This week is Parashat Valyera, and one of the many things in Parashat Valyera, which is a sort of monumental story, clearly the most monumental story is the Akheda, we've dealt with that a lot in past years, and of course the Annunciation at Avraham's tent and the birth of Yitzhak and Paul whom he smiled with lots of very big stories in Valyera. One of the stories, which is a big story, but often gets overlooked because it doesn't play the same central role in our historic development, as those others, is the story of the destruction of stone. And more to the point is what exactly happened in stone when the two guys went there to visit, and so we would assume based on the way that we refer to, even in English, Saddam, even the word sodomy, and staconos, meaning, that one of the big crimes in stone was that of, I guess you'd call it gang rape, and the scene that is the central scene that sort of tells us about the terrible people of stone and why the deserved to be destroyed seems to be that that's what it's about, which raises an interesting problem when we look in a pasuc in Yerzkaal paraktazayim where he says the following, "Henezaa ya avon stom acrotar." This is at the end of a beautiful but very painful parak about the sins of Yushalayim and describes Yushalayim as being the younger sister of other nations that sinned, but their sins weren't as bad as that Yushalayim, and here was the sin of Yushalayim, "Go on sivat lechaem, Yushalvatashkate," it was a proud, in other words, a comfortable city or wealthy city, wealthy area that had lots of peace and quiet. "Hayyallah believe not to hab," the city and its banoat, banoat means the excerpts of the city, had this prosperity and quiet, the "yan anive avon loaazika," and she didn't support the poor, and you would think that the real crime that we mentioned here would be of the story that happens in this event. So let's take a look at the story itself and let's see what it actually says because here's what happens. We get a veil over our eyes. We do this a lot of stories about what we assume happened because of the way we heard it or because we read certain things into it or because it's similar to another story, and the result of it is that we don't necessarily read the story straight to what it actually says. Let's say "Vayavu" in passage 2. "Vayavu'shnam al-Aqim's tawma ba'arab," the two malachim, remember, "Avaram" escorted three malachim, one of them disappears here, the makhlokir is showing, "Why? Who is it?" And the two of them come to stone by airab at the end of the day. "V'alot," Yushalvishar is tawm, "Lot," is sitting at the gate of stone, which already you should raise a question for us. "Why is Lot," who's a relative newcomer to this town, sitting at the gate of stone, "Vayavu'shnam al-Aqim'likratam al-Aqim's tawmashtakhopaymārta," "Lot sees them and he goes and he bows in front of them," which reminds us of the very beginning of the parasha, one chapter earlier, "P'arqyudh'at," where Avaram sees guests and he goes and bows to them and says, "Please come to me," and this is right now a beautiful parallel. "Keep in mind," I'm going to come back to this in a couple minutes, that's "Dome is a city that has recently suffered a great calamity. They were attacked, they were captured, they were conquered, they were taken captive, and ransacked by the kings of the east," kadawla, Omer, and that coalition. So keep that in mind, that's kind of the back of what's going on. Now, "Vayomir," here's what Lot says, "Hinayna, Adonai," exactly the way Avaram greets the guest, my masters, "Surun al-Baitavu'sham, Belina Rachatsu, Wagweham," unlike Avaram, who offers to bring them food outside. Lot says, "Turn now to my house, and sleep there, and wash up, vishqam, temboqam, kadawqam," and then get up early in the morning and leave. Now, there's a few things that are odd about this. The first one sounds odd, but it's not, because if we contrast it to Avaram's invitation, Lot actually seems much more hospitable. The answer is very clear that this is nighttime, and so the first concern is, where are they going to stay? It does come and stay in the house, and you can wash up, and you can stay there. The other thing that's a little strange is he says, "And get up early and leave." Now, that could just be good wishes. I assume you guys want to hit the road, so you're going to get up early and leave. Although, it sounds a little bit like, "Okay, come," and they get that cat out of here. So, it's a little unclear what that's about. "Vayomiruloh," keep our home nollie, and they say, "No, we're going to sleep in the street." Now, we hope it's not actually a street, it's the city square, because what's their job? Their job is to see how the people behave in stone. So, they want to be doing recon out there. They can't be in his house. "Vayimt sabban me oud vais sur a la vie v'ol beiton." Now, it's interesting, because these are Malachim, Malacheshm, and Lot is able to persuade them to come to his house. Look, that's a little