow mysteriously after seeing the
ghost. Further supporting this reading, in verse 13, the woman says that she
sees Samuel rising, and describes what she sees; that is, he has not yet risen
in verse 12.
Any reading of the text as a coherent narrative requires the assumption
of a space, somewhere in these verses, during which the woman performs
the actual raising of the ghost. The common view is that this happens be-
tween verses 11 and 12: Saul asks the medium to raise Samuel (v. 11)in the
narrative silence she obligesand then she sees ( ) Samuel and cries
aloud, now somehow recognizing Saul (v. 12); he says, Do not be afraid [of
me] (v. 13), and then she sees Samuel rising. The cause for general schol-
arly confusion is clear. If, however, we take seriously that the medium sees
Samuel rising in verses 1314 () , then it makes better sense to
assume that the action happens between verses 12 and 13: Saul asks the me-
dium to raise Samuel, but she fears ( ) Samuel, and tells Saul that she
knows who he is (vv. 1112)though, knowing that he is the king, she does
what he demandsbut she fears the prophet, whom she now must face as
48. Fischer, Gottesknderinnen, 139.

49. Campbell, 1 Samuel, 28283.
Y6621.indb 121 1/27/15 1:08 PM

she raises him, and thus Saul says, Do not be afraid [of Samuel] (v. 13).
Such a reading would explain the medium as having recognized Saul on the
basis of his own words, appearance, or actions (or entourage), rather than
somehow after raising the ghost, and would make sense of her description
of Samuel rising from the ground in verses 1314. In addition, this has the
nice eect of demonstrating thatas we have already seen, and will see
the medium is much more afraid of Samuel, even after death, than of Saul.
It is also debated how Saul recognizes Samuel on the basis of the me-
diums statement. She describes what she sees: I see an coming up
from the earth . . . an old man is coming up, and he is wrapped in a robe,
and Saul understands that this is Samuel (vv. 1314). It is sometimes pos-
ited that Saul knows this to be Samuel because the robe he is wearing is
specically a prophetic garment. This seems unlikely, given the lack of evi-
dence that there was such a thing. It is tempting to wonder whether instead
of a particular sort of garment, this is one particular robe: it may be remem-
bered that in 1 Sam 15:27, Saul tore Samuels robe. The problem with such a
theory is that it is only the necromancer who sees Samuel, and she says just
that he is wearing a robe. But there is a far simpler reason why Saul would
know that this was Samuel. The very question, though frequently posed,
seems to miss a key point: Saul, having requested the ghost of Samuel,
trusts that the necromancer will successfully raise himso when a man is
raised, neither Saul nor the narrator second-guesses how to identify him.
It has been suggested that the food the woman prepares for Saul and
his men after all of this is some kind of sacricial ritual meal connected to
necromancy. This interpretation lacks support. I admit that it would be
50. The MT reads , an old man, and the LXX reads , i.e.,
(to raise up, as in Ps 145:14), a man standing upright. McCarter prefers the
latter on the principle of lectio dicilior (1 Samuel, 419); though if the LXX
is preferable on this, perhaps the idea is not that the man is standing up, but
raised up.
51. Beuken, 1 Samuel 28: The Prophet as Hammer of Witches, 10; Klein has
Samuel in his usual prophetic robe (1 Samuel, 269).
52. Fischer suggests that this is the same robe Saul saw Samuel wearing in 15:27
(Gottesknderinnen, 140); McCarter refers to the robe as Samuels characteristic
garment, citing 15:27 and 2:19, but does not think this is the basis for recogni-
tion (1 Samuel, 421).
53. Such proposals range from the more reasonable to the somewhat less so. Of the
rst type: Milgrom argues that almost always refers to ritual slaughter, and
Y6621.indb 122 1/27/15 1:08 PM

appealing to see this as a ritual meal associated with the ancestor cult: the
dead were symbolically invited to such meals, and here we have the literal
presence of a divine ancestor. Moreover, the text never mentions Samuel
going back down into the earth. It would be gleefully macabre to imagine
that the necromancer is feeding not only Saul, but the dead Samuel as
well. However, this seems, shall we say, improbable. First, even in a ritual
of feeding the dead, we have no reason to expect a necromancer to be the
one cooking. Second, it would be ill-advised to read too much into the
fact that Samuels descent is not mentioned before the meal, since it is also
not mentioned afterward. (This is another indication that the author is not
deeply concerned with the act of necromancy itself.) The meal is most likely
a matter of the kings hunger and the mediums safety.
This would likely have been an expected act of hospitality; factoring
in Sauls headlong sprawl of terror and hunger (both specied in v. 20),
the pressure would be mounting for any host to feed the guest in question.
Considering then that our host has recognized that this is the king, it seems
impossible that she would not oer him a meal (whether out of respect,
fear, or some combination of the two). Lastly, those suggesting a ritual
meal seem to overlook the mediums own statement, in which she explains
includes this episode as one such use (Profane Slaughter and a Formulaic Key
to the Composition of Deuteronomy, 12); see also Loretz, Nekromantie und
Totenevokation, 309, and Tropper, Nekromantie, 227. Fischer sees both practical
and ritual aspects of the meal (Gottesknderinnen, 14246, 154). Of the second
type: Reis claims that the meal is a mantic sacrice to the dead entailing the
stringently proscribed eating of blood, and an unholy but legally eective cov-
enant between Gods anointed and an idolatrous shaman. She claims further
that because the manner of preparation is not specied, the lamb must have
been eaten raw, with the blood (Eating the Blood, 4, 17). In another vein, some
suggest that it is an ironic ceremonial royal meal. Klein, following Beuken: In
a sense, as Beuken argues, the woman oered Saul a ceremonial royal meal even
though he had just discovered that all hope of kingship was lost to him. The
ironic touches persist (1 Samuel, 273).
54. Lewis casts doubt on the closest supposed parallels, those at Ugarit, question-
ing the character of the marzeah as a funerary feast comparable to the Meso-
potamian kispu, and challenging the interpretations of the section of Aqhat at
times called The Duties of an Ideal Son (CTA 17.1.2634), and of the Dagan
stelae (KTU 6.13, 6.14), as representing funerary meals (Lewis, Cults of the Dead,
5398). For a more optimistic view of the feeding of the dead in biblical texts,
see Bloch-Smith, Judahite Burial Practices and Beliefs about the Dead, 12230.
Y6621.indb 123 1/27/15 1:08 PM

precisely why she is oering Saul food: Eat, so that you have the strength
to go on your way (v. 22).
We should not overlook what the text does not say. This is not a short
encounter. The majority of the textverses 8 to 23portrays events as if
in real time. The period of collapsed time in verses 2425 is far longer than
all of the rest of this, however. Although the medium hurried to slaughter
the calf, the process of cooking it would take more time than the divination
itself seems to have. The collapsed time indicates that the narrator does not
see the content of the meal as the point. While the author was not inter-
ested in the mechanics of necromancy, the fact of the raising of Samuel was
still overt. Here, the author is not concerned with any aspects of the meal
that ring of ritual in any way, and we should not invent a subtext. Saul ap-
pears to have fasted in preparation for divination. This is a known practice,
and we are given no alternative reason why he would have had nothing to
eat all day or all night (v. 20). The meal may have had a vague connection
to the act of divination in the sense that it was a break-fast, but on the not-
every-excavated-cup-is-a-ritual-goblet principle, sometimes a meal is just
a meal.
Agency and Authority

Interpreters of the En-dor story tend to give divinatory credit dispro-
portionately to Samuel. The text, however, does not. Certainly the mes-
55. Lewis compares this to Davids fasting and lying on the ground in 2 Sam
12:1524, which he interprets as a ritual descent to the underworld (Cults of the
Dead, 4344). A closer comparison might be the various examples of fasting in
preparation for divination, some also oered by Lewis, such as Jehoshaphats
institution of a fast for all of Judah before inquiring of Yahweh in 2 Chr
20:34 (Cults of the Dead, 114). McCarter considers this a fast for purication
(1 Samuel, 421).
56. Consider Beuken, for instance, who inexplicably claims that the initiative is
Samuels: In short, Samuel beats the woman to it. He does not allow himself
to be conjured up: he appears. . . . The conjuration does not succeed. What hap-
pens to the woman appears to be more of a vision (1 Samuel 28: The Prophet as
Hammer of Witches, 89). Others have agreed that this is a good possibility,
e.g., Klein, 1 Samuel, 271. Beuken then engages in a lengthy and rather strongly
stated discussion of the womans incapability of understanding what is happen-
ing, though Saul understands: The mysterious practices shackle her to a level
of comprehension on which she cannot follow the prophet (1 Samuel 28: The
Y6621.indb 124 1/27/15 1:08 PM

sage comes from the prophet and not the medium, but this is what a me-
dium does: she mediates a message from beyond the grave. In this case,
she mediates a message from the prophet Samuel, who in turn mediates a
message from Yahweh.
Nevertheless, it is common for interpreters to ascribe less agency to the
medium than the text does. We see at the beginning of the story (v. 3) the
reminder not just that Samuel was dead, but that he was buried at Ramah.
Samuel has not been raised from the dead in this story. The ghost of Samuel
appears, courtesy of the necromancer. It should be observed that the ten-
dency of interpreters to refer to Samuel and the witch, rather than the
ghost of Samuel and the medium, distorts the roles and the agency of the
characters as presented in the text. The ghost of Samuel speaks with au-
thority once the medium has conjured him, but he did not come of his own
accord. He in fact asks Saul (a bit irritably, perhaps understandable under
the circumstances), Why have you disturbed me by bringing me up? He
did not want to be brought up, but nds himself there due to the agency
and actions of the medium. Even when he speaks to Saul with Yahwistic
authority, then, this is explicitly brought about only through the mediation
of the necromancer.
The ghost of Samuel is not the only one who speaks with authority.
After the encounter with the ephemeral and ethereal Samuel, the medium
says to Saul (translating quite literally for the moment), Your maidservant
has listened to your voice ( ;) I took my life in my hands
and heard your words (- ) which you spoke to me. So now
you also listen to the voice of your maidservant ( - -
, vv. 2122). The issue of who listens to whose voicenot just in
Prophet as Hammer of Witches, 13). Fuchs writes similarly that the woman
is no match for Gods prophet (Prophecy and the Construction of Women,
56). Reis gives agency to Samuel by arguing that he would only allow himself to
be raised for Saul (Eating the Blood, 910); Simon does this by asking, Why,
though, did the prophet enable this woman, a purveyor of sin, to become the
sole agent of mercy in this episode? (A Balanced Story, 166). A subtler version
of this comes from Brueggemann, who writes, Even in death, Samuel domi-
nates the narrative, and in his discussion of the text pays almost no attention to
the medium at all (First and Second Samuel, 193).
57. Although the particle is often translated please, this is a convention not
grounded in either usage or etymology. Examining the usage of following the
imperative in the prose of the Pentateuch and Former Prophets, Shulman counts
Y6621.indb 125 1/27/15 1:08 PM

the everyday sense, but in the sense of both hearing and heeding an au-
thoritative voiceis a central theme throughout the text. The narrators
setup of the story is that Saul no longer hears God, who refuses to answer
him. Saul repeats this complaint to Samuel: God has turned away from me
and doesnt answer me anymore, not through prophets or through dreams!
Samuel responds that God will punish Saul because he did not listen to
his voice. Now, nally, Saul hears the answer from the divine realm he has
been seeking, from the ghost of Samuel mediated by the diviner. The theme
continues through the end of the chapter: Saul initially refuses to eat, but
when the medium and his servants urge him together, he relents and heeds
themagain, he listens to their voice. So when the medium turns to Saul
and says, I have heard your voice . . . now you hear my voice, it is not an
ohand remark that stands on its ownit picks up on this central theme,
which runs through the whole story. She speaks boldly to the king, us-
ing the same phrase in regard to Saul heeding her that she has just used
in regard to her heeding him (unlike the many translations with versions
of I obeyed you . . . now you please hear me out). This kind of authority
would not surprise readers from the mouth of a prophet; it most likely has
not surprised anyone, verses earlier, from the mouth of Samuel. Perhaps
70 occasions on which the speaker is superior to the addressee, 36 on which

the speaker is inferior, and 46 on which the speaker is equal in status (The
Particle in Biblical Hebrew Prose, 6774). While I dier with Shulmans
interpretation of the texts and thus of the meaning of , her categorization
demonstrates usage by a superior or an equal in more than three-quarters of
these cases (116 out of 152). Christiansen argues that the particle should be un-
derstood as propositive, i.e., proposing action or indicating intent (A Linguistic
Analysis of the Biblical Hebrew Particle n: A Test Case, 37993). Christian-
sen also summarizes several signicant etymological arguments (though I am
not convinced that etymology dictates usage), perhaps most importantly that of
Gottlieb, who traces through Arabic, Ugaritic, Amarna Akkadian, Hebrew, and
Syriac the development of an energic form that eventually became independent
(The Hebrew Particle n, 4754). See also the many nondeferential uses of the
particle cited in IBHS 34.7, such as that in Yahwehs soliloquy of Gen 18:21,
-, I will go down and see. Waltke and OConnor do not oer a
single instance of the use of to indicate politeness, and quote the argument
of Lambdin that the particle instead seems . . . to denote that the command in
question is a logical consequence, either of an immediately preceding statement
or of the general situation in which it is uttered (Lambdin, An Introduction to
Biblical Hebrew, 170).
Y6621.indb 126 1/27/15 1:08 PM

it is just as natural for the necromancer to speak to the king with such
authority.
As indicated by both the narrative arc and the acceleration of the use
of the thematic language, the mediums declaration represents the peak use
of this theme in the story. The theme appears in the setup in verse 6, in
Sauls words to Samuel in verse 15, in Samuels speech in verse 18, and then
in the mediums speech to Saul again, and again, and again: three times in
verses 2122. The only occurrence after this is when Saul listens and agrees
to eat. In literary terms, the recurring theme of listening to a voice of au-
thority climaxes in the mediums speech to Saul, with her direction, now
you listen to me.
This underscores the key dramatic shift of the episode. At the begin-
ning of the story, Saul still tries to act with authority, though he is already
seriously faltering. He is trembling with fear before the Philistines and un-
able to divine an answer from God, but he will give orders to the medium:
Divine for me by a ghost, and bring up the one I tell you to! (v. 8). The
medium is rightly frightened in response, knowing she could be killed for
doing this (v. 9). But by the end of the story, Saul is literally laid at out on
the ground, terried by the words of the ghostand also feeble from hun-
ger, the story addsand the medium stands above him and says, I listened
to you . . . now you listen to me (vv. 2022). His initial refusal is not a sign of
any lingering strength or autonomyit is the response of a petulant child,
too hungry to get up to eat, too distraught to be comforted. The medium
cannot do anything about Sauls general weakness and terror, but at least
she can get him o the oor and feed him. My claim that her speech is
authoritative does not rest on an interpretation that she is annoyed, or that
she just wants him to regain enough strength to go. Regardless of her mo-
tivation, which I do not pretend that we can see, she speaks to Saul, who
is lying prostrate on the ground, weak from terror and hunger, with the
authority with which he originally spoke to her.
The mediums authority is not diminished by any guilt of illicit activity;
this issue is overtly addressed in the text. Saul swears to her that she will
bear no guilt. The key phrase in the oath, -( v. 10), is often ren-
dered in ways that soften this, such as you wont get into trouble over this
(NJPS), or the same idea, no punishment shall come upon you (NKJV),
and very similarly the NASB and others. However, the word almost
always means iniquity, referring to an act, or guilt, which is the conse-
quence of an act. Saul does not promise not to punish the medium; he tells
Y6621.indb 127 1/27/15 1:08 PM

her that she will not bear guilt. Rendering the word as punishment in this
verse, rather than its vastly more common meaning guilt, is a choice that
reects a prior assumption about the texts view of the woman.
The lack of condemnation of necromancy and the necromancer is also
evident in the content of the divined message. The ghost of Samuel reviles
Saul for his disobedience to God in not slaughtering the Amalekites, and
warns of all sorts of terrible things that will happen as a resultbut he
does not so much as mention the fact that Saul is in the act of consulting a
medium. Samuels only complaint in regard to this event is that he did not
want to be disturbed.
It is noteworthy that a story that begins with the information that Saul
had removed the mediums from the land, and which includes condemna-
tion of Saul, does not contain any indication that Yahweh or the ghost
of his prophet had a problem with this act of necromancy. The medium
is never condemned, and Sauls punishment is overtly for other reasons.
Furthermore, that Sauls guilt is connected to the Amalekites is emphasized
after this story: Davids successful divination in 1 Samuel 30:78, mentioned
above, is in regard to whether he should attack the Amalekites; God an-
swers and says yes, and David promptly slaughters them. After this, in one
of the two versions of Sauls death, he is killed by an Amalekite (2 Sam 1:
116). The story of necromancy and the surrounding material are consis-
tent in naming Sauls disobedience regarding the Amalekites as his primary
transgression, in not naming any disobedience on the part of the medium,
and in not condemning this act of necromancy.
Most signicant, of course, is the very fact of the mediums successful
divination. Saul has tried to hear from Yahweh through dreams, through
urim, and through prophets. This should not surprise the reader, since it is a
continuation of an earlier plotline. In chapter 16, the spirit of Yahweh had
left Saul, , and the harmful spirit of God came upon
him (1 Sam 16:14), as it does again in chapter 19. Between these two stories,
we see that Yahweh was with David, but had left Saul,
(1 Sam 18:12). The conversation between Saul and the ghost of Samuel picks
up on this: Saul says that God has left him, , and Samuel
conrms, ( 28:1516). Saul cannot hear from Yahweh on his
own, or through other direct divinatory methods. The one who successfully
58. Contra Fischer, who sees the whole as a cautionary tale with Deut 18:914 in the
background, i.e., the king engages in a forbidden practice, and so the upcoming
battle goes badly for him (Gottesknderinnen, 147, 150, 154).
Y6621.indb 128 1/27/15 1:08 PM

provides the king with access to Yahwehs message is the necromancer, but
the story makes no comment on this fact. The main conict in the story
is not about necromancy; that is much more the conict for interpreters.
Sauls recourse to a medium lends irony to the story, but assigns no guilt.
The main conict, the thing that gives the text its dramatic power, is that
Saul cannot access divine knowledge, and it is resolved when the medium
can, and Saul hears Yahwehs message through the ghost mediated by the
necromancer.
Divergent Traditions
The story of the medium in 1 Samuel displays Sauls many faultshis
weakness and fear as a leader, his melodramatic wretchedness, and most of
all his inability to hear Godbut it does not include condemnation of the
act of necromancy it describes. This, on the contrary, is the method through
which God nally does answer Saul. Saul looks bad here, but the necro-
mancer comes o well.
The Chronicler has a dierent take on this: all of a sudden, one of
Sauls two major transgressions is consulting the necromancer. The story of
the encounter itself is skipped, since the Chronicler is not concerned with
Sauls life, but he makes reference to it and in fact attributes Sauls death
partly to this incident (1 Chr 10:1314). The author of the Samuel text pre-
sents the necromancer as successful, as the one who nally provides access
to divine knowledge, and shows her overall in a remarkably positive light.
The Chronicler then comes along and makes a necessary adjustment (for
his ideology), demonstrating a concern with judging this type of divination
that the author of Samuel does not. Given the Chroniclers perspective, it is
not surprising that a kings consultation of a necromancer would suddenly
be depicted so negatively in his retelling. What is more noteworthy is that
reading the story in Samuel alongside Chronicles throws into relief the ex-
tent to which the earlier text is unconcerned with condemning the diviner.
59. For another approach leading to a similar conclusion, see the rhetorical analysis
of Fritschel, who questions whether references to various forms of magic are
pejorative in a selection of ten texts. As she notes concisely in regard to the
story of the necromancer, That her actions are not denounced demonstrates
that the function of this text is not to denounce magic (Women and Magic in
the Hebrew Bible, 198).
60. For further discussion, see Hamori, The Prophet and the Necromancer:
Womens Divination for Kings, 82743.
Y6621.indb 129 1/27/15 1:08 PM

The story in 1 Samuel is a literary delightit is creepy, poignant, scath-

ing, and eloquent. The portrayal of the ineectual and misguided king is
humorous, but also touching. We see his experience of fear, his repeated
failed attempts (unlike David) to gain divine insight, and his cloaked visit
to the medium. He laments to the ghost of Samuel, falls down full length
on the ground, partly from fear and partly because he had not eaten any-
thing, stubbornly refuses to eat, and so on. Even if King David is no prince,
Saul is no David.
Saul is painted as a weak character, but the medium is not. Saul is guilty
and will be punished, as the ghost of the prophet proclaims; the medium is
told explicitly that she bears no guilt. She is portrayed with agency in rais-
ing the ghost of Samuel, and speaks to the king with authority. If the text
de-legitimates Saul (as many argue, and as seems clear), it correspondingly
legitimates the medium. After Saul has slaughtered priests, alienated the
living Samuel, and exiled the ghost-diviners and spirit-diviners, he needs a
message from Yahwehand this comes at last through the - .
The story of 1 Samuel 28 reveals a world lled with possibilities for
divining by spirits (recalling the expansive terminology for the spirits as
well as the diviners in this text alone). Against this backdrop, the necro-
mancer is not characterized as some sort of Canaanite death-worshipping
sexual deviant, but as the diviner who nally provides Saul with the access
to Yahwistic knowledge he has been seeking, through raising the prophet
of Yahweh. Necromancy may be portrayed as one step further removed
from Yahweh, but this is a matter of degree, and not of kind.
Y6621.indb 130 1/27/15 1:08 PM

8 The Wise Women
of 2 Samuel
Wise women in the Hebrew Bible have not been identied as having
a divinatory role. Some of the wise men of the Bible are associated with
divination, however, and wise women attested elsewhere in the regiones-
pecially the titled wise women of Hittite literatureexplicitly function as
diviners. The issue at hand is to consider whether the wise women in the
stories of 2 Samuel 14 and 20 reect any type of divinatory role, as these
other wise men and wise women do.
Wise Men
The range of depictions of wise men in the Bible extends far beyond
what is pertinent here. In addition to the concept of the wise as exempli-
ed in the wisdom literature, there are skilled craftsmen or artisans (for ex-
ample, Exod 28:3; Isa 40:20; 2 Chr 2:6 [Eng. 2:7]), as well as heads of tribes
who are designated to be leaders to assist Moses (Deut 1:15).
The wise men relevant here are specically those associated with
divination. In the majority of cases, these men hold ocial positions, and
they are generally mentioned in conjunction with other court gures. For
example, when the Pharaoh needs a dream interpreter, he calls his wise
men and his magicians (-- --, Gen 41:8);
then, where they fail, Joseph the diviner par excellence succeeds. When
another Pharaoh needs some solid magic to combat that of Moses and
Aaron, he summons the wise men, this time paired with the sorcerers
1. Grabbe oers a useful overview (Priests, Prophets, Diviners, Sages, 15280).
131
Y6621.indb 131 1/27/15 1:08 PM

() . These wise men and sorcerers, collectively called the

magicians of Egypt, succeed in reproducing the feats of Moses and Aaron
( - , Exod 7:11).
Written signicantly later, the book of Daniel integrates various senses
of wisdom. The hero and his three compatriots have knowledge, erudi-
tion, and wisdom ( - ;) in addition to the book
smarts all four share, Daniel also has understanding of visions and dreams
( - , Dan 1:17). When Nebuchadnezzar inquires
of these men, he nds them superior to all of his magicians and conjur-
ers ( - )in all matters of wisdom and understanding
(Dan 1:20). After this, when the magicians, enchanters, and sorcerers fail to
interpret Nebuchadnezzars dreams ( , ,, Dan 2:2), he
orders the execution of all of the wise men of Babylon, with Daniel and
friends among them ( , Dan 2:1213).
A few passages in the prophets may have in mind pictures similar
to these foreign court scenes. In Isaiah 19:11, the wisest of the counsel-
ors of Pharaoh are mocked for their counsel, which has become befud-
dled. Isaiah carries on, Where are your wise men now? ( ,
19:12). The reading of these wise men as having a divinatory role does not
depend only on the Genesis and Exodus narratives about Pharaohs and
their defeated wise men. Within Isaiah 19, this is not the rst reference to
befuddled counsel and fruitless divination. The passage describes a series of
terrible things that will happen in Egypt, and it all begins with this combi-
nation: I will obfuscate its counsel, and they will inquire of idols and
and and so forth (Isa 19:3).
So far, each of these texts has painted a picture of wise men in a for-
eign courtthough not all foreign men, with Daniel the Jewish dream
interpreter exalted as the wisest of Nebuchadnezzars wise men. Wise men
within Israel are depicted as having divinatory abilities as well. Isaiah treats
wise men in parallel with other diviners in an oracle about prophets, seers,
and wise men all losing their special insight: Yahweh has closed the eyes of
the prophets and covered the heads of the seers (they will be like illiterate
people trying to read a book), and the wisdom of the wise men will expire
(Isa 29:1014). In a similar vein, when the prophet in Second Isaiah rejects
diviners of whom he disapproves, he lists wise men among them: Yahweh
will make ineectual the signs of idle talkers, make fools of the diviners,
and turn the wise men backward and make their knowledge look foolish
( , Isa 44:25).
Y6621.indb 132 1/27/15 1:08 PM

The Wise Women of 2 Samuel 133
One of the types of wise men we see in biblical texts, then, is a person
associated with divinatory knowledge. In some cases, this appears to be a
particular role in a foreign courtas Jeers denes them, a professional
class of wise magicians. In other cases, the term encompasses a range
of roles associated with sorcery and divination, as when various groups of
specialists are together called wise men. Finally, there are the wise men
of Israel who are mentioned in parallel with other diviners, such as prophets
and seers. As a whole, the relevant group exhibits a range of overlapping
functions, including those of counselor, diviner, magician, and speaker of
2. This is Jeerss identication of overall, in both Israelite and foreign

courts, though in her fuller discussion she observes that they are not always asso-
ciated with magic (Magic and Divination, 4044). Jeers does not mention wise
women.
3. Isa 3:23 presents an intriguing case, where esteemed roles are grouped in cat-
egories: the hero and the warrior and the judge; the prophet and the diviner
( )and the elder; the leader of fty and the upstanding man; the counselor
and the and the expert in charms. Especially given the other refer-
ences to the divinatory in First Isaiah, the placement of the
here between the counselor ( )and the expert in charms ( ) is sug-
gestive: perhaps the role of the includes aspects of both the former
and the latter. Jeers also recognizes that this group of three is listed together
with reason, and sees them all as experts in giving counsels, who may use magi-
cal or other means (though I would part with her where she goes on to suggest
that the would be those in charge of the forces of creation; ibid., 43).
The key is the meaning of here. The sense of as artisans does not t
the context (though most translations render it this way). Jeers understands the
in general as a medicine man, pointing especially to the use of a cognate
in Kirta (KTU 1.16 V 2528), since she sees the root of the Hebrew as unknown
(pp. 4951); and BDB 361b translates the word in Isa 3:3 alone as referring to
magical arts or drugs, citing Aramaic and Ethiopic cognates. However, is
surely a cognate of Akkadian eru, wise (CAD E 313314 s.v. eru A; in fact, the
CAD itself notes the connection). In the phrase , then, each word
refers either to wisdom or magical activity and carries a connotation of the other:
these are the wisest of the wise magicians, or those most skilled in the magical
arts of knowledge. Given the placement of between the counselor
and the expert in charms, the references to divinatory elsewhere in First
Isaiah, and the potential semantic range of , I believe that we have in Isa
3:3 a reference to magically skilled wise men listed among other leaders of soci-
ety (all of whom Yahweh is about to wipe outbut this is not the point, since
judges, prophets, and upstanding men are among them, too).
Y6621.indb 133 1/27/15 1:08 PM

words of wisdom, each associated in the above texts with special knowl-
edge. Jeers connects the various functions of the under the umbrella
of counsellor, and suggests that divining abilities are understood as part
of a counsellors functions. As another way to reect their various inter-
secting abilities, perhaps we might think of the as those skilled in the
arts of knowledge.
Hittite Wise Women

The most clearly relevant of the wise women in the region are those
well attested in Hittite literature. These women held a recognized role in
societythat is, these are not references to women who happened to be
described as wise (as the titles in 2 Samuel are usually taken), but to a
group of people who served a particular function, who were called by a
consistent title.
The term MUNUSU.GI literally means old woman, but it is usually
translated as wise woman. These women are associated with special
knowledge, so the sense of emphasizing their great age is that it points
to their great wisdom. These women, wizened and wisened, were magical
specialists and diviners. The old women or wise women engaged in a
range of activities, including oracular divination. They worked both alone
4. Jeers, Magic and Divination, 4243.

5. See most recently Mouton, Sorcellerie Hittite, 10525. Mouton is interested
here in magic (particularly harmful magic), but note esp. 10911. For discussions
and texts, see nal, The Role of Magic in the Ancient Anatolian Religions
according to the Cuneiform Texts from Boazky-Hattua, esp. 6470; Haas

and Thiel, Die Beschwrungsrituale der Allaiturah(h)i und verwandte Texte, 2225;

Gurney, Some Aspects of Hittite Religion, 4463; and on a range of functions of
the wise women, from divination to sorcery to funerary rituals, Bin-Nun, The
Tawananna in the Hittite Kingdom, 11739. nal notes that as of 1988, all attesta-
tions of the wise women were collected in Daddi, Mestieri, professioni e dignit
nellAnatolia ittita.
6. As discussed by Hass and Thiel, Die Beschwrungsrituale der Allaiturah(h)i und

verwandte Texte, 22.
7. A helpful point of comparison may be the ETCSL rendering of Sumerian
umma, lit. old woman (=Akk. ibtu), alternately as wise woman and experi-
enced woman.
8. Gurney notes the central role of the KIN oracle (Some Aspects of Hittite Religion,
46); citing in turn Archi, Il sistema KIN della divinazione ittita, 11344. Other
Y6621.indb 134 1/27/15 1:08 PM

and alongside other diviners, providing their services to the royal family as
well as to other citizens.
The wise women can be seen acting in their capacity as diviners, for
example, in The Bilingual Edict of Hattuili I. Hattuilis reign was appar-

ently full of familial opposition and intrigue, and in this text, the king rails
against one of his sons (Labarna) and defends his decision to disinherit
him, and promotes another son (Murili) as his heir. Toward the end of the
Edict, Hattuilis courtiers tell the king what the queen, Hatayar, has been

up to in the midst of all of the hullabaloo: She now still keeps on con-
sulting the Old Women. Although the MUNUSU.GI is known for both
sorcery and divination, the womens activity in this text is clearly divinatory
and, as Mouton observes, has no obvious connection to sorcery at all.
One peculiarity of the outdated approach according to which divina-
tion was considered magical (as opposed to prophecy, which was consid-
ered religious) is that the demonstration of divinatory insight and the
performance of magical feats do not actually go hand in hand very fre-
quently among the religious specialists of the Hebrew Bible. Elijah and
Elisha exhibit this overlap, for instance, but throughout the biblical mate-
rial, the intersection of these roles seems to be the exception rather than
the norm. It is striking, then, that we do see this combination of divinatory
ability and the performance of magical feats among the (relevant type of )
wise men of the Bible, as we do among the Hittite wise women. In both
activities of the wise women included a scapegoat ritual involving a mouse (I

have taken the evil o you and attached it to this mouse. Let this mouse carry it
on a long journey to the high mountains, hills and dales), and one involving a
puppy (They take a live puppy and wave it over the king and queen, also in the
palace the Old Woman waves it about, and she says: Whatever evil thing is in
the body of the king and queen and in the palace, now see! . . . It has vanquished
it. Let it carry away the evil thing and bring it to the place that the gods have
appointed. Then they take away the live puppy). Less colorful but perhaps more
relevant is a funerary ritual in which two wise women engage in symbolic ac-
tions and dialogue (Gurney, Some Aspects of Hittite Religion, 4463). See also the
elaborate ritual against impotence: Honer, Paskuwattis Ritual Against Sex-
ual Impotence (CTH 406), 27187, and a long excerpt adapted from Honers
translation, in Frantz-Szabo, Hittite Witchcraft, Magic, and Divination, 2014.
9. Frantz-Szabo, Hittite Witchcraft, Magic, and Divination, 2009.
10. The Bilingual Edict of Hattuili I, translated by Gary Beckman (COS

2.15:7981).
11. Mouton, Sorcellerie Hittite, 109 n.14. The passage is KUB 1.16 + iii 6569.
Y6621.indb 135 1/27/15 1:08 PM

cases, the functions overlap but are not identical: the gures are known for
both areas of activity but can engage in them separately.
Other Wise Women?

To my knowledge, there is no evidence for the regular use of wise
woman as a title for a divinatory role in Mesopotamia, but related epi-
thets do appear with specic reference to divinatory skill. Dumuzis series of
epithets for his sister Getinanna culminates with wise woman, explicitly
based on her divinatory ability to interpret dreams: Bring my wise woman
[umma], who knows the portent of dreams, bring my sister! Let me relate the
dream to her. Nane, known for dream interpretation as well, as discussed
in chapter 1, is also referred to as a wise woman (nin umma; A Hymn to
Nane [Nane A], li. 225). The goddess Gula is called a wise woman or
sage in tandem with references to her roles in divination and sorcery: she
(Gula) is a wise woman, a diviner, an exorcizer (apkallat brt muipat).
Ninsun, when interpreting her sons dreams, is repeatedly called the mother
of Gilgamesh, knowing everything (mudeat kalama; P 15, 37).
This is not to suggest that references to wise women or female sages
are always related to divinatory skill. Epithets such as those above are note-
worthy for their relationship to the sense of wise man and wise woman
seen in the Israelite and Hittite material, respectively. Elsewhere, however,
female deities described as wise are also associated with childbirth. There
are several references to wise Mami in her role as the midwife of the
gods (with various forms of eru, wise; for example, Atrahasis I 193, 250;
III iii 33). In Ugaritic literature, the ktrt are goddesses associated with
conception and childbirth. The word itself indicates their wisdom or skill
(like the god Kothar-wa-Hasis), and they are thus sometimes called the
wise women. Pardee denes them as apparently the (female) skillful
12. Alster, Dumuzis Dream, 55, li. 2425. On umma, see n.7 above. This text, in
which Getinanna is just a girl, is an excellent example of the ETCSLs rationale
for translating the term as wise woman.
13. Translated on ETCSL as wise woman, rather than experienced woman, in
this case.
14. As translated in CAD B 112 s.v. brtu; cf. C. J. Mullo-Weir, Four Hymns to
Gula, 15, 17.
15. Lambert and Millard, Atra-Hass: The Babylonian Story of the Flood.

