A Voice for Dinah

My Niece’s Bat Mizvah drash sheds light on the “Me Too” Movement.

Watching my niece read her sermon, I had to keep the tissues handy watching my niece own this piece of cultural history.

Hi, I’m Alexa.

Today I get to talk about one of the most interesting parts of the whole Torah because it mentions the rape of Dinah, which is a very significant event. Another important thing happens in the Torah this week, which is that Jacob wrestles with a divine being and is renamed Israel. I have always been very passionate about feminism and have felt very inspired and impacted by the “me too” movement. For those reasons, I have decided to explore the rape of Dinah this morning because I believe that Dinah, along with all the women in the Torah, deserves a voice. I can’t imagine what it must be like to have your whole entire life shortened into a few words in the Holy Book and your whole legacy other than that one event to have vanished. Even though there are still so many women in the Torah who don’t get to have a voice today, I am honored to do my best to try and give Dinah a voice this morning. I believe that even one woman, or one girl, having a voice makes a difference.

First, I’m going to give a brief summary of this week’s Torah portion.

My Torah portion starts with Jacob being told that his brother may attack him so he separates his community into two halves, and sends one of them across a stream. Jacob stays on the other side of the stream and encounters a divine being, with whom he wrestles until dawn. The divine being wrenches his hip bone, blesses him with the name Israel, and leaves. This is believed to be the beginning of Judaism. That morning, Esau and Jacob run to greet each other and are happily reunited.

Esau and Jacob then depart. Jacob travels to Sukkoth and builds a house for his family. Dinah, Jacob’s daughter, leaves the house alone, which is quite uncommon for the time. Shechem, the son of Hamor, who is the chief of the country, “lies with” Dinah in the woods, or in common translation, forcefully rapes her. Jacob and his sons are mad at Shechem because he is not Hebrew. Shechem wants to marry Dinah. He and his father are willing to pay a high price as well as to allow the Hebrews to live among their people in order to have her in their household. Jacob and his sons decide to agree to this plan so long as Shechem and all the men of their community become circumcised.