This DRAFT paper seeks a greater understanding of the symbolism of the city of Shechem in the Hebrew Bible. It examines verses in Genesis 34, Joshua 20 and 24, Judges 9, I Kings 12 (ident. II Chron. 10), and Psalm 60 (ident. Ps. 108).[1] Motifs will be identified roughly but clearly.

Genesis 34: The Rape of Dinah. Shechem is a city in which divisions occur. Dinah separates herself from her family "to see the daughters of the land" (1). Dinah is further separated from her family and from her own honor when she is raped by Shechem, son of Hamor (2). This also divides the people of Shechem from the house of Jacob. Though Shechem and Hamor try to heal this division with their offer of mutual assimilation, accepting the offer would be tantamount to accepting the god or gods of the Hivites, dividing Israel from God. Jacob's many sons, probably too young to realize this situation on their own, act nonetheless to prevent this grave division. Out of their emotional response to the rape of Dinah, they pretend to consent to Hamor's offer, but actually seek to deceive Shechem. Having accomplished this, assuming an irreconcilable division between the house of Hamor and the house of Jacob, they kill all the males in the city, separating every wife from every husband, every child from every father (25, 27, 29). Shechem thus becomes the first city subject to mob violence and ethnic cleansing. Indeed ethnographers could easily identify Genesis 34 as a perfect fundamental account of "group loyalty and ethnic violence."[2] The mass murder in Shechem, then, symbolizes also the extreme form of division I will call anti-assimilation against false gods. Finally, the dangerous course of action chosen by the sons causes a final division between them and Jacob, for Jacob did not choose to act in passion but with some amount of patience. Over-emotionalism and vengeance therefore become themes worth tracing in future references to the city.

Shechem also comes to illustrate one other set of motifs in Genesis 34. As a city, Shechem reminds us of Babel, a fully assimilated city, and of Sodom. In both cities there are what may be called public discourses (11:3-4, 19:7-8). In Shechem we see an even better example of a public-square address when Hamor and Shechem convince the townspeople to accede to circumcision. Three features of such an address are salient here. First, the address seeks to reason with the people. The people are given a choice whether or not to agree. Contrast this with the unspoken ease with which Abraham circumcises his people: he does not ask them but takes them to be circumcised (17:22-27). Second, it addresses all the people together, without recognizing their individual lives and motives; it is, like the people of Shechem in relation to Dinah, no respecter of persons. Third, the plan proposed gets the people killed by their own attempt to put things right (cf. the fates of Babel and Sodom).

The atrocities in Shechem are so great, on every side, in every way,[3] that the God who once decided to destroy all flesh on earth, in this critical moment at the end of the chapter, forbears and shows the mercy of silence. It is clear that a reckoning is required for all (perhaps including Dinah). But since the sons of Jacob took the law into their own hands and decided to become the arbiters of God's justice, we ought to trace one final motif, which I will call the relation between God's justice, human justice, and human killings.[4]

The remainder of this paper attempts two things. First, it seeks to trace these motifs through other stories involving Shechem. Second, and more importantly, it aims to show that the horrors of Genesis 34 are not forgotten by God; the people of Israel shall ever atone for their iniquity at Shechem.

Joshua 20: God Establishes Sanctuary. In Exodus 21:1-14, God seems to address several of the situations that Jacob has encountered, via a series of "judicial decisions" (21:1). Exodus 21:2-6 parallels Jacob's long sojourn in the house of Laban. Exodus 21:7-11 resonates well with the nuances of Jacob's absentee relationship with Dinah. Exodus 21:12-14 has a direct application to the murders in Shechem by the sons of Jacob--God says:

The sons of Jacob, who, in the heat of their emotional reaction to the rape of Dinah, chose to use guile to kill the house of Hamor (Ge 34:13), fall squarely within the "judicial decision" of verse 14.

But a useful distinction has been made: if a death is neither the cause of overemotional deceit (14) nor any temperature of intent (12), but God lets the death occur nevertheless (13), the blood of the deceased will not be on the head of the one who did the striking. The striker may deserve the human justice of Genesis 9:6, but God will seek to institutionalize protection for such a one. It seems that if God lets someone die by the hand of an unwitting other, God's justice has been served unwittingly, and the striker shall not die.