16. For example, by Coogan in his translation of Aqhat (Stories from Ancient Ca-
naan, 3435). For comparison, in Parkers translation of Aqhat, they are simply
the Katharat (Ugaritic Narrative Poetry, 5657).
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ones. The ktrt appear for instance in Aqhat (KTU 1.17 II 2440), where
they seem to inspire a rousing change in Danil, who can then impregnate
his wife. Their role as conception deities is evident again in KTU 1.24, a
poem telling of the marriage of the deities Yarikh and Nikkal-Ib. If the
role of the ktrt as goddesses of conception overlaps at all with activity usu-
ally associated with divination (and this is an if with a very light touch),
it might be found in one provocative line of this poem. Lines 56 begin an
address, To the Katharat, and then it is not entirely clear who speaks the
words of line 7, but it is presumably they: Behold, the young woman shall
give birth to a child (hl glmt tld b[n . . .]). It would be interesting if their
functions as birth goddesses included announcements of future births.
Evidently, references to the wisdom or skill of a goddess (wise Mami
and the ktrt) may relate to conception in some Mesopotamian and Uga-
ritic contexts. At the same time, in the cases above where wise woman
is actually used as an epithetfor Getinanna and Nane in their roles as
dream interpreters, and for Gula in her role as diviner and exorcistit is
explicitly related to divinatory skill (and in the latter case, also to sorcery).
These terms are by no means uniform, even within a given body of litera-
ture, let alone across cultures. Divination and sorcery are functions of some
wise men in Israelite literature and not others; the Hittite MUNUSU.GI
17. For a summary of disagreement over the meaning of the epithet, and for bibli-
ography, see Pardee, Kosharoth, 49192; and see discussion and bibliography
in Marsman, Women in Ugarit and Israel, 21416. For a dierent approach, see
Ginsberg, who argued that they were human (Women Singers and Wailers
Among the Northern Canaanites, 1315).
18. Els blessing of Danil points to Danils impotence as the cause of his lack of an
heir (KTU 1.17 I 3637). Then Danil makes seven days of sacrices to the Katha-
rat (II 2440), after which we hear of the joy of the bed (II 4142) and the
counting of months.
19. The Betrothal of Yarikh and Nikkal-Ib, translated by David Marcus, in Parker,
Ugaritic Narrative Poetry, 21518. The ktrt are also mentioned in KTU 1.11 (A
Birth, translated by Parker, in Parker, Ugaritic Narrative Poetry, 18687), but the
text is too fragmentary to draw any further conclusions about their activity.
20. As translated by Marcus (minus punctuation); as Marcus notes, the similarity to
Isa 7:14 is obvious (in Parker, Ugaritic Narrative Poetry, 218 n.1).
21. On birth oracles as divinatory activity, see Hamori, Heavenly Bodies: Preg-
nancy and Birth Omens in Israel, 47999.
22. It is also possible that the Hittite reading of MUNUSU.GI, haawa (or for

Frantz-Szabo, haawa-), may be a play on the word for midwife. Hass and

Thiel, Die Beschwrungsrituale der Allaiturah(h)i und verwandte Texte, 22.

Y6621.indb 137 1/27/15 1:08 PM

certainly specializes in these skills, but may perform them quite separately
(an expiation ritual here, divinatory inquiry there). It is not that the epithet
wise woman must carry a connotation of a divinatory function, but that, as
seen in these examples across a range of Near Eastern literature, it at times
has this sense, just as wise man within the Hebrew Bible does. On to the
wise woman within the Bible itself, then.
Wise Women in 2 Samuel

There is a range of traits and skills associated with wise women in
biblical texts, as there is with wise men, albeit among a smaller sample.
There are female artisans mentioned alongside the male (Exod 35:25 and
36:1), and women in some way associated with lamentation ( Jer 9:16 [Eng.
9:17]). There are two texts, however, in which the speech and activity of a
wise woman is associated with a divinatory role.
In the rst story, Joab sends to Tekoa for a wise woman ()
who can speak to David about Absalom, who killed his brother Amnon
to avenge the rape of their sister Tamar. Joab is said to put words in her
mouth; then the wise woman goes before the king and presents a covert
parable featuring herself as the mother of two sons, one of whom killed
the other, and she begs for the king not to let her surviving son be put to
death: They will extinguish my only remaining coal! (2 Sam 14:7). After
she enacts the parable and David has responded, predictably, by promising
the safety of her surviving son, she turns and accuses the king of having
incriminated himself. In the end, David asks her whether Joab was involved
in this, and she and David have a brief conversationone that Joab would
not have been able to anticipate, so he cannot very well have put these
words in her mouth (2 Sam 14:120).
The fact that Joab has put some words in the womans mouththe extent
of this unfortunately we cannot knowrenders her role unclear, but by no
23. The eeting poetic mention in Judg 5:29 probably does not refer to anything
relevant here. While it would be nice to see the mother of Sisera consulting
wise women (or sing., with several versions and manuscripts) like the Hittite
queen Hatayar in The Bilingual Edict of Hattuili I, the phrase does not really

support such a reading. Perhaps the better comparison, though further aeld,
would be to the wise men who are the personal advisors of Haman. While the
kings wise men are royal legal advisors (Esth 1:13), Haman has his own wise
men who advise him more generally on how to deal with Mordechai (6:13).
Y6621.indb 138 1/27/15 1:08 PM

means unimportant. We do know that this wise womans specialized services

were required. We see from the beginning of the story that she has a special-
ized role: Joab has sent specically for her, bringing her in from another city
to perform this task. She is clearly not just any woman pulled in to deliver
Joabs lines; surely someone in all of Jerusalem could have done well enough
at that. Though the details are obscured, it is evident that Joab has gone to
some eort to bring in a person with a particular function. (One might recall
here how the Hittite wise women served the king and private clients.)
What then can we tell of this function, through the haze of Joab being
responsible for some unknowable portion of her words? We know one key
thing: whether the precise words of her accusation are hers or Joabs, he has
brought her in for this very purpose. She is not some upstart who waltzes in
and rebukes the king at will, come what may. She is a wise woman whom
Joab sees as having the authority to accuse the king of guiltand from
Davids reaction, we see that Joab was right. Joab will not say these things to
the king himself, for whatever reason (fear of immediate death, perhaps?).
The wise woman, however, can tell the king directly that he is guilty. She
can face the king and accuse him of guilt, because Joab has sent to another
city specically for someone who can present not only the stealth parable,
but also the rebuke, without which the parable is meaninglessor, put oth-
erwise, someone like Nathan.
The approach is precisely the same as the prophet Nathans two chap-
ters earlier. Nathan presents a parable to David, in response to which the
king acknowledges the wrongdoing of his parabolic stand-in. Then Nathan
24. Fontaines conclusion is optimistic: That she listens to Joab as he puts words
in her mouth is a sign of her wisdom, not some foolishnessthe tradition is
clear that a wise person listens to a variety of viewpoints, accounts and opinions
before making a decision and putting it into action verbally (Smooth Words:
Women, Proverbs and Performance in Biblical Wisdom, 192). Others draw the op-
posite conclusion: A. A. Anderson, for example, sees her as something of a pup-
pet (2 Samuel, 187). Surely there is a reasonable middle ground.
25. It has occasionally been suggested that she is an expert in lamentation, but this
does not t the context. McCarter, in arguing against that notion, momentarily
seems to suggest that she is indeed there just to recite lines: Joab is in need of
an actress, not a professional mourner. Just before this, however, he observes
that the term wise woman may express itself in a variety of skills and talents,
most characteristically in an ability to use speech to achieve desired results
(2 Samuel, 345).
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accuses David of being guilty himself (You are the man! ,

2 Sam 12:7), and asks David why he has acted this way (Why then have
you treated the word of Yahweh with disdain? - ,
v. 9). Like the prophet Nathan, the wise woman delivers her parable,
asks the king why he has acted this way, and tells him that his own judg-
ment against those guilty in the parable has incriminated him: Why
then have you thought this way when it comes to the people of God? On
the basis of pronouncing this judgment, the king is like the guilty party
( . . . , v. 13).
The wise womans post-parable reveal includes an accusation perhaps
even more cutting than just the statement, Based on your own words, you
are the guilty one. It also casts a harsher light on the parable itself. She had
not merely said that one of her sons murdered the other. Rather, her two
sons were ghting in the eld, no one intervened!and
so the one killed the other. Recalling what has led to the present crisis,
that Absalom killed Amnon because when Tamar was raped, David did
nothingDavid was very angry, and then two years passed (2 Sam 13:21
23), after which Absalom nally killed his brotherthis suddenly becomes
a particularly incisive line.
So in the rst story, we see a gure with a specialized role, someone
brought in from elsewhere in order to function very much like the prophet
Nathan, delivering a covert parable and its attendant accusation of the kings
guilt. Compare also the marvelous story of the prophet who gets himself
beaten up so that he can appear bedraggled and bandaged before Ahab,
and then enacts a parable that leads the king to incriminate himself (1 Kgs
20:3543). The person Joab brings in to act like these prophets is called a
wise woman; we know that wise men can have a divinatory role within
Israelite literature, as can wise women in the literature of Israels neigh-
bors. So far, it seems a reasonable bet that this is not totally coincidental.
The story ends on an appropriate note. The womans closing line does
more than just stroke Davids ego: My lord is wise, like the wisdom of the
angel of God, knowing everything on earth (2 Sam 14:20). Within this
26. This one is a bit darker, what with that poor rst gentleman who declines to
beat on the prophet, only to be doomed to immediate death by lion. (Ahab,
who goes away sullen and vexed, as the NASB charmingly puts it, should be
relieved in comparison.)
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very story, and from the wise womans own mouth, we see a view of as
privileged divine knowledge.
In the second story, the encounter is between a wise woman and Joab
himself. Joab, having previously brought in a wise woman to rebuke David
for being too hard on Absalom, has recently rebuked David for being too
grieved for his son (2 Sam 19:28 [Eng. 17]). Then, during the chaos fol-
lowing Absaloms death, one Sheba ben Bichri appears on the scene and
rallies all Israel to follow him instead of David (2 Sam 20:12). Joab and
his men pursue Sheba, who ees into the city of Abel, and they start at-
tacking the wall. Just then, a wise woman calls down to the people: Listen,
listen! Say to Joab, Come here, so I can speak to you (2 Sam 20:16). It is
implicit that the people comply; Joab approaches, the wise woman tells him
to listen, and Joab replies, I am listening (20:17).
Let us remember that at this moment, Joab is trying to defeat an en-
emy who until recently had all Israel abandoning David to follow him.
The situation is a bit urgent. Joabs only reason to stop and listen to the
wise woman is if he sees her as having the authority to get him what he
wants. Joabs men assume she has this authority, just as Joab does: she calls
down to them and says, Get me Joab, and they do; she wants him to ap-
proach, he approaches. The wise woman begins to speak to Joab: They
used to say in olden times: Let them inquire at Abel, and thus they would
be done with it ( ,
20:18). Her city has long been known, she says, as a place for authoritative
oracular inquiry. This does not explicitly tell us who the woman is, but we
now have three pieces of information to t together: she is called a wise
woman, she is portrayed as having authority, and all this in a city known
specically for authoritative oracular inquiry.
She continues her rebuke of Joab for attacking such a place: I am
among the peaceable and faithful of Israel; you are seeking to kill o a city
and a mother in Israel! Why would you swallow up the heritage of Yah-
weh? (20:19). The rst claim is straightforward; the last claim, regarding
27. McCarter observes another reversal here: in the rst story, Joab told the
wise woman what to do; in this story, the wise woman tells Joab what to do
(2 Samuel, 431).
28. Or so it says; as McCarter points out, the rest of the story makes all Israel
seem something of an exaggeration. Soon afterward, as he observes, all Israel
seems to have gone home (2 Samuel, 431).
29. See ibid., 42829, on the diculties of this verse.
Y6621.indb 141 1/27/15 1:08 PM

the heritage of Yahweh, may refer either to Abel as the seat of oracular
inquiry or to the womans role in it (or perhaps both).
In between, we come to the only use of the phrase a mother in Is-
rael outside of the song of Deborah and Barak. In the present context,
the phrase is usually understood to refer to the city of Abel itself. Since
the phrasing straightforwardly indicates two separate entities, a city and
a mother in Israel () , explaining it as a hendiadys for the
city takes some doing. First, it requires a lack of recognition of mother in
Israel even as a potential title for the female character speaking. Second, it
depends on a peculiar reading of the phrase itself. The image of a mother
city is interpreted by analogy with the few references to cities and their
smaller daughter villages ( Josh 15:45; Judg 11:26). However, the cities in
those texts are not called mothers, and there is no sense in this text of
describing cities and villages in relation to one other.
In addition, if there were no reference to a human being, the use of
would be rather odd. If the mother in Israel were not a person, then
in the sentence several unusual things
would be happening at once. The verb , to kill, would somehow take
two inanimate objects (to kill a city, a mother-town). In this scenario,
rst the word must be read as a reference to the people of the city
(cf. 1 Sam 5:12), then the mother in Israel must be read as an unprecedented
way of describing a city, and nally the two terms must be read in hendiadys.
This seems awfully convoluted. More realistically, because the verb
is doing double duty, its rst object either could be inanimate (to destroy
a city and kill a mother in Israel) or could represent the people (to kill o
a city, and a mother in Israel). Either way, the simplest explanation is that
the woman, who has already just been talking about herself (I am among
the peaceable and faithful), then refers to herself as a mother in Israel.
On the basis of this text alone, the phrase should be under-
stood to refer to the wise woman. The additional use of the same phrase to
30. Ackerman and Camp both address a possible relationship between the
references of the two wise women (14:16, 20:19). Ackerman, Warrior, Dancer,
Seductress, Queen, 40; Camp, The Wise Women of 2 Samuel, 29.
31. For example, McCarter translates, Youre trying to destroy one of Israels
mother cities! (2 Samuel, 426, 430); Hertzberg translates, you seek to kill a city
which is a mother in Israel (1 and 2 Samuel, 370, 373). Even Camp, writing on
the wise women, sees the city as the mother (The Wise Women of 2 Samuel,
2728). Ackerman, on the other hand, understands to refer to both
the city and the woman (Warrior, Dancer, Seductress, Queen, 3941).
Y6621.indb 142 1/27/15 1:08 PM

refer to Deborah in Judges 5:7 renders alternatives unnecessarily contrived.

The term a mother in Israel refers in Judges 5 to Deborahs advisory role,
as discussed earlier. Ackerman brings the two texts together and observes
that here too, the woman who is a mother in Israel is primarily known
for her counsel. I would add that in each casenot circularly dependent
on one otherthe woman who is called an is associated with
divination.
Back to the wise womans question: Why would you swallow up the
heritage of Yahweh? Joab answers, if I do any such thing!
McCarter puts this nicely: Ill be damned if Im going to aict or destroy
anything! (Though Sheba probably did not see it this way.) Joab explains
the situation to the wise woman and asks her to turn Sheba over, and she
replies, His head will be thrown to you over the wall. Then the woman
went to all of the people in her wisdom, and they chopped o the mans
head and tossed it over (2 Sam 20:2122). We saw previously how Joab and
his men outside of the city responded to the wise womans authority. As
Ackerman points out, here we have good indication of how seriously the
people within the city take her counsel: she goes to the people to inform
them of her plan to decapitate Sheba and throw his head over the citys
walls. . . . Presumably, she has to persuade the people of Abel to agree with
this proposed course of action. Everyone in this storyJoab, Joabs army
outside of the city walls, and the people of Abel withinall have listened
with impressive obedience to the instructions of the wise woman.
As with the prophet Miriam, we do not see this womans divinatory
activity itself, but we do see her make a claim to divinatory authority. The
character, introduced as a wise woman, reminds Joab that this place is
known for authoritative oracular inquiry, speaks with authority within it,
and calls herself an . In this case, we also see the woman sur-
rounded by people who uniformly receive her words as authoritative.
We can then begin to identify the commonalities between the two wise
women. I must disagree with the conclusion Camp draws, in the only sus-
tained treatment of the wise women. Camp observes that the two wise
32. Ackerman also sees the military connection as a signicant element of the
mother in Israel role, partly on the basis of the military context of Judg 5
(Warrior, Dancer, Seductress, Queen, 3843).
33. McCarter, 2 Samuel, 426, 429.
35. That is, with attention to their identity: Wesselius is interested in the literary re-
lationship between the two wise woman passages, and what they might tell us
Y6621.indb 143 1/27/15 1:08 PM

women both speak with authority, and compares them to royal advisors,
but she then suggests that the womens wise speech is reected specically
in the fact that each woman at some point utters a proverb (2 Sam 14:14,
20:18). This is a problematic comparison, since the two phrases in ques-
tion are dierent sorts of proverbs used for dierent purposesthat is, if
14:14 contains a proverb at all, rather than just a poetic analogy (we are like
water . . .). In the opening oracle of Second Isaiah, is the prophets asser-
tion that all esh is grass a proverb (Isa 40:6)? I am inclined to think not.
However, even if one accepts that we are like water is a type of proverbial
language, the functions of the phrases in 14:14 and 20:18 are too dissimilar to
warrant identifying them as the common element of these womens speech.
This problem is then reected in Camps conclusion. Focusing on what she
sees as a shared use of language, a diculty remains for her in establish-
ing what the two womens shared role would be. She concludes: The wise
women of Tekoa and Abel, then, appear in situations in which they act in a
manner associated with a prophet and a military leader, respectively, while
using forms of language associated with the wisdom tradition. By this
about Davidnot about the wise women (De wijze vrouwen in 2 Samul 14 en
20, 89100). Occasional sustained treatments of one woman or the other also
do not address the matter of role relevant here. In his book on the parable of the
wise woman of Tekoa, Lyke is interested in various aspects of the proverb, and
not the role of the woman herself, except to the extent that he thinks we cannot
know much about it (King David with the Wise Woman of Tekoa, 21). A. Brenner
briey discusses these two women, concluding that they belong to a specic
institutionthat of wise women. These women are clever, articulate, involved
in the political life of the communityin short, they enjoy a status similar to
that of an elder, or a wise man (The Israelite Woman, 3438, quotation 38).
36. Camp, The Wise Women of 2 Samuel, 1720.
37. Camp acknowledges that there is a dierence, but defends her identication of
14:14 as a proverb (ibid., 20).
38. Ibid., 24. Fontaine follows Camp in focusing on the womens wise speech,
but seems to see the wise women here, and even in the Hittite texts, essentially
as local den mothers. She extrapolates: wives and mothers known for their
common-sense teachings and ability to resolve conicts might be drafted into
the service of their neighborhoods, towns or cities. Such women are found in
2 Samuel as wise women, and their sisters are well attested among the Hit-
tites. She pictures this as a phenomenon somewhat broader and clearer than
what is represented in the biblical texts: One of the most critical features of
Israels wise women was, once again, their excellent and timely use of language
Y6621.indb 144 1/27/15 1:08 PM

analysis, their common trait is the use of some type of proverb, in some con-
text, for some purpose, but in totally dierent roles. In a later essay, Camp
attempts to align these roles more, arguing that these women, especially
she of Abel, seem to be doing what we would expect elders to do, in par-
ticular, representing their people in national political-military situations.
It is not clear, however, in what way the wise woman of Tekoa is either rep-
resenting her people or serving a military function. Camps recognition of
the authoritative speech of the two wise women is signicant, but this does
not yet explain what role the women actually have in common.
What then are the unifying features in the depictions of the two
women? To begin from the beginning: each character is introduced as a
wise woman. These are generally taken as simple descriptions of women
who happened to be wise, often referred to in the literature as the woman
of Tekoa and the woman of Abel, as if the narrators might just as eas-
ily have mentioned Beatrice from Schenectady, who was wise, and later,
Estelle of Forest Hills, a clever woman. Instead, the two women are both
called by a specic epithet. The sense of wise woman ( ) as a
title is highlighted when seen in contrast with an actual simple descriptive
phrase: compare Abigail, who is described in 1 Samuel 25:3 as an intelligent
woman (- ) and does not serve a particular social function.
In 2 Samuel 14 and 20, the wise women are introduced by their titleand
by their title aloneand in each case, the wise woman is in the story
because she is serving a specic social function. Based on the presence of
in the resolution of conicts (2 Sam. 14, 20). . . . What began as womens wisdom
in the world of the home has clearly gone public, to the good of all (Fontaine,
Smooth Words, 65).
39. Camp, The Female Sage in Ancient Israel and in the Biblical Wisdom Litera-
ture, 189.
40. Contra Schroer, who observes in regard to the women of 2 Sam that In both
cases, the wise woman looks like a signier of status or ocial position, but
then includes Abigail and Judith within the same subcategory, before moving
on to discuss counseling mothers and wives (Wise and Counselling Women in
Ancient Israel, 7172).
41. As Camp observes, the author, at least, seems to have expected the audience to
have a framework to understand such a gure (The Wise Women of 2 Sam-
uel, 17). Camp goes further, though, arguing that the audience would recognize
the wise woman both as a culturally stereotyped character and as a reection
of a historical political role.
Y6621.indb 145 1/27/15 1:08 PM

an equivalent male title in Israelite literature, an equivalent female title in

Hittite literature, the association of both of those roles with divination, and
the association of each wise woman in 2 Samuel with a divinatory func-
tion, wise woman should not be taken as an incidental description in these
texts, but as a title. For this reason, I have continually referred to each as a
wise woman, rather than the customary woman of Tekoa and woman
of Abel, which imply that the adjective wise is simply a description.
In both stories, we see that the character has a specialized role. In the
rst, Joab has to send to Tekoa for a wise woman who can do the job he
needs done. If there were no specialized skill or function involved, Joab
would not need to seek out this particular woman in this particular town. In
the second, the wise woman asserts that she is an and demon-
strably serves a particular function among the people of her city.
In both cases, the specialized role of the wise woman is an authoritative
one. Each woman speaks in a manner that demonstrates that she assumes
she has authority: the wise woman of Tekoa accuses David of guilt with
dangerous boldness, and the wise woman of Abel gives orders to Joab, Joabs
men outside of the city walls, and her own people within. In each case, the
response of other characters shows that the wise womans authority is real
and accepted: David accepts the rebuke of the wise woman of Tekoa, whom
Joab has brought in to serve this very function, and everyone in sight com-
plies with the instructions of the wise woman of Abel.
So what is the nature of the authority with which they both speak? In
both stories, the womens authority is associated with divinatory speech.
The wise woman of Tekoa interacts with David just as the prophet Nathan
did only two chapters earlierincluding the stealth parable, the question-
ing of why the king would act as he did, and the accusation of guiltand as
another prophet later would with Ahab. The wise woman of Abel has au-
thoritative wisdom even within a town known for its wisdom. She reminds
Joab that Abel has long been a seat of authoritative oracular inquirythat
is, authoritative divinationand then calls herself an , an advi-
sory role here as it is in reference to Deborah in Judges 5.
42. The removal of titlesor at least the lack of recognition and use of titlesis
an interesting thing. It is similarly common to see references to the woman of
En-dor, even though she is introduced as an - and only happens
to live in En-dor, whereas one does not generally see references to unnamed
men of God as the man of Shiloh (1 Sam 2:2736) or the man of Judah
(1 Kgs 13:110). Peculiar.
Y6621.indb 146 1/27/15 1:08 PM

The two roles are not necessarily identical. (The roles of all titled
prophets are not identical either.) With one story about each of two wise
women, one under assault at home in her city and the other brought tempo-
rarily to Jerusalem to serve a particular function there, there is not adequate
data on which to judge the precise relationship between the two roles.
At a minimum, both stories tell of gures titled wise women who
have specialized roles; both texts portray gures with recognized authority,
as demonstrated by each womans activity and conrmed by each womans
reception within the story; and both of these authoritative specialized
roles are related to divinatory speech, as one wise woman uses the specic
rhetorical approach recognizable from the speech of the prophet just two
chapters earlier, and the other explicitly associates herself with the speech
of divinatory experts.
To my knowledge, it has not been recognized that the wise womens
shared role is associated with divinatory speech. Even if little more can be
determined about the exact nature of their roles, the wise womens associa-
tion with divination should be recognized on the basis of these texts alone,
and then all the more so in light of the presence elsewhere of wise men and
wise women who function as divinatory experts.
Y6621.indb 147 1/27/15 1:08 PM

9 Huldah
This is the only story in the Hebrew Bible of a titled who delivers
a classic prophetic oracle. Many have seen in the uniqueness of the story
an indication of either the lack or marginalization of female prophets.
However, there is nothing in the text to suggest that there was anything
remarkable about the king consulting a female prophet in general, or that
the narrator had any interest in the gender of this female prophet in par-
ticular. On the contrary, what is remarkable is that Huldah is remembered
straightforwardly as the prophet of Yahweh who delivers the pivotal oracle
to Josiahin spite of the fact that she gets it wrong.
Huldah of Jerusalem
Crisis has come to the temple. A scroll has been uncovered, its con-
tents found to have been woefully neglected, and Josiah needs to con-
sult a diviner. It is in this context that we meet Huldah. Those looking
for signs of Huldahs marginalization in the brevity of her introduction
search in vain. In the balance, we know more about Huldah than we
1. I will include a few key examples, but readers may refer to the thorough work
on the history of gender-related interpretation of Huldah by Handy, Reading
Huldah as Being a Woman, 544.
2. While less common, the logic of looking for armation here is just as prob-
lematic. Weems argues that it is precisely the lack of information oered that
brings such attention to Huldah: The less we are allowed to know about the
woman prophet, the larger she looms in both the narrative and in the readers
imagination (Huldah, the Prophet: Reading a [Deuteronomistic] Womans
Identity, 324).
148
Y6621.indb 148 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Huldah 149
do about some male prophets, and less than we do about others. She is
identied by her husbands name, just as a man would be identied by his
fathers name. The additional details regarding her husbands occupation
and family line are there to provide more identifying information about
Huldah, as such things went in those days. Similarly, rather than nam-
ing Huldahs town of origin, the narrator says where she lives currently.
The author gives the information relevant for the story, with the nice
additional detail of her particular neighborhood: she lived in Jerusalem,
in the Mishneh.
Several major translations present Huldahs identication through her
husband as the primary point, and render the statement about where she
lives as parenthetical (for example, NASB, NKJV, ASV). This is not the
perspective of the text. The statement about where she lives is an indepen-
dent clause and uses the feminine singular ( ,
2 Kgs 22:14). It is not that Josiahs men went to Huldah the prophet, the
wife of Shallum ben Tikvah ben Harhas, the wardrobe keeper (who lived
in Jerusalem in the Mishneh), but rather that they went to Huldah the
prophet, the wife of Shallum ben Tikvah ben Harhas, the wardrobe keeper.
She lived in Jerusalem, in the Mishneh.
This is a minor point, but for those concerned that Huldah is short-
changed in her introduction, it is a distinction worth observing. This is a
succinct example of the complex interplay between the gendering of the
text and of the characters by the Israelite tradition on the one hand (Hul-
dah is indeed identied through her husband), and by modern interpreters
on the other (there is no good textual reason to render the independent
clause describing Huldah as subordinate to the appositional phrase identi-
fying her husband).
There are also those concerned that the overall presentation of Huldah
marginalizes women. In her article on the construction of female proph-
ets, Fuchs has observed that we do not see any of the female prophets
discourses with Yahweh. She concludes that The narratorial ambivalence
toward womens prophetic function is exposed in the suppression of the
possibility of a female dialogue with yhwh, and notes that a may
be shown to use the messenger formula, or a variation thereof, but there
is no objective narratorial conrmation of the event. While the formula
yhwh spoke to Moses or God spoke to Jeremiah appears frequently,
this formula does not appear in the context of female prophecy. This
3. Fuchs, Prophecy and the Construction of Women, 5758.
Y6621.indb 149 1/27/15 1:08 PM

distinction between the prophets use of the messenger formula and the
narrators presentation of Yahwehs message is overemphasized. Deborah,
for instance, proclaims what Yahweh has told her, speaking for Yahweh
using the prophetic rst person ( Judg 4:67); this and her other procla-
mations about what Yahweh is doing and will do (4:9, 14) are conrmed
by the narrator throughout the story. Equally, there are texts in which
male prophets proclaim messages from Yahweh that the reader is see-
ing for the rst time. Huldah uses the formulaic phrase ,
thus says Yahweh, three times in ve verses, in addition to an inserted
-, the oracle of Yahweh! Her language reects an assumption of
prophetic authority in both form and content, and the narrator presents
her as authoritative.
Others, meanwhile, have seen Huldah presented as authoritative spe-
cically as a woman. Butting and Fischer, for example, both emphasize the
importance of the placement of Deborah and Huldah as the rst and last
prophets of the redacted books of the Former Prophets. Butting views this
framing as a reection of womens prophetic authority, and specically as
it relates to Torah; she thus sees Huldahs role as the prophetic counter-
point to Torah as represented in the story. Fischer, again focused on the
question of how each female prophet is depicted in terms of Mosaic suc-
cession, sees the framing of the Former Prophets by Deborah and Huldah
as evidence that both women are presented as true prophets in the line
of Moses, and emphasizes that in this post-exilic framing, we actually see
the increased inuence of women in and upon scripture in the Persian
period, contrary to common assumptions. She reads Huldah in particular
as embodying the joining of prophecy and cult, making her an idealized
successor to Moses.
4. Butting, Prophetinnen Gefragt, 99100. The model of female prophets as em-

bodying a counterpart to Torah is her guiding framework throughout, begin-
ning with Noadiah as the prophetic counterpart to Nehemiah (pp. 1011). In her
view, it is also through the prophecy of the other female prophets that Torah
is made present and relevant: she sees Miriams song as having this function in
relation to the exodus narrative, and so also Deborahs song in relation to the
narrative of Judg 4 (pp. 44, 121).
5. Assumptions that, as she observes, are at times formulated in an anti-Jewish
manner (Fischer, Gottesknderinnen, 185; on women and scripture in the Persian
period, see also pp. 27677).
6. Ibid., 17985.
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Huldah 151
Huldah is often referred to in the literature as an ocial prophet.

