Lot's Daughters
Introduction
The story of Lot's Daughters is given in Genesis 19 amidst the story of Sodom and Gommorrah. We know that Lot has at least 2 daughters—the ones that follow him and escape the judgment pronounced on the city—but it is possible that Lot had other daughters.
The Strangest Parts
Rape/Sex Trafficking
We all know the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, and most of us remember the people of Sodom wanted to rape the angels who visited Lot. That's weird enoguh by itself—even in the wildest crowds of today's society I don't think people going around announcing their intention to rape someone. But, the narrative get's even stranger when Lot offers his daughters instead. What kind of father is more interested in protecting grown adult guests who are strangers (even if they are angels) than his own daughters?
The passage doesn't say where Lot's daughters are when he makes this offer, so it's impossible ot know if they were aware that their father offered them up to the mob. Yet, I can't help but think this is indicative of how he treated them in general. How our parents treat and raise us has a profound effect on who we become as adults. A great t example of this is that our attachment style, which defines how we behave in relationships, is formed based on how w
Incest
By the end of Genesis 19, Lot's daughters are in a state of desparation and have no faith that they will find husbands. Many women (and men) today can relate. So many of my friends are single, well into their 40s and even 50s. Marriage rates are at an all time low, and if can feel like a helpless situation. My friends and I have often talked about how hard it is to even meet men, let alone finding on to date and marry. Once, I even turned to my male friends and asked where we should go to meet nice men—most of them had no answer and the ones that did, recanted their answer after they thought about it, suggesting the men there were "actually kinda creepy." It's easy to lose faith that there's a man out there for us—many of us have. I don't have an answer for regaining faith (other than prayer and the Holy Spirit), but I do know that we don't want to be like Lot's daughters making rash decisions.
Ancestors
Lot is the son of Abraham's brother Haran, making Lot's daughters Abraham's great-neices. As such they are also descended from Eber, Shem, Noah, Seth, and Adam and Eve. If the notion that the word Hebrew comes from Eber, this would make Lot's daughters Hebrews as well (note, the term Israel comes from Jacob, Abraham's grandson, so while all Israelites are Hebrews, not all Hebrews are Israelites).
Descendants
As mentioned previously, Lot's (surviving) daughters feared their prospects for a husband and decide to sleep with their father to conceive children. The eldest has a son whom she names Moab, while the younger has a son she names Benammi. They become the progenitors of the Moabites and the Ammonites, respectively.
Since there are no names given for the daughters, I looked up the meaning of the their sons' names instead—I thought they might tell us something more about the daughters' state of mind like with Leah. I did not find either meaning particularly profoud as they mean basically what the narrative has already told us.
- from a prolonged form of the prepositional prefix m- and H1; from (her [the mother's]) father; Moab, an incestuous son of Lot; also his territory and descendants:—Moab.
- of his father
- from H1121 and H5971 with pronomial suffix; son of my people; Ben-Ammi, a son of Lot:—Ben-ammi.
Questions
About the Passage
I've always asked questions when studying the Word, then I learned about Phototheolgy and was encouraged to be more proactive about asking questions. Below is a list of the questions I asked while reading about Lot's daughters.
- Why does Lot offer up his daughters to the townspeople?
- Do they know their father offered them up to the town?
- If so, how did they feel about it
- Does their father's action influence their willingness to comit incest?
- Is this a clue to other types of trauma the daughters might have experienced
-
If the daughters are virgins, who are the son-in-laws?
- How many daughters does Lot have?
- Were the son-in-laws betrothed or already married?
- If they were betrothed/married to the daughters who surrived, how did they feel about the daughters leaving?
- Did the daughters miss the son-in-laws?
- Why didn't they look back?
- How old were they?
- Were they happy they survived the destruction?
- Did they have friends who died in the city?
- Why did they feel it so important to preserve their father's line?
- If they lived in a patriarchal society, wouldn't Lot have always needed a son to carry his lineage?
- Was this desparation driven by the loss of their husbands/betrothed?
- Did they ever find husbands or did they remain single forever?
- Did Lot ever discover what they had done?
- Did Lot assume men from Sodom were the father?
- Does Moses know about this because God revelaed it, or was it common knowledge?
- Did the mothers try to hide their actions?
- Did the Moabites/Ammonites embrace this as part of their history or deny their origin?
- Was incest more taboo than rape, sodomy, and offering up your daughters?
- Did God allow them to be saved because their was something righteous within them or simply for Abraham's sake?
- How bad was the destruction that they thought there was no man left in the earth?
- Why didn't Lot go back toward Abraham?
- Did the daughters know of Abraham?
- Why didn't they ask to keep journeying until they found men?
If I Could Talk to Them
A popular ice breaker is the question "if you could have dinner with anyone, who would it be?"—or something along those lines. Usaully, our rationale behind our answer is that we would find a conversation with that person interesting. When I read about people in the Bible, especially women, I often wonder what I would talk to them about if I could.
A lot of the questions I had about the passage (in the above section) have to do with what Lot's daughters knew and didn't know, their motivations, and what happened after the events in Genesis 19. This would likely make up the core of what I would speak to them about.
Aside from the questions about, I would probably dig in to their childhood. Genesis 19 tells us all the men of the city were gathered around the house, but it doesn't tell us where the women were. Were there other women in the city? If so, were any of them friends of Lot's daughters? God promised Abraham He would spare the city for 10 righteous people, so if there were women in the city, they must have also been wicked. What sins where they committing?
Jude 1:7 reiterates sexual immorality as a sin of Sodom, but Ezekiel 16:48-50 suggest the sins of Sodom (possibly specific to the women of Sodom) are arrogance, idleness, gluttony, not helping the poor, and committing abominations. Since none of us are perfect and clearly Lot's daughters had no trouble committing incest (sexual imorality), I am also curious what kind of life they lived before and after the destruction of Sodom. Did they change any after they had time to reflect of the events?
Journal Pages
YouTube Discussion
References and Footnotes
- "Strong's H4124. מוֹאָב". Blue Letter Bible; visited January 2, 2025
- "Strong's H1151. בֶּן־עַמִּי". Blue Letter Bible; visited January 2, 2025
- Pastor Ivor Myers' Phototheology Game Deck
- "Sodom and Gomorrah". Encyclopedia Britannica. August 1, 2024; visited January 2025
Ammonites, Breakfast & Bible, Genesis, Genesis 19, Lot, Moab, Person Study, Women, YouTube
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