odd. Why don't they just say, "Hey, we're not moving." But somehow, he pastures them and they come to his house. "Vayyas le mistem wa saut al fave ochaylu," and he actually gives them dinner, gives them some wine, gives them some bread. Very nice. "Tere miskavu," and before they even lie down, meaning to go to sleep, "Vayom shai hai yir un shai sidom," notice the phrase, it's a little double phrase, "the people of the city," meaning the people of stone. "Nasabu ala bayyad," they all surround the house. "Minar viyad zakain," meaning everybody, young and old, sounds like only the man, but young and old. "Kolha am mikatsa," and then there's another extra phrase. We already said they're all there, and now it says all of them to the very edge. "Vayyikr ua loit, vayom rula," they call out to loit and they say, "Ai yehana shimashimah shabari la halayla." "Where are the men who came to you during the evening?" In other words, they know that they're there. "Hoth siyyame elayno," and this is the critical word, "veneda aotam," send them out to us that we may know them. Now, what does conventional wisdom is not the word, but conventional understanding of what it is they want to do to them, what is it that will get you the 500 bucks in jeopardy if you pick "dome for 500"? What would that, how would you translate that phrase? Let's see, "Aim elayno vayda aotam," send them out to us that- Well, that's the idea of the sexual nature. Right, and that's what we think. I'll show you in a minute why we think that, but there's no reason to think that here, and that's why I gave you the background. The people of stone have been attacked by an outside army, living in a ransacked, they're on the alert, and now two strangers come in and loit brings them in. What do they assume the strangers are? What do the people of stone assume the strangers are? Or might be? They might be spies, buying out the land, they might be part of an enemy. So, what do they want to do? Oh, it's the "Aim elayno vayda aotam," bring them out to us so we can interrogate them. Literally, they are. Are you going to say- Is that the usual? What? Is that the usual use of "ne daat" to interrogate this? Because the verb "la daat" with its sexual meaning is only used in the context of heterosexual relations, and almost always in the case of marital heterosexual relations, as "in vayya daat amr khabat." You don't find it, for instance, when Amnon grabs Tamar in the rape case. You don't find him. That's heterosexual. So, it's a little bit of laying on a meaning that's foreign to the text here to say that they want to rape them. I'm going to show you where it comes from. If I say "aim elayno tappetra vada al-Sagar harabza," the load goes out, and he closes the door behind him, and then he says the famous line, which is really bizarre, and gets our hackles up, because, of course, we all think that they are claiming that they have the rights or they're demanding, that these people be sent out for gang rape. In the witch case, the load's next words just drive us crazy, and we think he should get voted as "worst father in history," because he says, "Alna ahai tareu." My brothers don't act badly. "Hine na'ali shtay banot." We all know this story. He says, "I have two daughters. I share lo'yadu ish," meaning they're unmarried. They've never had relations with the man. "Ocea na'etan al-ehem." I will bring them out to you, meaning in lieu of these guys. "Vasu'am ka tobbe nighani." You could do whatever you want to them. Now, in our conventional understanding, what is it lo'yad's offering to the people of city? I know you don't want to say it because it's disgusting. He's offering his daughters for gang rape, and maybe he misjudges, and he thinks, "Oh, this whole crowd is all fired up sexually, so I don't want them to take my guests. They could take my daughters," which, of course, makes us just sick to sick to sick to sick to our stomach. And now, "Rakhla nashimha'ala al-tusasa sudbar kang kangbao bhajsal koreati." Just don't do anything to these people because they're my guests. And, of course, we invoke the whole tradition of bedouin hospitality that when somebody comes in your house, they become part of your family, you take responsibility for them, and that's true. But to that extent, that's pushing it. Now, let's see what happens. Vayamru Geshehala, because there's something further on that gives us more pause for thinking here. Vayamru Geshehala kangbao lagur vayshpoch safot. One guy came here as a visitor, and suddenly, he's a judge. Migmahr here. Atanar al-Akhamiam, we're going to treat you better than worse than we were going to treat him, them. In other words, we were going, they're admitting that we're going to treat the guests worse, bad. We're going to treat you worse than that, which means what? Vayatu vayishpilot miho, that same word that Lot used to pastor the two guys to come to his house, they pester him by a truly broad deleth, and they come to break the door down, which is a little unusual because he's