Unclean women:

A woman is unclean for seven days after giving birth to a boy. On the eighth day, the boy will be circumcised, and the mother will spend the next thirty-three days “in the blood of her purifying.” Whatever that means. During that time, she is not allowed to touch anything holy or go to the church.
If she has a daughter, she will be unclean for two weeks and spend sixty-six days in the blood of her purifying. Because, of course, girls are evil.

After her purifying is complete, she will bring a lamb and a pigeon or turtledove to the priest for a sin offering. “Then she shall be clean from the flow of her blood.”

Original text

God talked at Moses for a really long time up on that mountain, telling him all the rules he wanted the Israelites to follow. Here are some highlights:

• You’ll be put to death if you steal a slave and then sell it.
• You’re allowed to kill someone who breaks into your house, but you have to do it at night. If morning comes and the guy is still alive, he has to pay. If he can’t pay, you can sell him. If the stolen animal is found on him, he’ll pay double. Weird desert math.
• If you seduce a virgin and have sex with her, you’d better be prepared to marry her and pay her father her bride-price. If her father won’t give her up, you still gotta pay up.
• You will kill all sorcerers.
• Don’t boil a goat in its mother’s milk.

When he ran out of silly laws to talk about, God told Moses he was going to send an angel to lead the Israelites to Canaan and defeat the people who already lived there.

Original text 21 22 23

At about this time, Judah went and had sex with some chick whose father was named Shua. The woman herself has no name, but she had three sons: Er, Onan and Shelah. When Er was old enough to get married, Judah found a wife for him named Tamar. But God didn’t like Er so he killed him. Judah told Onan it was his duty to have sex with Tamar so she could raise offspring for Er. But Onan didn’t like the idea of his own kid being thought of as Er’s kid, so whenever he had sex with Tamar, he used the pull out method to keep from getting her pregnant. Well, God didn’t like that, so he killed Onan. Judah figured Tamar was bad luck so he told her to just remain a widow.

After Judah’s wife died, he went up to Timnah to shear his sheep. Tamar, sick of not being able to have any children just because God didn’t like her husbands, disguised herself as a prostitute and went to meet Judah on the road to Timnah. Since her face was covered, he didn’t recognize her. So they had sex and then she went home and he went about his business with the sheep shearing. About three months later, someone told Judah that Tamar had cheated on her husbands’ memories and was pregnant. Judah ordered her to be burned, but Tamar said, “Hey, remember that prostitute? That was me.” Judah said, “Damn, I should have let Shelah have her.” Tamar gave birth to twins, Perez and Zerah.

Original text

Jacob and the clan were now living in a city called Shechem. Shechem was also apparently the name of some guy whose father, Hamor the Hivite, was the “prince of the land.” This guy Shechem caught a glimpse of Dinah, Leah’s daughter, and decided he just had to have her. So he raped her (because he loved her so much) and then told his father he wanted Dinah to be his wife.

When Dinah’s brothers found out, they went home to complain to their father. When they got there, Hamor was talking to Jacob. He assured them all that Shechem loved Dinah and told Jacob their two clans should intermarry. Any of Hamor’s daughters could marry any of Jacob’s sons and they could all be a big happy incestuous family. Jacob and his sons said the only way they’d allow such a thing would be if Hamor and his whole clan got circumcised. Shechem was more than happy to get circumcised. And since Shechem and his father were pretty popular guys, pretty soon everyone in town was circumcised, too.

And while all the men in town were in bed recovering from what had to have been a pretty horrible procedure back then, two of Dinah’s brothers, Levi and Simeon, went and killed every male they could find, including Hamor and Shechem. They plundered the city and took everything they could get their hands on. Jacob was not amused. He scolded them, but they insisted it wasn’t right that Dinah had been treated “like a prostitute.” I’m glad at least a couple of folks had some sense.

Original text

There was a famine in the land, so Isaac went to Gerar. God came down and said, “Don’t go to Egypt. I’ll tell you where to live. All these lands will belong to you and your many, many offspring. I liked your dad, so I’m keeping my promises to him.”

So Isaac settled in Gerar, and he and Rebekah did the sister-wife thing that worked out so well for Abraham and Sarah all the time. But the Philistines saw them laughing together and figured brothers and sisters never laugh together, so Isaac and Rebekah must be husband and wife. King Abimelech said, “Why would you say she was your sister? One of us could have raped her thinking it was all good because she’s just your sister, but then we would have felt totally guilty because she’s really your wife. Why do you people always try to do this to us?” Then he told all his people to just leave Isaac and Rebekah alone.

Isaac became rich in Gerar and all the Philistines envied him. King Abimelech finally told Isaac to get out of town because he was so much mightier than everyone else. So Isaac took his toys and went to the Valley of Gerar. There, he dug the same wells his father had dug which had now been filled with dirt. When one of them struck water, the people of Gerar claimed it for their own. So Isaac dug another well, and again the people fought him over it. They didn’t care about his third well, so he decided that one was his favorite.

After a while, Isaac took the family up to Beersheba. God came down and said, “Hey, Isaac. Just wanted to remind you that I’m here and I blessed your father and I’m going to bless you and all your offspring.” Isaac said, “Shoot, I haven’t built an altar to you in a while. Sorry about that.” He built an altar, pitched a tent and called it home.