But which place will God establish to be a sanctuary for such a person? In a great show of ironic understanding, God lets the people decide which cities they will choose,[5] to let them partake in God's plan of mercy. How different from the sons of Jacob, who took it upon themselves to partake in God's justice! The irony is intensified when Israel chooses Shechem to be one of those cities (Joshua 20:7). The place of hotheaded vengeance is redefined as a place of sanctuary. A kind of poetic justice, recalling that which the sons of Jacob meted out to the house of Hamor in their mockery of circumcision, now is turned back upon Israel. The Levites (the priestly class) by lot drawing Shechem as a residence (Joshua 21:21) shows a clear combination of God's rule with man's rites in the city; God has reclaimed the city as, in some sense, holy.

Joshua 24: A Final Rest? We shall see whether this is enough to overcome Shechem's basic identification as a symbol of division. It does seem so, for Joshua, in his old age, reassembles all the tribes of Israel at Shechem (24:1). It is a unification of the people in a grand public-square address in which the Israelite history from Abraham is summarized (2-13). In the speech, Joshua says that he is speaking God's words and that God has given them the choice of which god to serve, the pagan gods or the true God (15). Here the people of Israel answer faithfully, and so Joshua reminds them to dispose of the foreign gods (23) and then proceeds to draw up a special covenant, a new "judicial decision," in Shechem (25). This last great act of Joshua can be seen as an act of atonement for the sins of the house of Jacob. Symbolically, too, Joseph's embalmed body (Ge 50:26), which had been carried around since the exodus from Egypt, is buried finally in Shechem (32). In this sense, this covenant of the Israelites finally gives rest to a wandering that began when God told Jacob to leave Shechem in Genesis 35:1.

Judges 9: Sexual Sin and Murder Return. In Judges 8:30, however, we learn that Gideon was quite a womanizer: he had many wives and seventy sons. The sons are divided from each other in that they have several different mothers. One of those sons is born to a concubine from Shechem and is given the inauspicious name of Abimelech (31). Worse, as soon as Gideon dies, Israel returns to the immorality of following Baal-berith and forgets about God (33-34).

Abimelech sees his chance and shouts a public-square address via his Shechemite half-brothers (9:1-2). Their address is heard by all the landowners of the city (3). The content of the address is: "Which is better for you, for seventy men, all the sons of [Gideon], to rule over you, or for one man to rule over you?" (2). Having convinced the townspeople to make the choice of family and group loyalty, Abimelech proceeds to kill all but one of his many brothers (5). The remaining brother curses Abimelech and the townspeople (which is probably what Jacob's sons should have done, seeing how effective it turns out to be), and God proceeds to drive a divisive spirit between Abimelech and the landowners of Shechem (23). God brings justice by pitting them against each other
(24-25), and eventually Abimelech deceitfully ambushes the Shechemites (34-36) and then mass-murders them (45) and burns the thousand or so remaining survivors (49). Finally, Abimelech is himself unceremoniously killed (53-54). Thus was God's vengeance wreaked through human wars (56-57).

I Kings 12: Endless Division. Solomon's son Rehoboam becomes king of Israel, and Shechem is the chosen place. (Verse 12:1 seems to suggest that this had become a usual locale for installing a king.) Another two public-square meetings are held in Shechem, between which Rehoboam must decide whether to treat Israel harshly or lightly. Rehoboam is divided between the counsel of the older men, who counsel lightness, and the younger advisors, who counsel harshness (6-11). Rehoboam chooses harshness, but this is part of God's plan to punish Israel for continuing to follow false Gods (12:15; 11:33). Israel, not knowing this judgment, turns to mob violence and stones Rehoboam's messenger to death (12:18).

Sadly, Shechem persists as a symbol of unalterable division. The rival whom God had brought forth, Jeroboam, invents a new Shechem with its own gods and its own priests, drawn from among the laity (25-33). Jeroboam quite easily gets Israel to worship two golden calves (28-30, despite the clear prophecy of Shemaiah, 22-25), simply by calling out to them to choose the easy, local gods rather than the long trip to Jerusalem. "And the Israelites kept up their revolt against the house of David down to this day" (19). Shechem seems to be the fundamental symbol of the struggle against false gods.

Psalm 60: A Cry for Restoration.

[1] O God, you have cast us off, you have broken through us,

You have become incensed. You should restore us.

[2] You have caused the earth to rock, you have split it open.

Heal its breaches, for it has tottered.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

[6] God himself has spoken in His holiness: "I will exult, I will give out

Shechem as a portion . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

[10] Is it not you, O God, who have cast us off

And who do not go forth with our armies as God?

[11] Do give us assistance from distress,

As salvation by earthling man is worthless.

[12] By god we shall gain vital energy,

And he himself will tread down our adversaries.

NOTES