A Case Study Of Modern Jewish Education

Abstract

(10) When you take the field against your enemies, and the Lord your God delivers them into your power and you take some of them captive, (11) and you see among the captives a beautiful woman and you desire her and would take her to wife, (12) you shall bring her into your house, and she shall trim her hair, pare [literally ‘make’] her nails, (13) and discard her captive’s garb. She shall spend a month’s time in your house lamenting her father and mother; after that you may come to her and possess her, and she shall be your wife. (14) Then, should you no longer want her, you must release her outright. You must not sell her for money: since you had your will [‘innah] of her, you must not enslave her. (NJPS translation) In the ancient world, captured civilians were taken home as slaves. In the Rabbinic mind it was a given that non-Jews would sexually exploit civilian prisoners of war. Hence the Rabbinic tale (Gittin 57b) memorializing the ‘‘400 boys and girls who were taken captive [to Rome] for shameful purposes,’’ but committed group suicide en route rather than endure the fate which awaited them at their destination. In contrast, Michael Walzer cites the BC law as the first legislation in human history to regulate the wartime treatment of women based on ‘‘a conception of the captive woman as a person who must be respected, despite her capture.’’ 3 To the rest of the ancient world, granting a captive full marital status and then, when the