outside already. Vayatu the hu'ana shimit yadam. So, these two angels put their hands out, vayavir lottal yamabaita, and they bring Lot'an because evidently the door had been opened. Vayatu deleth, adel seguar, when they closed the door, metanashimah shimah shimah shimat habaiti kubasan vayrim, and then they immediately strike a plague on all the people in front of the door and blind them. Mikaton vyad-gadol, again, the young and the old, was that mean. Vayilumumu sapata, hanegad these guys wandering around, looking like at a zombie, a couple apocalypse looking for the door. Vayimurunah shimah lott. Now, the two guys turned to lott. Now, you would think that we're done now with the ugly scene, but there's something here that that, as you see, I highlighted it, that's a little odd. Vayimurunah shimah lott. Admi ala kafo, khatanu van akhum nottakha, bhachala shayl ala khaba'ir. Who else do you have in town? And they say, a son-in-law, sons or daughters, and anybody else you have in the city, hotsaymi namakha. Now, who is in the house with lott? We don't know. But it sounds like they're asking whether lott has other family members who are elsewhere in town, here's Gogadu them. Kimashritim anakkulatamakha maza, we are going to destroy this place. We, speaking in God's name, this is a big discussion with the Raspam, and the Raspam understands malachim. Kigalatsa khatanu preyadu maza, shayl ala khatanu. Their evil is risen up before God, and the cries from their evil have risen up before God, and God has sent us to destroy it. And now, what happens, vayite sai lott, vayite ba'ir al-hathan hablochheb nottad? Who does lott go to? He goes to his sons-in-law, which by the way tells you, "Who does he have?" The malachim said, "Khatanu vanakkulatamakha." Who does lott actually have in town? He has khatanim. What does khatanim mean? It can mean son-in-law, it can mean future son-in-law, meaning somebody who's already betrothed his daughter, but not yet married her. Keep that in mind. Now, he goes out, when he goes out, how can he talk to his khatan? How is khatanim? What does that tell you about his khatanim? Where were they? They were outside as part of the crowd, because the tatq said, "A whole town, all the men came." So that means his sons-in-law, we don't know how many, we're going to find out it's two, his two sons-in-law are part of the crowd, the angry crowd outside. And he goes out to them, and they're called khatanav, "lochrevenotav." We'll see what that means. "Vayyom rikumu-tsuminamakomazekimasqib al-shidall-naytahir-weihim-saqhebeneh-hatanav." He tells them, "Let's get out of town. God's going to destroy the town." And they think he's silly, they laugh at him, and of course, the end, they die. All right, by the way, who leaves town? Loth, who else? His wife? His wife? Oh, wife. Two daughters. And two daughters. That's it. Now, remember, they're two daughters that Loth had said, "Here are my two daughters, I shall I do a tenish." How many daughters does Loth have? So many people think Loth has two, has four daughters. Two daughters who are married to these guys, who live elsewhere with these guys, and two single daughters at home, who he had offered to the crowd. And these guys, speaking on behalf of their wives, his daughters laugh at him, so they don't get out of town, and the only ones who do get are the three women who live with Loth in the house, his wife and two daughters. And of course, we know what happens to his wife. She becomes a pillar of the community, and then his daughters, of course, become mothers of his children. It's all very disgusting. Anyhow. And when the angels guess who's in the house, why don't they mention the wife? Yeah, so remember, they're not telling him about people in the house. They're telling him, go out and get people in the town who are family members and get them out of town. The wife and the two daughters are in the house. She doesn't have to mention them. So now, you see the questions here again, thank you, Jason, for suggesting it. Now, the first thing I want to do is share with you why I think it is that we read the story the way we do. Because again, reading the simple text of the story, we do not know what the intent of the town's people is, but the simplest read of it is we want to interrogate them. And we know that they're going to be brutal because when they say to Loth, we're going to treat you worse than we're going to treat them. That means we intended to do them harm. But there's nothing sexual about it. Why do we think this is a gang rape? And why do the word sodomy enter the English language to mean a man having sex with another man and often forcefully? It's because there's a parallel story to this. The parallel story is the story of Pilaigesh Pihiva. At the end of the narrative piece, meaning there's the story of Pilaigesh Pihiva, which is Parakuteit and Shoftim, then there is the response of Benais Rao, which is the Civil War, which is Parakkhaf, and then there is the denu maw of the whole thing, which