Even aside from the other diculties with such terminology, it is unclear
whether Huldah is the kings prophet-on-call. Josiah tells his men to in-
quire of Yahweh, and they go consult Huldah (2 Kgs 22:1314). Is she in the
regular employ of the king or in some less ocial sense his go-to prophet,
or did Josiahs men select her for this task? This could be more like the pic-
ture in 1 Samuel 28, where Sauls men know where to go to nd a diviner.
It is possible that the content of Huldahs prophecy reects a connec-
tion to the royal court. More than half of her oracle is focused on praising
Josiah:
Thus says Yahweh, the God of Israelsay to the man who sent you to me
thus says Yahweh: I am about to bring adversity upon this place and its
inhabitants, in accordance with all the words of the scroll which the king
of Judah read. Because they forsook me and made oerings to other gods,
angering me with all of their deeds, my anger will burn against this place
and will not be extinguished!
But as for the king of Judah, who sent you to inquire of Yahweh, say this to
him: Thus says Yahweh, the God of Israel: When you heard those words,
because your heart was softened and you humbled yourself before Yahweh
when you heard what I spoke against this place and its inhabitants, that it
would become a wasteland and a curse, and because you tore your clothes
and wept before me, I have indeed listenedthe oracle of Yahweh
Therefore I will gather you to your fathers, and you will be gathered to your
tomb in peace, and your eyes will not see all of the adversity that I bring
upon this place. (2 Kgs 22:1520)
The rst section of the oracle lays the blame fully with the people; the
second, longer section explains why Josiah is exempt. So there is some
sort of administrative process here whereby the king sends for divinatory
7. E.g., Fritz, who assumes an ocial position, writing that Huldah is the only
woman mentioned as the holder of this oce (1 & 2 Kings, 400). For a very dif-
ferent perspective, see Edelman, who argues that Huldah (if historical) would
have been a prophet of Asherah (Huldah the Prophetof Yahweh or Ashe-
rah? 248).
8. And in fact, the oracle does not do much beyond this. As Handy points out,
What is most noteworthy about this short speech by Huldah is how little it
actually says about anything . . . For a biblical speech from Yahweh, this is truly
vague (The Role of Huldah in Josiahs Cult Reform, 50).
Y6621.indb 151 1/27/15 1:08 PM

consultation, the diviner in question bears the title , and her oracle un-
waveringly favors the king. The similarity to the pep-talking court prophets
of 1 Kings 22 and other texts is apparent. Then again, what dominates the
larger story is the Deuteronomists presentation of Josiah as the good king
who, in spite of his righteousness and his reform, is not able to save Judah
from itselfso perhaps it is just that Huldahs message suits the narrators
message.
The Story of a Scroll

The main character in this story is the scroll. Anything can happen to
the rest of the characters, and in the end, it will make no dierence: what
matters is what happens in the life of the scroll.
The scroll, uncovered in the process of temple repair, is a bit of a mys-
tery. After some deliberation among a few court and temple ocials, the
decision is made to bring the scroll to someone who can inquire of Yahweh
directly. Now, it is not unprecedented for a king to consult a diviner in
order to conrm previous cultic instruction from a deity. Had the story
included only this one attempt to validate the scroll, it would look as if
Josiah were engaging in the practice of having a diviner double-check an
earlier revelation.
This is not how the narrative proceeds, however. As the text presents
it, there are other religious authorities who might have veried the scroll,
but one by one, they are unable to do so. The scroll is rst found by the high
priest Hilkiah. The high priest does not know what to make of it and gives
it to the scribe Shaphan to read. Shaphan brings it to Josiah but discusses
temple repair business with the king before coming to the subject of the
scroll, apparently not quite recognizing its import. He then reads it to Jo-
siah, and among the three menthe high priest, the scribe, and the king
9. Fischer thinks that Huldah is denitely not a court prophet, because the delega-
tion goes to her, rather than she to the court, and because she refers to Josiah not
as the king but as the one who sent you (Gottesknderinnen, 16364). These
suggestions strike me as reasonable but by no means conclusive.
10. Handy helpfully compares this to Mesopotamian literature in which kings are
apparently expected to consult diviners in order to double-check or conrm
previous cultic instructions from deities, and particularly to the cult restoration/
reform texts of Esarhaddon and Nabonidus (The Role of Huldah in Josiahs
Cult Reform, 4053).
Y6621.indb 152 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Huldah 153
they still must turn to a higher authority. Josiah concludes that divinatory
expertise is required, and he sends Hilkiah the high priest and Shaphan the
scribe (with their titles used repeatedly in the story) along with the kings
minister and two other men to inquire of Yahweh. It is only because each
of the other religious authorities is stumped that they seek out the diviner
who can consult Yahweh directly. This is not a presentation of a standard
procedure of double-checking with a prophet: it is a matter of turning to a
diviner who has access to divine knowledge that even the high priest and
his colleagues do not have.
The narrator thus attributes signicant divinatory authority to Huldah.
So, the men go to Huldah and she validates the scroll. The purpose of the
narrative is the authorization of the book, and it is Huldah who gives her
imprimatur. This also means, as is frequently observed, that Huldah is the
rst person to authorize a canonical text. It may be Josiahs reform, but it
is Huldahs canon.
Then again, as the story goes, the reform itself would not have hap-
pened without Huldahs oracle either. So far, all Josiah has done is rend his
clothes and send his men. It is only in response to Huldahs divination that
Josiah institutes the reform. He does not act on his own authority in re-
sponse to the scrollhe acts on hers. As the narrative presents it, if instead
of conrming all the words of the scroll which the king of Judah read, the
prophet had said, Thus says Yahweh: Dont worry so much about the scroll,
Josiah, there would have been no reform.
In spite of these many indications that Huldah had the same prophetic
authority we see in male characters in other texts, many interpreters have
questioned why Josiah would have consulted a woman. There is nothing
in the text to indicate that this was unusual, and enough record of female
prophets elsewhere, including in the roughly contemporary Neo-Assyrian
oracles, to indicate that it was not. That Huldah is a woman is a nonissue
11. E.g., Camp, Female Voice, Written Word: Women and Authority in Hebrew
Scripture, 100101; Eskenazi, ed., and Weiss, assoc. ed., The Torah: A Womens
Commentary, xxxviixxxviii; Swindler, In Search of Huldah, 1783. Bruegge-
mann holds precisely the opposite perspective: Clearly Huldah as a prophetess
has no autonomous function or voice, but is dependent on the Torah scroll and
is in its service (1 & 2 Kings, 54950). Although this is part of a longer section in
which Brueggemann argues that the passage sees temple, kingship, and proph-
ecy all as subordinate to Torah (pp. 54859), his stripping Huldah of all agency
is perhaps a bit extreme.
Y6621.indb 153 1/27/15 1:08 PM

in the story. The inclination of scholarsfrom the rabbis to nowto ask

why Josiah consulted a female prophet reects the issues of interpreters,
and not the text itself.
Huldahs Mistake: Divergent Traditions

So the Deuteronomist presents Huldah as having access to divine
knowledge that even the high priest lacks, as speaking with prophetic au-
thority in both form and content, and as fullling the function of validating
the scroll and sparking the reform that is so crucial to the Deuteronomists
story arc. There is a hitch, though: according to the narrative in Kings,
Huldah is wrong.
The nal words of Huldahs prophecy to Josiah are that he will die
in peace. He does not. He institutes the reform, and shortly afterward is
slaughtered by Neco. This is hard to get around. The structure and content
both make the meaning clear. The rst half of Huldahs oracle concerns the
fate of Judah: because the people have forsaken God, worshipped idols, and
so on, something bad will happen. The second half concerns the fate of the
king: because he has repented, rent his clothes, and wept, something good
will happen. Huldah says, I will gather you to your fathers, and you will be
gathered to your grave in peace (v. 20a).
What do we do, then, with Huldahs mistake? It is not uncommon to
see the explanation that Huldahs oracle means only that Josiah will die
beforeand thus not have to seethe national disaster. This explanation
12. In contrast to 1 Sam 28, where Saul species that he wants an - .

For a full reading of these two stories side by side and the implications of their
similarities, see Hamori, The Prophet and the Necromancer: Womens Divina-
tion for Kings, 82743.
13. For discussion of rabbinic explanations (e.g., that Josiah expected a woman to
be gentler and more merciful than a male prophet, such as Jeremiah), see esp.
Halpern, Why Manasseh Is Blamed for the Babylonian Exile, 493, and Co-
gan and Tadmor, II Kings, 28384. Others today explain Josiahs choice of a
female prophet dierently. According to Weems, for example, the author chose
a female prophet in order to surprise his audience, and her gender is pivotal to
his theological message, i.e., that even a woman could see the coming disaster
(Huldah, the Prophet, 32139). Gafney observes the nonchalant presentation
of Huldah as a female prophet, but also suggests that Huldah may have served
Josiahs mother, who would then have inuenced her son (Daughters of Miriam,
9798).
Y6621.indb 154 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Huldah 155
requires focusing on the tail end of the oracle, Your eyes will not see all of
the harm I am bringing upon this place (v. 20b), and pointing out that be-
cause Josiah dies, technically Huldah is correct. As interesting and creative
as this interpretation may be, it works very hard to circumvent the plain
meaning of the text. Huldah tells the king that because of his repentance
he will be gathered to his grave in peaceafter which he is promptly elimi-
nated. It seems awkwardly contrived to emphasize the technical accuracy of
the statement that Josiah will not see the coming disaster, while explaining
away the inaccuracy of the reassuring promise on which this rests. Various
interpretations have also been oered of what it means to be gathered to
your graveor better but less poetically tombbut whatever is done
with the rest of the oracle, it is not possible to get around the in peace.
It would appear that some of these explanations betray more interest
in verifying Huldahs oracle than in judging the plain sense of the text.
In some cases, scholars have overtly defended Huldahs status as a true
prophet. Naturally, other scholars have attributed the inconsistency be-
tween Huldahs mistaken prophecy and the texts silence about it to com-
posite sources.
However, the Deuteronomist is at no point concerned with this dis-
crepancy. In a story overtly concerned with correct religious practiceas
14. Examples include Fischer, Gottesknderinnen, 16566, and Sweeney, I & II

Kings, 43942. Rashi and Kimhi had read the text this way, and as Halpern has
pointed out, scholars still frequently resort to this explanation (Halpern, Why
Manasseh Is Blamed for the Babylonian Exile, 497505). This view is some-
times framed in terms of how God showed Josiah mercy by bringing about his
death before the fall of Judah (e.g., Sweeney, I & II Kings, 440). This explanation
might lead one to worry, for if this is Gods mercy . . .
15. Edelman, for instance, thinks that this could refer to the manner of burial
(Huldah the Prophetof Yahweh or Asherah? 24041). However, Halpern
observes that Kings makes a distinction between those who lie with their fa-
thers, i.e., die in peace, and those who die violently; the phrases to lie with the
fathers and to be gathered to ones kin, both of which Halpern sees behind
Huldahs statement, only refer to natural deaths (Why Manasseh Is Blamed
for the Babylonian Exile, 500; see further bibliography, 500 nn.5961). Halpern
elsewhere discusses the apparent exception of Ahab: Halpern and Vanderhooft,
The Editions of Kings in the 7th6th Centuries b.c.e., 23035; see also Stipp,
Ahabs Busse und die Komposition des deuteronomistischen Geschichts-
werks, 47196.
16. Campbell and OBrien, Unfolding the Deuteronomistic History, 458.
Y6621.indb 155 1/27/15 1:08 PM

seen in both the rst half of Huldahs oracle and in Josiahs reformthe
Deuteronomist has no problem with the fact that the second half of Hul-
dahs prophecy to Josiah is dead wrong.
This is neatly xed in Chronicles. The Chronicler evidently sees the
problem and adjusts as necessary. The Kings version, which takes up all
of one verse, says only that Neco went to ght the king of Assyria at the
Euphrates, Josiah went out to engage him, and when Neco saw him he
killed him at Megiddo (2 Kgs 23:29). The story in Chronicles is far more
detailed, and elaborately excuses Huldahs incorrect prophecy. Essentially
as in Kings, Neco went up to ght at Carchemish on the Euphrates, and
Josiah went out to engage him, but here we deviate from the earlier story.
Neco sends messengers to Josiah to say: What have I to do with you, King
of Judah? I am not against you today, but against the kingdom with which
I am at war, and God has ordered me to hurry! Stop impeding God, who is
with me, that he may not destroy you! (2 Chr 35:21). The Chronicler then
explains that Josiah would not go away, but went to ght Neco anyway, and
did not listen to the words of Neco from the mouth of God (2 Chr 35:22).
Necos archers shoot Josiah, he is mortally wounded, and tells his men to
get him out of there. (This is a little reminiscent of the story of Sauls death,
but must have been a common enough scenario.) Josiahs servants get him
out of his chariot and into another (unless his chariot was damaged in
battle, this is presumably to disguise his movements), and they bring him
to Jerusalem, where, the Chronicler writes, he died and was buried in the
tomb of his fathers (2 Chr 35:24). Huldahs incorrect oracleI will gather
you to your fathers and you will be gathered to your tomb in peacehas
been explained away. Josiah had the chance to avoid battle and to die in
peace, just as Huldah said he wouldonly he did not listen to the words of
God through Neco.
The Chronicler makes one other key adjustment as well: all of a sud-
den, Huldah no longer has a role in instigating the reform. In Kings, the
17. One implication of this, of course, is that the oracle is presumably from before
Josiahs violent death, i.e., predating its falsication. See, e.g., Cogan and Tad-
mor, II Kings, 284, and Halpern, Why Manasseh Is Blamed for the Babylonian
Exile, 501.
18. Oddly, as opposed to the other way around (the words of God from the mouth
of Neco).
19. These two key changes in Chronicles are mentioned also, in dierent ways, by
Fischer, Gottesknderinnen, 17778, and Gafney, Daughters of Miriam, 96, 101.
Y6621.indb 156 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Huldah 157
entire story takes place in the eighteenth year of Josiahs reign, when the
king is twenty-six years old. The scroll is found and read to him, he sends his
men to consult Huldah, and in response to her oracle, he institutes reform.
In Chronicles, Josiah has already begun his reform many years earlier. In
the eighth year of his reign, he began to seek God () ,
and in the twelfth year, he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem (2 Chr 34:3).
The implication is either that Josiah sought God in some general sense or
that he inquired of God through other prophets. Either way, the author-
ity in having the divine knowledge to spark the reform is taken away from
Huldah and given to Josiah or to other prophets.
This is not a matter of scribal error concerning the numbers eight and
eighteen; the text species that this happened in the eighth year of Josiahs
reign, while he was still a youth, and then, as in Kings, dates the nding
of the scroll and the prophecy of Huldah to the eighteenth year. The text is
rather heavy-handed with this emphasis on the order of events: in the eigh-
teenth year of his reign, after purging the land and the temple, he sent some
of his men to do temple repair. Then the scroll is found, and the king sends his
men to consult the prophet. This section of the story is very close to the one
in Kings. After this, Josiah renews the covenantwhich of course cannot
happen before the nding of the scrolland then there is one pointedly brief
statement that Josiah removed all of the abominations from the whole land
of the Israelites, and made all who were present in Israel serve Yahweh their
God (2 Chr 34:33). This is followed by a section on reinstituting Passover.
20. Minor changes include the detail of the nding of the scroll, names, and a
last phrase attached to the end of Huldahs oracle, which now refers to all
of the harm Yahweh will bring upon this place and upon its inhabitants
(2 Chr 34:28). It is interesting to note that one of the changes in this version is
the absence of Achbor. In 2 Kgs, many of the names are those of similar types of
animals: Huldah (rat), Achbor (mouse), and Shaphan (rock badger). Although
I would certainly not argue that this is a folktale, the coincidence (?) of names
rings of the genre: Rat, Mouse, and Badger Instruct the King. It is just con-
ceivable that the Chronicler reacted to the folktale feel of the story, could not
change the name of Huldah, and perhaps not that of Shaphan, who also appears
as the grandfather of Gedaliah (2 Kgs 25:22, though if this were really the case
one would expect him to be named as such in Chronicles as well), but could at
least lose Achbor. This is wildly speculative, of course, but I nd the possibility
charming. (Additionally, all three animals are mentioned in Lev 11: in 11:5,
and and in immediate succession in 11:29.)
Y6621.indb 157 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Had the Chroniclers only major change been that Huldahs oracle
does not spark the reform, this might by itself raise the possibility of a
negative view of Huldah. However, the rst major change, which explains
away Huldahs error, makes this interpretation improbable. The Chronicler
clearly has a vested interest in cleaning up the prophets record. Now, it is
odd that in the execution of this, the Chronicler presents Neco as having
more divine knowledge than Huldah, or at least updated information. But
it is just as striking that Neco has more divine knowledge than Josiah.
Since we would clearly be wrong to take from this that the Chronicler had
a negative view of Josiah, we equally should not assume that this reects a
negative view of Huldah. Rather, the Chronicler provides an explanation
for what would otherwise be inaccurate prophecy. The transfer of credit for
instigating the reform from Huldah to Josiah, then, does not reect the
Chroniclers interest in diminishing Huldah, but in promoting Josiah.
This was perhaps especially desirable as a countermeasure to the now-
necessary story of Josiah dying because he did not heed the word of God
on the battleeld. The new story of Josiahs violent death does not negate
the Chroniclers overall armation of Josiah. It is typical of Chronicles to
provide some account of wrongdoing to explain a mysterious misfortune,
and the death of a righteous king would be an obvious candidate for such
an addition. It is not necessary to posit that the Chroniclers sole interest
in the battleeld insertion was in redeeming Huldahs image, instead of
in explaining tragedy through sin. After all, other prophets with undis-
puted standing made errors as well. Rather, we may note that the specic
way in which the Chronicler explains righteous Josiahs violent death is
through providing a second, alternate prophecy. Lest it be unclear to his
readers that this is what is happening, the Chronicler spells this out: Josiah
did not listen to the words of Neco from the mouth of God (2 Chr 35:22).
So one impetus for the addition may be the Chroniclers abiding inter-
est in providing cause for otherwise inexplicable tragedy, but the cause he
provides demonstrates his recognitionand smoothing overof Huldahs
mistake.
21. For other ideas on how the sequence of events might relate to Huldahs role
in the reform in Chronicles, see David A. Glatt-Gilad, The Role of Huldahs
Prophecy in the Chroniclers Portrayal of Josiahs Reform, 1631.
22. On this theme, see Japhet, The Ideology of the Book of Chronicles and Its Place in
Biblical Thought, 15076, esp. 16568.
Y6621.indb 158 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Huldah 159
Between the two traditions, then, we have an original story in which

the is assumed to be authoritative, in which her gender is a non-
issueas is her errorand a revision by the notorious clean-up crew of
Chronicles, in which the prophets error is carefully explained awayand
her gender remains a nonissue.
Y6621.indb 159 1/27/15 1:08 PM

10 The Prophet Who
Conceived and Gave
Birth to a Son
The reference to the in the Isaiah memoir is eeting. Yahweh

tells Isaiah to take a stylus and engrave on a large tablet, Le-Maher Sha-
lal Hash Baz. After calling upon his reliable witnesses, Isaiah narrates,
I went to the prophet, and she conceived, and she gave birth to a son
( - , Isa 8:3). Yahweh tells Isaiah to name him
Maher Shalal Hash Baz.
Some have argued that the is not a prophet, but simply Isaiahs
wife, and that she is given her title only for this reason. This has been
shown to be unsupportable. Wildberger has summarized the key arguments
eectively, including for instance that women were not generally referred to
by a feminine form of a husbands title (including the common example of
, queen; we have no example of an Israelite or Judean kings wife so
titled); it seems particularly doubtful that a term such as prophetess would
be the exception and work this way; and that there are clear references else-
where to who are indeed prophets. The main reason not to see the
1. The form (-PN) is the same as that found on many seals, bullae, jar handles,
etc.; whether here this means Concerning Maher, For Maher, or Belonging
to Maher, etc., is open to interpretation. A summary discussion of possibilities
is available in Clements, Isaiah 139, 94.
2. Jensen, Isaiah 139, 101; Ackerman, Isaiah, 173. The implication that the
is not really a prophet is evident also where her title is kept in quotation marks
(the prophetess): Sweeney, Isaiah 139, 167.
3. Wildberger, Isaiah 112, 337, and further bibliography therein; see esp. Jepsen,
Die Nebiah in Jes 8, 3, 26768.
160
Y6621.indb 160 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Prophet Who Conceived and Gave Birth to a Son 161
as a prophetpresumably the only reasonis that the signicance

of her role in the story is unrecognized.
No great signicance should be read into the brevity of Isaiah 8:3. Af-
ter all, Isaiah 8:2 is equally terse: Should we assume that because we are
not told explicitly that Isaiah follows through on Yahwehs instructions to
engrave the tablet that he does not actually do it? That he calls upon reli-
able witnesses instead in regard to the only action he does narrate, namely
his impregnating the ?One would hope not. The narration is terse at
every point, and we have no more reason to doubt that the is a
than to doubt that the witnesses are witnesses, just because we lack a spe-
cic scene that they witness. It is true that the does not speak in this
text. What she does in the story is perform a prophetic symbolic act: she
bears a sign-child. This woman literally delivers an oracle.
The Prophetic Symbolic Act of the

Here again, some interpreters nd negative meaning in the brevity of
the text. While obviously this prophet is not the one in the spotlight in
Isaiah, rather than assuming she is a passive vessel, we should aim to iden-
tify what the verse is actually describing: the performs a prophetic
symbolic act. She embodies her message, in a rather signicant commit-
ment to the prophetic sign-act. Such sign-acts appear elsewhere in the
book as well, as in Isaiah 20, where Isaiah goes naked and barefoot for three
years as a sign and wonder ( , Isa 20:3); compare the conclusion
to this story, where Isaiah proclaims that he and the children Yahweh has
given him are for signs and wonders ( , Isa 8:18).
Maher Shalal Hash Baz is explicitly a sign-child, and his birth is part
of a broader sign-act: Maher Shalal Hash Baz is literally written as a sign
for people to read, even before it is given to him as a name. Isaiah is told
to take a large tablet and engrave it with this phrase (Isa 8:1). Then Isaiah
4. Fuchs, for example, reads the as a sexual object and reproductive object,
and summarizes: The female prophetic word is replaced and displaced by the
female body (Prophecy and the Construction of Women, 65).
5. The tablet should be large presumably because it was for public display, as noted
by Wildberger, Isaiah 112, 33435; Kaiser, Isaiah 112, 180; and Blenkinsopp, Isa-
iah 139, 23738. For discussion of divergent understandings of the tablet and
stylus, see Clements, Isaiah 139, 94, and Wildberger, Isaiah 112, 33032.
Y6621.indb 161 1/27/15 1:08 PM

calls upon witnesses, and later Yahweh tells him what to name the child.
These details tell of the role of Isaiah, the childs father. However, the verse
attributing agency to the , the childs mother, is not parenthetical. He
went; she conceived; she gave birth. The story is overtly one of prophetic
symbolic action, and, not to put too ne a point on it, most of this action
is hers.
But in the ancient Israelite context, would not this still be viewed as
Isaiahs action? It is not so clear. Ordinarily, perhapscompare the case
of Gomer, discussed shortlybut two factors indicate that this is not so.
First, we are told exactly one thing about the woman in this story about a
prophetic sign-act: she is a prophet. Second, we have stories demonstrat-
ing that women were known to have agency in conception, and not just
to be passive vessels, as is sometimes the caricature of ancient perspectives
(consider Rachel, Leah, and the mandrakes; Gen 30). Should our default
assumption be that the prophet who conceives and bears the sign-child
in Isaiah 8:3 has agency or not? She is referred to as a ;there is no
indication that the title here is an exception, being suddenly meaningless;
and she is instrumental in the enactment of the sign over a long period of
time (nine months; cf. Isaiahs three years of nakedness). This is not to say
that the action is all hers: both prophets participate in the sign-act. One
6. Isaiahs part is also specied: the verb should be understood with its sexual
connotation here, as in Lev 18:6, Deut 22:14, Ezek 18:6, and elsewhere.
7. Fischer briey discusses the text from a similar angle, observing that the female
prophet is an integral part of the symbolic action, and that the importance of the
action is stressed by the fact that both people involved are prophets (Gotteskn-
derinnen, 214, 21617). She is not sure Isaiah is the childs father, however, so it is
unclear exactly what his involvement would be (p. 197). Fischers focus, however,
is on identifying the Isa 8 prophet as a successor to the women who served at
the tent of meeting, whom she reads as cult prophets (pp. 96108, 191, 2056).
Gafney also has a sentence identifying the prediction, conception, gestation, and
delivery of the child as a joint prophetic undertaking between Isaiah and the
Woman-Prophet (Daughters of Miriam, 104). This does not appear to be cen-
tral to her understanding of the womans prophetic activity; she concludes, The
reasons for Isaiahs identication of this woman as a prophet are lost; yet one
may assume that Isaiah understood her to have an authentic prophetic vocation,
whether as an oracular poet, liturgical wordsmith, percussionist, or practitioner
of any of the other activities that fell under this rubric (p. 107). Butting, Fischer,
and Gafney all speculate that this woman reects possible female authorship at
some stage: Butting, that the woman herself may be responsible for some of the
Y6621.indb 162 1/27/15 1:08 PM

prophetic parent carries and gives birth to the sign-child, and the other
receives the words about what he symbolizes.
Perhaps the elaboration of the sign-childs name provides a nice reec-
tion of this shared prophetic agency: For before the boy knows how to call
out, My father! or My mother! the wealth of Damascus and the spoil of
Samaria will be carried o before the king of Assyria (8:4). Out of context,
this would seem to mean only, while the boy is still talking baby talk. We
have just heard about this particular child and his particular parents, how-
ever; the image is of Maher calling out to his father and mother, to Isaiah
and the . While not signicant in itself, this casts a warm light on the
end of the story of the shared symbolic action of Isaiah and the .
The events of chapter 8 are part of a still broader series of symbolic
actions beginning in chapter 7. Maher is not the only sign-child in this
story. The rst is Isaiahs son Shear Yashuv. He has no birth story, but his
role as a prophetic symbol is evident in his name, in Yahwehs instruction
to Isaiah to bring him along to prophesy to Ahaz (Isa 7:3), and by analogy
with the other two sign-children in Isaiah 78. The sons symbolic function
is highlighted through his fathers oracle, which is marked by repeated ref-
erences to other men only as sonsthat is, he calls them only the son of
Remaliah (7:4, 5, 9) and the son of Tabeal (7:6). This is unusual, and four
such usages in a six-verse oracle are striking. Isaiah brings his son before the
king, and then refers to these men (though not Rezin) only as sons, with
the thrust of his message alluded to in the name of his own son by his side.
The juxtaposition of sons in the passage is pointed, and Isaiahs son Shear
Yashuv stands out as a potent sign.
The story of the second sign-child immediately follows. Ask for a sign
from Yahweh your god, says Yahweh to Ahaz (Isa 7:11). Upon the kings
refusal, Isaiah proclaims to the house of David, Therefore the Lord himself
will give you a sign: the young woman is pregnant, and she will give birth
to a son, and she will give him the name Immanu El (7:14). The sign is
not only the infant himself, but the pregnancy and the birth of the baby as
prophetic writing attributed to men (Prophetinnen Gefragt, 9); Fischer, that a

post-exilic prophecy group dominated by women writes itself into the prophetic
books through this womanand thus that women must have had a signicant
role in the redaction of the Bible, in addition to being involved in the writing
of the prophetic books from the beginning (Gottesknderinnen, 216, 218); and
Gafney, that this woman could be responsible for some of the material in 2 Isa
(Daughters of Miriam, 107).
Y6621.indb 163 1/27/15 1:08 PM

well. While the traditional Christian interpretation of this oracle seems to

overlook the infants historical relevance in Isaiahs own time, it does also
rest on an understanding of the fact that the womans pregnancy itself is
portrayed as a sign, which is something more historically oriented readings
at times miss.
Although the identity of the is not specied for the reader, she
is not a mysterious future gure, a young woman, but probably someone
known to Isaiah, the young woman. In this case we are not told who the
father is either, though we might make an educated guess as to paternity,
since the sign-children in the immediately preceding and following texts are
Isaiahs, and after the set of three he makes reference to his multiple sign-
children (Isa 8:18). Some commentators argue that the is Isaiahs wife,
and that the is Isaiahs wife, and thus that these are the same woman.
This strikes me as a series of compounded assumptions: rst that Immanu
El is Isaiahs son, second that a woman Isaiah impregnated must have been
married to him, and third that he must have had only one wife. Each of
these is possible, but the identication of the and the as the same
woman and namely Isaiahs wife relies on too many combined uncertainties.
At the same time, this sign-child is in some ways closely connected to the
next. While Immanu El is still eating baby food, the northern alliance will be
defeated (7:1516); while Maher is still talking baby talk, they will fall (8:4).
That the reference to the giving birth to a sign-child is preceded
by these two other stories of sign-childrenone of whom has no backstory,
and the other of whom is born to an of uncertain identityraises the
question of exactly what aspect of this prophets pregnancy and childbear-
ing constitutes divinatory activity. It is certainly not simply that bearing a
sign-child makes one a diviner.
8. The verse can reasonably be interpreted to mean either that the woman is already
pregnant, reading the rst noun-adjective phrase in the present tense, or that she
will be pregnant, reading as if in the future, following the statement that Yahweh
will give a sign. The latter option might imply that the conception of the child
too is part of the sign.
9. Discussions of the range of views regarding whether Immanu El is Isaiahs son
and whether all three children have the same mother are available in count-
less commentaries; see e.g., Clements, who discusses various options, argues that
all three children are Isaiahs but are not necessarily born to the same woman,
but concludes that the is Isaiahs wife (Isaiah 139, 8082, 88); and Kaiser,
who address a range of categories of interpretations, and also notes that Jerome,
Rashi, and Ibn Ezra all saw Immanu El as Isaiahs son (Isaiah 112, 15172).
Y6621.indb 164 1/27/15 1:08 PM

The sign-children born to Gomer in Hosea 1 illustrate the point well.

Yahweh tells Hosea to go take a whore of a woman and children of whoring,
for the land utterly whores around ( - ,
Hos 1:2). Hosea complies, taking Gomer as his symbolic whore of a wife,
and three times she conceives and bears a child. The identication of the
infants as signs is overt: each time, Yahweh tells Hosea what to name the
sign-child ( Jezreel, Lo-ruhamah, Lo-ammi) and why. But the reproduction
itself is also a key part of the sign, as is explicit in Yahwehs initial instruc-
tion to Hosea to have children with a whore. Yahweh then addresses the
children directly, telling them what to proclaim to their brothers and sis-
ters, and instructing them to plead with their mother, the whore (Hos 2:36
[Eng. 2:14]). The whoring metaphor is drawn out after this as well, in
elaborate and graphic fashion. It is not only the children born to Gomer
who are signs; the entire picture of the whore who gives birth to the chil-
dren is the sign.
The sign of the whore who gives birth to Hoseas children is empha-
sized with each repetition of the act, with the sign-names and explanations
interspersed: she conceived, and she bore him a son . . . she conceived
again, and bore a daughter . . . when she had weaned Lo-ruhamah, she
conceived and bore a son (Hos 1:3, 6, 8). The signs are not the names alone,
but the events all told. The childrens signicant names are part of a larger
set of birth omens in which the whore giving birth to the prophets children
signies a particular message about Yahwehs relationship with Israel.
Unlike the in Isaiah 8, the mother of Hoseas sign-children does
not act in a divinatory capacity. In Isaiah 8, a character who is called a
prophet participates in a prophetic symbolic act, and we should not assume
she lacks agency; in Hosea, a character who is called a whore is explicitly
part of the sign herself.
So it is not the fact of bearing a sign-child alone that is an indicator of
prophetic function, but the presentation of the actor and the act. In other
words, the fact that the woman who participates in the symbolic action
in Isaiah 8:3 is introduced as a prophet makes it prophetic activity. This is
not as simplistic as it sounds, and is very much like some other areas of
divinatory activity. When the Egyptian baker delivers a sign through his
10. The fact that this is horribly disturbing is not the point here, but perhaps should
not go unmentioned. On a brighter note, it is intriguing that Yahweh speaks
directly to the children and tells them what to proclaim. Would that not consti-
tute prophetic activity on the part of the children?
Y6621.indb 165 1/27/15 1:08 PM

dream, he is not functioning as a diviner (the dream requires interpreta-

tion); when Joseph, the diviner par excellence, delivers a sign through his
dream, it is portrayed as divinatory activity and as a product and signal of
Josephs special divinatory role, even when his brothers too can interpret the
dream. Why? Because Joseph is a dream diviner (and divines more broadly:
, Gen 44:5), so when he has a symbolic dream it is divinatory.
The distinguishing factor in the stories of the births of sign-children is the
description of the mother, just as it is in the description of the dreamer.
The having a sign-child is like the Egyptian baker having a dream;
the having a sign-child is like Joseph having a dream. What prior
assumptions would need to be in place in order not to assume that when a
female prophet gives birth to a sign-child, it is her symbolic action as well,
and not only the fathers? Reading the story as a joint sign-act by the two
prophets seems the most straightforward interpretation.
Isaiah makes one nal remark about his sign-children: I and the chil-
dren Yahweh has given me are signs and wonders in Israel, from Yahweh
of hosts, who dwells in Mount Zion (Isa 8:18). This is immediately fol-
lowed by the sound rejection of necromancy: the writer condemns those
who say, Inquire of the ghosts and spirits that chirp and moanshould
not a people inquire of their gods, the dead, on behalf of the living? This
is notable partly for the juxtaposed comments on dierent types of divina-
tory roles, the one an armation of both Yahweh and his prophet, and the
other a rebuke of necromancers and those who use them. The rebuke is
noteworthy also for its masculine plural address to the necromancers, as
discussed earlier in reference to the woman of En-dor. In that story, we saw
a positive depiction of an individual female necromancer; here, the people
are rebuked for saying to the male (and maybe also female) necromancers:
Inquire ( )of the ghosts and spirits that chirp and moan . . . Yet an-
other point on the spectrum of biblical images of necromancers will come
when a dierent prophet specically targets women who practice necro-
mancy, as we shall soon see.
11. Some have suggested that v. 19 is a later addition, but this is rooted partly in not
seeing a relationship between the comments on dierent types of divinatory
roles. On various possibilities, see Wildberger, Isaiah 112, 36465; Clements,
Isaiah 139, 101; and Kaiser, Isaiah 112, 200. Wildberger, for example, sees v. 19
as an addition, but vv. 1618 as well.
Y6621.indb 166 1/27/15 1:08 PM

11 The Daughters of Your
People Who Prophesy
In the course of a long diatribe against false prophets and prophecy,

Ezekiel lays into a group of women who engage in some shadowy activi-
ties, the description of which (two and a half millennia later) leaves some-
thing to be desired, as far as the details are concerned. The murky picture
includes hunting , making live what should not live and making die
what should not die, and using wrist-fetters and long shawls, with func-
tions about which we can only speculate (Ezek 13:1723). Ezekiel initially
refers to these women as the daughters of your people who prophesy.
As the passage continues, however, it becomes apparent that the activity
mentioned does not include prophecy at all, but something else entirely.
While the lack of prophecy has frequently been observed, there has been
no consensus regarding the something else. The women are accused of
performing some type of false divination that involves hunting and
manipulating life and death. This should be understoodas it has been
quite rarelyas necromancy.
Hocus-Pocus or Divination?
Setting aside for the moment the oddity of Ezekiel introducing these
women as the daughters of your people who prophesy and then embark-
ing on a description of their activities that bears no resemblance to proph-
ecy, the immediate question is whether previous interpretations have really
been so far o the mark. If so few interpreters have understood the passage
as referring to necromancy, is it not more likely that they were reading more
straightforwardly, and that the present reading is a quirk?
167
Y6621.indb 167 1/27/15 1:08 PM

The most common assumption has been that the women of Ezekiel 13
are, whether by this name or another, witches. They are read, for example,
as fortune-tellers engaged in hocus-pocus (Greenberg); as making black
magic (Hals); as performing minor mantic acts and magic (Zimmerli); as
women who deal in magic on the sly and insolent woman soothsayers
engaged in heathen demonism (Eichrodt); and as involved in the occult
(Blenkinsopp). These are not straightforward readings of the text, but over-
simplications that misrepresent the womens activity. Though magic and sor-
cery are complex categories, they function in this type of analysis as a gener-
alization. A notable exception is Nancy Bowen, who interprets the womens
activity as related to medical and ritual aspects of childbirth. Evidence for this
is lacking, though, since there are no references in the text to birth, pregnancy,
children, medical work, or healing, while there are references to divination.
Neither line of interpretationthat the women are doing hocus-pocus
or that they are childbirth specialistsis consistent with the literary con-
text of the oracle. This part of Ezekiel is focused on the condemnation of
what the prophet sees as false divination, and the oracle against women in
13:1723 is framed as a clear parallel to the oracle against false male prophets
in 13:116. Our assumption should be that the womens activity is divinatory,
and the burden would be on those who argue otherwise.
Just before this, in 12:2128, Ezekiel prophesies repeatedly that ev-
ery vision and word will be fullled, for there will no longer be any
empty vision or attering divination in the midst of the House of Israel
( - , Ezek 12:24). Many
of the key terms and phrases in this oracleempty visions, false divina-
tionsappear in various forms over and over again throughout chapter 13
as well.
1. Greenberg, Ezekiel 120, 240; Hals, Ezekiel, 8890; Zimmerli, Ezekiel 1, 296;
Eichrodt, Ezekiel, 169, 172; Blenkinsopp, Ezekiel, 70.
2. Bowen, The Daughters of Your People: Female Prophets in Ezekiel 13:1723,
41733; and again in Bowen, Ezekiel, 7173. Gafney follows Bowens reading
(Daughters of Miriam, 109).
3. Bowen does see her proposed childbirth ritual as part of the womens role as
prophets, but it is not clear how this would work or what the evidence might be.
However, her reasons for this reect a welcome approach: Bowen concisely and
eectively discusses the fallacy of the magic-religion dichotomy and its problem-
atic eects on the interpretation of the text.
Y6621.indb 168 1/27/15 1:08 PM

The Daughters of Your People Who Prophesy 169
The rst section of chapter 13 is an oracle railing against male prophets.

