Reflections – Consider the Lilies

Lot’s Wife: the woman who turned

Like many of the women of the Bible we don’t know the name of our next woman, only that she was Lot’s Wife (although in some Jewish traditions she’s named Ado or Edith). We know very little about her other than she had two daughters and that she lived in Sodom, a town with a long-lasting reputation for being rather seedy. Although we know very little about her life she’s mainly remembered for the manner of her death: being turned into a pillar of salt as punishment for turning around to look back at her burning home.

It’s a curious story.

Lot was Abraham’s nephew and he settled the land called the Plain of Jordan (better known as Sodom), whilst Abraham settled in Caanan.

The enigmatic angelic visitors who had visited Abraham and Sarah then headed towards the city of Sodom. Lot, who was sitting at the City gate, greeted them and invited them to his home and his wife provided a feast for them. However, before they’d finished eating the ‘men of the city’ surrounded the house demanding the visitors be given over to them ‘so that we may know them’ (Genesis 19.5). Lot refused to allow the men into his home and instead offered them his own virgin daughters.

Much has been written of these passages in relation to sexuality, and they have been used as justification of God’s displeasure at same-sex relationships. This is simply wrong. This is not a passage about relationships, same-sex or otherwise: it is about violence. The men of Sodom want to rape Lot’s visitors, and so he protects them by offering his own daughters instead.

The angelic visitors strike the rampaging Sodomites with blindness so they can’t find the door and then they urge the family to flee before the city is destroyed. They were told:

Flee for your life; do not look back or stop anywhere in the Plain; flee to the hills, or else you will be consumed.
Genesis 19.17

As the family flee, the cities of Sodom and neighbouring Gomorrah are both destroyed in a shower of ‘sulphur and fire from the Lord out of heaven’.

But Lot’s wife, behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt
Genesis 19:26

Why did she look back? And why salt? It’s all very strange.

I’ve often heard it said the reason she looked back was that she she lacked faith, but this seems overly harsh. Perhaps she was grieving a place which held all her childhood memories; or maybe she felt closer to the people in Sodom than to her husband, a man who would offer up his own daughters to be raped in order to protect some visitors; or perhaps she was simply terrified and frozen to the spot by the horror she was seeing.

The rock formation called ‘Lot’s Wife’ is found near the Dead Sea on Mount Sodom in Israel

It is interesting to note that the ‘Pillar of Salt’ is also an ancient legend told to explain some curious salt rock formations in this region.

Also, being turned into a pillar of salt is an idiom in Eastern tradition for dying of fright.

Whatever happened to Lot’s wife, she reminds us of thousands of women forced to flee their homes each day due to violence, war and natural disaster. She reminds us of all those who look back and remember all those they’ve left behind.

But perhaps she also reminds us that in this time of Lent we are also invited to turn – to turn towards God, who receives us with open arms of love.

Prayer

The UN Refugee Agency estimates that there are 70.8 million forcibly displaced people in the world today and 37,000 people each day flee their homes due to conflict or persecution. (see here for figures at a glance: https://www.unhcr.org/ph/figures-at-a-glance)

Answer me, O Lord, for your steadfast love is good; 
according to your abundant mercy, turn to me.
Psalm 69.16

God of love, as we remember Lot’s wife who had to turn away from her home in fear, we remember all those today who are forced to leave their homes and face an uncertain future. Give them your strength and show them your love. We pray also that, in this time of lent, we might turn towards your love and know your peace in our lives. Amen

Sarai: under the oaks

Genesis 18: 1-23; 21; 23

I have always loved trees. As a child growing up in Buckinghamshire we had a vast sycamore tree in our garden which we called ‘The Big Tree’ (See image below). It was said to be one of the largest and oldest of its kind in the UK and was simply magnificent. There was a branch to the left of it that came right to the ground which was perfect for climbing up into a cavity in the middle of the tree, which was the place we went to as children to get away from everyone. My first experience of prayer was here as I spoke to God about whatever problems I was having – normally some kind of sibling rivalry or another.

The Big Tree at The Old Rectory, Adstock, Bucks painted by R Read. Sadly the tree died several years ago.

There is something permanent and comforting about old trees. I often sit under Christ Church’s ‘Jaberwocky Tree’ imagining all those who have gone before over the centuries, and somehow all the temporary concerns are put in to perspective.

Sarai’s (her name is later changed to Sarah) story features a particular tree, or group of trees, evocatively named ‘The Oaks of Mamre’.

Sarai was married to Abram (her half-brother) and much of their life was spent travelling as Abram had been called by God to leave their homeland (Haran) and go into a new land where, he was told, they would be blessed. (Genesis 12.1-3).

They were indeed blessed in many ways, with wealth, land and livestock, but they were not blessed with a child, and this was all that Sarai wanted, and was all that was expected of her as a woman.

It is at the base of the Oaks of Mamre that two incidents occurred which changed the course of Sarai’s life. It was here that Abram first received the promise that they would have a child, and not only that, but their offspring would be so numerous they would be ‘like the dust of the earth’ (Genesis 13.16).

The Oak of Mamre believed to be around 5000 years old and which, in tradition, is said to mark the place where Abraham entertained the three angels or where Abraham and Sarai pitched their tent.