ends up with the pithmena binyamin, grabbing the girls from the dancing festival and the vineyards at the end of Parakkhaval, in Parakkhafal. But Parakuteit, in the narrative itself, there's a guy who, if the guy is a terrible guy, he's really wretched. And his wife runs away from him. It's Pilaigesh that's unclear. She's Pilaigesh runs away from him because she's afraid of getting angry. He is angry at her unclear. He finally, four months later, goes to the retriever from Beitlachan. He lives up in the Shofm run. And then it takes him a few days to get away because the father-in-law wants to hold him there. He finally gets away and they leave a little late in the day and they can't get all the way home, so they stop in Givah. I'm making a long story, very short. They stop in Givah. And they're out in the town square in Givah, which is a town of Binyamin. And there's an older man there who comes from hard-frying and evidently rents a house. He's an outsider, lives in this town. And he invites them in. And they say, well, we have food to take care of. I'll take care of you. I'll feed you. Everything's fine. They're in the house. (speaks in foreign language) These terrible people, these low-lives surround the house. Sounds familiar? They're on the house. (speaks in foreign language) (speaks in foreign language) They tell this guy, who, by the way, is not one of theirs. He's an outsider who's rented space there. (speaks in foreign language) Send out the man who came to you and we will know him. And again, we don't know what that means. But we reflect back because of what happens later. (speaks in foreign language) Does this story sound familiar? The owner of the house comes out. (speaks in foreign language) My brothers don't be badly. Exactly a quote from what? (speaks in foreign language) This man is coming to my house. It doesn't mention his lad or the girl. He just mentions the man. The man came to my house. (speaks in foreign language) Don't do this disgusting thing. He may, and watch what the guy says. (speaks in foreign language) I have a virgin daughter. (speaks in foreign language) When he's got a pillow, I guess. (speaks in foreign language) You, I'm going to send them out and you can have your way with them. (speaks in foreign language) Do whatever you want to them. (speaks in foreign language) Don't do anything to this man. He's my guest. Don't do this disgusting thing. What's the disgusting thing that he assumes they're going to do? Gang rape. And what bears that out? (speaks in foreign language) So they didn't want to, this deal, they wanted the guest. So the guest takes his own pilega shop. I'm talking about disgusting. (speaks in foreign language) He throws her on the street. (speaks in foreign language) They all have sex with her. And here, (speaks in foreign language) is the one example I know of where it's heterosexual, but it's non-consensual and non-marital and then they have the word (speaks in foreign language) And (speaks in foreign language) When Don comes, then they let her go. Now by the, just a little further on the story, he's gone to sleep. He has dinner and goes to sleep while his pilega is just being gang raped outside. He wakes up in the morning and wants to leave and he sees her lying by the door and he says, "Come on, let's go." I mean, there's no way to describe how disgusting this is. He puts her, she doesn't respond, so he puts her on the back of his donkey and takes her home. And then he cuts her up into 12 pieces and sends the 12 pieces around the country as say, "This is what Benjamin did and the tribes are falling apart and all the symbolism of it." But what seems to be the case is that she actually wasn't dead when they got home. Yeah, the story is just layers of disgusting, undiscusting. But this story is so similar to the story of Stome that we lay the clear meaning in and result in diva on Stome. We say, ah, they ended up raping that girl, which means what they wanted to do is rape the guest, who by the way, we wouldn't have minded. He was a disgusting guy. And by parallel, that must have been what was going on in Stome, which of course, coming back means load really is the most disgusting person in history. Being willing to say, take my two daughters and rape the heck out of them. Just don't touch these guests. It's beyond. But that's likely not what happened. Now, let's take a look. The Rashban takes a position that you guys are all familiar with. Nadao Tom. He says, "Mishkab is a whore, but he draws the parallel." Right? The bhoshur says, "When Nadao Tom, they can't mar them loads. They can't do it. They can't do it. They can't do it. They can't do it." So the bhoshur is willing to entertain that Nadao Tom meant, we want to interrogate them and see if they're here, honestly, or they're trying to steal or something. But then he says, since load said, I have two daughters, Stavinki La Vera, Yutovinotan, Lee Tal Elbeham. He says, "From the fact that load offered his two daughters proves that it was sexual and