The indictment begins with a repetition of verbal and nominal forms of
heavy enough to appear sarcastic: Prophesy to the prophets of Israel
who prophesy, and say to those who prophesy from their own minds (
-,i13:2) . . . Woe to the foolish proph-
ets who follow after their own spirits not having seen a thing! (13:3). The
prophets (so called again in v. 4), who are said to be like foxes among the ruins,
have seen empty visions and [oered] false divination ( ,
i13:6) and have proclaimed the oracle of Yahweh when Yahweh did not
send them. Ezekiel thus asks again, Did you not see an empty vision, and
speak false divination? ( - ,i13:7).
These key phrases are repeated twice more in verses 89 (once with the pre-
vious noun-adjective pairings switched): Because you have spoken emp-
tiness and envisioned falsehood, Ezekiel proclaims, God will be against
you, against the prophets who envision emptiness and who divine false-
hood ( - . . . ) .
Therefore, Ezekiel says, gone are the prophets of Israel who prophesy to
Jerusalem, and see for it a vision of peace when there is no peace (13:16).
Then Ezekiel is told to turn his face against the daughters of your peo-
ple who prophesy from their own minds ( ,i13:17).
After this introduction paralleling that regarding the male prophets in 13:2,
the oracle against the women continues with a description of mysterious,
eerie activities, and concludes, Therefore you will no longer see empty vi-
sions and practice divination ( -) ,
and I will snatch my people from your hand, and you will know that I am
Yahweh (13:23). The statement that the women have been practicing divina-
tion could not be clearer. With the introduction claiming that they proph-
esy and the conclusion that they will cease to practice divination, there is
no question: the women are diviners. Commentary on their hocus-pocus,
black magic, demonism, activity in the occult, and so on misrepresent
the womens religious function. Labeling their activities as magic of any
kind, even without the added layer of condemnation in these descriptors,
inaccurately presents the women as engaged in an entirely dierent realm
of activity from the men. Such characterizations imply that the men acted
within the religious sphere (even if negatively), while the women were in-
volved in a separate area of magical activity. This is rooted in the notion
that religion and magic are distinct categories, and vividly demonstrates
Y6621.indb 169 1/27/15 1:08 PM

how the outdated theoretical model, whether held consciously or not, ob-
structs our ability to understand the spectrum of Israelite divination. These
labels also reect the tendency to attribute womens religious activity to the
latter category (magic), which then circularly limits our view of womens
activity in Israelite religion.
The passage has only rarely been recognized as referring to necromancy.
In an article on avian spirits, Marjo Korpel examined the representation of
the spirits of the dead as birds or as birdlike in Ugaritic literature and in this
text. Jonathan Stkl has recently argued that the women called munabbitu
in several texts from Emar and the of Ezekiel 13 are in both cases
necromancers, based on internal evidence in each context as well as a new
philological proposal regarding the verbs as equivalent forms.
4. Jost, on the other hand, reads Ezekiels own methods as equally magical, and
sees the text as an example of conicting prophetic positions (The Daughters
of Your People Prophesy, 73). She considers the possibility that the women
might have prophesied (also?) in the name of Ishtar, building on Spiecker-
manns thesis that the text reects Assyrian inuence, noting the presence of
the female prophets of Ishtar of Arbela in the seventh century (pp. 7476). This
seems an unnecessary leap.
5. Korpel, Avian Spirits in Ugarit and in Ezekiel 13, 99113. Van der Toorn also
understands the women of Ezek 13 as necromancers, reading the as the
birdlike spirits of the dead (From Her Cradle to Her Grave, 123; also van der Toorn,
Family Religion in Babylonia, Syria, and Israel, 232). Meyers includes the passage
in a broader discussion of the presentation of women and female gures in
Ezekiel, noting the need to set aside the traditions ideological opposition to the
women as well as the dichotomy between magic and religion, and to recognize
the religious practice of the women. Like Bowen, she reads the womens activity
as related to reproduction, but she mentions that it could possibly be addition-
ally related to necromancy; Meyers, Engendering Ezekiel: Female Figures Re-
considered, 29092. Schmitt sees the passage as having to do partly with spirits
and the dead, but does not mention necromancy; he sees it rather as reecting
a general discomfort with female prophets (Magie im Alten Testament, 36062).
Surprising omissions of the text altogether include Loretz, Nekromantie und
Totenevokation, Tropper, Nekromantie, and Cryer, Divination in Ancient Israel.
6. Stkl, The in Ezekiel 13 Reconsidered, 6176. The verb nb at Emar
can refer to the invocation of the dead in inheritance arrangements. Building
on the previous work of Daniel Fleming, who rst connected the munabbitu
and nb to the biblical Hebrew in terms of both etymology and role as
religious personnel, with the nb involved in divinatory inquiry (explicitly at
Mari) and the munabbitu at Emar involved in a less clear type of invocation,
Y6621.indb 170 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Women Who Hunt

The rarity of the identication of the womens activity as necromancy is
due in part to the obscurity of both language and objects: the references to
the spirits of the dead are couched in metaphor, and the items and practices
are unfamiliar to us. The indications are clear, however, after a bit of unfold-
ing of the evidence.
The oracle is worth including in its entirety:
Woe to those who sew fetters on all wrists and make shawls for heads of
every height, in order to hunt . Will you hunt the of my people
and make your live? You have profaned me to my people for handfuls
of barley and pieces of bread, making die that should not die, and
making live that should not live, while you lie to my people, you who
listen to lies. Therefore thus says the Lord Yahweh: I will go up against your
fetters with which you hunt the like birds, and I will tear them from
your arms and shoo away the that you hunt, the like birds.
I will tear o your shawls and snatch my people from your hand, and they
will no longer be prey in your hands, and you will know that I am Yahweh.
Because you intimidated the righteous with falsehood (and I did not harm
him), and encouraged the wicked not to turn from his evil way that he
might live, you will no longer see empty visions and practice divination,
and I will snatch my people from your hand, and you will know that I am
Yahweh. (Ezek 13:1723)
The items the women use are certainly tools of the trade, though ob-
serving this does not do much to elucidate the process. The women sew
fetters ( )on wrists and make shawls ( )to put upon heads, in
order to hunt ( i13:18). The joints of hands ( ) should logically
be wrists, though it is often read as elbows. The term is exible; in Jer-
emiah 38:12 it must mean armpits, as required by the story line there. The
on the wrists are sometimes rendered cushions, as in later Hebrew,
and the word does seem already to have had this meaning by the time of
the Septuagint, which translates . Instead of reading through
the lens of tannaitic Hebrew, though, observing the many forms of the Ak-
kadian cognate oers a more logical meaning. Akkadian kas A (CAD K
25053) means to put a person in fetters, to bind hands and feet, to bind
Stkl argues that the evidence suggests that the invocation is necromantic, and
also that munabbitu and are equivalent verbal forms. D. Fleming,
Nb and Munabbitu: Two New Syrian Religious Personnel, 17583.
Y6621.indb 171 1/27/15 1:08 PM

magically; kastu (CAD K 243) refers to binding magic; and ksu B (CAD
K 43233) refers to a bond or fetter. The prevalence of wrist-binding in
Mesopotamian magic makes this reading a far more logical choice than
the otherwise-mysterious cushions or elbow pads. The women also make
shawls for heads of every height; the implication is that the shawls should
be long, presumably covering from head to toe.
Questions surrounding the nature of these mysterious items have
often occupied interpreters attention more than the purpose of the
items: the women sew wrist-fetters and so on in order to hunt
() . While we should certainly not think of as the Hellenistic
soul, we should also not overcorrect and lose the sense of as something
like the life force, to use Diethelm Michels preferred term. Greenbergs
translation of the phrase ( v. 18) as the persons of my
people, for instance, has little meaning. The semantic range of does in-
clude the inner life or life force. Beyond this, as Michel and van der Toorn
have argued, can specically refer to a spirit of the dead or ghost.
A key indicator that the in this passage are indeed the spirits
of the dead is their comparison to birds. Ezekiel proclaims Gods judg-
ment: I will go up against your fetters with which you hunt the
7. Other interpretations range from Greenberg on what the prophet scongly

calls cushions and rags (Ezekiel 120, 244), to Korpels reading of the items as
bird-catching nets based in one case on a word she acknowledges is etymologi-
cally unrelated (Avian Spirits, 1023); and very dierently again, to Bowen on
ritual medical paraphernalia of some sort (The Daughters of Your People,
424). Jost suggests that the items may be like tellin and tallit (The Daugh-
ters of Your People Prophesy, 71). Fischer describes the women as fabricating
textiles, and sees this as not related to magic (though she notes the potential
similarity to tellin and tallit as well; Gottesknderinnen, 22829).
8. Greenberg, Ezekiel 120, 233. He later specically dismisses theories based on the
notion of the magical catching of disembodied souls (citing Gaster in particular),
claiming an absence of evidence that nepe ever has such a sense in Hebrew
(Ezekiel 120, 240). The present text is only one of several examples of such exist-
ing evidence. Gaster oers several cross-cultural examples of soul-catching, which
should be useful for someone wishing to update the study from a more contem-
porary perspective (Myth, Legend, and Custom in the Old Testament, 2:61517).
9. Diethelm Michel, Np als Leichnam? 8184. Van der Toorn agrees with
Michels assessment here, and additionally observes the use of nb (which cor-
responds to Akkadian etemmu) in the Panammu inscription KAI 214 (Family
Religion, 232 n.113).
Y6621.indb 172 1/27/15 1:08 PM

like birds [], and I will tear them from your arms and shoo away
the that you hunt, the like birds (13:20). The peculiar form
of can be taken in a few ways, but certainly refers to ying, and
is usually translated like birds. The lamed could also be a possessive, in
which case instead of hunting like birds, the women would hunt
the of the ying ones. All versions of this are rooted in the no-
tion of that y like birds, which conjures up the image of the spirits
of the dead. The bird imagery continues through Yahwehs next warning
as well: I will snatch my people from your hand, and they will no longer
be prey in your hands ( - - ,
13:21).
The use of bird imagery for spirits of the dead is not uncommon in
Near Eastern literature. Consider Enkidus description of his dream to
Gilgamesh:
[He struck] me, he turned me into a dove.
[He bound] my arms like (the wings of ) a bird,
to lead me captive to the house of darkness, the seat of Irkalla:
10. Even Greenberg, who reads as persons rather than any kind of spirits
and nds the lamed of unclear, translates like birds on the basis of Ara-
maic , bird. Allen, who nds the lamed dicult with either a participle,
ying, or a noun, bird, points to Cornills proposition (in the following foot-
note) and suggests the phrase (let go free) into the state of persons who y
away. Greenberg, Allen, and Zimmerli all point to the Aramaic stem , to
y, and all suggest the comparison to a bird escaping from a snare in Ps 124:7;
Greenberg and Zimmerli additionally note the comparison to Prov 6:5 (Green-
berg, Ezekiel 120, 24041; Allen, Ezekiel 119, 191; Zimmerli, Ezekiel 1, 289).
11. The textual issues in v. 20 of the odd - and the repetition of do
not aect the issues at stake here. It is possible that - is not only an
oddity but an error, but the most common proposal would still seem to describe
necromancy: Cornills widely noted speculation was that - was origi-
nally , free, based on the phrase , set free, as in Deut
15:1213 and elsewhere (Das Buch des Propheten Ezechiel, 251). Others have had
simpler responses, for instance, Brownlee: All critics of the passage have been
aware of an excess number of souls in the passage. It is usual to delete several
(Exorcising the Souls from Ezekiel 13:1723, 369). One could of course note
the excess number of passages in Brownlees statement for an example of such
redundancies as an authors own work.
12. The mention of people in this verse does not aect the reading of as the
spirits of the dead; in Ezek 26:20, the people in Sheol are called the .
Y6621.indb 173 1/27/15 1:08 PM

to the house which those who enter cannot leave,

on the journey whose way cannot be retraced;
to the house whose residents are deprived of light,
where dust is their sustenance, their food clay.
They are clad like birds in coats of feathers,
And they cannot see light but dwell in darkness.
Much of this passage also appears in the descriptions of the underworld

in The Descent of Ishtar (li. 410) and Nergal and Ereshkigal (iii 15).
After the parallel section, Nergal and Ereshkigal adds, [they moan] like
doves (iii 7). The key line describing the dead as clad like birds in coats
of feathers appears in all three texts (for Gurney, birds in garments of
wings; iii 4). On this line in The Descent of Ishtar (li. 10), Dalley notes that
the image of feathered creatures in the underworld is common in Mesopo-
tamian iconography as well.
The use of bird imagery for the dead has been observed by Spronk and
Korpel, among others. Spronk oers a range of examples of the widespread
use of such imagery, including its important place in Egyptian religion, the
winged Ugaritic rpum, representation of the spirits of the dead as uttering
birds in Greek funerary art and its use in Homer (Od. 11, 207 and 222; 24, 69),
and more, as far aeld as Arabic and Persian concepts of the dead as birds;
and related to this, the many Mesopotamian and Canaanite winged demons.
While a few of these examples seem less certain on the basis of either the ety-
mology or the relevance of the cultural origin, the more certain and relevant
examples are more than enough to demonstrate the theme.
13. SBV Gilg VII 182190; George, The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic, 1:645.
14. The passage in Nergal and Ereshkigal begins at the end of column ii but is
reconstructed in Gurneys edition of the Sultantepe version I use here, with
line numbers unknown due to missing lines beforehand; Gurney, The Sultan-
tepe Tablets VII. The Myth of Nergal and Ereshkigal, 115; Lapinkivi, The Neo-
Assyrian Myth of Itars Descent and Resurrection.
15. Dalley, Myths from Mesopotamia, 160 n.3.
16. At times including reference to one or more of the above passages. In addition
to Spronk and Korpel, note Bottro, La mythologie de la mort en Msopota-
mie ancienne, esp. 34; and Lewis, Cults of the Dead, 131.
17. Spronk, Beatic Afterlife in Ancient Israel and in the Ancient Near East, 100,
100 n.3, and bibliography. On the rpum, see Johannes de Moor, Demons in
Canaan, 11718.
18. For further examples and bibliography, see (in addition to Spronk, above) Kor-
pel, Avian Spirits, 99100, and Gaster, Myth, Legend, and Custom in the Old
Y6621.indb 174 1/27/15 1:08 PM

In her work on avian spirits, Korpel focuses rst on some Ugaritic ma-
terial, arguing that the Ugaritic rpum texts demonstrate that in Canaanite
religion there existed a form of magic which enabled man to call up the
spirits of the dead in the form of birds, and then observes the presence
of such a tradition in Ezekiel 13. A few others have also recognized that
the use of bird imagery in Ezekiel 13 signies that the are the spirits
of the dead. Van der Toorn notes that the women in this text attempt to
communicate with the spirits of the dead. The latter are called souls by
Ezekiel. According to a gloss in the text, meant as a clarication, they are
ying souls, an expression based on the idea that the dead can manifest
themselves in the shape of birds.
Those who address the presence of this tradition in Ezekiel 13 seem
to see it as exceptional in the Bible, or perhaps point to Isaiah 8:19. Even
Korpel argues against the idea that the reference to birds in Ezekiel 13 is a
late gloss partly on the grounds that the idea of avian spirits is so foreign
to the Old Testament but so common in ancient Canaanite folk religion.
In fact, the traditional use of bird imagery for the spirits of the dead is not
so foreign to biblical traditions.
The birdlike qualities of the spirits of the dead are visible in several other
biblical texts. The clearest picture of this comes from a selection of texts in
First Isaiah, where ghosts and birds are both described as chirping, in the
same terms. Consider the hypothetical request for necromancy in Isaiah
Testament, 769 (whose interests include occurrences of the idea that cannot be
related, such as in China and Indonesia). Hays discusses the use of bird imagery
for the dead in light of animal imagery more broadly (Chirps from the Dust:
The Aiction of Nebuchadnezzar in Daniel 4:30 in Its Ancient Near Eastern
Context, 30525).
19. Korpel, Avian Spirits, 102. If the strongest form of her thesis is not fully proven,
the general association between birds and the spirits of the dead certainly is.
Her arguments regarding certain details of Ezek 13, such as her proposal that
the items used by the women are bird-catching paraphernalia (pp. 1023), are
not necessary to the basic point.
20. Van der Toorn, From Her Cradle to Her Grave, 123.
21. Spronk mentions Isa 8:19 and 10:14, but also 59:11, which is quite dierent (Be-
atic Afterlife, 255). Lewis, conversely, notes the bird imagery in his discussion of
Isa 8:1920, but does not address Ezek 13 (Cults of the Dead, 131).
22. Korpel, Avian Spirits, 104. If the references to birds were an addition, all this
would demonstrate is that at an early date, the somewhat opaque text about
hunting was interpreted as referring to spirits of the dead.
Y6621.indb 175 1/27/15 1:08 PM

8:19, mentioned in the previous chapter: Inquire of the ghosts and spir-
its that chirp and moan ( - -) .
The verbs and are used together to describe the chirping and
moaning of birds elsewhere in First Isaiah: I chirp like [such-and-such
type of bird], I moan like a dove ( , Isa 38:14).
In Isaiah 29:4, is used alone in the comparison of the doomed city
to a ghost: You will be brought low and speak from the earth, and your
speech will be from below the dust; your voice will be like a ghost from
the earth, and your speech will chirp from the dust (
) . Assyrias
imagined boast in Isaiah 10:14 similarly uses alone: Assyria has raided
the people like raiding a nest and gathering the eggs, and not one apped
a wing or opened a beak and chirped ( ,
Isa 10:14). Thus, within the (relative) control group of First Isaiah, we hear
of chirping ghosts in 8:19 ( )and 29:4 (), and chirping birds
in 10:14 ( )and 38:14 ( ;)Isaiah 8:19 pairs the ghosts chirping
with moaning () , the same pairing of sounds attributed
to birds in 38:14 () .
Make Your Live

So the women in Ezekiels diatribe are condemned for hunting the
spirits of the dead. What do they then do with them? Ezekiel asks the
women, Will you hunt the of my people, and make your live?
() . This statement is often taken to
mean and make your own live, but in context this makes no sense.
Your refers to the that the women have just hunted, which
are now theirs (belonging to them, or in their control). This is further clari-
ed in the next verse, which describes the women manipulating the spirits,
making die that should not die, and making live that should
not live (- -) .
Given that this is an oracle explicitly against some kind of divination
(you will no longer see empty visions and practice divination, Ezek 13:23),
the sense of making spirits of the dead live here must refer to necromantic
communication. The use of chirping ghost imagery in the condemnation of
necromancy in Isaiah 8:19 further supports this. Moreover, we know that
23. The later idea of the chirping of angels must be rooted in this tradition as well.
Y6621.indb 176 1/27/15 1:08 PM

the specic concept of raising spirits is indeed within the Israelite imagi-
nation. The story in 1 Samuel 28, though dierent from this oracle in so
many ways, oers a clear precedent for the interpretation of the raising of
a spirit or ghost (there called an ). The beliefs and practices behind
these two texts may be quite dierent, just as the terminology is dierent,
but we do see the shared notion of making spirits of the dead live for the
sake of divination.
This then begins to get at what it means to make live that
should not live. What then about the preceding phrase, to make die
that should not die? While this adds to the murky picture of the women
manipulating death, the precise meaning is not obvious. It should not be
read as literally killing people (hence my somewhat awkward choice of to
make die). There is another text that helps elucidate this phrase. The only
other biblical text in which a person is said to hunt is Proverbs 6:26,
there in reference to the predatory activity of the dangerous woman. The
term does not refer to literal necromancy in that text, but is an example
of the use of necromantic imagery that runs throughout the depictions of
dangerous women in Proverbs 19.
The relationship between the various representations of women in
Proverbs 19 is not altogether clear, but in brief, the portrayals of dangerous
women in those chapters are closely related to one another, not only in their
function but in their shared use of specic phrasing and imagery. If they
are not meant to form one consistent image, they are certainly overlapping
personications with recurring images and consistent behavior. In addi-
tion to the rst point of connection with Ezekiel 13 (the hunting of ),
those personications include the comparison of the womans prey to birds
(cf. Ezek 13:20), and the repeated images of a dangerous woman sending
people to Sheol. It is this last connection that most concerns us here.
This is a central theme in the representations of dangerous women in
Proverbs 19: her house sinks down to death and her tracks to the ;
none who come to her return and reach the paths of life (2:1619); her
feet go down to death, her steps take hold of Sheol (5:5); her house is the
pathway of Sheol, descending to the chambers of death (7:27); and nally,
the foolish woman invites innocent passersby into her home, but her po-
tential prey does not know that the are there, that her guests are in
24. These issues, as well as that of the necromantic imagery and metaphor in Prov-
erbs 19, are addressed in full in ch. 15 of this book.
Y6621.indb 177 1/27/15 1:08 PM

the depths of Sheol (9:18). Returning to Ezekiel 13, the accusation that the
women who hunt are making die that should not die may
be at least somewhat clearer. In whatever precise sense, these women who
manipulate death are seen as able to send their prey down to Death.
We must also consider that the two key phrasesto make die and to
make live, in that orderare not paired strictly as a description of necro-
mancy. This plays on an earlier tradition in which Yahweh does just these
things. Ezekiel deftly gives a sense both of the womens activity itself, the
manipulation of death, and of what he sees as the proper view that renders
the womens activity transgressive. In the Song of Moses, we nd: See
now that I, I am he, and there is no god beside me! I make die and make
live, I have wounded and I will heal, and no one snatches out of my hand
( . . . , Deut 32:39). In Hannahs
prayer as well: Yahweh makes die and makes live, sends down to Sheol
and raises up ( , 1 Sam 2:6). Ezekiel 13 takes
up this tradition, implying that it is because only Yahweh actually makes
die and makes live that he will put an end to the divination of the necro-
mancers. Yahweh will destroy the instruments of the necromancers work,
those fetters and shawls, and says twice, I will snatch my people from your
hand ( -) , and you will know that I am Yahweh.
What Exactly Makes This Necromancy False?

The divination performed by this group of women is unquestionably
described in strongly negative terms. This is a dierent issue from in pre-
cisely what sense it was deemed false. Given the variety of measures for
recognizing false divination named in dierent traditions (cf. Deut 13:24
and Deut 18:2022), as well as the tolerance of an eective act of Yahwistic
necromancy in 1 Samuel 28, the identication of the women as necroman-
cers is not quite enough to explain the accusation of falsehood.
The section begins with the order to Ezekiel to turn his face against
the daughters of his people who prophesy from their own minds (Ezek
13:17). It is clear immediately what is wrong with their activitytheir divi-
nation comes from their own minds rather than from Yahwehbut it is
25. I use snatch in these proclamations rather than deliver in order to capture
the sense of competition over control of the spirits (from the inability of others
to take from Yahweh in the Song of Moses, to Yahwehs taking of the spirits in
Ezek 13), while setting this o against the image of the snaring of birds.
Y6621.indb 178 1/27/15 1:08 PM

well worth noticing what is not wrong: the women are said to prophesy.
The use of the hitpael in verse 17 has frequently been taken as a signier of
pretense, that is, women who play the prophet. The hitpael of this verb
does not imply pretense, however. This is evident, for instance, in Ezekiels
use of the hitpael in reference to his own prophecy (Ezek 37:10), as noted
already by Wilson in 1979. He argued that the original sense of the hitpael
was indeed to act like a prophet, but without a sense of fabrication. It
meant, rather, to act as a prophet does, to exhibit characteristic prophetic
behavior, which as he notes would dier from group to group as well as
over time. Wilsons many examples include the clear illustration of 1 Kings
22:8, 10, 18, in which the prophecy of both Micaiah and the court prophets
is described in the hitpael. Thus, at the very least, the use of the verb in
Ezekiel 13:17 does not indicate that the women were only pretending to
prophesy. Beyond that, it could possibly suggest that Ezekiel saw them as
exhibiting what he understood to be characteristic prophetic behavior. One
interesting possibility: if what seemed characteristic to Ezekiel was his own
prophecy (37:10), and he was prone to elaborate visions, and he describes
the women as prophesying and having visions, it is possible that in some
ways their divination resembled his own.
Ezekiel does charge the women with lying, but even here, the implica-
tion is not just that the women are deceiving, but that they are themselves
deceived. Ezekiel accuses them of making live while you lie to my
people, you who listen to lies () . The phrase
is usually taken to refer to the people who listen to lies, that is, those
listening to the women, but the masculine plural of should not be
decisive, since the previous phrase that explicitly refers to the women also
has a masculine plural sux () . There are several such anoma-
lous masculine suxes in the passage, and it makes sense to read this full
phrase as including matching suxesthe women tell lies and listen to
lies. This corresponds to the end of the oracle, where Ezekiel concludes
26. Greenberg, Ezekiel 120, 233, 239.

27. Wilson, Prophecy and Ecstasy, 32936, quotation 33031. Even Fischer, who
sees the text as a case study in the dangers of false prophecy (which for her
means that the writers had in mind these prophets failures to function as suc-
cessors to Moses), notes that translations of the hitpael as second-class proph-
ecy only reect the bias of translators (Gottesknderinnen, 22130).
28. Wilson, Prophecy and Ecstasy, 335.
29. Note in v. 20 and in v. 21.
Y6621.indb 179 1/27/15 1:08 PM

that the women will no longer see empty visionsthat is, he refers to them
listening to falsehood in verse 19 and seeing falsehood in verse 23. This is
also in line with the oracle against the male false prophets, who see false
visions and hear and see lies (13:69). Again, the women are told that they
will no longer see visions; in other words, they have been until now. The
perspective of the text is that these women are in fact experiencing visions.
Their divination is also not false in the sense of being spoken in the
name of a god other than Yahweh. The implication of verse 19, You have
profaned me to my people (-) , is that these women have
indeed spoken in Yahwehs name. From their perspective, their divination
is Yahwistic. From the authors perspective, they have gotten it all dead
wrong (and you will know that I am Yahweh!), but not because they have
spoken in the name of some other god. On the contrary, the oense is pre-
cisely that they have spoken falsely in the name of this god.
Nonetheless, their divination is eective. As in many other texts, the
identication of the divinatory activity as false does not mean that it was
perceived as ineectual (cf. Deut 13:24 [Eng. 13:13]). This is consistent
with the view of other maligned religious practices, which may be spurned
for any number of reasons, but not because they are assumed to be unpro-
ductiveconsider, for instance, the king of Moabs eective child sacrice
in 2 Kings 3:27, which accomplishes its goal and causes Israel to retreat
(regardless of child sacrice having been banned along with foreign divi-
nation in Deut 18:10). Ezekiels oracle states that the women have in fact
been making die that should not die, and making live that
should not live. Yahwehs response will be to strip them of the tools of their
trade, thus preventing them from successfully continuing in their activities.
As Eichrodt puts it, Ezekiel did not doubt the ecacy of the womens acts
in the name of Yahweh, but condemns the falsehood of their claim to be
acting with Gods commission or according to his will.
It is also not the fact that the women are paid for their work that makes
it false. We see that many Yahwistic prophets were professionals. Neither
is it a matter of greed, even among professionals. They receive handfuls
of barley and pieces of breada rather modest living, as Jost points out.
30. Contra, e.g., Hals, who assumes it must be some form of syncretistic practice
(Ezekiel, 89).
31. Eichrodt, Ezekiel, 17172.
32. Jost, The Daughters of Your People Prophesy, 71. Greenbergs alternate ex-
planation of the barley and bread not as payment but as used in divination has
Y6621.indb 180 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Lastly, there is no indication of greater suspicion because they are female, as

we see from the accusation against mens false divination in the rst oracle
of chapter 13.
So the women are said to prophesy with no implication of pretense;
they do so based on visions Ezekiel believes they are actually having; they
perform their divination in the name of Yahweh; and it is assumed to be ef-
fective. What then makes it false? From Ezekiels perspective, the women
are mistakentheir lying is not a matter of inventing messages or proph-
esying in the name of another god, but of eectively divining in the name
of Yahweh and being wrong. The crux of the problem is that their faulty
divination is persuasive.
The reasons given in the oracle for stopping the womens visions are
that they have profaned Yahweh to his people, intimidated the righteous
with falsehood, and encouraged the wicked not to turn from his way. This
then appears to be a matter of authority and accessthe authority to claim
divination in the name of Yahweh, access to divine knowledge, and ac-
cess to the people. Ezekiels Yahweh warned the women in verse 21 that he
would snatch my people from your hand, and they will no longer be prey
in your hands; the oracle ends with Ezekiels second iteration of this: you
will no longer see empty visions and practice divination, and I will snatch
my people from your hand, and you will know that I am Yahweh (v. 23). In
other words, because of the womens eective divination in Yahwehs name,
the people have ended up in the wrong hands. (It is a nice touch that we
get to see competition over control of the spirits: the are prey in the
womens hands, but Yahweh will shoo them away and snatch the birds from
their hand . . . at which point they are in his.)
These women represent a competing religious view within Yahwistic
divination. Yahwism is in the eye of the beholder (diviner, worshipper): just
as Jeroboam may have seen his golden calves as Yahwistic, while the author
of the Kings story did not, these women engaged in Yahwistic necromancy,
but the writer of Ezekiel 13 opposed them. According to the oracle, the
women have so far been successful in a religious power struggle, as they
have intimidated the righteous and encouraged the wicked. As a group
its appeal, but seems unlikely. He notes that in Mesopotamia breadcrumbs are
oered exclusively to ghosts, citing Oppenheim, but this is only a possibility
Oppenheim considers, and he specically distinguishes the scattering of bread-
crumbs from actual bread, which is what is mentioned in Ezek 13. Greenberg,
Ezekiel 120, 240; Oppenheim, Analysis of an Assyrian Ritual (KAR 139), 258.
Y6621.indb 181 1/27/15 1:08 PM

of people experiencing visions and prophesying in the name of Yahweh,

presumably their interpretation of this would be dierent. Ezekiel may
condemn their manipulation of , but from his own oracle we see that
the women were convinced by their divination. Even Ezekiel himself can-
not say anything of the women other than that their visions are wrong: this
is not a portrait of malice, but a window onto an inner-Yahwistic divinatory
conict.
In some cases the source of conict between diviners is easily identi-
able, as when prophets serve dierent gods and thus dierent social groups,
the classic example being Elijah and the prophets of Baal in 1 Kings 18. In
other cases, what identies prophets as representatives of dierent social
groups is less clear. Though Ezekiel portrays the women in this text as of-
fensive to Yahweh, his rhetoric reveals that this is because they are acting
in Yahwehs name. Bowen, who comes to a similar conclusion regarding
the oracle as reecting conict within Yahwism, identies the core issue
as Ezekiels desire to squelch the diversity of lingering pre-exilic Judahite
Yahwistic practices. Whether Ezekiel objected to a range of lingering
practices, or specically Yahwistic necromancy, this condemnation would
only be warranted if Ezekiel saw the womens activity as a threat. The evi-
dence beyond this oracle also indicates that we might be seeing a type of
divination of some lasting social signicance.
Taken alone, this oracle might only point to a particular group of
women whose practices Ezekiel opposed. The combined picture of the
various necromancy texts, however, suggests something greater. We have
one story in which a king consults a necromancer, whose work is eective,
whose portrayal is positive, and whose title is analogous to a normal Ak-
kadian term for necromancer; several admonitions against inquiring of the
dead, indicating that this was something people were doing; and this oracle,
in which the necromancers pose a threat because they are seen to actually
make live, and practice in Yahwehs name (thus profaning it). I noted
earlier the expansive vocabulary relating to ghosts and spirits of the dead in
1 Samuel 28. The range of terminology relating to necromancy overallto
the spirits of the dead, to the practitioners, to the practicethroughout
these texts all told becomes quite extensive indeed. The combined evidence,
which includes a variety of literary genres, perspectives, and terminology,
indicates that this form of divination had a stronger presence than is some-
33. Bowen, The Daughters of Your People, 431.
Y6621.indb 182 1/27/15 1:08 PM

times assumednaturally enough, considering the long-standing practice

elsewhere in the region.
Moreover, these texts indicate that the practice of necromancy was not
always seen as incompatible with Yahwism. The medium of En-dor pro-
vides the king with the access to the word of Yahweh that he has been
seekingrst through dreams, urim, and prophets, and now through the
necromancerand the daughters of your people who prophesy lead the
righteous astray and profane Yahweh by making live in his name.
The conict between these women and the Ezekiel school is less like that
between Elijah and the prophets of Baal than like the competition between
Jeremiah and Hananiah.
Ezekiel sees this divination as false not because it is ineective, idol-
atrous, and so on, but because it is not: these successful necromancers pose
a threat within Yahwism, and they are perhaps more examples than outliers.
Y6621.indb 183 1/27/15 1:08 PM

12 The Women of Joels
Radical Vision
The day of Yahweh is coming! Violence and destruction, starvation and

misery, re and droughtall manner of gloom and anguish will prevail on
that day ( Joel 1:152:11). But perhaps there is still time to repent; and then
there will be abundant rains and rich produce and heaps of wheat and vats
of wine and the grazing animals will have nothing to fear and everyone will
eat and be satised and there will be no more shame (2:1227)! And then,
Joel says, and then: Afterward, I will pour out my spirit on all esh, and
your sons and your daughters will prophesy; your old men will have dreams,
and your young men will see visions. Even on the servant boys and servant
girls will I pour out my spirit in those days! Joels great vision in 3:12
(Eng. 2:2829) is famous for its radical inclusivity. In the time to come, says
Joel, everyone will have access to divine knowledge.
This could be taken as a warm and wonderful statement about the equal-
ity of all humankind, except for one detail: the entire point is that this image
reects how things arent. Like the image of the impossibly rich abundance
in nature that precedes it, this is a picture of something seen as both ideal
and unattainable, thrown out into the imagined eschatological future. The
apocalyptic oracle continues with a series of omens of the kind that typically
accompany visions of the end times: And I will give signs in the skies and
on the earth! Blood, and re, and plumes of smoke! The sun will be turned
into darkness, and the moon into blood (3:34 [Eng. 2:3031]). So we see
two things in Joels oracle: that there was a concept of the broad distribution
of divinatory access as an ideal, and that it was seen as not realizable in the
authors present, or perhaps in the regular course of history.
184
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The Women of Joels Radical Vision 185
So what does this eschatological ideal look like to Joel? There is the
obvious symbolic representation of the whole spectrum of society: the sons
and daughters, the old men and young men, and even the male and female
servants. There is also a range of types of divination: prophesying, dream-
ing, and having visions, all brought about by Yahweh pouring out his spirit
on all esh.
But this is worth a pause: if all of this is sparked by Yahweh choosing to
pour his spirit onto everyone (as repeated in both verses), why then would
he not have done this before? The answer remains a bit of a mystery: Yah-
weh is ckle, and pours out his spirit on whomever he chooses. Apparently
it is only in the imagined future that this will include all types of people.
Such disavowal of human responsibility for the distinctions between who
can prophesy and who cannot is not out of place among biblical texts, but
if this oracle is characterized by an element of social revolution, as Wol
writes, it is essentially a revolution against Yahwehs previous choices.
Wol notes that Joels oracle is a promise of the fulllment of Moses
wish in Numbers 11:29. Moses exclaims there, Would that all the people
of Yahweh were prophets, that Yahweh would put his spirit on all of them!
Finally, in the last days, as Joel imagines them, Yahweh will catch up.
1. Though note that women of a certain age seem to be missing.