King Abimelech took his adviser, Ahuzzath, and his army commander, Phicol, and they all went to see Isaac. Isaac said, “Uh, hi, I thought you hated me. What do you want?” They said, “Well, it’s like this. We know you’ve been blessed by God, so we wanted to make sure we could be friends. You know, you don’t kill us in exchange for us sucking up to you? What do you say?” Isaac said that was just fine and they all had a feast that night.

When Esau was forty, he married a woman named Judith and apparently also a woman named Basemath. They were both Hittite women, and this upset Isaac and Rebekah. We don’t like the Hittites.

Original text

Abraham was getting pretty old and he knew he was going to die soon. He told one of his servants to make sure Isaac didn’t marry one of those dirty Canaanite chicks, but to go to his home country and find a wife for him. On no account should Isaac go with him. The servant asked how he was going to make some woman follow him all the way back to Isaac, and Abraham said something about God making him promise not to let Isaac go back there. Thanks for your help, Abe.

So the servant traveled to Nahor. When he got to the well outside the city, he let his camels drink so he could watch the women coming out to get water. A young woman named Rebekah who just happened to be the granddaughter of Abraham’s brother, Nahor, offered the servant some water. He had just been thinking that he was thirsty, so he took this as a sign from God that this girl was the right one. He asked Rebekah if there was room in her father’s house for him to stay the night.

Rebekah’s brother, Laban, let the man in. The servant introduced himself and explained why he was there. Bethuel, Rebekah’s father, said, “Yeah, go ahead and take her.” Rebekah sighed and said, “Yeah, okay.” And off they went. As soon as they got back to Negeb, Isaac took Rebekah to his tent and sexed her up right and proper. And in this way, “Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death.” How nice for him.

Original text

Abraham and Sarah decided to take a little trip, so they traveled to Gerar. When they got there, Abraham made Sarah pretend to be his sister again. And again, Sarah was taken by the king. And again, God threatened the king. The king had not actually slept with Sarah yet, so he said, “God, man, the guy said she was his sister. How was I supposed to know? Besides, I haven’t touched her yet.” God said, “Oh, right. Well, that’s because I, the LORD, kept you from touching her. That’s right. Now give her back to her husband or I’ll kill you.”

The next morning, the king went to Abraham and said, “What’s your problem? What did I ever do to you to make you trick me into sleeping with a blessed man’s wife? Jerk.” But Abe said, “Well, I figured if you thought you couldn’t have her that you would kill me and take her anyway. Besides, she really is my sister, and when we got married, it was part of our agreement that she would pretend we’re not married whenever we visit a new place.”

Man, that’s just fucked up.

Original text

God told Abram that if he left home and went to a place God would show him, he would make Abram super special and bless him and stuff. So seventy-five-year-old Abram took his nephew, Lot, and Sarai and all their servants and hit the road. When they got to Canaan, God told him all this land would belong to him one day. So Abram built an altar and, I don’t know, sacrificed a sheep probably. Then they all headed to Bethel and built another altar.

There was a famine going on at the time, so Abram and Sarai went to Egypt. Before they entered Egypt, Abram said, “Sarai, you’re pretty hot, and if the Egyptians know you’re my wife, they’ll probably kill me so they can keep you. Let’s say you’re my sister instead. If you’re good, the Pharaoh will be nice to me.” So that’s what they did, and the Pharaoh took Sarai into his harem or whatever. I guess she was pretty good in bed because the Pharaoh gave Abram all kinds of goodies: sheep, oxen, donkeys, servants, camels – you name it.

Then God found out the Pharaoh was banging a blessed man’s wife and got pissed. He cursed the Pharaoh with plagues, and the Pharaoh went to Abram and said, “Dude, why didn’t you tell me she was your wife? This sucks.” He gave Sarai back to Abram, and she and Abram left Egypt with all their new stuff.

Sarai and Abram leave Egypt

Original text

There was a crafty serpent skulking around the garden and he decided to stir up trouble one day. He went to the woman and asked her which trees God said she could eat fruit from. The lady told the serpent that God said she and Adam could eat from any of the trees except the tree of knowledge of good and evil. He told them eating from that one would kill them. The snake said God was a big fat liar who just didn’t want the humans to be as smart as him. So the woman looked at the tree and thought the fruit looked pretty good. She ate some fruit and gave some to Adam, and suddenly they both realized they were naked.

The man and woman hid themselves when they heard God come walking through the garden. God called out to Adam when he couldn’t find him and Adam said he was hiding because he was naked. “Who told you that you were naked?” God said. “Did you eat from that tree after I told you not to?”

“Uh,” Adam stammered. “I…see…” He looked around and saw his wife still hiding in the bushes. He turned back to God and said, “It was her! She made me do it!”

The woman shot Adam a dirty look. “The serpent said it was cool,” she told God.

God was pissed. He cursed the snake to a lifetime of slithering around on his belly and being killed by man. He cursed the woman and told her she would now be under her husband’s rule and that giving birth would be painful. Thanks a lot, lady. Then God told Adam to get the hell out his garden and learn to farm if he wanted to eat. Adam named his wife Eve, “because she was the mother of all living.” Then God gave them some clothes and kicked them out. To make sure they couldn’t come back and eat from the tree of life and live forever, he put a cherubim and a flaming sword outside the garden to keep them out.

God is not messing around when he tells you to stay away from his tree.

Original text