that they want to do something sexual." And then, of course, that continues to really paint load in this terrible frame. The Radaxes. In Nadao Tom, Mihang. Look at the Radaxes. What's in Nadao Tom? Let's find out who they are. In Eichloyo Rayla, Voli Raina, on Ashima Scarim. How come these people are going to come to our city? So Maashram Rula Hargam, come over to Nadao to be like, "I'm going to give up." In other words, the Radaxes takes the opposite position and says, "What do the people in stone want to do?" They wanted to know who these guys are. And he says, "And it's the same thing in Giva, because when the guy, the guy who cut his pilagas up, that disgusting guy, when he tells the story that generates the civil war against Pinaim, he says, "They wanted to kill me and they took my pilagas and they raped her." He doesn't tell the fact that he threw her out. Which means that the men surrounding the house, even in pilagas, Pinaim, intended to interrogate him and not to rape him. Which means the Radaxes takes the Bohorshore's supposition and goes all the way with it. Now, as far as the daughters go, which is the second piece of the puzzle, Rashi says, "Stave a note Nesuotaiulobai'ir and Shotanjawait, are we soot by him?" Now notice, though, what Rashi says, "Khatanav" in the Pasuk, he goes out to his khatanav, which either means his sons-in-law or his future sons-in-law. And Rashi says, "Yeah, he had two married daughters in the city. These are their husbands." But then he says, "Lokhevanotag" means that these are the ones who married his daughters to the two other daughters in the house who are Arusotaiul, which means these are their intendeds, which means who are these khatanav? And Rashi, perhaps, believes that he talked to four guys, two who are already married to his daughters and two who had betrayed them. Unclear. If you take a look at the Seghalthob, the Seghalthob was a student of the Lekachthob. Lekachthob, otherwise known as the Tsubtazutrata, was about the same time as Rashi in the Balkans. And in his commentary, he says, "Vaidavar al-Khatanav," source eight, "are Babanotaiulaw," same thing. He's got four daughters. Shtaim nesuot, Shtaim nesuot. They're all spoken for, two are married to Arbitro. And he notices, he says, "What does Lokhevanotag mean?" Shtaim nesuot, "Lokhevanotag." These are people who are eventually going to marry his daughters. And again, you find more commentators who say "hatanav" are not necessarily sons-in-law, but rather the ones who are betrothed to his daughters. So what's happening here? So this fellow, Moore Chaucer, in an article that I stumbled upon years ago, makes an argument which I think is compelling. But again, it only works if we read the text as the text without any overlay of Pilagres Piguva and of other understanding and parenthetically, what do Chazal continue to hit up as being the real sin of stone? We saw it, Jezkal said, that the people of stone were not charitable, that the people of stone were not good to guests and the whole story with Eliezer in the bed, chopped his legs off the whole thing. Let me do a shim, and that we even have a halachic concept called medatz-dom, and what's medatz-dom? It's zen-neh-neh, it's a lokha-ser. If you can benefit and I won't lose anything, then I should let you have it. If I don't do it, that's called medatz-dom, which means the way that Chazal continued to look at stone is as somebody who, a town where the people are afflicted with real miserly kind of attitude towards others, they are very ungenerous and has nothing to do with sexuality. That's the way Chazal generally view it. You see in the Bishonim that some of them said, oh, what the people in stone wanted to do was to gangrate, but notice that they get it from like a spigiva. So the way he reads it is as follows. Load to a shared with Shah of Stone. Why is load out at the gate? So it's something like Avram who's in front of his own tent. Why is load at the gate of the city? Simple explanation is load is aware of how the people in stone feel about strangers. Load was raised very differently to be welcoming his strangers. Load therefore knows that if any strangers come, he had better whisk them to his house quickly because otherwise they stand in mortal danger of being beaten up or maybe even killed by a crowd that doesn't like strangers. Certainly they won't get a nice welcome. So he's hanging out by the gate. What does he tell him to do? Again, looking at the highlighted text that I bought that I put in different front, he says quickly come to my house. He's not saying because he wants to be nice and sweet. He wants to protect him quickly come to my house and then he says and get up early and leave. It's not get up early if you want to and get on the road. It's get out of town quickly. So come stay the night and get it early out of town because the people in this town are angry at strangers. And now who comes? Notice in the purple. On Shay Ha'ihir on Shay's dome. Notice the double phrase. The people