2. Wol, Joel and Amos, 67. Perhaps Stuart has got it right, if possibly with a spin he
did not intend, referring to the democratization of the Spirit. Apparently it was
Yahweh who needed a little more democracy (Stuart, Hosea-Jonah, 260).
3. Wol, Joel and Amos, 67.
4. Though Wol sees the image in Joel as being only about the existence of proph-
ets, and not about prophetic utterance. He argues that Joel envisions a nation
of prophets, simply living in relation to Yahweh, but not proclaiming anything
(ibid., 66). This is unsupportable partly because Joel explicitly says that people
will prophesy, and partly because there is no evidence whatsoever for such a
concept. The term nation of prophets also seems a bit sketchy for its implied
juxtaposition with nation of priests (i.e., the kingdom of priests and holy na-
tion that is actually mentioned in Exod 19:6, unlike a hypothetical nation of
prophets). In addition, Mosess exclamation in Numbers 11 is in direct response
to a complaint about people going around prophesying.
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13 Noadiah
The passing reference to Noadiah ( Neh 6:14), the last named

female prophet, is too brief to warrant concluding much of anything at
all, except for that our hero Nehemiah sees her as an enemy. In this, she is
in good company. The story of Nehemiah so far has included intermittent
opposition and mockery from Tobiah and Sanballat, among others (Neh
2:10, 19; 4:17). As our text begins, Nehemiahs enemies are plotting various
ways to interfere with his work. In one of their more creative moves, they
hire a prophet, Shemaiah, to tell Nehemiah he had better run for the hills
(or the temple). Nehemiah gures out the ruse and shakes his st in the
air at Tobiah, Sanballat, and also Noadiah the prophet, and the rest of the
prophets who have been intimidating me (6:14).
The scene is rife with such conict. Sanballat has recently written
Nehemiah a letter, accusing him of having wrangled some prophets into
proclaiming that he, Nehemiah, would be king (Neh 6:57). This could be
Sanballats ction, of course, part of a great smear campaign against Ne-
hemiah (which is certainly how the latter sees it), but it could also be that
there were in fact many active prophets with a range of views, with each
party denouncing the prophets who represented opposing views, in a classic
prophetic conict.
It is interesting that in this exchange (Neh 6:7 and 6:14), Sanballat
and Nehemiah do not depict the prophets who oppose their positions as
false, but as having been deployed and manipulated by the otherSan-
ballat sees them as Nehemiahs pawns, and vice versa. The threat is not that
of so-called false prophets, but of powerful political adversaries who use
186
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Noadiah 187
multiple means of opposition, one of which is some maneuvering of

prophets.
Perhaps Noadiah is one of the prophets being handled by Sanballat
and friends, actually acting with the goal of scaring Nehemiah into submis-
sion; or perhaps we should take into account Nehemiahs tendency toward
dramatic antagonism and speculate that Noadiah is simply a prophet who
opposes Nehemiahs work, and so he sees her as being out to get him. From
this text, one would be hard-pressed to conclude more about Noadiah than
that Nehemiah saw her as an enemy.
In fact, among the things that one would be hard-pressed to conclude
is that Noadiah is actually female. Noadiah is male in the Septuagint, Syr-
iac, and Arabic; this collection of textual witnesses alone would be signi-
cant. In addition, there is a Noadiah son of Binnui in Ezra 8:33. It would be
quite a coincidence for Ezra-Nehemiah to include two characters named
Noadiah, one male and one female. Finally, the reference in Ezra is to two
Levites, Jozabad ben Jeshua and Noadiah ben Binnui; two Levites by the
names of the two fathers, Jeshua and Binnui, appear together in Nehe-
miah 10:9 and 12:8. The most likely scenario may be that the versions of Ne-
hemiah 6:14 in which the prophet Noadiah is male reect the more reliable
tradition. Then again, if the character were male, Nehemiah might have
referred to Noadiah and the rest of the prophets, and not to Noadiah the
prophet and the rest of the prophets.
If Noadiah the prophet is indeed meant to be female, it is not clear
whether there is particular attention drawn to her gender. The question
is why Noadiah alone is named in this verse. Maybe she was especially
prominent, or maybe Nehemiah had had a particularly bad experience with
her, and maybe in either of these cases it had nothing to do with gender.
1. Contra Kessler, who nds it clear that Noadiah, among other prophets, was
claiming Nehemiah as king, thus putting him at risk with the Persian authori-
ties. He also sees the text as reecting a position in this period that subordinates
prophecy to Torah (Miriam and the Prophecy of the Persian Period, 8284).
Butting follows Kessler, seeing Noadiah as the exponent of prophecy, in con-
ict with Nehemiah as the exponent of Torah, and again argues that it is in a
female prophet that the relationship of prophecy to Torah is expressed (Prophe-
tinnen Gefragt, 1011). Fischer sees in Noadiah the increased prophetic authority
of women in the Persian period, from which point she sees other traditions of
female prophets written back into the story of Israels prophetic past (Gotteskn-
derinnen, 255, 27677).
Y6621.indb 187 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Or maybe she is singled out because she is female, and as Carroll sug-
gests, female prophets who oppose male authority do not fare well. Carroll
compares Miriams opposition to Moses in Numbers 12 and suggests that
Noadiah may be meeting a similar fate here.
This is certainly possible. However, no character who opposes the main
positions taken in a given text fares too well, so the fact that this includes
women does not indicate that in every case it is because they are women.
Perhaps the safest conclusion to draw on the basis of the passing reference
to Noadiah is that Nehemiahs world full of dangerous enemies included a
range of political opponents and representative prophetic conict, and one
player at one point may have been female; and if Noadiah was female, and
if Nehemiah meant to draw attention to this, he did not succeed, as we can
see from the signicant variant traditions that understood the character as
male.
In this texts eeting reference to Noadiah, as in the brief passage in
Joel discussed in the previous chapter, there is enough intriguing material
to warrant inclusion in a work on womens divination. However, while each
passage raises a variety of issues that merit scrutiny, neither one throws
much light on views of womens divination, and I prefer to draw no conclu-
sions beyond what the evidence can bear.
2. Carroll, Coopting the Prophets: Nehemiah and Noadiah, 94.
Y6621.indb 188 1/27/15 1:08 PM

14 Rachel, the Mother of
Micah, and the Teraphim
The texts discussed until now have all included portrayals of women
engaging in or associated with divination. We turn here to two texts that
are not in the same category, but that allude to divination, to diering de-
grees. The story of Rachel depicts the matriarch holding on to her familys
teraphim, which are frequently used for divination. The story of Micah in-
cludes a glimpse of his mother, whose range of religious activity in just a
few verses includes the commissioning (but not use) of divinatory objects.
The use of teraphim for divination is explicit in many texts. In Ezekiel 21,
for instance, the king of Babylon is said to engage in divination (-)
in several ways, including inquiring of the teraphim ( , Ezek
21:26 [Eng. 21:21]). The divinatory function of teraphim is equally overt
in Zechariah 10:2, and with a similarly negative judgment: For the ter-
aphim have spoken iniquity, and the diviners have seen false visions
( -) . First Samuel 15:23 uses in
parallel with teraphim (rebellion is like the sin of , stubbornness is like
;) and so on. While teraphim may have served other functions as
well, their use in divination is suggested by most textual references.
1. Lewis too observes that the divinatory function . . . is the best attested among
the occurrences of terpm in the OT. He nds that the teraphim are associ-
ated with divinatory practices of some kind in all of the passages except for the
Michal story and the possible exception of the Rachel story. Lewis, Teraphim,
849. Van der Toorn also emphasizes the divinatory function of teraphim in bibli-
cal texts (The Nature of the Biblical Teraphim in the Light of the Cuneiform
Evidence, 21117).
189
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The word (always grammatically plural) is usually translated house-

hold gods. This is accurate in a general sense, but more specically, the ter-
aphim were gurines representing deied ancestors. While this had been
suggested before, van der Toorns extensive arguments based on the com-
bination of comparative evidence from Nuzi and Emar and philological
and contextual evidence from biblical texts have solidly demonstrated that
this is the case, and the identication of the teraphim as ancestor gurines
has at this point been widely accepted. The distinction between generic
household gods and ancestor gurines is signicant here because, as van der
Toorn and others observe, the use of ancestor gurines in divination may
indicate the practice of necromancy.
The older theory that ownership of the family teraphim signied in-
heritance of property has been persuasively countered, but a more nuanced
kin to this hypothesis remains. Ktziah Spanier has argued that in addition
to being used for divination, the teraphim were emblems of authority.
If this is the case, it is intriguing that this proposed function is not only
compatible with divination, but particularly compatible with necromancy.
Passing down an ancestor gurine as both an instrument for divination
and an emblem of authority is perfectly logical: through the teraphim, one
patriarch gains privileged access to another.
2. Van der Toorn, The Nature of the Biblical Teraphim, 20322; van der Toorn
and Lewis, , t erpm, 15:77789.
3. Rouillard and Tropper had previously suggested that the teraphim were ances-
tor gurines, though (as van der Toorn observes) based on less strong evidence
(TRPYM rituels de gurison et culte des anctres daprs 1 Samuel XIX 1117 et
les textes parallles dAssur et de Nuzi, 34061, esp. 35161). Lewis, Teraphim,
84546; Cooper and Goldstein, The Cult of the Dead and the Theme of Entry
into the Land, 295.
4. Van der Toorn, The Nature of the Biblical Teraphim, esp. 21517. Lewis, Tera-
phim, 84850. On the close relationship between teraphim and , see Rouil-
lard and Tropper, TRPYM rituels de gurison et culte des anctres, 35556.
5. Spanier argues that Rachel stole the teraphim in order to gain status as the pri-
mary or preferred wife, and to pass authority to her sons (Rachels Theft of the
Teraphim: Her Struggle for Family Primacy, 40412). Sarna had already pointed
out that in this text the teraphim could not have been meant to guarantee legal
land inheritance (against arguments such as that of Speiser, Genesis, 250), since
they are leaving the land in question permanently; Sarna, Genesis, 216.
Y6621.indb 190 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Rachel, the Mother of Micah, and the Teraphim 191
Regardless of whether teraphim served other functions as well, it is

clear that they were used for divination. The work of the present chapter
in no way depends on the theory that this divination was specically nec-
romantic, but it should be noted that if it was, we might have here another
association or two between women and necromancy.
Rachels Teraphim
The suggestion that Rachels theft of the teraphim in Genesis 31:1735
was related to their potential divinatory use is not new. Rashbam, Ibn Ezra,
Kimhi, Nahmanides, and others argued that she took the teraphim in order
to keep Laban from consulting them and discovering her whereabouts.
This is of course a possibility. There is another possibility, however,
which will presumably be evident to the reader by this point in the present
work. Could it not be that Rachel herself wanted to be able to use the tera-
phim for divination? To my knowledge, this suggestion appears nowhere
in ancient, medieval, or modern commentary. At the very least, if it has
appeared anywhere, it has quietly disappeared as well.
The author does not discuss Rachels motives for stealing the teraphim,
so we cannot establish them with certainty. We can, however, establish that
her motivation does not appear to be related to inheritance, as some have
argued. When Jacob tells Rachel and Leah that he plans for them all to
leave Labans land, the sisters respond with the observation that their future
childrens inheritance is with Jacob now anyway. Do we still have any por-
tion or inheritance in our fathers house? Arent we like strangers to him?
For he sold us, and utterly ate through our money. All of the wealth that
God took from our father, that is ours and our childrensso all that God
6. For examples and brief discussion, see Greenberg, Another Look at Rachels
Theft of the Teraphim, 239; and Spanier, Rachels Theft of the Teraphim, 405.
This tradition persists: Sarna, for instance, notes the use of the teraphim for divi-
nation and suggests, Perhaps Rachel, by appropriating them, hoped to deprive
her father of the ability to detect Jacobs escape, citing Rashbam and Ibn Ezra
(Genesis, 216).
7. The reader may recall a similar default assumption of male agency in interpreta-
tion of the Rebekah story, where if divination is recognized at all, it is almost
always assumed that Rebekah sought out a diviner or man of God to inquire
on her behalf.
Y6621.indb 191 1/27/15 1:08 PM

has said to you, do (Gen 31:1416). The sisters state explicitly that their
father has nothing left for them, and so they will emigrate with Jacob, and
thus with their inheritance. After the women agree to emigrate, Rachel
steals the teraphim. This is not presented as related to the subject of the in-
heritance; nor would it accomplish anything related to an inheritance that
the sisters have just said no longer exists with Laban in any case.
Note also that the sisters have been speaking and acting as a unit until
now: they speak as one in 31:1416, and then they are put on camels together
in 31:17. In light of the bitter competition between the sisterscreated by
Laban in 29:2130which comprises virtually their entire story until now
(29:3130:24), their speech and action as a unit in the rst part of this scene
is rather pointed. It is immediately after this that Rachel steals the tera-
phim: this action is hers alone.
Rachels sudden independent action here in taking the teraphim re-
ects something for which she has an independent desire. She wants to
hold on to these items of her household religion. A reasonable default as-
sumption is that Rachels desire to hold on to her familys teraphim was not
merely a desire to have the objects, but also to use them. Since they were
primarily associated with divination, it seems most likely that she took the
teraphim so she could utilize them for this purpose.
The simplest explanationthat Rachel steals the teraphim because she
wants them for a function they serveseems straightforward even before
we consider her place in the broader narrative. After all, what is specic to
Rachel in the tradition? Her primary role in the literature is as the mother of
Joseph. Mother and son are famously alike: they are both the most beloved
of JacobRachel more than her sister, and Joseph more than his brothers
(29:30, 37:3). They are also both remarkably beautiful: Rachel and Joseph
are identically said to be attractive of form, and attractive of appearance
( - ,i29:17; - ,i39:6).
8. Because the word always appears in the plural, it is at times dicult to tell
whether the intended meaning is singular or plural (like , in more than
one way). It is unclear whether Rachel steals one object or more. She is able to
hide her teraphim beneath her, but since we know neither the size of the tera-
phim nor the baggage allowance of the camel (presumably large), the question
remains open. I will use the plural here for the sake of convenience, but am not
committed to the view that she must have taken more than one teraphim.
9. Van der Toorns brief discussion of how Rachels theft indicates her reluctance
to break with her fathers family religion is instructive; Family Religion, 257.
Y6621.indb 192 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Joseph is also the biblical diviner par excellence. He is a dreamer (37:510)

and an interpreter of dreams (chapters 4041); he has a silver goblet that he
uses for divination (44:5); and when he confronts his brothers before the
great reveal, he reminds them that he is a diviner ( ,
44:15). Do we have here another way in which mother and son are portrayed
as similar? Perhaps Rachel too is associated with divination.
Petty Theft or Part of a Larger Motif?

The scene is usually read as a petty crime. But how does Rachels
theft t into the themes of the story? The author uses the word eight
times between verses 19 and 39, playing with dierent senses of the word
(for example, Jacob stole away unbeknownst to Laban, - ,
v. 20). This literary dexterity demonstrates the authors conscious attention
to the motif. Theft and accusations of theft appear repeatedly in the broader
story (expressed through other terminology as well), and considering how
the motif functions overall may shed light on how the author uses it here.
First, within the Jacob-Laban story line: the pattern is that Laban
tries not to give Jacob what the narrator presents as being rightfully Jacobs
through Gods blessing; Jacob acquires what is his but is then accused of
having stolen from Laban; and then he is blessed anyway. In chapter 30,
Laban wants to keep his ocksas Jacob tells it later, Laban tries to cheat
him by repeatedly changing his wages, adjusting between the speckled
sheep and the stripes and solidsbut Jacob, blessed by God and good at
magic, always increases the ocks that are to be his wages. Labans sons
then accuse Jacob of having taken their fathers wealth from him. The nar-
rative conrms through Jacobs dream report that the ocks were in fact
given to him by God.
The events surrounding Jacobs marriage to Rachel reect the same pat-
tern. The narrator presents Rachel as the divinely intended wife, but Laban
holds her back from Jacob; after Jacob has met Labans demand for seven
extra years of service and tries to leave with his wives, Laban accuses Jacob
of having absconded with his daughters like captives taken at swordpoint.
He also accuses him twice of having stolen away unbeknownst to him, and
once of having stolen his teraphimall in verses 2630.
In chapter 31 in particular, from the rst verse and all the way through,
the chief thing at stake is the taking of someone elses goods. As the chapter
begins, Labans sons are angry that Jacob has stolen from their father. Jacob
Y6621.indb 193 1/27/15 1:08 PM

explains to Rachel and Leah that God has continually taken ( )Labans
ocks and given them to him (31:79). The sisters acknowledge that God
took (again )this wealth away from their father and gave it to Jacob
(31:16). Then, when the matter of the teraphim arises, the issue at stake is
whether Jacob or someone in his party has once again stolen from Laban.
Already within this material it is clear that in the matter of the teraphim,
we are not dealing with an isolated instance of theft, but with one manifes-
tation of a broader theme.
Second, this is the theme that characterizes the Jacob-Esau story line.
As Esau sums up in 27:36, Jacob has twice taken what was his: rst the
birthright and then the blessing. In both of those scenes, the narrative in-
dicates that what Jacob took was divinely intended for him all along. We
see this motif, then, from the early Jacob story in which Jacob is accused of
having stolen the birthright and the blessing, to the Jacob v. Laban subplot,
in which Jacob is accused of having stolen Labans ocks and his daughters,
to the scene in question, in which Jacobs party is accused of having stolen
the teraphim.
None of the previous acts of stealing are condemned: each time Jacob
takes something from another personwho in each case feels the injus-
tice of it and characterizes it as stealingthe narrator portrays Jacobs ac-
tions as a strategic means to an end. From the authors perspective, God is
transferring Labans household to Jacob and his household, just as he had
previously transferred Esaus birthright and blessing to Jacob. If, when Ja-
cob acquires Labans wealth through questionable means, this is understood
as part of how God is transferring Labans household to Jacob, why not
also when Rachel acquires Labans teraphim through questionable means?
Labans response demonstrates that the teraphim are a valued part of his
household, and they are now transferred to Jacobs household. (The reader
will recall that the ruse is never discovered, and Rachel keeps the teraphim.)
Why assume that the narrator saw Jacobs actions as justied, but Rachels
as unjustied? When Labans sons are angry that Jacob has stolen their
fathers ocks, we know that from the authors perspective, God has given
this wealth to Jacob. When a few verses later Laban is angry that someone
in Jacobs party has stolen his teraphim, perhaps here too the implication
is that the accuser misses the pointthat once again, Jacobs household is
increased while Labans is decreased. As with Esau in the formative epi-
sodes and with Labans sons moments earlier, so too with Laban now: the
unfortunate unblessed smart at the injustice of their blessing and goods
Y6621.indb 194 1/27/15 1:08 PM

being snatched by Jacob, and fail to recognize that this is God transferring
blessing to Jacob. It is unclear on what basis we would assume that this is
the authors perspective each of the other times that Jacob and his house-
hold are increased through deceit, but not this time. Perhaps here too the
act is strategic, and the ends justify the means.
The objections to this may be that in Rachels case, either the action
or the thing stolen is more illicit. We have no indication that either of
these was the narrators view. On the rst possible objection: when Esau
accuses Jacob of stealing his blessing, he is right. Jacob deceives his ail-
ing father, takes advantage of his blindness, and steals the blessing from
his brother. This is actually quite appalling. However, from the authors
perspective, Jacob is meant to have the blessing, and so even taking ad-
vantage of his aging fathers disability and stealing from his own brother
is portrayed as part of how he acquires it. Likewise with the ocks: when
Labans sons accuse Jacob of stealing their fathers ocks, their accusa-
tion is correct, or at least if it is incorrect, it is only very technically so
because, playground-style, no one said you couldnt control the outcome
with magic (30:3143).
On the second possible objection, the teraphim are not seen as illicit
here. We have no more reason to condemn the use of teraphim than to
condemn Jacobs use of magic. While both are denounced in other tradi-
tions, neither is in this one. Several texts reect the acceptance of teraphim
as part of Israelite religious life. The presence of teraphim in Davids palace
in 1 Samuel 19 is presented as so perfectly acceptable as to be a nonissue.
Hosea 3:4 includes a list of things Israel will have to survive without for
a time: they will be without a king, a leader, a sacrice, a matzevah, and
without ephod and teraphim (as a pair). Afterward, the children of Israel
will return to Yahweh their God and David their king, and fear God again
(3:5). Later texts, such as those in Ezekiel and Zechariah, certainly take a
critical view of the teraphim, but we cannot import this view backward, any
more than we would with other aspects of Israelite religious life that later
became problematic for Yahwists.
10. Van der Toorn also reads this to mean that according to this text, an ephod and
teraphim belonged to the normal equipment of an Israelite cult place (ibid.,
219); Grabbe considers the possibility that it may demonstrate Hoseas accep-
tance of the teraphim as legitimate for divinatory purposes (Priests, Prophets,
Diviners, Sages, 127).
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So, if we shake the preconceptions gifted to us by the agesrst, that

Rachels stealing is unjustied while Jacobs is justied, and second, that
the teraphim were necessarily illicitthen what in the text actually indi-
cates either of these? If nothing, then the safest conclusion is that this is
yet another story of Labans household being transferred to Jacobs family,
through what the author portrays as questionable but justiable means.
Furthermore, if Rachels theft of the teraphim were seen as seriously
illicit (that is, dierent from Jacobs acts), one would expect to see some
remark, some criticism, somewhere in the Rachel story. Instead, we see Ra-
chel depicted as the divinely chosen wife, favored by both Jacob and the
narrator, from her rst appearance on. This does not require reading her
behavior as idealall of the patriarchs and matriarchs are painted in full
color, as complex and awed peoplebut the positive portrait of Rachel is
noteworthy.
Rachels identity as the chosen wife is central to her story. This is how
she is introduced and how her story develops. She also remains the favorite
after this scene. As Jacob and his family are heading o from Haran, she
takes the teraphim; as they are approaching their destination, she maintains
the place of privilege. When Jacob sees Esau o in the distance coming
toward him with four hundred men, he carefully divides his children ac-
cording to their mothers, puts the servant women and their children in the
most dangerous spot at the front, Leah and her children behind them, and
Rachel and Joseph safely at the rear (Gen 33:12). While the author of this
story is no Chronicler (heavy on the consequences of disobedience and im-
morality), characters who do things the author nds terrible do not tend to
come out glowing and still so favored, as Rachel does.
The overwhelmingly positive portrayal of Rachel as the divinely se-
lected matriarch and Jacobs preferred wife is, I think, pivotal in traditional
interpretation of her actions. Since we know that teraphim could be used
for divination, imagine how the story might be read if it were about, say,
Jezebel. Would it not seem obvious that she wanted to have the teraphim
for the sake of using them for divination? An interpreters preconceived no-
tions about divination in general, or womens divination in particular, may
create an obstacle to drawing the simplest conclusion: that Rachel wants
the teraphim because she wants to use them.
Like the story of Rebekah, this is a picture imagining life in the world
of the ancestors, long before the authors own time. The larger story is rich
with reections of local religionincluding Jacobs memory of his earlier
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matzevah, Jacob and Labans matzevah, and their shared sacriceand in

this context, the author imagines Rachel procuring her teraphim. A mini-
mal reading is that the authors impression of the days of yore includes a
picture of a woman who wants her familys divinatory objects, presum-
ably in order to use them. We have here a portrait of another matriarch,
also brought in from the ancestral land, who exhibits a personal interest
in divination. A fuller, but still cautious, reading: the narrator sees this in a
positive light. This is part of the larger theme of Labans household being
transferred to Jacobs, through the Jacob family stealing what the narrator
sees as rightfully theirs, as part of Gods blessing and inheritance. Given the
narrative patterns and the overwhelmingly positive depiction of the matri-
arch, interpreting Rachels stealing from Laban as dierent from and worse
than Jacobs requires reading into, or even against, the text.
The Mother of Micah, Benefactress

In Judges 17, we meet the character of Micah the Ephraimite and, ever
so briey, his mother. She does not engage in divination, nor is there any
reason to think she intended to. I include her here only because the very
few verses that mention her pack in a good deal of religious activity, and
one of her actions seems to be the commissioning of divinatory objects for
her sons sanctuary. The story that follows is Micahs and not his mothers,
and so, as in the Rachel text, the narrator does not demonstrate particular
interest in her motivations. Micahs story begins:
He said to his mother, The eleven hundred pieces of silver which were
taken from you, about which you uttered a curse in my earslook, I have
the silver. I took it. His mother said, Blessed be my son by Yahweh. So he
returned the eleven hundred pieces of silver to his mother, and his mother
said, I fully dedicate the silver to Yahweh from my hand, for my son, to
make a graven image and a molten image. Now I will return it to you. So
when he returned the silver to his mother, his mother took two hundred
pieces of silver and gave it to the craftsman, who made a graven image and a
molten image; so they were in Micahs house. This man Micah had a sanctu-
ary, and he made an ephod and a teraphim, and consecrated one of his sons
to be a priest for him. In those days, there was no king in Israel; a man did
what was right in his own eyes. ( Judg 17:26)
Although the story is about Micah, the rst several verses center on
the religious activities of his mother. First, as Micah acknowledges, she had
Y6621.indb 197 1/27/15 1:08 PM

cursed him when he stole the silver. Then, when he admits his thievery and
returns the silver, she blesses him in the name of Yahweh; unfortunately,
we do not also get to see the content of her curse. Next, she proclaims that
she is dedicating all of the silver to Yahweh, for her son. Finally, she gives a
craftsman two hundred of her eleven hundred pieces of silver, and he makes
the rst pair of images for Micahs private sanctuary () , the
and the .
This leaves nine hundred pieces of Micahs mothers silver, which she
has just said she is fully dedicating to Yahweh for her son. The next verse
says that Micah made an ephod and a teraphim. Is the implication that
these too are funded by his mother, with the silver that she has just pledged
back to him for the express purpose of dedicating it to Yahweh on his be-
half? All of the details of the transaction are skipped this time. A craftsman
must have made these items as well, and been paid to do so, but we hear of
no such person, and we hear neither about where the money for their con-
struction came from nor to whom it was paid. It is safe to assume there was
a craftsman and a nancial transaction involved here too, just as there was
the rst time. Since Micahs mother has dedicated eleven hundred pieces
of silver to Yahweh for her son, used two hundred for one pair of sanctuary
objects, nine hundred pieces remain, we are told that she gives the money
back to her son, and then he commissions another pair of sanctuary objects,
it seems likely that the funding for this pair comes from her as well.
There seems to be little attention paid to Micahs mothers role here.
Niditch does observe that there is a question regarding whether Micah or
his mother commissions the pieces, though she suggests that the ambigu-
ity might be attributable to multiple narrators. Otherwise, there is a good
deal of attention to Micah as the owner of a home sanctuary, but not to his
benefactress, the Doa Gracia of his private .
11. I disagree with the idea that should be read as a hendiadys in order
to match the singular verb that follows (Boling, for example, suggests, sculpture
and something poured out; Judges, 256). For alternate views and bibliography
on the question, see T. Butler, Judges, 37889. Reading the two words as a hen-
diadys would not change the above interpretation, however.
12. Niditch, Judges, 17778.
13. Cox and Ackerman have addressed the nancial activity of Micahs mother and
attribute it to her recent widowhood (Micahs Teraphim, 137). See Cox and
Ackerman also for discussion of the teraphim in general and in this text, and of
the .
Y6621.indb 198 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Of these four cultic objects, we know that the ephod and teraphim
could both be used for divination (see Davids use of the ephod for divina-
tion in 1 Sam 23:9 and 30:7). It seems the and the were as well,
based on the objection to this elsewhere. In Habakkuk 2:1819, the and
( called a teacher of lies, ) are scorned together, in a Second
Isaiahstyle mocking of the absurdity of telling this wood and stone over-
laid with silver and gold to awake and arise, saying, It will teach! Compare
Zechariah 10:2, For the teraphim have spoken iniquity, and the diviners
have seen false visions.
It is not clear whether Micah uses all four objects for divination, but
there is at least no separation drawn between those we know are divinatory
and those that seem to have been. They are all listed together repeatedly,
but in dierent orders, throughout the larger story ( Judg 18:14, 17; 18:18; and
all but the in 18:20). In 18:24, Micah calls these items my gods which
I made. It would not be surprising for representations of gods to be used
for divination: that is, for the gods to be asked to speak (cf. the teraphim
speaking in Zech 10:2). The four objects, two of which are certainly used
for divination and two of which seem to have been, reside together in Mi-
cahs sanctuary, where the Levite priest will soon inquire for the Danite
spies ( Judg 18:5).
The range of Micahs mothers religious activity in these very few verses
is remarkable: when her son steals from her, she curses him, and when he
returns her silver, she blesses him and funds his sanctuary. This may be most
interesting for the parts that we do not get to see: would that we could hear
the content of the curse she utters, and see the details of her role as bene-
factor in dedicating eleven hundred pieces of silver to Yahweh for her son.
(This seems a tremendous amount; cf. the Levites pay, which is specied at
in 17:10.) Finally, it is intriguing that she seems to fund the
construction of divinatory objects for her sons sanctuary.
The benefactress is unknown to us. Many commentatorsancient,
medieval, and modernhave noted that Delilah received eleven hundred
14. The range of possibilities for the ephod has been widely observed, but does not
aect the present argument.
15. Cox and Ackerman argue that several elements of Judg 1718 suggest that Mi-
cahs father has recently died, and that the teraphim is thus commissioned as an
image of the new deied ancestor (ibid., 1116). The use of the ancestor gurine
here for divination would then be necromantic inquiry.
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pieces of silver for her betrayal in Judges 16:5, and some have thus consid-
ered the possibility that Delilah was Micahs mother. This is a stretch.
While it is conceivable that a numerical detail in one story about a woman
associated with a great deal of silver may have at some point ltered into
another, this still would not indicate anything about the identity of the
character in the Micah story as understood by the author. The suggestion
that these were written as the same character is not supported.
However, the placement of the narrative directly after the story of Sam-
son and Delilah may be useful in interpretation in a dierent way, especially
given its placement between that and the story of the Levite and his con-
cubine. Ackerman has usefully juxtaposed Delilahs relative autonomy with
the concubines utter and tragic lack of the same. Both of these are in
some ways surprising, as Ackerman observes: Delilah has more autonomy
than the reader might expect given the constraints of the nonmarital sexual
relationship, whereas the concubine, who turns out in fact to be the Le-
vites wife (her father is referred to as his father-in-law in Judg 19:4, 7, and
9), has virtually none. If we consider the story of Micah bookended by these
tales, his mothers nancial and religious autonomy is all the more striking.
From start to nish, the story of Micahs sanctuary is Yahwistic. His
mother explicitly blesses him in Yahwehs name, and Micah installs a Le-
vite as priest of his sanctuary, because that way, he gures, Yahweh will be
good to him ( Judg 17:13). The description of a private sanctuary with graven
images does not match later proper Yahwism, of course, and thus some
see it as idolatry, but it should be understood as comparable to the sin
of Jeroboamand, as I have argued, that of the women of Ezekiel 13: it is
Yahwistic from the perspective of the characters, if questionable (or worse)
from the perspective of the storyteller.
These few verses, only there as a prologue to a much longer story, hint
at a fascinating character: she utters a curse at her son, then blesses him
in Yahwehs name, and nally acts as an autonomous benefactress who
16. For examples of ancient and medieval commentary, see Gunn, Judges, 233.
Among modern scholars, McCann (Judges, 120) and Matthews (Judges and
Ruth, 17071) note the possibility that Delilah was Micahs mother, and Schnei-
der argues for it (Judges, 23133).
18. McCann sees Micah as having created another god besides God (Judges, 120),
and as engaging in idolatry (12022). Niditch, however, recognizes the Yahwism
as comparable to that of Jeroboam (Judges, 18182).
Y6621.indb 200 1/27/15 1:08 PM

chooses to fund the creation of sacred objects for her sons private sanc-
tuary. She commissions the and , which may serve a divinatory
function, and likely also funds the ephod and teraphim, which are certainly
divinatory objects. The allusions to this womans activities are tantalizing;
the details are just beyond our reach.
Michal
The story in which Michal uses a teraphim as a decoy after letting
David down through a window to escape Saul is not related to divination
(1 Sam 19:1117). One poignant note, though: if we consider how Rachels
desire to keep her fathers teraphim rings of her son Josephs divination and
his divinatory objects, and Micahs mother funds the construction of divi-
natory objects for her sons sanctuary, then Michals utterly banal use of the
teraphim also seems suddenly reminiscent of her father, Saul, who became
known for his lack of access to divine knowledge. Far from being associated
with divination, either successful or failing, Michals utilitarian appropria-
tion of the teraphim reects Sauls legacy of limitation in this area.
Women and Their Teraphim?

