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Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship?

Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

It seems to me that is correct. Also have to correct the statement of only one perpetual servant. There is the Gibeonites, and the Bond Servant who wishes to keep his family and children. There by his ear is pierced by the awl.

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Good overall summation, though.

Ps. If a master gave his Hebrew servant a Hebrew wife, it would only be a matter of time before she would be released. He could wait that out.
If the master gave her a servant that he had obtained who was not a Hebrew, she wouldn't get released. Thus the servant would have to join the family to stay with her.


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Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

Lila said:
Is it real that even nowadays some women are in a concubine relationship to a poly married man?
Click to expand...

I don't know if any wife is considered a concubine by her husband in this day.
If so, only they could explain the reason for that definition of their relationship.
I would be interested in understanding what their way of looking at it is, though.
 
Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

Ok..... those 18 post cover it pretty well.

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Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

In that thread a critical question was ignored.
I will restate it while paying obeisance to the discussion that overwhelmed the thread.

It is proven that three of the concubine marriages in Scripture were slaves or handmaidens of slaves.
Does that prove that all concubine marriages were between a master and a slave/handmaiden of his wife?


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Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

I thought this was done with that thread that was brought up. And left it at my last post. Then all the sudden as I was studying Melchizedek Covenant. It suddenly dawned on me.
It takes blood to make a covenant.
It takes agreement blood and a covenant meal to ratify a covenant. Correct me if I'm wrong.
Okay here is what hit me. Can you truly have a marriage covenant to a non-virgin? There is no blood upon consummation.
You can have agreement, I promise, etc. And you can have a public declaration at the feast. But what you don't have is a full-fledged marriage covenant. You have simply added a concubine to your family.

Please refrain from throwing tomatoes and just share scriptures.

Steve I don't believe all concubines should have to be slaves. This post may prove that true.

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Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

If this turns out to be true, it is quite a game changer. It would greatly change the perceived value of virginity.
It would in no way change anything about my relationship with my wives though.


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Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

Hmmmm, this is an interesting take. I will be interested to see how it holds up.
 
Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

In deed it shouldn't. They are still "wives " regardless. I think for me personally it shows yet another way I can make changes to my life to better reflect Yah"s way and culture. And corrects how I will teach my children about their purity.

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Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

torahlovesalvation said:
It takes blood to make a covenant.
It takes agreement blood and a covenant meal to ratify a covenant. Correct me if I'm wrong.
Okay here is what hit me. Can you truly have a marriage covenant to a non-virgin? Enter there is no blood upon consummation.
You can have agreement, I promise, etc. And you can have a public declaration at the feast. But what you don't have is a full-fledged marriage covenant. You have simply added a concubine to your family.
Click to expand...

I love diving into the Bible like this to challenge our thinking, and I sure hope no one throws tomatoes. :)

I hear what you are saying regarding blood and covenants. Ruth is an example, however, of a woman who was not a virgin and taken as a wife (to Boaz).

Ruth 4:13 So Boaz took Ruth, and she became his wife, and he went in to her. And the Lord enabled her to conceive, and she gave birth to a son.

It always becomes interesting translating verses like this though, as wife (Hebrew ishshah) could be a multitude of other words, such as woman, but I don't see that it can be translated concubine (Hebrew pilegesh).
 
Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

Ruth is an example of levirate marriage. Her firstborn male child will belong to her previous husband and take his name to preserve it in the land. Therefore she is a full-fledged wife when she is Redeemed by Boaz. Even though not a virgin. Her kinsman redeemer is performing levirate marriage continuing the Covenant she made with her previous husband. Levirate marriage is the exception here.

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Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

Yes
I believe, based on her advice to Ruth, that Naomi felt that a full Levirate marriage was not going to be given to her foreign daughter-in-law.
Even the closer kinsman seemed to believe that he could marry her as a concubine. At least, that is the only explanation that I can see for his apparent stupidity about the inheritance.
Boaz apparently was saying that a full-meal-deal was required, so the other guy backed out.


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Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

Good point. The "closest" redeemer backed out. Ruth 4:6 MEV

The redeemer replied, “I am not able to redeem it for myself lest I ruin my own inheritance. Take my redemption rights for yourself, for I cannot do it.”
*Inheritance *
The right of a full wife .
She was to be full status "wife".
The redeemer was only willing as a "lesser wife" status.

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Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

Regarding Ruth, I think that technically the Levirate marriage would have been offered to Naomi (assuming Boaz was her husband's brother or close relative). But being too old to have children, Ruth received the Levirate marriage as a substitute. The fact that it doesn't strictly follow the law regarding Levirate marriage is interesting, either the culture as a whole or Boaz personally extended it through generosity. But that's off-topic.

This idea also doesn't work because:

Abishag, the virgin David took in his old age, is called his "concubine". If virgins were always "wives", she would have been called a wife.
Now, he didn't actually have sex with her, so there was no blood covenant - but if consummation forms the marriage, without sex she wouldn't have been his concubine either. The fact she is called his concubine shows that it is the covenant that makes the marriage, not the sex - but that's a topic that's been thrashed out elsewhere!

I have always also assumed that the handmaids of Sarah, Rachel, Leah etc were young girls who were servants of their mistresses, and then once of age were offered to their mistresses husbands as concubines. So they too would have been virgins. This isn't overtly stated. But it would be hard to imagine them all being non-virgins.

Solomon had 300 wives and 700 concubines. Did Solomon, the wealthiest king ever, decide to marry 700 non-virgins, when he had access to any virgin he desired?

The idea that a concubine is a wife with an agreement that has different inheritance rights in it has scriptural support. The idea that it is the lack of a blood covenant is, in my opinion, wild speculation that just doesn't make sense in too many scriptural examples.
 
Slow down, Samuel.
I agree with you that Naomi was probably first in line for a Levirate marriage. They both were. But the age issue made the marriage to Ruth the most reasonable choice.
It obviously was Levirate marriage and following the Law, proven by the very fact that Boaz knew that he had to legally give the nearer kinsman first right of refusal.
But how does any of that negate tls's proposal?
The fact that she was advised to offer herself under cover of darkness to Boaz is anything but a standard marriage proposal. It would scream mistress in most societies. Concubinage seems the only reasonable goal that Naomi was headed toward.


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Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

I don't understand your point about Abishag, you are actually making tls's point. David failed to make the blood covenant with her, so right there she didn't become a completed wife. A form of concubine.
What or who is your authority for defining a concubine? Scripture does not give us one, and I am not about to accept one base upon tradition.

As far as Jacob's concubines, there is no point there. Tls never suggested that only non-virgins were concubines.

Solomon had 700 wives and 300 concubines, you have it backwards. Again, tls never said that all concubines were non-virgins, he proposed that all non-virgins were concubines.


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Re: Could the Woman At The Well be in concubine relationship

As I was pondering the implications of such a thing being a societal norm, I suddenly realized that this way of thinking would return are daughters back to a healthy respect for their own purity. After all, who would find interest in a prospective young man. Then give themselves away, knowing it means if it doesn't work. Their first marriage, they'll be less than full wife status. No. Indeed they would guard it even more. And so would there father's!
Also they would tend to fight even more to keep their first marriage than to be so quick to divorce .
Just some more food for thought.

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