of the city, the people of stone makes it sound like this is a formal delegation of sort who isn't mean Narviyad Zakane. Now if you look at the very end of the source source material, you'll see that Nairun Zakane are amrismus, meaning there's a way of talking about everybody. Nairun Zakane, but Nairun Zakane also in some cases represent sort of two levels of the town council. Remember when Rahevan was trying to decide what to do when the people said to him, will be loyal servants to you if you release the, relieve us of the tax burden that your father put on us? He takes counsel with whom? With the Zakaneim who tell him do what they say and they'll be loyal and then he takes counsel with the Nairun who he grew up with and they tell him, stick it to him. And like an idiot, he follows their advice and that's the end of the United Kingdom. Nairun's story. So Narviyad Zakane may be formal terms for the two layers of the town council and what are they saying? Where are the people who came? Send them out so we can know them. We want to interrogate them. Now, what does Lotan know about their interrogation? He knows that their interrogation methods are not smooth. They're not nice. They're going to be rough. So he wants to protect them. So what does he say? I have two daughters. Now, what is the function of the two daughters here? So I'll take you to a postuc later in Breshete when Yaakov does not want to send Benjamin down to Mitsraim. What does Rovane, which this, this fails, what does Rovane say in Source 11? Rovane says, I'll take care of Benjamin and you can kill my two sons if I don't bring him back. Now that's of course a silly statement, but what does he really mean to say? I'm going to give you my two sons as human pledges against my taking care of Benjamin. That's what Lotan is doing here. Lotan is saying, I'm vouching for these people. They're okay and I'm going to get him out of town first thing in the morning. And in the meantime, you can hold on to my two very valuable daughters. What makes them very valuable? They're unmarried. My two very valuable daughters as human pledges for these two guys and then I'll get them back and he knows they're not going to touch them because that's the worst thing in the world that they would do to somebody who's being held as, again, a collateral key loop. Now I know it sounds weird to us, although we see it sometimes in procedurals where the cop comes and says, here, take me, let her go. She didn't do anything. But this is not uncommon in the ancient world. And as soon as you can do whatever you want meaning, we know you're not going to hurt them. I know you're not going to hurt them. And they're the protection. And now their attack on load is that you've come here. You're a stranger and you're suddenly taking over. You're suddenly becoming like the town representative. You're going to take these people in and you're going to offer collateral, etc. And so now we see a very different picture. Now who are some of the people who are outside who are part of the town council? Two young men who would be trolled, the only two daughters that load has. And he goes and says, we got to leave town and they laugh at him. And then they're out of the picture and all that's left is locked and his wife and these two daughters will, of course, become the progenitors of Ammon and of Moaven Ammon. But it's a very different way of looking at it because, again, for not for no good reason, or shall we say, for no compelling reason, we read this story as a story about gang rape. But the simpler reading of it is that it's a story about a town which besides its own moral failings in the way that they treat the underprivileged and the way they treat outsiders and the underprivileged, it's explicit, that besides that, they have this very recent history of being attacked and they're very much on guard. And so therefore, Lotte realizes the only way for these two guys to be safe is for me to bring them into the house and people want them. My daughters will be human pledges in the meantime of straight or read of that. How does that impact on a reading of the story of Pélégus Pélégus Pélégus? We saw that the Radakh actually turned it backwards, is that even in Pélégus Pélégus Pélégus, it wasn't really about rape, at least not at the beginning. And that's what they did when he threw his Pélégus out. So a different way of looking at the at a story that's well known to us. And we'll meet next week and we'll take a look at something interesting in Pélégus. According to this theory, then why would Lotte describe his daughters as Ashir Loyo Du'ish? That makes him more valuable. That's not relevant. Makes him more valuable. Yes, it does. Makes him more valuable. They're more valuable. They now could fetch a good price, right? As a machete gun. No, they're more valuable. He's giving over something that is a more valuable piece of property of his, if you will. Sorry for saying it that way. By describing them that way. Sure. Okay, see you guys next week.