There was once a tendency to suggest that teraphim were particularly
associated with women. Wellhausen, for instance, noted the domestic wor-
ship of teraphim, to which the women are specially attached, and Gunkel
suggested that the Israelite authors were more comfortable portraying a
womans use of teraphim than a mans (that is, that of Rachel, but not Ja-
cob, and Michal, but not David). Although these suggestions are logical,
given the use of teraphim in household religion and the texts that connect
them to female characters, the evidence does not support the theory. Van
der Toorn still cautiously addresses this as a possibility, while acknowledg-
ing Wellhausens insucient evidence, and adds that Labans anger over his
missing teraphim demonstrates that the cult of the teraphim was by no
means the exclusive business of women. While I disagree about the sig-
nicance of Labans angerhis concern throughout the story is that people
keep stealing from him, while Rachels desire for the teraphim cannot be
19. Wellhausen, Prolegomena to the History of Ancient Israel, 32 n.1. Gunkel,

Genesis, 334.
20. Van der Toorn, The Nature of the Biblical Teraphim, 210.
Y6621.indb 201 1/27/15 1:08 PM

explained in this waythe fact that they are his missing teraphim dem-
onstrates that men also used these objects. In the story of Micah as well,
though my interest is in the role of his mother, the text itself focuses on
Micah who owns the teraphim, and the Levite priest, who inquires in
Micahs sanctuary. The only other gender-specic reference to divining by
teraphim concerns the king of Babylon (Ezek 21:26 [Eng. 21:21]). Teraphim
are not specic to the divinatory activity of women.
The scholarly tendency to assign particular religious activities along
gender lines is strong, as seen in the pervasive notion of female prophets
as songstresses. The distinction between mens and womens roles is not
warranted in the case of teraphim either. On the contrary, as we see en-
capsulated in Rachel and Labans tug of war over the teraphim, these are
divinatory objects that might hold appeal for both women and men.
Y6621.indb 202 1/27/15 1:08 PM

15 What a Witch: Divination
Imagery and Metaphor
The previous twelve chapters have been devoted to texts that reect a
broad range of views of womens divination. As an addendum, there is one
minor literary phenomenon that should be addressed here, partly because it
reects tinges of the later trajectory of interpretation of womens divination.
A few texts employ images of womens divination, used metaphorically. In
each context, the sense of the metaphor is pejorative.
Images of the Dangerous Woman in Proverbs 19

Proverbs 19 includes a series of images of women of whom the ancient
reader should be wary. These depictions are closely linked through their
shared phrasing and imagery (as well as their textual function). Without as-
suming they are meant to be a fully unied image, I will refer in the singular
to this set of personications, which includes, at the very least, a signicant
overlap in recurring images and consistent behavior.
1. On the relationship between the foolish woman of Prov 9 and the foreign
woman of Prov 7 and earlier texts, see Weekss detailed observations regarding
a range of connections, e.g., the foolish woman entertains guests in Sheol in
9:18, and the foreign womans house is the path to Sheol, 7:27; the uncommon
word is used of both, 7:11, 9:13; and both entice men into illicit pleasures.
Weeks concludes that the foolish womanhere Follyis a personication, like
Wisdom, but she is associated, possibly even identied with the type of woman
portrayed in chapters 57 (Instruction and Imagery in Proverbs 19, 72). Both the
foolish woman and the foreign woman act as a counterpart to the gure of Wis-
dom, and both lure men to their deaths; Weeks sees a probable identication
203
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The dangerous woman is described metaphorically as engaging in nec-

romancy. In Proverbs 6:26, she is said to hunt i(
). The phrase occurs only here and in the indictment of necromancy
in Ezekiel 13, as discussed earlier. The phrase in Proverbs is translated in an
enormous variety of ways, many of which seem to interpret it as connoting
the sexual danger that the woman represents (for example, she will snare
a person of honor, NJPS), but the Hebrew phrase would be odd for such a
reading, and the very range of meanings proposed ags a need for further
analysis. The Ezekiel passage has only rarely been recognized as describing
necromancy, and so this has not factored into interpretations of the use of
the phrase in Proverbs. The phrase refers to necromancy here, as it does
there.
This is by no means the only insinuation of necromancy, or something
like it, in the portrayal of the dangerous woman in Proverbs. Among the
allusions to necromantic activity before the reference to hunting in
6:26, it is said of this woman that her house sinks down to death and
her tracks to the i( - - ;) none
who come to her return and reach the paths of life (2:1819). This is not
a description of your garden-variety temptress. It is not a foreign woman
who entices men into illicit sex, or a foolish woman who lures men into
danger. Her house sinks down to death (the verb is also associated
with Sheol and Death in Ps 49:15); and she leads not only to death, but to
the . Then in 5:5, Her feet go down to death, her steps take hold of
Sheol () . That is, she herself in some
sense goes down to Sheol. Note that the direction of movement here is
to Sheol. It may be that this is not precisely necromantic language (it
is after all metaphor), but it is also not simply an expression of generic
doom. Recall that Ezekiel 13 also referred to the necromancers making
die what should not die. The imageryso far, all leading up to chap-
ter 6is a picture not merely of death, but of the pathways between the
living and the dead.
That these are allusions to necromantic activityeven if metaphori-
calis further supported by the description of the need for apotropaic
magic in the verses immediately preceding the reference to the woman
hunting . To guard against this evil woman, the commandment and
between the two women, who serve a similar function throughout these passages
(12829).
Y6621.indb 204 1/27/15 1:08 PM

What a Witch: Divination Imagery and Metaphor 205
teaching of the father and mother are to be worn as protective amulets:

Always bind them on your heart, tie them around your neck; when you
walk around it will guide you, when you lie down it will guard over you, and
when you are awake it will talk to you (6:2122). This is explicitly related
to the need for protection against the woman: For the commandment is a
lamp and the teaching a light, and reproofs of discipline are the path of life,
to guard you from the evil woman () , who will attempt to
reel you in with that persuasive speech, batting those eyelashes; she is a ,
and hunts ( 6:2324, 26).
This would then function like the protective amulets from Ketef Hin-
nom, which Barkay and his colleagues have concluded were used apotro-
paically, based on reevaluation of the texts (using new higher-resolution
images). Both Ketef Hinnom texts refer to protection against evil, :
Ketef Hinnom I refers to blessing more than any [sna]re and more than
Evil ( ][ , li. 910), and Ketef Hinnom II refers to Yahweh
as the rebuke of [E]vil ( ][, li. 45). Both famously include the
benediction for Yahweh to bless and guard (or traditionally keep, )
the wearer. The suggestion that Proverbs 6:2022 describes either an amu-
let or a substitute for an amulet, and has some apotropaic function, has been
made before. The additional comparison to the Ketef Hinnom amulets
should now further establish this sense of the text.
The man who needs protection from the evil woman who hunts
in 6:2426 is then caught by her in 7:2223, following her as a bird speeds
into a snare (-), not knowing that its with his life. This imagery for
the danger of being ensnared by evil will now be familiar from Ketef Hin-
nom. It may additionally be a play on the language for ghoststhe man
having followed the path to Sheol, rather than the path of lifegiven the
2. Text and translation of Barkay et al., The Amulets from Ketef Hinnom: A New
Edition and Evaluation, 5861, 6568.
3. Fox also notes the concept of tying the words like a pendant or amulet on
a string around your neck, and that the metaphor also suggests amulet-like
protection, but sees this as indicating that the teachings are a substitute for an
actual amulet (Proverbs 19, 22829). See, however, Miller, Apotropaic Imagery
in Proverbs 6:2022, 12930, briey establishing the apotropaic function of these
objects, building on Speisers work on the apotropaic use of the bound items in
Deut 6:78 and 11:1820 (Speiser, Palil and Congeners: A Sampling of Apotro-
paic Symbols, 38993). The apotropaic function is assumed by others as well,
e.g., Murphy, Proverbs, 39.
Y6621.indb 205 1/27/15 1:08 PM

ghosts elsewhere who it and chirp like birds, this womans penchant for
hunting , and the image in Ezekiel 13 of the women who hunt
like birds (Ezek 13:20). This possibility is heightened by the fact that what
follows is overtly about the fatal risk of following the woman: one is not
to stray down her path, for many are the pierced she has struck down, and
numerous are all her slain; her house is the pathway of Sheol, descending to
the chambers of death (7:2627).
The portrayal of the womans contact with the dead continues. The de-
scription of the foolish woman calling out from the doorway of her house
in 9:1318 concludes with a vivid picture. She beckons the passersby in
verse. 16 (just as Wisdom does in v. 4), but her potential victim does not
know that the are there, that her guests are in the depths of Sheol
( - - ;9:18). This woman entertains the dead in Sheol. This
is not a passing remark, but the closing statement of Proverbs 19.
There are other references in Proverbs 19 to death and destruction re-
sulting from consorting with the wrong peopleProverbs is full of this
but, by contrast, the troublemakers in 1:12 only compare themselves to the
hungry maw of Sheol, saying let us swallow them [our victims] alive like
Sheol, and in 2:1213, the men who speak duplicitously follow the ways of
darkness. Only the imagined woman controls the pathways to Sheol; only
she plays host to the .
The religious danger this woman presents is not that she leads people
into idolatry, as often assumed. She does not worship other gods or make
questionable sacrices: she is religiously dangerous because she manipu-
lates the pathways to Sheol. The point is not necessarily that the imagined
woman is literally meant to be a necromancer, but that the author depicts
the dangerous woman using the language and imagery of necromancy. This
is by no means the only option. The womans house could be the road to
ruin, shame, loss, and so on, without being the road to Sheol; it could be de-
scribed as a dismal whorehouse, not a ghost house, full of harlots upstairs,
and not ghosts downstairs; her guests could be fools, and not the .
4. Though he sees her primarily as an adulteress, Fox notes that in the conclusion to
Prov 7 the woman is described in nearly superhuman terms, as a mass murderer
and an aliate of the underworld (Proverbs 19, 253). This depiction might t
better with the conclusions of Weeks, who argues that the emphasis in the im-
ages of the woman in Prov 19 is not on adultery, but on apostasy, with the stress
on her persuasive speech (Instruction and Imagery in Proverbs 19, 8488).
Y6621.indb 206 1/27/15 1:08 PM

The necromancy language is a choice. So why use this imageryhunting

, hosting the , housing the pathways to Sheolrather than sim-
ply the language of idolatry?
I believe that this is rooted in the broader cultural trope of the reli-
giously and sexually dangerous woman. This image is widespread, and in
this trope, the religious danger is not only worship of the wrong deity, but
something more nefarious. A brief look at another text may illustrate.
Part of Proverbs 7 strikes me as quite reminiscent of a passage from
the third tablet of Maql, the anti-witchcraft ritual. Many parts of Maql
refer to sorcerers in pairs: may such-and-such happen to my sorcerer and
my sorceress, pii u piti (II 172), my male witch and my female witch,
kapi u kapti (II 15; cf. I 68, I 11011, I 181). The beginning of Tablet III,
however, suddenly portrays a hypothetical witch alone: The witch who
roams incessantly in the streets, who constantly enters houses, who prowls
in the alleys, who lurks in the main street, turning again and again forward
and behind, she has come out to the square and blocked the way, she has
cut o the trac. She robbed the good young man of his virility, she takes
away the lusciousness of the good young woman, with her gaze she takes
away her juiciness (III 112).
The woman in Proverbs 7 targets her man as he walks down the street;
Look, a woman comes out to meet him, with a whores clothes and a
watchful mind. She is murmuring and rebellious; her feet wont stay at
home. Now in the street, now in the square, she lurks at every corner. She
seized him and kissed him . . . (Prov 7:1013). A few verses later, he follows
like an ox to slaughter, and like a bird into a snare, not knowing it will cost
him his life (7:2223).
I am not suggesting a direct link between Proverbs 7 and Maql III. A
more likely scenario is that the various personications in Proverbs 19, like
Maql, reect the culturally live image of a dangerous woman who preys on
5. The most recent translation is Abusch and Schwemer, Das Abwehrzauber-

Ritual Maql (Verbrennung), 12886.
6. I base my somewhat explicit translation of kuzuba, her juiciness, on the various
meanings of kuzbu, which include luxuriance, sexual vigor, sexual organs (euphe-
mistically), and abundant moisture, as in reference to well-irrigated vegetation
and owing canals (CAD K 61415). Note that inbu and kuzbu are used in parallel
also of Ishtar (RA 22 170:6 and 8); (CAD I 14647). For the text of the relevant
part of Tablet III, see Meier, Die assyrische Beschwrungssammlung Maql, 2223;
Tallqvist, Die assyrische Beschwrungsserie Maql, 5455.
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men both spiritually (that is, relating to the world of spirits) and sexually.
This trope is specic to women and is rooted in fears and suspicions about
various powers women might hold over men. It thus necessarily includes
religious danger that goes beyond the lure to idolatry. Before reecting
more on this trope, however, it remains to draw a preliminary conclusion
regarding the allusions to necromancy in Proverbs 19, and to consider a
few other texts.
The main implication of the above is that the image of the dangerous
woman in Proverbs is tinged with the language of necromancy because
some form of such otherworldly power is native to the trope. The dangerous
ability to manipulate the hidden spiritual world, and sexually tempting or
even predatory behavior, are a set of traits that together depict peril per-
sonied. The image in Proverbs is not about necromancy, but about peril.
The intimations of necromantic activity in Proverbs 19 function as a
metaphor, and a profoundly negative one. As emphasized throughout this
work, various biblical traditions exhibit a range of perspectives on dierent
types of divination. The ideas reected in Proverbs 19 are generally aligned
with those traditions that equate certain forms of divination with foreign
practice, illicit religious activity, and all manner of abominations.
Images of the Soothsayer and Whore in Isaiah 57:313

Isaiah has just been condemning the impotent leaders of Israelthe
watchmen who are blind, the dogs with no bark, the shepherds with no
knowledge (56:1011)and then he lays into them with this scandalous
characterization: You, come here, you sons of a soothsayer () , o-
spring of an adulterer and a whore ( , Isa 57:3). A lengthy
7. Note the common imagery of prowling, lurking, preying. Some of the language
itself is also shared: as the woman hunts, , in Prov 6:26, the witch in Maql
prowls. This is the Akkadian cognate sdu A (CAD S 5758), to hunt or prey
on (as well as to whirl), which is used in cuneiform texts to describe the preda-
tory actions of malevolent beings, such as the utukku-demon who prowls in
the land (CT 17 36 K.9272:9), and the evil beings who prowl through the city
(CT 16 31:123f ).
8. Though the MT has the verb , other versions have the logical noun, e.g.,
in the LXX. The BHS critical apparatus suggests , as if adul-
terer is another reference to the woman, which has the odd eect of taking the
father out of the picture entirely. The phrase makes the most sense as it stands:
Y6621.indb 208 1/27/15 1:08 PM

indictment of the people begins with this address to them as the children
of a deviant woman, before turning into an image of the people collectively
personied as the woman herself.
The imagined woman in this text is again spiritually and sexually dan-
gerousshe is both a soothsayer and a whore. In this case, however, she
is explicitly not foreignrather, she is essentially said to be worse than a
foreigner. The depiction comes in the context of an oracle that juxtaposes
righteous foreigners with unrighteous Israelites. After oering assurance
to those who do what is right and just, who keep the Sabbath and do no
harmnot only Israelites, but also the foreigner (-)the prophet
delivers this withering picture of Israels own leaders. The burnt oerings of
righteous foreigners will be accepted on the mountain of God, and Gods
house will be called a house of prayer for all peoples (56:17)but not so
for the Israelite leaders, who are the unrighteous , drawn in contrast
to the righteous -.
In verse 6, we turn to the woman herself, and Isaiah dives into a litany
of accusations of sexual and religious deviance. These intertwined images
run through the whole passage, and include good old-fashioned idola-
try as well as something more spiritually potent. The deviant womans
activities mirror the initial twin labels of whore and soothsayer: Youve
made your bed welcoming . . . youve loved their bed; youve seen yad
( . . . , v. 8). And then: You have sent
your envoys afar, lowered them to Sheol (- , v. 9). The image
of a woman who controls the pathways to Sheol is familiar by now. While
the text does not portray communication with the deadthe woman is not
the imagined parentage includes both father and mother, in the presumably
realistic image of a male adulterer and a female prostitute.
9. Perhaps the image of Israel as the child of a transgressing woman just blurs into
this next section addressing Israel as the same woman, or perhaps it is a brilliant
literary move, in which the people repeat the sins of the fathersor in this case
the motherssuggesting that the unrighteous leaders of Israel are continuing
in a history of unrighteous leaders.
10. On some of these verses in Isa 57 as a creative expansion of material in Jer 2, see
Holladay, Was Trito-Isaiah Deutero-Isaiah After All? 197201.
11. The verb also refers to being lowered to Sheol in Isa 29:4, in which Jeru-
salem is personied as a woman. In that context, the prophet compares the city
after its collapse to a ghost chirping from beneath the ground (with no sugges-
tion of the imagined woman controlling the path down).
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seeking knowledge from Sheolthe relationship to divinatory activity is

evident from the earlier use of .
Here too the divination language is derogatory. The word itself
is used as a slur, and the imagery throughout the oracle is wildly, radically
derisive. The portrayal as a whole is phenomenally disparaging, with the
imagined woman embodying the combination of religious and sexual dan-
ger in graphic and shocking ways.
Sorcery and Sexual Deviance in Literary

Characterizations of Dangerous Women
The images of a woman as both spiritually and sexually dangerous in
Proverbs 19 and Isaiah 57:313 are part of a broader pattern. In these two
texts, religious peril is signied by divinationhunting , soothsaying,
manipulating the road to Sheol. In the trope as it generally appears, the
danger stems specically from womens sorcery. It is the fact that the Prov-
erbs and Isaiah traditions draw on the trope of sorcery and sexual deviance
in their images of womens divination that is of interest here, rather than a
detailed rehearsal of the well-known trope itself. A brief reection should
suce.
Men are frequently said to whore after other gods (Exod 34:1516;
Lev 17:7 and 20:56; Deut 31:16; Judg 2:17 and 8:27, 33; and so on). Where
the whore metaphor is used for men, however, they are said to be engag-
ing in idolatry, not sorcery. The double-barreled accusation of sorcery and
sexual deviancebeing a witch and a whoreis applied, in every case, to
a woman. It appears in reference to both female characters and imagined
women (images, personications), but never to men.
There is ample evidence from biblical and other Near Eastern texts to
demonstrate that both men and women engaged in sorcery. Sorcery itself
was not specic to women in historical terms; rather, there was something
specic to women about sorcery in literary terms. In Akkadian texts,
12. Not all female whore metaphors include sorcery (e.g., the personications in
Isa 1:21, Jer 23, Hos 14), but all whore metaphors that include sorcery refer to
women.
13. In Naming the Witch, Stratton focuses on the rhetoric of stereotypes of witches
and accusations of witchcraft, with signicant attention to gender. Throughout
her work, she addresses relevant patterns in Greek, Roman, early Christian, and
rabbinic literature.
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for instance, the masculine noun kapu (sorcerer) nearly always appears
alongside the feminine noun kaptu (sorceress), while the sorceress is fre-
quently mentioned by herself. Actual witches could be male or female;
individual portraits and targets of accusations were generally female.
Although my focus here is on the employment and adaptation of a
literary trope, it is worth remembering that this was not only a literary phe-
nomenon, but a historical association that aected womens lives. Consider,
among many possible examples, the joint accusations of sorcery and sexual
deviance recorded in a Mari letter in which the wife of Yarkab-Addu is
subjected to a river ordeal on charges of both sorcery (generically kipum)
and sexual betrayal (ARM 26 249).
The image of the sorceress who preys on men both magically and sexu-
ally is seen in literature from Mesopotamia (as in Maql) to Greece (con-
sider Circe, just to name one example), so it is not surprising to see it show
up in Israel as well. The tandem accusation of a female character being a
witch and a whore is a recurring motif, not specically tied to Yahwistic
monotheism but rooted in more widespread images of dangerous women.
Where it appears in biblical literature, it should be recognized as an expres-
sion of this broader trope.
14. CAD K 29192. The portrait of the lone female witch in Maql III, discussed
above, is an example of this pattern. Consider in this light the sorceress of
Exod 22:17 (Eng. 22:18).
15. On the stereotype of the female witch in Mesopotamia, see Abusch and Schwe-
mer, Corpus of Mesopotamian Anti-Witchcraft Rituals, 46.
16. Durand, Archives pistolaires de Mari I/1, 52729; with commentary on several as-
pects of the river ordeal, including these accusations, 51216. For Durands evalu-
ation of Bottros earlier edition of the text with a dierent reading of the rel-
evant section, see 528 n.f; Bottro, Lordalie en Mesopotamie ancienne, 104145.
17. I intend for the word whore to communicate the full semantic range of the
term , which can refer to a profession, habitual behavior, or a perceived
character trait. In some texts it is used as a technical term (prostitute), and in
some, it is sexual slander (slut); the modern English use of the word whore
communicates this spectrum of possibilities, and includes the inherent ambigu-
ity of which meaning is intended (this ambiguity being part of the force of the
insult). See, for instance, the range of meanings in Ezek 16:3134, where the per-
sonied woman is repeatedly called a whore, but contrastedto take Ezekiels
tonewith whores who do it for money, while shes a whore who doesnt
even take money, i.e., a slut.
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We see this type of paired accusation, for instance, in Isaiah 47:115.

The personication of Babylon begins with the shaming of the sym-
bolic woman: Get down and sit in the dust, virgin daughter of Babylon
(- - - , Isa 47:1). The humiliation of sit-
ting in the dust, as seen elsewhere in Isaiah, is applied here to the so-called
virgin, already in mocking irony. The theme continues in verses 29, as the
prophet derides the woman Babylon, who is told to strip: your nakedness
will be uncovered, your shame will be seen ( , v. 3).
This is depicted graphically: the imagined woman will have to lift her
skirt and bare her legs. These things, Isaiah says, will come upon you in
spite of your many sorceries, in spite of the great power of your spells
( , Isa 47:9). He continues, Your wisdom and
your knowledge have led you astray (Isa 47:10). Lest we should be at all un-
clear about what skewed sort of wisdom and knowledge Babylon is meant
to have, the prophet continues, Harm is coming upon you which you will
not know how to bewitch away ( , Isa 47:11).
The woman Babylon does not commit idolatry, but performs sorcery; she
is mocked not for the false power of her idols, but for that of her spells.
We nd a similar personication of promiscuityboth sexual and re-
ligiousin Nahum 3:4. Here Nineveh is personied as a whore ( )and
a sorceress () , with a repeated parallel between these respective
activities (, ). Because of all of the whoring of the seductive
whore, the sorceress, who sells nations with her whoring, and families with
her sorceries, God will go up against Nineveh, telling her that he will
lift her skirt over her face, showing her naked place ( )to the nations
and her shame to kingdoms (v. 5).
The tandem accusation of womens sorcery and sexual deviance is not
restricted to prophetic oracles or applied only to images and personica-
tions. It also appears in narrative, used as a personal insult. In 2 Kings 9,
Jezebels son runs into Jehu and asks, Is all well, Jehu? Jehu replies, How
can all be well, what with the promiscuities and many sorceries of your
mother Jezebel? ( - , 2 Kgs 9:22).
Now Jehu is not known for being the kindest character, but even for him,
18. Biddle compares this to the personication in Isa 57: Lady Zions Alter Egos:
Isaiah 47:115 and 57:613 as Structural Counterparts, 12439.
19. On possible further magical language in the passage, see Blenkinsopp, Isaiah
4055, 27484.
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How can all be well when your mothers such a witch and a whore? is not
nice. The contemptuous line is an insult in much the same way as it would
be in modern parlance: there is no evidence that Jezebel did anything to
merit such slander. There is no description of her engaging in sorcery, or
in fact in sexual activity of any kind, let alone whoring. She has been a
violent queen, killing the prophets (1 Kgs 1819), having a local landowner
executed on trumped-up charges so that her husband could take his vine-
yard (1 Kgs 21), and trying to kill the prophets some more. First Kings 21:
25 explicitly blames Jezebel for Ahabs wickedness (in spite of the fact that
16:31 tells of Ahab marrying her because he was already wicked), but even
there, she is blamed only for having generally incited him. Jezebel is vio-
lent and nastynote her threat to Elijah in 19:2, when she nds out that
he survived her rst mass slaughter of prophetsand she is described as
abusing her power in horric ways, ways we would today label as tyrannical
or dictatorial. She is not, however, a sorcerer. Your mothers a witch and a
whore is purely an insult.
It is clear, then, that the witch and a whore trope known from lit-
erature to the east and west of Israel was present in Israelite literature as
well. Of particular interest here are the implications of Proverbs and Isaiah
drawing on the motif of womens sorcery and sexual deviance in the service
of another agenda.
Womens Divination and Sexual Deviance

Seen in the light of the witch and a whore texts (Isa 47:115; Nah 3:4;
and 1 Kgs 9:22), the images of spiritually and sexually dangerous women in
Proverbs 19 and Isaiah 57:313 begin to look less as if they include critiques
of divination specic to Yahwistic tradition and more like another expres-
sion of a familiar trope. Note in addition that the tandem accusation is
regularly linked to suspicions about foreignness: this has a place in all ve
of the above texts, further indicating the generic relationship among them.
At times it is clear which suspicion is primary and serves as a hook for the
others, and at times not: the rhetoric is intertwined.
The adoption of this trope encompasses two disturbing developments:
the implied association between some types of womens divination and
sorcery, and the overt association between them and sexual deviance. The
use of this rhetoric is limited, however: rst to soothsaying, necromancy,
and the attendant manipulation of the pathways to Sheol, and second to
Y6621.indb 213 1/27/15 1:08 PM

imagined women or personications, rather than narratives about actual

female diviners.
The historical tendency to associate womens religious activity with sor-
cery is well known. While womens divination is not yet conated with
sorcery in the Hebrew Bible, we see the tinges of a later view in the char-
acterizations of Proverbs 19 and Isaiah 57. We know that certain forms of
divination were regarded with suspicion in some traditions, as exemplied
by Deuteronomy 18:1011, but equally that they were not seen the same way
in other traditions. The depiction of these particular types of divination
using the same rhetoric as the familiar trope suits well those who share
the Deuteronomists perspective, as it assumes and signals to the reader an
association with sorcery.
The association with sexual deviance serves a similar purpose. Knusts
work on ancient sexual slander (mostly early Christian) addresses the social
function of this type of rhetoric, most centrally that it is, of course, about
power. Sexual accusation serves to delimit group boundaries by dening
insider and outsider behavior and delegitimizing opposing or competing
positions. Sexual slander in a religious context has the further function of
broadly characterizing a group as immoral, deviant, and thus justiably
disparaged. As Knust observes, however widespread and stereotypical,
charges of sexual misbehavior were hardly merely rhetoric. Intended to
malign and defame, these accusations were deployed in erce struggles for
identity, prestige, and power. Both facets of the tropethe assumed and
implied association with sorcery, and the explicit sexual deviancethus
serve to delegitimize the religious activities depicted in the personications
in Proverbs 19 and Isaiah 57.
These images of spiritually and sexually dangerous women are not spe-
cic to the Yahwistic authors, then, but adaptations of a cultural idiom.
In neither case is the main purpose of the text to condemn the divinatory
activity imagined (unlike in Ezek 13); but these particular traditions saw
necromancy and soothsaying as akin to sorcery (or a kind of sorcery), and
20. On the Mesopotamian witchs origins before becoming associated with evil, see
Abusch, Some Reections on Mesopotamian Witchcraft, 2133, esp. 2223;
and on the juxtaposition of the evil sorceress and the ipu as her legitimate
male counterpart, see Abusch, The Demonic Image of the Witch in Standard
Babylonian Literature: The Reworking of Popular Conceptions by Learned Ex-
orcists, 2758, esp. 3139.
21. Knust, Abandoned to Lust: Sexual Slander and Ancient Christianity, 6.
Y6621.indb 214 1/27/15 1:08 PM

seeing these divinatory activities as illicit, the authors found a natural ex-
pression for their views in the existing trope.
Womens Divination in Later Interpretation

While the imagined women in Proverbs 19 and Isaiah 57 are not called
sorcerers, they are cast in a similar light. We are only in the hazy beginnings
of an interpretive trajectory here; as time goes on, a trend develops. The
strong association between womens divination and sorcery is seen already
in the New Testament, where Jezebelaccused of sorcery in 1 Kingsis
suddenly accused of calling herself a prophet. The tandem accusation of
false prophecy and sexual deviance is so pronounced that Jezebel has come
to embody the combination of sexual and religious danger.
In the reinterpretation of Jezebel in Revelation 2:2023, the symbolic
character claims to be a prophet (), persuades the otherwise in-
nocent to fornicate (), and is unwilling to repent of her own
fornication (). In a horrifying turn, God delivers sexual punish-
ment for sexual deviance: See, I will throw her into bed, and those who
commit adultery with her into great oppression [lit. related to pressing]
(
, 2:22). Finally, God vows to kill Jezebels children (with Death, no
less), thus proving himself: all the assemblies will know that I am he who ex-
amines kidneys and hearts ( .