And it was also at the foot of the Oak of Mamre many years later when Sarah and Abram had another encounter with the Lord who came in the guise of three strange men, and again they were promised they would have a child.

But this time Sarah laughed at the prospect. She was now past the menopause or, as the bible delicately puts it, ‘it has ceased to be with [her] the manner of women’. Abraham was also past his prime – ‘my husband is old, shall I have pleasure?’ (Genesis 18.11-12).

But this time the promise was fulfilled. Sarah did indeed have a child, Isaac (which means ‘he laughs’).

Sarah’s life can’t have been easy and, as Hagar’s story yesterday revealed, she struggled with rivalry and jealousy. But she was faithful and strong and is remembered in all three Abrahamic faiths as one of the few biblical matriarchs (with Rebekah and Leah).

At the end of her long life Sarah was buried in the very first description of a funeral and burial in scripture, in a place lovingly secured by her husband Abraham, and where he would later join her: in a plot overlooking her beloved Oaks of Mamre.

So the field of Ephron in Machpelah, which was to the east of Mamre, the field with the cave that was in it and all the trees that were in the field, throughout its whole area…After this, Abraham buried Sarah his wife in the cave of the field of Machpelah facing Mamre (that is, Hebron) in the land of Canaan.
Genesis 23. 17-19

Reflection

In John’s Gospel one of the very first disciples Jesus calls to follow him is Nathanael, who is sitting under a tree at the time!

I saw you under the fig tree
John 1.48

and the very first thing Jesus says to those who follow him (in John’s Gospel) is:

What are you looking for?
John 1.38

‘I saw you’, ‘What are you looking for?’

These are good questions to begin our Lent journey. Perhaps you might like to go outside and spend some time sitting under or near a tree and reflecting on what it is you’re looking for this Lent? It might be something personal like Sarai who longed for a child, or it might be a more rewarding job, or wisdom for a particular problem, or an ability to concentrate on your studies. Or perhaps it is for a deeper relationship with God this Lent.
Whatever it is, perhaps you might like to take it God in prayer.

Prayer

Heavenly Father, thank you that you see us and hear us when we come to you in prayer. As you heard your daughter Sarai many centuries ago we pray that you would hear us today as we speak to you of all that we long for.

Amen

Hagar: the woman who is seen

Genesis 16 and 21

Note: this series of posts about women of the Old Testament were originally written for a Lent Blog in 2020. They have been updated. Many of the images are original pieces of art produced by Micah Hayns. Please only use them with permission. You can get in touch with him for originals or high res. images for promotions via http://www.micahhayns.com

We begin with Hagar.

Hagar was the very first person to dare to give God a name. She wasn’t a person of any authority or particular merit, she wasn’t a prophet or a priestess: she was an Egyptian slave-girl owned by Abram’s wife, Sarai.

Sarai hadn’t been able to have children and so had hatched the kind of plan that we might recognise from the Handmaid’s Tale: she would have a child with Abram via the means of her slave, Hagar. Abram willingly went along with the plan and Hagar, clearly having no choice in the matter, became pregnant. The two women began to hate each other but Sarai of course, had the upper hand and Abram gave his wife authority to do as she pleased. Sarai’s anger deepened as time went on and she became violent and eventually the pregnant Hagar, fearful for the safety of her unborn child, fled to into the wilderness.

It was as she was hiding near a well that Hagar heard the voice of an angel:

Hagar, slave-girl of Sarai, where have you come from and where are you going?’
Genesis 16.7

She was promised her son would be a ‘wild donkey of a man’, and told to return.

Hagar was so overwhelmed by having been seen and heard, perhaps for the first time in her life, that she gave the Lord a name,

You are El-roi”; (God who Sees), for she said, “Have I really seen God and remained alive after seeing him?”
Genesis 16.13

*The Dismissal of Hagar* by Giuseppe Nicola Nasini, between 1657 and 1736, (image from Wikimedia Commons)

She bravely returns to Sarai, gives birth to Ishmael, and brings him up in Sarai’s household until Sarah (given a new name) had herself produced a child of her own, Isaac. Now with a son of her own Sarah didn’t want them around anymore and they were once again banished.

Ishmael was an adult by this time (around 15 years old). The banished pair wandered in the desert until their food and water had dried up and all hope of survival had gone. In the first description of a death ritual in scripture, Hagar put her child under a bush, sat at a distance, and waited for him to die.

Their tears were heard by the angel of God who, like the angel that appeared to Mary centuries later, said to them: ‘do not be afraid’, a well of water appeared and they survived.

Hagar became a Grandmother to many, and Ishmael’s descendants, the Ishmaelites, populated the land and grew powerful.

Hagar, enslaved, abused, and mistreated, was seen and heard by God.

THE SITUATION TODAY

Sadly slavery isn’t in the past and although it’s hard to find accurate statistics it is estimated that over 40 million people are held against their will and that 71% of overall victims of modern day slavery are believed to be women – this is nearly 30million people! https://www.antislavery.org/slavery-today/modern-slavery/

Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, 
there is freedom.
2 Corinthians 3.17

PRAYER

Loving God, who sees and hears all those who cry out in need, bring comfort and freedom to all your children, to those who are kept against their will, those who live in fear of violence, and those who are forced to run away to protect their family, in the name of El-Roi, The God Who Sees.
Amen