Why on earth would a victim of rape in the bible...accept this and why woul God allow it?

Question

Deuteronomy 22:28-29
If a man is caught in the act of raping a young woman who is not engaged, he must pay fifty pieces of silver to her father. Then he must marry the young woman because he violated her, and he will never be allowed to divorce her.

Answer 1

By despoiling the woman the man is penalized greatly. Instead of getting a dowery, he has to pay. Instead of potentially marrying a woman of equal or greater status to enhance his status, he is probably marrying an lesser (probably he was preying on someone 'weaker' and less influential than himself), enhancing her status and bringing his down. Third, he can never divorce her, no matter what she does. Her children will inherit everything he owns. He is obligated to take care of her for the rest of her life. If she does not act in a 'wifely' manner towards him (and who would blame her) and refuses to sleep with him subsequently (and if he sleeps with another woman outside of marriage he gets penalized again), or cook him dinner, or clean his tent or even move in with him (staying with her father's family instead), then there is nothing he can do about it. He still has to keep supporting her. Even if she goes and sleeps with another guy (which still would have been frowned upon) he can not divorce her and must keep supporting her and her children. This decree actually means that the assaulted woman would be cared for by her attacker, not that she must go live in his house and do his laundry. (Also consider this, men at the time would be very reluctant to marry a woman who wasn't a virgin. After a rape, her future prospects would have been dim. This decree ensures that she will not be left in the cold to starve.)

As for the 'why do bad things happen to good people' question: People, human beings have free will. Without it, we wouldn't be humans, we would be meat puppets. This means that people are free to act in a good way or in a bad way. This means that bad people will do bad things to good people. God is just, but that doesn't mean 'fair.' This is one of those examples. Is it 'fair' that a good woman was raped by a bad man? No. Is it 'just' that after raping the woman the man is forced to care for and support her for the rest of her life, give a dowery to her daughters, and to leave his family holdings to her children? Yes.

Hope this helps

Answer 2

The Inuit also had this rule: if a man murders another man, he must marry that man's woman and care for that man's children. It's a punishment, and an open-eyed way to show the consequences of your actions. For all your life you will have the reminder of what you have done before your eyes, and for the victim, they must move on and either become bitter or learn to forgive. You can't live in the past. It is physically impossible, even when dire things happen. The justice system we have here in the west is very different, and makes many young men suffer more than they should by being thrown in jail. Is that a good punishment? For us it makes sense. For others, this is crazy.

Answer 3

You need to get your mind into their culture and not ours. Why you people think that what is done today has always been done confounds me. Take a look across the ocean and you'll see that first hand today. Their culture is also not ours. Our culture developed out of the teachings of new testament. The respect we show towards people is a direct result of biblical teaching. Go back and look at old Roman culture and you'll get an eye opener. It's the way things were done and these rules were put in place to show right and wrong. Read Pauls explanation of the law in Romans for better understanding.

Answer 4

What Bible translation do you have? That is a highly outdated mistranslation.

The real translation is basically that if a man and a woman engage in premarital sex then they must get married and he must pay a fine for breaking the rules of engagement.

The "cannot divorce" clause is to keep the young man from talking a woman into his bed, getting caught, paying the fine, marrying her, then just abandoning her. The law protects a woman from being left pregnant and without a husband because the man cannot keep it in his pants (something that happens all to often now).

There is a very different word for rape as opposed to willing coitus without marriage. (Unwilling) rape is listed in a different part of the bible as a abominable act against a woman and is punishable by the death of the man.

Answer 5

Koresh and Laura's answers are correct. They early Hebrews were actually quite concerned about making sure that women weren't left without protection, hence levirate marriage and this law. And the Story of Ruth, where the concern is for the survival of both widow and mother-in-law.

It was a huge issue. Unfortunately, the larger culture wasn't quite ready to accept women as independent.

Answer 6

You must realize the culture in which it was written.

A raped woman, in those times, would never be able to marry. A single woman had no future other than being a beggar. This way she would be provided for in her future. This is not a nice future, but better than the alternative.

Answer 7

the problem with ones attitude about this subject has to do with looking at God as one of bad morals rather than one of good morals.
and looking at it from the point of view of present day society and the prevelant morals today.

but in Jewish society of Biblical days a good Jewish father did his job in correctly raising his sons according to godly laws and principles to respect women so there never was any actual rape as we know it now days.
but there were incidences of unmarried people sleeping together and that is what this scripture addresses.

David sleeping with Bathsheba is such an example.

in those days when a Jewish man and unmarried Jewish woman consented to sleep together it was violating the sanctity of virginity - purity and the marriage-bed.

but to consider this by moral society today, everyone would have to think that a moral God who gave moral laws to obey would disregard the morals of a good Jewish father raising a good Jewish daughter and allow an immoral man of sexual disregard for females to actually be allowed to marry that girl and have children and never divorce.

and everyone would be right to condemn such an idea.

as with in society today., couples who sleep together and result in pregnancy, get married. (leaving out the abortion option).
and for some reason it doesnt work out, the married couple later gets a divorce.
and we can all say that such practices are acceptable as moral - correct?

Answer 8

In addition to everyone elses answers, women in those times were considered almost a possession of the man. They didn't have rights like today and mankind was barbaric. God dealt with man where he was at and made provisions for the women, too.

Answer 9

You are violating the context of the passage. Furthermore, I don't see any version that translates this word "rape". The context suggests that this is consensual.
You are omitting the phrase "and they are discovered", which clearly shows that this is not rape.
I don't know if you are doing this intentionally or in ignorance, but I don't think you want to be found slandering God, lest He reprove you and you be found a liar.

Answer 10

it incredibly is a unwell way of watching rape. the problem with maximum folk is they connect tiers to diverse incorrect acts. this is like rape is erroneous yet abortion is extra incorrect simply by fact it relatively is seen homicide. on a similar time as abortion might desire to be prevented usually, human beings might desire to understand that residing with the end results of unintentional being pregnant ought to be undesirable and the two incorrect for the mummy besides simply by fact the youngster. there is not any might desire to insert God in rape or its effect.