, 2:23). In other words, God alone is the true diviner, essentially
claiming, Only I examine kidneys! I divinenot you.
The subsuming of womens divination into the category of sorcery now
has a long and robust history. As the accused sorceress and whore Jezebel
becomes a false prophet, the necromancer of En-dor becomes a witch.
22. The association between false prophecy and sexual deviance is not restricted
to women. Within early Christian writing, for instance, Justin and Irenaeus
associate these traits for both men and women (ibid., 14347). As seen in the
Mesopotamian, Greek, and Israelite examples, however, the association is more
extreme with women; this trend continues.
23. Allusions to God examining kidneys as a way of gaining knowledge about peo-
ple are found in Ps 7:10 (Eng. 7:9), 26:2; Jer 11:20, 17:10, and 20:12. The meaning
of the idiom is clearGod looks into hearts and mindsbut the root of the
metaphor should not be overlooked.
Y6621.indb 215 1/27/15 1:08 PM

We have already seen the preponderance of interpretations that read sexual

activity into that story as well. The job of the thoughtful reader, then, is to
recognize the tinges of the association between certain types of womens
divination and sorcery (along with the requisite illicit sex) that we see al-
ready in certain biblical traditions, while neither extrapolating from those
texts nor retrojecting from later trends into the diverse pictures of female
diviners throughout the Bible.
Y6621.indb 216 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Concluding Reflections
These biblical texts depict a wide variety of types of divinatory

activity, as well as a range of authorial perspectives. The traditions
reecting ideas about womens divination are no more uniform than
those regarding mens divination. The various authors have dier-
ent interests, concerns, and literary aims, and demonstrate a vari-
ety of attitudes toward the activities they present and toward the
practitioners. Signicantly, this is not a matter of general preference
for certain types of divination (such as prophecy) over others (such
as necromancy). Rather, dierent texts oer dierent takes on the
same form of divination.
Among the prophets, for instance, we have on the one hand
Miriam, who is remembered in a deeply conicted fashion. The
two main Miriam traditions both remember her as a prophet, one
through her title and the other through the story of her prophetic
conict with Moses, but in neither case do we see her prophetic ac-
tivity: rather, in the latter case, we see her arguing precisely against
an implied disavowal of her prophetic authority, and in this tradi-
tion, Yahweh both agrees with her basic premise (that he does in-
deed speak through prophets too) and punishes her for claiming
that such prophetic authority is equal to that of Moses. The prophet
Deborah, on the other hand, is remembered with no sense of con-
ict, and embodies the very model of leadership in her time: she is in
her prophetic role more like Moses than like Miriam. The tradition
of the prophet Huldah is resolutely positive, to the point that her
incorrect prophecy in Kings is explained away in Chronicles.
1. As the reader has seen, I am skeptical about how much we can read
into the passing phrases regarding Miriam in Mic 6:4, or Noadiah in
Neh 6:14.
217
Y6621.indb 217 1/27/15 1:08 PM

218 Concluding Reflections
Meanwhile, in 1 Samuel 28 an individual necromancer is shown in a

remarkably positive light: it is only through her divination that Saul nally
receives the knowledge he has been seeking, when prophecy, dreams, and
urim have failed; and when the ghost of Samuel speaks, he condemns Saul
but has nothing to say regarding the necromancer or her act of necromancy
(aside from the fact that he wishes he had not been disturbed). The Chroni-
cler sees this quite dierently, and inserts into his brief encapsulation of
Sauls story an indictment for having consulted a necromancer. In sharp
contrast to the En-dor story in 1 Samuel, Ezekiel excoriates the women
who practice necromancy.
These texts reveal a spectrum of attitudes toward the divinatory activi-
ties they portray. Even in this, the issue is not so straightforward: the au-
thors also display a variety of literary aims, from storytelling about the days
of yore to political polemic, with much in between and all sorts of overlaps.
An author imagining the distant past paints a portrait of Rebekah engag-
ing in oracular inquiry about her pregnancy and interpreting a birth omen,
perhaps still exhibiting the ways of the old country. Ezekiel, for example, is
at the opposite end of the spectrum, presumably addressing practices in his
own environment to which he objects. This collection of traditions shows a
breadth of divinatory activity, and the goals and perspectives of the various
texts run the gamut. The literary traditions of the Bible reveal that in the
Israelite cultural imagination, women engaged in a range of arts of knowl-
edge, but simplistic views of each type and each text should be studiously
avoided. Such a statement may seem so obvious as to be unnecessary, but
the tendency to essentialize womens roles and ancient views of those roles
remains strong.
As noted in the rst chapter of this book, various intermediary activi-
ties are not easily dened by title and cannot always be neatly distinguished
from one another. This has been recognized in the general study of divi-
nation, and it is now evident within womens divination in particular. For
instance, the prophetic activities of Deborah are radically dierent from
those of the prophet who performs a symbolic action with Isaiah. The nec-
romancer of En-dor, who divines for King Saul when he is in crisis, is more
like the prophet Huldah, who divines for King Josiah in his crisis, than she
is like the necromancers of Ezekiel 13. Ezekiels necromancers, in turn, are
condemned in parallel with male false prophets, rather than with necro-
mancers in general (as in Isa 8:19).
Y6621.indb 218 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Concluding Reflections 219
There are benets to bringing all of these traditions together that ex-
tend beyond the new picture of the scope of womens divinatory activity
and the resulting fuller picture of Israelite divination. For example, individ-
ual texts that were read previously as one-o tales can now be understood
in a new light as parts of a broader phenomenon. The stories of the necro-
mancer who divines for Saul and the prophet who divines for Josiah have
each been read as one-of-a-kind textsand to be sure, they are quite dif-
ferent in many important waysbut they also both represent traditions of
womens divination for kings, and they reveal intriguing correspondences.
Reading these two stories together not only reveals a generic relationship
between them; it also illuminates the perspectives of multiple traditions. In
both Samuel and Kings, signicant aspects of the portrayal of divination
are contrary to what one would anticipate. In the Samuel text, the necro-
mancers divination is successful, and she is not condemned; in Kings, the
prophets oracle is wrong, and there is no further commentary to mitigate
this. All of this is exactly turned on its head in Chronicles. In Chroni-
cles, all of a sudden, one of Sauls two major transgressions is visiting the
necromancer, and, in order to explain away Huldahs incorrect prophecy,
a battleeld conversation between Josiah and Neco is added. In Samuel
and Kings, it is not an issue that the necromancer is successful or that the
prophet is not. The Chronicler makes the prophet look better than she does
in the Deuteronomistic History, and makes the necromancer look worse,
demonstrating a concern with judging these types of divination that the
Samuel and Kings texts do not. So we learn not only about some features
of womens divinatory activity from examining these texts side by side, but
even gain additional insight into the concerns of several dierent narrators.
Another benet of bringing together the many traditions of womens
divination is that certain patterns may rise to the surface. I have written at
length elsewhere about one surprising pattern: very few of the titled female
diviners are said to have children. This stands in stark contrast to divining
men, who are described as having a range of family circumstances, as well
as to the majority of other female characters in the Bible, including women
whose ospring are not particularly relevant to their stories. I am not
2. Hamori, The Prophet and the Necromancer: Womens Divination for Kings,
82743.
3. Hamori, Childless Female Diviners in the Bible and Beyond, 16991.
Y6621.indb 219 1/27/15 1:08 PM

claiming that actual female diviners could not be mothers, but that there
is a strong literary pattern of not portraying titled female diviners as also
having children. In each individual case, this could be explained away: what
is signicant is the pattern of the absence of children through the literary
portrayals of virtually all of the titled female diviners in biblical texts. (The
exception is the prophet who bears a sign-child as a prophetic symbolic
action.) The literary construction of female diviners in the Hebrew Bible
seems to reect a discomfort with the intersection of traditional female
roles and prophetic and other divinatory roles. Most women with special
access to divine knowledge are depicted as living outside of other social
norms as well. Historical and anthropological evidence suggests that the
association in biblical literature between unusual access to the spirit world
and non-normative social position conforms to observable social reality.
This is expressed in a variety of ways in dierent cultural contexts, from
the social location of shamans in many environments to the celibate male
priesthood of Catholicism. As seen in women in particular, the relationship
between special knowledge and fringe status is often expressed through the
lack of children. There are manifold examples of this in the ancient, me-
dieval, and modern worlds, as seen in literary creations, historical records,
and anthropological studies. Given the vast complexities of cross-cultural
comparison, let alone comparison including ancient and medieval literature
and modern anthropological evidence, I will not attempt to summarize the
evidence here. The cautious conclusion I draw from the amassed evidence
is that the pattern evident in the Hebrew Bible is unlikely to be coinciden-
tal. Whether this literary depiction was a conscious choice on the part of
any of the writers is impossible to judge. Whether such portrayals reected
the realities of life on the groundthat is, whether titled female diviners
actually tended to be childlessis also beyond our ability to conclude based
4. On the methodological validity of cross-cultural comparison of gender roles in

religious groups, see Sered, who notes that as an anthropologist she would not
expect to nd universals in most areas of religious belief and practice, but that
we do nd gendered patterns in religion, because there are cross-culturally rel-
evant social patterns in womens lives. Moreover, the primary pattern that Sered
identies as a cross-cultural social reality for women, and thus not a coinci-
dental inuence on womens religious experience, is the centrality of concerns
surrounding motherhood (Priestess, Mother, Sacred Sister: Religions Dominated by
Women, 7172). See also Keller, The Hammer and the Flute: Women, Power, and
Spirit Possession.
Y6621.indb 220 1/27/15 1:08 PM

on the evidence available. Perhaps such portrayals grew out of historical

realities in ancient Israel, perhaps they were consciously drawn, or perhaps
both. However, even if neither of these is the caseif actual female diviners
did not tend to be childless, and if the biblical writers did not consciously
portray them as women without childrenperhaps these depictions are
themselves a result of the same factors that create the cross-cultural social
trend. It is conceivable that the literary construct itself is Israels expression
of the widespread instinct to separate female divinatory and traditional ma-
ternal roles. The biblical writers overwhelmingly depict titled female divin-
ers in a way that coincides with the pattern evident in ancient, medieval,
and modern societies, and it seems improbable that this is all coincidence.
Another possible pattern, ripe for further exploration, is that some tra-
ditions imagined a connection between the matriarchs brought in from the
old country and certain types of divinatory activity. This could spark ques-
tions as to whether there are any related observable patternswithin other
aspects of the writers images of the Aramean matriarchs, for instance, or
within portrayals of divination along real or imagined cultural lines, among
both men and women.
Next, looking at each example of womens divinatory activity in depth,
it may become possible to view particular roles or activities more soundly
within the context of other such divination in the broader region. Just as
the roles of the wise women, for instance, are elucidated by comparison
(but not equation) to the titled Hittite wise women and to the use of wise
woman as an epithet connected to divinatory ability in Mesopotamia, per-
haps other such comparative possibilities will surface.
In many ways, womens divination does not look particularly dierent
from mens divinationnor should we expect it to, given relevant evidence
from elsewhere in the ancient Near East. There are clear exceptions, for
example in the lack of written prophetic collections attributed to women
here we might recall that Near Eastern scribal divination was overwhelm-
ingly a male professionbut by and large, the range of activities is similar.
Work on womens divinatory activity elsewhere in the Near East, including
prophecy, necromancy, dream interpretation, and more, would provide a
useful framework for further studyand be of signicant value in itself.
The general comparison does highlight one curious absence in the bib-
lical material, as seen against the broader Near Eastern background. No
female character in the Bible is ever reported to have a dream or interpret
a dream. Elsewhere in the region, there is a signicant tradition of female
Y6621.indb 221 1/27/15 1:08 PM

dreamers and dream interpreters. Among literary works, I have already dis-
cussed the roles of Ninsun, Nane, and Getinanna as dream interpreters;
Etanas wife dreams at the beginning and end of the Late Version of the
story; in the Hittite story of Kessi, the unsuccessful hunter asks his mother
to interpret his dreams; and in postbiblical interpretation, Miriam becomes
a dreamer. Among texts relating to historical divination, many women from
Mari report their dreams, and as discussed earlier in relation to Rebekahs
independent divination, in one Mari letter, one woman named Zunana
both reports her dream and interprets it, instructing Zimri-Lim in how to
proceed accordingly (ARM 26 232). Within the Bible, however, women are
never said to receive or interpret dreams. This is surprising, since dreaming
is a form of divination that does not require political power in Israel, a role
as a titled religious authority, or a place among the scribal elite. Dream-
ing is thus a way of receiving messages from Yahweh that is particularly
accessible to foreigners, for example: God is said to give messages to Abi-
melech (Gen 20:3), the Pharaoh (Gen 41:25), and Nebuchadnezzar (Dan
2:45) in their dreams. One might therefore expect this also to be a form of
divination particularly accessible to women, and yet no women are said to
have dreams. Plural references to dreamers may include women as well as
men, but the absence of any clear reference to a woman having a dream is
surprising.
As I noted at the outset, the question of who has access to divine
knowledge and who does not permeates biblical traditions, from texts
reecting on the divine choice of David over Saul, to those contrasting
Aarons works, which stem from direct divine instruction, with the Egyp-
tians inferior magic. This issue relates both to individuals in biblical texts
and to groups. One might expect, then, that such a perspective would lter
through the texts relating to womens divination. However, to whatever ex-
tent some biblical texts reect a concern with formulating Israelite identity
in relation to the Other, and sometimes specically Israelite male iden-
tity with women implicitly as Other, this is not an attitude that character-
izes the texts that portray womens divination. There are some dierences,
naturallysuch as the presence of pregnancy- and birth-related divination,
5. The Pharaoh and Nebuchadnezzar require Joseph and Daniel to interpret for
them, so by my reading (as delineated in ch. 1), these rulers are not engaging in
divination themselves. However, in both cases, the interpreter says that God is
the one who has communicated to the ruler in his dream.
Y6621.indb 222 1/27/15 1:08 PM

the absence of dreaming, the absence of children mentioned for virtually all
of the titled female diviners, and the rst hints of an association between
womens divination and sexual deviancebut the overall picture is not
shaped by a gender-based distinction between mens and womens access
to divine knowledge. The breadth of womens divinatory activities and the
range of attitudes toward them are not unlike those for men.
The recognition of the sibling relationship of all forms of divination,
and the application of this framework to the study of womens divinatory
activity in biblical traditions, brings into focus a picture of both men and
women striving to access divine knowledge in a multitude of ways. Exam-
ining traditions of divination, without privileging one type over another,
should enable us to establish connections and commonalities where they
had not been seen, and to shed false distinctions and divisions where they
had been. My hope is that this work demonstrates the spectrum of ideas
regarding womens many divinatory activities, and eshes out our picture of
the breadth of Israelite divination.
6. Perhaps the next scholar will treat another group that is in many ways framed
as Other, and consider for example the presentations of the divinatory activities
of foreigners. This could include a complex intersection of categories: foreign
nations, foreign characters, individuals considered foreign to a specic tradi-
tion (even such as an Israelite to a Judahite), and so on. On the one hand, when
certain types of divination are considered illicit, they are often associated with
foreign groups; on the other hand, when it comes to specic foreign characters,
there is more variation in the portrayals. How might such work color our views
of biblical traditions attitudes toward dierent groups? Will they often be found
to run the gamut, as attitudes toward womens divination do?
Y6621.indb 223 1/27/15 1:08 PM

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Stuart, Douglas. Hosea-Jonah. Word Biblical Commentary 31; Waco, TX: Word
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Styers, Randall G. Making Magic: Religion, Magic, and Science in the Modern
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Swindler, Arlene. In Search of Huldah. Bible Today 98 (1978): 1783.
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Y6621.indb 245 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Index of Subjects
Aaron: access to divine knowledge, 3; Aram, Syria (old country), matriarchs

conict with Moses (in Numbers associated with, 4345, 52, 58, 218,
12), 7478; cult, as symbol of, 61n1; 221
Egyptian magicians of Pharaoh Ark: access to, 4; as divining instru-
and, 3, 24, 25, 13132, 222; magic ment, 27, 28, 47
versus religion and, 23, 24, 25 arrow ritual, 32
Abel, wise woman of (in 2 Samuel 20), articial dichotomies, 1940; foreign,
84, 85, 131, 14147 divination viewed as, 4, 3133; male
Abiathar, 27, 32, 50n11 and female, as absolute categories,
Abigail, 94n2, 145 3540; ocial cult versus popular
Abimelech, 5, 52, 222 religion, 3133; prophecy polemi-
Abraham, 4344, 45, 46, 49, 53n17, 58, cally distinguished from divina-
59, 98 tion, 45, 19, 2631; public men
Absalom, 96, 138, 14041 versus private women, 3435; reli-
access to divine knowledge, as biblical gion and magic, 4, 2026; true
concern, 318, 222 and false prophets, 3334, 80
Achbor, 157n20 Asherah, 108, 151n7
adultery, 206n5, 208, 215 Assyria, 156, 163, 170n4, 176
Agag, 121 avian spirits, 170, 171, 17276, 177, 181,
Ahab, 140, 146, 155n15, 213 2056
Ahaz, 163
Akedah, 98 Baal, prophets of, 79, 80, 182, 183
Amnon, 138, 140 Babylon, divination by king of, 189, 202
amulets, 205 Babylon, female personication of, 212
ancestor spirits, 107n6, 108, 118 Barak, 72, 8284, 9092, 142
ancestor worship, 108, 112n19, 118, 123, Bible. See womens divination in bibli-
190, 199n15. See also teraphim cal literature
angelic communications, 6, 176n23 birds, spirits of the dead as, 170, 171,
anger and bitterness of Hannah, 9697, 17276, 177, 181, 2056
100101, 103 birth divination: prophet who con-
animal names, in Huldah story, 157n20 ceives and gives birth to son
apotropaic magic, 2045 in Isaiah, 94n2, 16066, 220;
247
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248 Index of Subjects
birth divination (continued ) crushing of twins in Rebekahs womb,

Rebekahs twins, interpretation 5254, 5657
of birth and appearance of, 5456; Cushite, Mosess marriage to, 7475
sign-children, 16166, 220; sign-
children in Isaiah, 16166; Tamar, Dagan, 51, 123n54
birth of twins of, 5758n28; by wise dangerous woman (in Proverbs 19),
women, 13637; young woman giv- 17778, 2038, 210, 213, 215
ing birth to Immanu El in Isaiah, Daniel, 7n3, 27, 132
16364. See also fertility, pregnancy, Danil, 46, 137
and childbirth the daughters of your people who
bitterness and anger of Hannah, 9697, prophesy (in Ezekiel), 16783;
100101, 103 birds, spirits of the dead as, 170,
breadcrumbs oered to spirits, 181n32 171, 17276, 177, 181, 206; childbirth
rituals and, 168, 170n5; as false
Canaanites and Canaanite religion, necromancers, 17883; hunting (of
25, 3233, 11113, 130, 17475 spirits) involved in, 167, 17176,
Cassandra (in Aes. Ag.), 7 206; identied as diviners, 16770,
chiastic structure of Hannahs prayer, 176; magic versus religion and,
1023 168, 16970; necromancy practiced
child sacrice, 180 by, 167, 170, 171, 17683, 204, 218;
childbirth. See birth divination; fertility, no prophecy per se involved in,
pregnancy, and childbirth 167; prophesying from their own
chirping, of birds and spirits, 118, 166, minds, 17879; recognized as
17576, 206, 209n11 prophets, 17981; shawls and
Christian tradition: on birth of wrist-fetters of, 167, 17172, 178;
sign-child in Isaiah, 16364; false Sheol and, 173n12, 17778; as
prophets and sexual deviancy in, witches, 167
215n22; Hannah as prophet in, 95, David: Absalom and, 96, 138, 14041;
104; womens sorcery and sexual access to divine knowledge, 3, 50,
deviance associated in, 21516 11617, 222; En-dor necromancer
Chronicler: En-dor necromancer and, story, Sauls decline and Davids
129, 218, 219; Genesis author com- rise as main focus of, 11417,
pared, 196; on Huldah, 15658 130; ephod used to divine by,
Circe, 211 27, 32; fasting in preparation for
Clarian Oracle, 7071 divination, 124n55; Michals use
Codex Vaticanus, 92 of teraphim and, 201; Sauls anger
concubine of Levite, story of, 200 at, 97; Tekoa, wise woman of (in
conict, prophetic, 33, 7481, 87, 90, 2 Samuel 14), 13841, 146; teraphim
170n4, 18283, 18688, 217 in palace of, 195; as trickster, 37;
consulting/inquiring, as concept, 3, 4, victory song after slaying of giant
2729, 31n23, 4652, 107, 118, 166, by, 67
182 the dead: feeding, 123; images of, 108;
court prophets, 152, 179 pathways between the living and
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Index of Subjects 249
(pathways to Sheol), 177, 204, dreams versus visions, 5051n12

2067, 209, 213; reviving, 25, 119. See drums and drumming, 6465, 67, 68, 82
also spirits of the dead drunkenness, Hannah accused by Eli
Death, 178, 204, 215. See also Sheol of, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101
Deborah, 8293; discourse with Yah-
weh, 150; gender-consciousness in ecstatic, mantic prophecy, 7, 30, 63n3,
story of, 9093; Hannah com- 69, 71n25, 113, 123n53, 168
pared, 99; Huldah compared, 92, Egyptian baker, dream of, 67, 16566
150; as judge and prophet, 8693; Egyptian magicians of Pharaoh, 3, 24,
in list of female prophets, Megil- 25, 13132, 222
lah 14a, 94n2; Miriam compared, Ehud, 91
82, 8384, 90, 93, 217; Moses Eldad, 76, 87
compared, 8690, 93, 150, 217; as Eli, 27n19, 97101, 103, 104
mother in Israel, 8486, 143; Elijah, 25, 72, 7980, 85, 135, 182, 183, 213
prophetic status of, 82, 84, 86, 89, Elisha, 23, 25, 28, 29, 30, 32, 72, 85, 135
217; Song of Deborah and Barak, Elkanah, 9798
6365, 68n18, 8284; wise women En-dor necromancer, 10530; access
compared, 143, 146 to divine knowledge, Sauls loss
Delilah, 199200 of, 11517, 126, 12829; authority
Delphic Oracle, 71 and agency of, 12429; as false
Deuteronomistic source: Huldah and, prophet, 39n39, 114n29; food pro-
152, 15556, 219; on inquiring of vided to Saul by, ritual status of,
God, 47; magic and religion as 12224; ghost-diviner/necroman-
viewed by, 25 cer, terminology used for, 10610;
divination: access to divine knowledge, historical analysis of biblical texts
as biblical concern, 34; dened, and, 17; as idolatrous and foreign,
48; direct and indirect, 6, 8, 11112; Josiahs approach to Hul-
2930, 4851, 222; intent, as aspect dah compared, 154n12, 218, 219; lack
of, 56; interpretation, as aspect of, of condemnation of, in 1 Samuel,
57; scribal, 1011, 13, 118, 221; spe- 12728, 129; location of En-dor,
cial identity as diviner, as aspect 112; magic, understood as use by
of divination, 56; technical, 4, 5, Saul of, 116n35; as medium, 110,
7, 1011, 2930; types, 18, 2631. See 11920; negative interpretations
also womens divination in biblical of, 11014, 129, 218; positive read-
literature ing of, 11011, 129, 218; process of
divinatory objects, tools, and instru- consulting the dead used by, 119;
ments, 2729, 47, 108, 109, 115, recognition of Samuel by Saul, 122;
171, 178, 180, 205. See also ephod; recognition of Saul and Samuel
teraphim by, 12022; removal of mediums
Dor, Gustave, 111 and spiritists from land by Saul
dream divination, 5, 67, 1213, 2627, and, 1056, 108, 110, 11617, 119; in
29, 16566, 184, 185, 22122 1 Samuel versus 1 Chronicles, 129,
dream incubation, 5, 2627, 29, 50, 51 218, 219; Sauls decline and Davids
Y6621.indb 249 1/27/15 1:08 PM

En-dor necromancer (continued ) 168, 170n5; Gomer, children born

rise as main focus of, 11417, 130; to, 165; impotence, 135n8, 137n18;
sexual elements read into activity infertility, 45, 52, 96, 97; post-
of, 11314, 216; who can see versus barren women, 100101; prophet
who can hear the spirit, 11920; who conceives and gives birth to
witch, misidentication as, 1056, son in Isaiah, 16066; sign-chil-
111, 215; women and necromancy, dren, 16166; Tamar, birth of twins
association between, 11718, 166, of, 5758n28; wise women associ-
191; Yahwism, compatibility of ated with childbirth, 13637; young
activities with, 183 woman giving birth to Immanu
Endora in Bewitched (TV show), 111n17 El in Isaiah, 16364. See also birth
Enkidu, 1516, 17374 divination; Hannah; Rebekah the
ephod, as divining object, 27, 28, 32, Aramean
50n11, 116, 195, 19799, 201 First Isaiah: spirits of the dead as birds
Esarhaddon, 152n10 in, 17576; wise men in, 133n3
Esau: birth and appearance of twins, food provided to Saul by En-dor nec-
interpretation of, 5456; naming romancer, 12224
of, 54, 5658; oracle on destiny of foolish woman (in Proverbs 9),
twins received by Rebekah, 5254; 2034n1, 206
orchestration of Isaacs blessing of foreignness: combined spiritual and
Jacob, by Rebekah, 45, 5960, 194, sexual danger linked to, 213; divi-
195; Rebekah as mother to, 37 nation viewed as foreign, 4, 3133,
Esther, in list of female prophets in 11112; as Other, 223n6; Proverbs
Megillah 14a, 94n2 7, foreign woman in, 2034n1;
Etana, wife of, 222 soothsayer and whore in Isaiah 57
extispicy, 6, 10, 13, 28, 215 worse than foreigner, 209
Ezekiel: characteristic prophecy of, 179;
divination by, 28; on false (male) Gedaliah, 157n20
prophets, 16869. See also daugh- gender and gendered assumptions:
ters of your people who prophesy antiphony, gender-based, 6566;
combination of spiritual and sex-
false prophets. See true and false ual danger, 21016; cross-cultural
prophets comparisons of gender roles, 220;
fasting in preparation for divination, Deborah, gender-consciousness
124 in story of, 9093; Israelite male
fathers, prophets referred to as, 8586 identity, biblical concern with,
female and male. See gender and 89, 222; magic, womens divina-
gendered assumptions; womens tion associated with, 21314; male
divination in biblical literature and female, as absolute categories,
feminist scholarship, 19, 3637 3540; mens and womens divina-
fertility, pregnancy, and childbirth: tion not signicantly dierent, 217,
childlessness of most female 221, 22223; Miriam, paradigmatic
diviners, 21921; the daughters of view of, 6162; necromancy associ-
your people who prophesy and, ated with women, 11718, 166, 191;
Y6621.indb 250 1/27/15 1:08 PM

parental language for prophets, Hittite wise women, 13436, 221

8586; public men versus private horn imagery in Hannahs prayer,
women, 3435; in scholarship, 19; 9495, 1013
sexual deviance, women associ- Hosea and Gomer, marriage of, 162, 165
ated with, 21315; song, women, Huldah, 14859; in Chronicles versus
and prophecy, nexus between, 73; Kings, 15659, 218, 219; Deborah
teraphim, gender associations of, compared, 92, 150; as rst person
2012; victory songs associated to authorize canonical text, 153;
with women, 6465, 83 historical analysis of biblical texts
Getinanna, vi, 1315, 50, 13637, 222 and, 16n21; husband, identica-
ghost-divining. See En-dor necroman- tion through, 149; identicatory
cer; necromancy presentation of, 14850; im-
ghosts. See spirits of the dead materiality of sex of, 118, 15354,
Gideon, 7n3, 50, 88 159; inquired of as diviner, 49; in
Gilgamesh, 13, 1416, 136, 17374 list of female prophets, Megillah
Gomer, 162, 165 14a, 94n2; Miriam compared, 35,
Greek concepts of divinatory activity: 6162; mistake regarding Josiahs
art, craft, or skill (), divina- death, 15458, 217, 219; as ocial
tion as type of, 7; Artemidorus, prophet, 15152; praise of Josiah
Interpretation of Dreams, 30; birds by, 15152; public/private spheres,
as spirits of the dead in funerary articial dichotomy of, 35; Sauls
art, 174; oracles, 7071; poetry and use of En-dor necromancer
prophecy, relationship between, compared, 154n12, 218, 219; scroll
68n18, 69, 7071, 72, 73; sexuality and prophetic authority of, 15254;
and sorcery, combination of, 211, as true prophet, 39n39, 150, 155;
215n22 uniqueness in Bible as deliverer of
Gudea, 1213, 15 classical prophetic oracle, 148
Gula, 13n16, 13637 hunting of spirits, 167, 17176, 2056,
207
Haman, 138n23
Hananiah, 33, 7980, 183 Ibn Ezra, 164n9, 191
Hannah, 94104; anger and bitterness idols and idolatry: combination of
of, 9697, 100101; drunkenness, sorcery and sexual deviance, 212;
accused by Eli of, 97, 98, 99, 100, dangerous woman of Proverbs 19
101; infertility of, 96, 97; prayer of, and, 2068; daughters of your
9495, 9596, 98103, 178; pro- people who prophesy and, 183;
phetic status of, 9496, 99, 1012, En-dor necromancer and, 105,
1034; story of, 9698 108, 11112, 123n53; Huldah on, 154;
Hatayar, 135, 138n23 inquiring and consulting through

Hattuili I, 135 idols, 28, 29, 47; Isaiah on, 28, 47,

Hazael, 85 132; soothsayer and whore (in Isa-
hendiadys, 109n13, 142, 198n11 iah 57), 20910; teraphim and, 200
Hilkiah (high priest), 153 Immanu El, 16364
hitpael, 179 impotence, 135n8, 137n18
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incantation, 23, 32 Jehu, 21213

infertility: of Hannah, 96, 97; of Jeremiah, 33, 49, 53, 7980, 149, 154n13,
Rebekah, 45, 52. See also fertility, 183
pregnancy, and childbirth Jeroboam, 181, 200
inquiring/consulting, as concept, 3, 4, Jerusalem personied as woman (in
2729, 31n23, 4652, 107, 118, 166, 182 Isaiah 29), 209n11
intent, as aspect of divination, 56 Jethro, 86, 89
interpretation, as aspect of divination, Jezebel, 196, 21213, 215
57 Jezreel (son of Gomer), 165
Irenaeus of Lyon, 215n22 Joab, 131, 13843, 146
Isaac: Akedah, 98; naming of twins, Joash, 32
56n25; orchestration of blessing Job, 53, 85n9
of Jacob, by Rebekah, 45, 5960, Jocasta (in Soph. Oed. tyr.), 7
194, 195; supplications of, regard- Joels vision of universal prophecy,
ing Rebekahs pregnancy, 4546, 18485
48n8, 5152. See also Rebekah the Jonah, 6, 53
Aramean Joseph: as dreamer/dream-diviner, 5,
Isaiah: Jerusalem personied as woman 26, 106, 166, 193; as interpreter of
in, 209n11; necromancy rejected by, dreams of others, 7, 26, 49, 131;
166; prophet who conceives and Rachel and, 19293, 201; silver
gives birth to son in, 94n2, 16066, goblet of, 27, 193; special identity as
220; sign-children in, 16166; on diviner, 5; as wise man, 131
soothsayer and whore, 20810; Joshua, 23, 67, 76, 87, 88, 89
young woman giving birth to Im- Josiah: cultic items burned by, 108;
manu El in, 16364. See also First death of, 15458; reforms of, 153,
Isaiah; Second Isaiah 154, 15658. See also Huldah
Ishtar, 170n4, 174, 207n6 Jozabad ben Jeshua, 187
Israelite, as term, 8n5 judges and prophets, 8693
Judith, 145n40
Jacob: birth and appearance of twins, Justin Martyr, 215n22
interpretation of, 5456; dream
at Bethel, 27n19; naming of, 54, kidneys, reading, 28, 215
5658; oracle on destiny of twins Kimhi, David, 155n14, 191
received by Rebekah, 5254; Kothar-wa-Hasis, 136
orchestration of Isaacs blessing ktrt, 13637
of, by Rebekah, 45, 5960, 194, 195; kuhhn, 71
Rebekah as mother to, 37; sent
back to Laban by Rebekah, 44, Laban: non-divinatory dream received
45; theft as theme in Jacob-Laban by, 5; Rachels theft of family tera-
and Jacob-Esau stories, 19397; as phim and, 191, 192, 19397, 201, 202;
trickster, 36n30 Rebekah sending Jacob to, 44, 45
Jael, 90n16, 91, 92n22 Lakwena, Alice, 34
Jehoshaphat, 124n55 Leah, 162, 19192, 194, 196
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Lemuel, mother of, 39n38 ance, association between, 215n22;

leprosy, 74n33, 75n35 feathered underworld creatures,
Levites, 80n48, 81, 8586, 187, 197, 199, 174; inquiring of the dead in,
200, 202 31n23; kings double-checking
Lo-ammi, 165 cultic instructions, 152n10; kispu
Lo-ruhamah, 165 (funerary feast), 123n54; as literate
lots, casting or drawing, 27, 106n1 phenomenon, 1011; magic and
religion in, 22; necromancy, 112,
magic: apotropaic, 2045; biblical view 118, 119n40; sexualized sorceresses
of, 2326, 3031; combination of in, 211; sign versus omen, use of,
spiritual and sexual danger, 21016; 59n30; wise women in, 136, 137, 221;
the daughters of your people who witches and witchcraft, 214n20;
prophesy and, 168, 16970; divina- wrist-binding in, 172
tion understood as, 26, 2829; messenger formula, 14950
Egyptian magicians of Pharaoh, metaphorical uses of womens divina-
3, 24, 25, 13132, 222; En-dor necro- tion. See pejorative metaphorical
mancer understood as use by Saul references to womens divination
of, 116n35; infrequency of divina- Micah the Ephraimite: judge and
tory insight combined with, 13536; prophet, combined roles of, 88;
Other, viewed as, 4, 21, 22, 24; Levite priest of, 8586, 197, 199,
religion articially distinguished 202; military chiefs, oracular
from, 2026, 16970; womens responsibilities of, 88; private
divination associated with, 21314. sanctuary of, 8586, 197201, 202;
See also entries at witch teraphim and mother of, 86, 189,
Maher Shalal Hash Baz, 160, 16162, 197201, 202
163, 164 Micaiah, 179
making die and making live, 17678 Michal, 201
male and female. See gender and military chiefs, oracular responsibilities
gendered assumptions; womens of, 8788
divination in biblical literature Miriam, 6181; conict with Moses
Mami, 136, 137 (in Numbers 12), 7481, 187, 217;
Manasseh, 108 Deborah compared, 82, 8384, 90,
mantic, ecstatic prophecy, 7, 30, 63n3, 93, 217; as dreamer, 222; Hannah
69, 71n25, 113, 123n53, 168 compared, 99; historical analysis
Mary, psalm of, 95 of biblical texts and, 16n21; infant
marzeah., 123n54 Moses and, 6263, 80n47, 81; in list
matzevah, 195, 197 of female prophets, Megillah 14a,
Medad, 76, 87 94n2; paradigmatic view of, 6162;
Mesopotamia and Mesopotamian prophetic status of, 61, 68, 7481;
divination: breadcrumbs oered public/private spheres, articial
to ghosts in, 181n32; evidence dichotomy of, 35; skin disease of,
of women as diviners, 12, 15, 16; 74n33, 7576, 8081; tensions in
false prophecy and sexual devi- depiction of, 6263, 74, 78, 8081,
Y6621.indb 253 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Miriam (continued ) names and naming, 54, 5658

217; Torah, womens prophetic Nane, 1213, 14, 13637, 222
authority relating to, 50n4; wise Nathan, 13940, 146
woman of Abel compared, 143. See nation of prophets/nation of priests,
also Song of Miriam 185n4
Moab, child sacrice by king of, 180 Nebuchadnezzar, 7n3, 27, 94, 132, 222
monarchy in Israel, 3, 9596, 101 Neco, 154, 156, 158, 219
Mordechai, 138n23 necromancy: ancestor worship and,
Moses: access to divine knowledge by, 112n19, 118, 190; birds, spirits of
3; conict with Miriam and Aaron the dead as, 170, 171, 17276, 177,
(in Numbers 12), 7481, 187, 217; 181, 2056; compatibility with
Deborah compared, 8690, 93, Yahwism, 183; dangerous woman
150, 217; Huldah compared, 150; in Proverbs 19 and, 2048;
as infant, 6263, 80n47, 81; Joels of the daughters of your people
vision of universal prophecy and, who prophesy, 167, 170, 171, 17683,
185; as judge and prophet, 8690, 204; falseness and, 17883; hunting
93; magic versus religion and, of spirits, 167, 17176, 2056, 207;
2324; Miriam as female coun- Isaiahs rejection of, 166; to make
terpart of, 6162; paradigmatic die and to make live, 17678;
view of, 61n1, 62; Song of, 6566, night as appropriate time for,
178; true and false prophets in 113; Saul, mediums and spiritists
succession of, 38, 150; wise men removed from land by, 1056, 108,
assisting, 131 110, 11617, 119; strength of pres-
mother in Israel: Deborah as, 8486, ence in Israel, 18283; teraphim
143; wise woman of Abel and use and, 19091, 199n15; women,
of phrase, 14243 association with, 11718, 166,
mothers: of Micah the Ephraimite, 86, 191; Yahwism and, 112, 114, 119,
189, 197201, 202; Ninsun (mother 125, 178, 18083. See also En-dor
of Gilgamesh), 1314, 15, 16, 136, necromancer
222; separation of maternal and Nehemiah, Noadiah as counterpart to,
divinatory roles, 221; of Sisera, 150n4
138n23. See also fertility, pregnancy, Nikkal-Ib, 137
and childbirth; Hannah; Isaiah; Nineveh, personied as whore, 212
Rebekah the Aramaean Ninsun (mother of Gilgamesh), 1314,
Muhammad, 71, 72n27 15, 16, 136, 222
music: drums and drumming, 6465, Noadiah (prophet), 18688; diculty
67, 68, 82; gender-based antiphony, analyzing reference to, 188, 217n1;
6566; prophecy and, 29, 6364, 68, list of female prophets in Megil-
72, 99; victory songs, 6465, 6768, lah 14a, omission from, 94n2;
8283. See also entries at Song seen as enemy (but not false
prophet) by Nehemiah, 18687;
Nabonidus, 152n10 sex of, 18788; viewed as pro-
nb, 170n6 phetic counterpart to Nehemiah,
Nahmanides, 191 150n4, 187n1
Y6621.indb 254 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Noadiah son of Binnui, 187 210, 213, 215; Jerusalem personied

Nob, priests of, slaughtered by Saul, as woman (in Isaiah 29), 209n11;
116, 130 Jezebel, 21213, 215; magic and
sorcery, womens divination associ-
ocial cult and popular religion, ated with, 21314; sexual deviance,
3133 women associated with, 21315;
old country (Aram, Syria), matriarchs soothsayer and whore (in Isaiah
associated with, 4345, 52, 58, 218, 57), 20810, 213, 215
221 Peninnah, 9697, 100, 101, 103
omens, 10, 17, 30, 43, 5459, 137n21, 165, poetry and prophecy, connection be-
218 tween, 6873
Onomacritus (in Arist. Pol.), 7 polemical distinction between proph-
oracles: access to divine knowledge ecy and divination, 45
and, 4; Clarian Oracle, 7071; of popular religion versus ocial cult,
Deborah, 85, 87, 88n11; Delphic 3133
Oracle, 71; of Ezekiel, 35, 168, 169, post-barren women, 100101
171, 176, 177, 17982; of Hannah, pregnancy. See birth divination; fertil-
94, 95, 101; of Huldah, 6162, 148, ity, pregnancy, and childbirth
15058, 219; in Isaiah, 144, 161, Priestly source, 25
163, 164, 209, 210; of Joel, 18485; priests: Abiathar, 27, 32, 50n11; Clar-
KIN oracle, 134n8; in poetry and ian Oracle and, 48n9; Hilkiah
prose, 6973; Pythia, 71; Rebekah (high priest), 15253, 154; Levites,
and, 47n7, 48n8, 52, 54, 58; sorcery 80n48, 81, 8586, 187, 197, 199,
and sexual deviance, association 200, 202; as mediators of divine
between, 212 revelation, 48n9, 71n25; Micah
Other: foreigners as, 223n6; magic the Ephraimite, Levite priest of,
viewed as, 4, 21, 22, 24; male Israel- 8586, 197, 199, 202; nation of, 185;
ite identity formation in opposi- of Nob, slaughtered by Saul, 116,
tion to, 9, 222 130; public men versus private
women and, 34, 35; skin conditions
Palm of Deborah, 87, 88 and, 75n36, 76n37; urim, use of, 27
parental language for prophets, 8486 private women versus public men,
Passover, 32, 157 3435
pathways between the living and the prophets and prophecy: conict,
dead (pathways to Sheol), 177, 204, prophetic, 33, 7481, 87, 90, 170n4,
2067, 209, 213 18283, 18688, 217; court prophets,
patriarchal divine-human conversa- 152, 179; Deborah, prophetic status
tions, 6, 49 of, 82, 84, 86, 89, 217; discourses
pejorative metaphorical references to of female prophets with Yahweh,
womens divination, 20316; in 14950; divination polemically
Christian tradition, 21516; com- distinguished from, 45, 19, 2631;
bination of spiritual and sexual female prophets, studies of, 3739;
danger, 21016; dangerous woman Hannah, prophetic status of,
(in Proverbs 19), 17778, 2038, 9496, 99, 1012, 1034; Huldah,
Y6621.indb 255 1/27/15 1:08 PM

prophets and prophecy (continued ) 58, 218; birth and appearance of

as ocial prophet, 15152; Isaiah, twins, interpretation of, 5456; as
prophet who conceives and gives both diviner and divined, 5860;
birth to son in, 94n2, 16066, 220; direct versus indirect inquiry of,
Joels vision of universal proph- 4851; divined by Abrahams ser-
ecy, 18485; judges and prophets, vant at her mothers house, 4344,
8693; list of female prophets, 5859; former time, Rebekah story
Megillah 14a, 94n2; mantic, ecstatic written as occurring in, 43; Han-
prophecy, 7, 30, 63n3, 69, 71n25, 113, nah compared, 103; independent
123n53, 168; Miriam, prophetic sta- and decisive character of, 4445;
tus of, 61, 68, 7481; music and, 29, infertility of, 45, 52; inquiry of
6364, 68, 72, 99; nation of proph- God, divination by, 4748; Isaacs
ets, 185n4; parental language for supplications and divination of,
prophets, 8486; poetry, connec- 4546, 48n8, 5152; later insertion,
tion to, 6873; robes as prophetic pregnancy divination regarded as,
garments, 122; Song of Deborah 4647n7; as mother, 37; naming of
not constituting, 8384; Song of twins, 54, 5658; oracle on destiny
Miriam not constituting, 6874, of twins received by, 5254; orches-
84; wise men, some prophets as, tration of Isaacs blessing of Jacob
13233. See also daughters of your by, 45, 5960, 194, 195; rhetorical
people who prophesy; true and question of, 53; terminological is-
false prophets; specic prophets, sues related to, 43n1
e.g. Miriam religion and magic, 2026, 16970
prostitutes and prostitution. See whores Remaliah, son of, 163
and whoring ritual meal, food provided to Saul
proverbial speech attributed to wise by En-dor necromancer as,
women, 14445 12224
Proverbs 19, dangerous woman in, rpum, 174, 175
17778, 2038, 210, 213, 215
public men versus private women, sacrice: child sacrice, 180; En-dor
3435 necromancer, food provided to
Pythia, 71 Saul by, 12224
Samson, 87, 88, 200
Rachel: divination, teraphim taken for Samuel: birth of, 9698; cultic activity
purposes of, 19193, 196; family at local shrine, participation in, 32;
teraphim taken by, 52n14, 19197, as judge and prophet, 87, 8889;
2012; Joseph and, 19293, 201; name, explanation of, 57; vision of
Leah, competition with, 192; man- Yahweh while sleeping in temple,
drakes and, 162; positive biblical 27n19. See also En-dor necroman-
portrayal of, 196; theft as theme in cer; Hannah
story of, 19397 Sanballat, 18687
Rashbam, 191 sanctuary, women serving in, 35
Rashi, 96n7, 155n14, 164n9 Sarah, 49, 94n2
Rebekah the Aramean, 4337; associa- Saul: access to divine knowledge, loss
tion with old country, 4345, 52, of, 3, 50, 11517, 126, 12829, 201,
Y6621.indb 256 1/27/15 1:08 PM

222; cultic activity at local shrine, Sheol: dangerous woman of Proverbs

participation in, 32; David, anger 19 and, 203n1, 2047, 210, 213;
at, 97; death of, 128, 129, 156; fear the daughters of your people who
of, 115, 121; mediums and spirit- prophesy and, 173n12, 17778; in
ists removed from land by, 1056, Hannahs prayer, 104, 178; sooth-
108, 110, 11617, 119; priests of Nob sayer and whore in Isaiah 57 and,
slaughtered by, 116, 130; as prophet 20910, 213
and diviner, 28; summoned by ibtu, 11, 29, 5051n12
Samuel, 88. See also En-dor sign: omen versus, 59n30; Rebekah as,
necromancer 5960
scapegoat rituals, 135n8 sign-acts, 161, 162, 166
scribal divination, 1011, 13, 118, 221 sign-children, 16166, 220
scribal elite, 16, 222 Sisera, 83, 91
scribes: Getinanna as, 1314; Shaphan, Sisera, mother of, 138n23
15253, 157n20 skin disease: as in or on someone,
scroll brought to Huldah, 15254 109n8; Miriam aicted with,
Second Isaiah: all esh is grass, 74n33, 7576, 8081
nature of phraseology of, 132; Solomon, 27, 50
Habakkuk compared, 199; prophet Song of Deborah, 6365, 68n18
who conceives and gives birth to Song of Hannah, 9495, 9596,
son in Isa 8:3 and, 163n7; on wise 98103
men, 132 Song of Miriam (Song of the Sea),
Sennacherib, 94 6374; association with Miriam,
seventy elders, 8687 6568; prophecy, not constituting,
sexuality: adultery, 206n5, 208, 215; 6874, 84; Song of Deborah and,
combination of spiritual and 6365, 68n18, 8284, 8384; as vic-
sexual danger, 21016; concubine tory song, 6465
of Levite, story of, 200; danger- Song of Moses, 6566, 178
ous woman in Proverbs 19 and, soothsayers and soothsaying, 168,
204, 2068, 210, 213, 215; En-dor 20810, 213, 214
necromancer and, 11314, 216; sorcery. See magic; entries at witch
false prophets and sexual devi- special identity as diviner, as aspect of
ancy, 215n22; Isaiah, prophet who divination, 56
conceived and gave birth to son spells, spell casters, and spell casting,
in, 161n4, 162n6; women associated 23n10, 105, 212
with sexual deviance, 21315. See spirit-divining. See En-dor necroman-
also whores and whoring cer; necromancy
Shallum ben Tikvah ben Harhas the spiritists, 28, 106, 109, 115, 116, 117
wardrobe keeper, 149 spirits of the dead: ancestor spirits,
shamans, 3334 107n6, 108, 118; as birds, 170, 171,
Shaphan (scribe), 15253, 157n20 17276, 177, 181, 2056; consulting/
shawls of the daughters of your people inquiring of, 2829, 31n23, 47, 49,
who prophesy, 167, 17172, 178 107, 119, 166, 182; control of, 78n26,
Shear Yashuv, 163 178n25, 181; multiple spirits, 119n39;
Sheba ben Bichri, 141, 143 raising, 3, 17, 105, 110, 112, 11922,
Y6621.indb 257 1/27/15 1:08 PM

spirits of the dead (continued ) 180, 182, 183; En-dor necromancer

124, 125, 130, 177, 178; vocabulary of, as false prophet, 39n39, 114n29;
10710, 182. See also dead; En-dor Ezekiel on false (male) prophets,
necromancer; necromancy 16869; Huldah as true prophet,
structuralism, 2526 39n39, 150, 155; Jezebel as false
symbolic acts, 135n8, 16166, 218, 222 prophet in Revelation, 215; Miriam
as true prophet even in opposi-
Tabeal, son of, 163 tion to Moses, 80; Moses, true
Tacitus, 71 and false prophets in succession
tallit, 172n7 of, 38, 150; Noadiah, 18788; sexual
Tamar: birth of twins of, 5758n28; rape deviancy and false prophets,
by Amnon, 138, 140 215n22; Yahwistic yet false proph-
technical divination, 4, 5, 7, 1011, 2930 ets, 33, 79, 18083
tellin, 172n7 twins, 5258
Tekoa, wise woman of (in 2 Samuel
14), 131, 13841, 14347 universal prophecy, Joels vision of, 185
tent of meeting, women serving at, urim, 27, 115, 117, 128, 183, 218
18n22, 38, 162n7 Uzzah, 4
teraphim, 189202; acceptability in
Israelite ritual life, 195; dening, Codex Vaticanus, 92
190; inheritance of property and ventriloquism, divination by, 109n8
possession of, 190, 19192; Micah, victory songs, 6465, 6768, 8283
mother of, 86, 189, 197201, 202; visions versus dreams, 5051n12
Michals use of, 201; necromancy
and, 19091, 199n15; plural form whores and whoring: En-dor necro-
of, 190, 192n8; Rachel, family mancer story and, 11314; Hosea,
teraphim taken by, 52n14, 19197, whoring metaphor in, 165; idols/
2012; use in divination, 18993, deities, prostituting oneself after,
196, 199, 201; women, association 108; Isaiah, 57; soothsayer and
with, 2012 whore in, 20810; as term, 211n17.
theft: of Micah, 19798; as theme in See also sexuality
Jacob-Rachel-Laban and Jacob- Wisdom, female personication of,
Esau stories, 19397 203n1, 206
titles of women diviners, removal of, wise women, 13147; of Abel (in 2 Sam-
146n42 uel 20), 84, 85, 131, 14147; child-
to make die and to make live, 17678 birth, association with, 13637;
Tobiah, 186 Hittite wise women, 13436, 221;
Torah, womens prophetic authority magic combined with divinatory
relating to, 38n36, 61n1, 150 insight in, 13536; in Near Eastern
trickster motif, 3637 literature generally, 13638; prover-
true and false prophets, 3334; the bial speech attributed to, 14445;
daughters of your people who Siseras mother and, 138n23; of
prophesy, false necromancy of, Tekoa (in 2 Samuel 14), 131, 13841,
17883; ecacy of false prophecy, 14347; as titular, divinatory, and
Y6621.indb 258 1/27/15 1:08 PM

authoritative role, 14547, 221; wise old country, matriarchs associ-

men in Bible and, 13134, 13536, ated with, 4345, 52, 58, 218, 221;
13637, 138n23, 140 pejorative metaphorical references
witch and whore motif, 21013 to, 20316 (see also pejorative meta-
Witch of En-dor. See En-dor phorical references to womens
necromancer divination); range of attitudes
witchcraft, 30, 105, 207, 210n13 toward, 21718; reasons for focus
witches, the daughters of your people on, 811; teraphim, 189202 (see
who prophesy as, 168 also teraphim); titles, removal of,
womens divination in biblical litera- 146n42; variation in activities re-
ture, 318, 21723; articial dichot- garded as, 218; wise women, 13147
omies in, 1940 (see also articial (see also wise women). See also nec-
dichotomies); bringing together romancy; prophets and prophecy;
traditions of, 21922; childlessness specic women, e.g. Miriam
of most women diviners, 21921; wrist-fetters of the daughters of your
the daughters of your people who people who prophesy, 167, 17172,
prophesy (in Ezekiel), 16783 178
(see also daughters of your people
who prophesy); dreamers/dream Yahwism: arrow ritual and, 32; elder
diviners in, women not acting prophecy and, 87; false yet Yah-
as, 7, 22122; evidence for, 1016; wistic prophets, 33, 79, 18083; Mi-
gendered assumptions regarding, cahs private sanctuary and, 200;
19 (see also gender and gendered necromancy and, 112, 114, 119, 125,
assumptions); historical analysis 178, 18083; spiritual and sexual
of biblical texts and, 1617; Isaiah, danger tropes not specic to, 212,
prophet who conceives and gives 213, 214; teraphim and, 195
birth to son in, 94n2, 16066, 220; Yarikh, 137
Joels vision of universal proph- Yarkab-Addu, wife of, 211
ecy, 18485; magic and sorcery,
association with, 21314; mens and Zedekiah, 49
womens divination not signi- Zimri-lim, 51, 222
cantly dierent, 217, 221, 22223; Zunana, 51, 222
Y6621.indb 259 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Index of Ancient Texts
Hebrew Bible 27:36 194

Genesis 27:43, 46 45n4
4:1 57 27:46 53n16
16:11 57 28:12 45n4
18 49 28:1617 27n19
18:13, 15 57 29:2130 192
18:21 126n57 29:30 192
20:3 5, 222 29:3130:24 192
20:17 46 30 162, 193
21:6 57 30:2630 193
24 43, 44, 59 30:3143 195
24:4 44 31 19394
24:58 44 31:79 194
24:1014 58 31:1416 192
24:21 58 31:16 194
24:28 44 31:17 192
24:46 59 31:1735 191
24:5051 59 31:19 193
24:57 44 31:20 193
24:60 45n3 31:24 5
24:67 44n2 31:39 193
25 5758, 59 33:12 195
25:1926 43, 45 37:3 192
25:21 46, 47n7 37:510 193
25:22 46, 52, 57 37:511 26
25:2223 4647n7 37:8, 10 49
25:23 54 37:19 27, 106
25:24 47n7, 54 38:29 58n28
25:2526 54 38:30 58n28
25:25a 57 39:6 192
27 44, 45 4041 26, 193
27:8, 13, 43 45 40:8 7
27:1516 45 41:8 131
260
Y6621.indb 260 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Index of Ancient Texts 261
41:25 222 Numbers

44:5 27, 166, 193 11 76n38, 185n4
44:15 193 1112 76n42
Exodus 11:1115 8687
2 81 11:1617 87
2:3 62 11:17, 25 78
2:4 63 11:29 185
6:2814:31 3 12 7481, 90, 188
7:1 78n44 12:1 75n34, 78, 79,
7:1011 24 83n2
7:11 132 12:3 79
1415 68n17 12:4 79
15 65, 67, 68, 72, 12:8 77n41
83, 90 12:12 75
15:1 65, 83, 99 20:113 24
15:1, 2, 12 64 20:8 24
15:121 64 21:9 23
15:20 64, 68 21:17 67n16
15:2021 65 26:59 62, 81
15:21 66, 73, 83 27:21 27
15:2225 23 Deuteronomy
17:16 24 1:15 131
17:913 23 4:29 47
18 87 6:78 205m3
18:1516 86 11:1820 205m3
19:6 185n4 13:13 33
22:17 [Eng. 22:18] 105, 211n14 13:24 178
28:3 131 13:24
32:9 106 [Eng. 13:13] 180
32:18 67 15:1213 173n11
34:1516 210 18 39n39, 114n29
35:25 138 18:913 112
36:1 138 18:914 31, 38, 128n58
38:8 35 18:10 180
Leviticus 18:1011 28, 47, 214
11:5 157n20 18:11 107
11:29 157n20 18:2022 178
13:217 75n36 18:22 33
17:7 210 22:14 162n6
18:6 162n6 24:9 80
20:56 210 25:9 76n37
20:6 108 25:17 81
20:27 107, 108, 31:7 88
109n8 31:16 210
Y6621.indb 261 1/27/15 1:08 PM

262 Index of Ancient Texts
Deuteronomy (continued) 17:13 200

31:30 99 18:5 85, 199
32:39 178 18:14, 17 199
32:44 99 18:18 199
34:912 89 18:19 85
Joshua 18:20 199
7:1020 27 18:24 199
10:1214 23 19:4, 7, 9 200
15:45 142 20:27 27
Judges 1 Samuel
2:17 210 1 101
3 91 1:4 96
3:10 87 1:6 96
4 84, 85, 150n4 1:7 96
45 68n17 1:10 96
4:4 86, 91, 92 1:1011 100
4:5 85, 87 1:15 97
4:67 150 1:16 97
4:9 150 1:20 99n12
4:14 150 1:22 97
5 64, 65, 83, 1:23 98, 99n10
8485, 86, 1:24 98
90, 143, 146 2:1 95, 99
5:1 83, 99, 99n13 2:110 98103
5:7 84, 143 2:48 101
5:12 83 2:5 100
5:29 138n23 2:6 104, 178
68 88 2:9 101
6:8 91 2:10 95
6:34 87 2:12 97n9
6:3640 50 2:19 98, 122n52
8:27, 33 210 2:22 35
9:53 52 2:23 101
11:26 142 2:2736 146n42
11:29 87 3:3 27n19
13 88 56 4
13:25 87 5:12 142
14:6, 19 87 6:67 4
15:14 87 910 32
16:5 200 912 116
17 197 9:9 28, 49
1718 88, 199n15 14:3743 27
17:26 197 15 116n34
17:10 85, 199 15:23 88
Y6621.indb 262 1/27/15 1:08 PM

15:23 189 28:15 3, 115n31, 127

15:27 122 28:1516 128
15:3335 116 28:18 127
16 128 28:20 123, 124
16:14 3, 128 28:2022 127
18:67 67, 68 28:2122 125, 127
18:12 3, 128 28:22 124
19 128, 195 28:2425 124
19:1117 201 29:5 67
21:12 [Eng. 21:11] 67 30:7 27, 50n11, 116,
22:1718 116 199
23:2, 4 50 30:78 3, 116, 128
23:24 116 30:8 50
23:24, 912 3 2 Samuel
23:9 27, 116, 199 1:116 128
23:912 32 1:26 115n31
24:1621 114 2:1 3, 50, 116
25:3 145 5:23 50
26:2125 114 12:7 140
27 115n30 12:9 140
28 105, 108n7, 110, 12:13 140
116n34, 129, 12:1524 124n55
130, 151, 13:2123 140
154n12, 177, 14 131, 138141,
178, 182, 218 143147
28:12 114, 115n30 14:120 138
28:3 108, 110, 14:7 138
115n30, 119, 14:14 144
125 14:16 142n30
28:4 115 14:20 140
28:5 121 17:18 96
28:6 28, 115, 127 19:28 [Eng. 17] 141
28:6, 1516 3 20 8485, 131,
28:7 28, 106, 108, 14147
115n33 20:12 141
28:8 108, 119, 127 20:16 141
28:823 124 20:1619 85
28:9 108, 127 20:17 141
28:10 127 20:18 141, 144
28:11 120, 121 20:19 141, 142n30
28:1112 121 20:2122 143
28:12 120, 121 22 94n1
28:13 121, 122 22:1 99
28:1314 121, 122 23:17 94n1
Y6621.indb 263 1/27/15 1:08 PM

1 Kings 23:29 156

3:315 50 25:22 157n20
3:415 27 Isaiah
9:22 213 1:21 210n12
13:110 146n42 3:2 114n29
16:31 212n18 3:23 133n3
17:824 25 78 163
18 182 7:3 163
1819 212n18 7:4, 5, 9 163
18:40 80 7:6 163
19:2 212n18 7:11 163
20:3543 140 7:14 137n20, 163
21 212n18 7:1516 164
21:25 212n18 8 162n7, 165
22 152 8:1 161
22:58 28 8:3 94n2, 160, 161,
22:8, 10, 18 179 162, 165
2 Kings 8:4 163, 164
1:2 28 8:1618 166n11
2:12 85 8:18 161, 164, 166
2:1922 23 8:19 28, 47, 108, 118,
3:11 28 166n11,
3:15 28, 29, 30 17576, 218
3:27 180 8:1920 119n40,
4:1837 25 175n21
6:57 23 8:19a 28
6:21 85 8:19b 28, 47
6:2829 37 10:14 175n21, 176
8:8 28 13:21 67
8:9 85 13:22 67
9 21213 19:3 108, 132
9:22 212 19:3a 28, 47
13:14 85 19:3b 28
13:1719 32 19:11 132
21:67 108 20 161
22:13 28 20:3 161
22:13, 18 49 27:2 67n16
22:1314 151 29:4 108, 176,
22:14 149 209n11
22:1520 151 29:1014 132
22:18 28 35:110 95
22:20a 154 38:14 176
22:20b 155 40:6 144
23:24 108, 110 40:20 131
Y6621.indb 264 1/27/15 1:08 PM

44:25 132 13:2 169

47:1 212 13:3 169
47:115 212, 213 13:4 169
47:29 212 13:6 169
47:3 212 13:69 180
47:9 212 13:7 169
47:10 212 13:89 169
47:11 212 13:16 169
50:6 76n37 13:17 169, 178, 179
54:1 95 13:1723 167, 168, 171
56:17 209 13:18 171, 172
56:1011 208 13:19 180
57 214, 215 13:20 173, 177, 206
57:3 208 13:21 173
57:313 20810, 213 13:23 169, 176, 180,
57:6 209 181
57:613 212n18 14:3 28
57:8 209 14:7 28
57:9 209 16:3134 211n17
59:11 175n21 18:6 162n6
Jeremiah 20:3 28
2 209n10 20:31 28
23 210n12 21 189
8:2 28 21:1 28
9:16 [Eng. 9:17] 138 21:26 [Eng. 21:21] 189, 202
11:20 215n23 23:3, 8, 21 56
17:10 215n23 26:20 173n12
20:12 215n23 37:10 179
20:18 53 38:12 171
21:2 28 Hosea
25:30 67 14 210n12
28 33, 80 1:2 165
28:1617 80 1:3, 6, 8 165
37:7 28, 49 2:36 [Eng.
51:14 67 2:14] 165
Ezekiel 3:4 195
8:11 46 3:5 195
12:2128 168 5:11 52
12:24 168 12:14 [Eng. 12:13] 89
13 11, 16869, Joel
170, 175, 177, 1:152:11 184
178, 181, 200, 2:1227 184
204, 206, 3:12 [Eng.
214, 218 2:2829] 18485
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Joel (continued ) 7:1013 207

3:34 [Eng. 7:11 203n1
2:3031] 184 7:2223 205, 207
Amos 4:1 52 7:2627 206
Micah 6:4 61n1, 79n46, 7:27 177, 203n1
217n1 9 2034n1
Nahum 9:4 206
3:4 212, 213 9:13 203n1
3:5 212 9:1318 206
Habakkuk 2:1819 199 9:16 206
Zephaniah 3:10 46 9:18 178, 203n1, 206
Zechariah 10:2 189, 199 31:1 39n38
Psalms Job 29:16 85n9
7:10 [Eng. 7:9] 215n23 Ecclesiastes 12:6 52
20:89 [Eng. Esther
20:78] 102 1:13 138n23
26:2 215n23 6:13 138n23
49:15 204 Daniel
74:14 52 1:17 132
75:6 [Eng. 75:5] 102 2 27, 71
75:11 [Eng. 75:10] 102 2:2 132
88:1 67n16 2:1219 132
113:9 100 2:45 222
119:172 67n16 4:6 27
124:7 173n10 4:30 175n18
145:14 122n50 5:116 27
147:7 67n16 Ezra
Proverbs 3:1011 67
19 177, 20308, 8:33 187
210, 213, 214, Nehemiah
215 2:10, 19 186
1:12 206 4:17 186
2:1213 206 6:57 186
2:1619 177 6:7 186
2:1819 204 6:14 186, 217n1
57 203n1 1 Chronicles
5:5 177, 204 5:29 [Eng. 6:3] 81
6:5 173n10 10:13 108
6:2022 205 10:1314 28, 129
6:2122 205 13:3 28, 47
6:2324, 26 205 25:16 39n38
6:2426 205 2 Chronicles
6:26 177, 204, 208n7 2:6 [Eng. 2:7] 131
7 2034n1, 17:3 28
206n4, 207 17:34 28
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20:34 124n55 Atrahasis I 193, 250;

25:20 28 III iii 33 136
33:67 108 The Building of
34:3 157 Ningirsus Temple,
34:28 157n20 li. 2332, 4350, and
34:33 157 93100 12
35:21 156 Cuneiform Texts from Babylonian
35:22 156, 158 Tablets in British Museum
35:24 156 CT 16 31:123f 208n7
CT 17 36
New Testament K.9272:9 208n7
Luke 1:4655 95 The Descent of
Revelation 2:2023 215 Ishtar, li. 410 174
Dumuzis Dream 1315
Quran 7172 li. 1925 13
20:81 5657n26 li. 2425 136n12
21:5 71n26 li. 29 15
36:69 71n26 li. 42, 4849,
37:3637 71n26 6769, 24048 1516
52:30 71n26 li. 20515 15n18
69:4043 71n26 Emar, texts from 170, 190
Enmerkar and
Rabbinic sources Ensuhgirana 24n11

Midrash Four Hymns
Exod. R. 1:13 80n47 to Gula 136
Lev. R. 26:7 119n39, 120n46 Gilgamesh epic
Talmud dreams and
Berakhot 31a 97n8 divination in 1316
Megillah 14a 94, 102 Penn Tablet (P)
Megillah 14b 94n2 15 and 37 13, 136
Sot.ah 12b 80n47 SBV Gilg VII
Targum 18290 17374
Jonathan A Hymn to Nane
on Hannah 94 [Nane A], li. 225 136
Judg 5 84n4 KAR 139 181n32
Prophets Maql
(Tg. Neb.) 94n1 I 68 207
Pseudo-Jonathan I 11011 207
on birth of I 181 207
Tamars twins 58n26 II 15 207
on Rebekahs II 172 207
pregnancy 53n15 III, 12 207, 211
Mari letters
Mesopotamian sources ARM 26 207 11, 29, 211
Alandimm II 87 55 ARM 26 214 50
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Mesopotamian sourcesMari letters KTU 1.17 II 4142 137n18

(continued ) The Betrothal of
ARM 26 227 50 Yarikh and Nikkal
ARM 26 229 50 Ib, KTU 1.24 137
ARM 26 232 51, 222 A Birth, KTU 1.11 137n19
ARM 26 236 50 Dagan stelae, KTU
ARM 26 249 211 6.13, 6.14 123n54
dreaming in 26n17, 222 Kirta, KTU 1.16
nb in 170n6 V 2528 133n3
prophets rpum texts 175
speech in 72
Neo-Assyrian oracles West Semitic inscriptions
female Deir Alla texts 73
prophets in 11, 153 Ketef Hinnom I, li.
prose nature of 910 205
most texts 7273 Ketef Hinnom II,
SAA 9 1.6 72, 73n31 li. 45 205
Nergal and Ereshkigal Panamuwa
(Sultantepe version I) inscription, KAI 214 172n9
iii 15, 7 174 Zakkur stela 73
Nuzi, texts from 190
OB Lu-azlag Hittite sources
A 356 106n3 Bilingual Edict of
BC, Seg. 6, 3 106n3 Hattuili I 135, 138n23

umma izbu Kessi, Late
I1 56 Version of 222
I 58 54 KIN oracle 13435n8
I 63 55 KUB 1.16 + iii 6569 135n11
I 83 55 Paskuwattis Ritual
I 83131 55 Against Sexual
II 7 54 Impotence
II 19 55 (CTH 406) 135n8
IV 3134 55
Greek sources
Ugaritic sources Aeschylus,
Aqhat Agamemnon, li. 1134
Danils and 1209 7
sacrices in 46n6 Aristotle, Politics
The Duties of an 1274a.28 7
Ideal Son (CTA Artemidorus,
17.1.2634) 123n54 Interpretation of
ktrt 136n16, 137 Dreams 2.69 30
KTU 1.17 I 3637 137n18 Homer, Odyssey
KTU 1.17 II 11:207 174
2440 137 11:222 174
Y6621.indb 268 1/27/15 1:08 PM

22:349 68n18 Sophocles, Oed.

24:69 174 tyr. 709 7
Josephus, Antiquities
6.14.4 11011 Latin sources
Septuagint (LXX) 107n4, 122n50, Augustine, City of
171, 187, God (Civ.) 17.4 95n4
208n8
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Index of Key Ancient Terms
Most words and phrases are listed in the forms in which they appear most
frequently in the text and notes.
Hebrew 24, 132

31, 10510, 112, 119, , 24, 31, 105, 132
120, 132, 176, 190 104, 176, 178
, Samuel as 112, 119, 122, 177 2089
8486, 14243, 146 31, 166, 193
86, 138, 145 176
132 31, 49, 108
- 1057, 110, 117, , 87, 16971, 179
130, 146, 154 , 27, 38, 61, 81, 8283,
27, 106 86, 8992, 99,
- 10510, 117, 130, 14849, 152,
146, 154 15966, 16970,
105, 212 186
47, 108 108, 167, 17073,
28, 31, 4649, 53, 17583, 2047, 210
86, 108, 115, 118, 6768
157, 166, 176 , 31, 20810
176 and 5657
108, 165, 205, 208, 46
21112 , 75, 81
31, 105, 212 31, 106, 108, 110,
31, 169, 189 114, 121, 13233,
24, 131, 13234, 141 16869, 189
24, 13132 177, 204, 206
133 31, 50, 98, 108,
31, 10610, 132, 176 11516, 141, 189
17172 45, 125
9697, 101 , 8689
105, 212 , 172, 176, 204, 208
270
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Index of Key Ancient Terms 271
Aramaic munabbitu 17071

27 nb 17071
s. du 208
Arabic a et.emmi 106, 110; 172
ba 107 ailtu 15
atara 46 ibtu 134
gaiya 56 uttum 5051
kuhhn 71
Sumerian
Ugaritic L GIDIM.MA 106, 110
ktrt 13637 umma 134, 136
rpum 17475
Hittite
Akkadian api 107
ipu 214 haawa 137
MUNUS
bar, brtu 10, 136 U.GI 13435, 137
pii, piti 207
eru 133, 136 Greek
ilu 119 7
kas, kastu, ksu 17172 208, 215
kapi, kapti 207, 211 215
kuzbu 207 7
Y6621.indb 271 1/27/15 1:08 PM

Women Divination

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Women Divination

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Womens Divination in Biblical Literature

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The series is committed to producing volumes in the tradition

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Permission to reprint an excerpt from Dumuzis Dream: Aspects of Oral Poetry in

Yale University Press books may be purchased in quantity for educational,

Printed in the United States of America.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Hamori, Esther J., author.

This paper meets the requirements of ansi/niso z39.48-1992 (Permanence of

Y6621.indb iv 1/27/15 1:07 PM

Y6621.indb v 1/27/15 1:07 PM

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part one: womens div inat ion and

1. Access to Divine Knowledge, 3

part t wo: biblic al perspect iv e s on

3. Rebekah the Aramean, 43

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13. Noadiah, 186

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All translations of Hebrew and cognate languages are my own, except

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10. Bibliothque archologique et historique 79. Paris:

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NIV New International Version

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Who has access to divine knowledge?

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Divination and the Arts of Knowledge

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2. On fundamentals of message and symbolic-message dreams, see S. A. L.

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elements present: necromancy requires intent as well as possibly the special

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to Joseph, We each had a dream, but there is no one to interpret them.

3. Other examples include the dreams of Pharaoh and Nebuchadnezzar inter-

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I am primarily interested in ancient Israelite ideas about divination:

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by issues of communal identity formation in relation to the Other. This

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on divination have not included particular attention to women. There is

This must be understood in terms of Cryers stated primary interest in

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tautological statement). When we read divination texts, we are seeing evi-

10. Ibid., 138. Or similarly, continuing to view divination in terms of academic

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to other human beings, is a dierent question. Certainly, literary portray-

14. As noted by Stuart Weeks, By understanding the biblical prophetic literature

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One would not ordinarily refer to a goddess as performing divination;

The series of epithets Dumuzi rattles o is astonishing. He begins by

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interpretation. It is, rather, part of an expression of the wide-ranging

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Getinanna cried toward heaven, cried toward earth.

This is not a divination text: it is unrelated to the various genres of

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