Early in this blog I got a comment from my good friend
Flippo, who said he couldn’t wait to hear my take on Lot. I’m not sure if he
meant this as a challenge or he just wanted to goad me. See, Flippo is Jewish,
and knows his scripture. And he’s probably interested in seeing if I can find
any meaning of the debacle of Lot’s life.
You can read about this in Genesis 18 and 19. The story of
Lott, taken as a whole, is often cited by the non-religious as a good reason
not to read the Bible, or at least not to let your kids read it unsupervised.
Which reminds me, I should give the disclaimer that the following blog post is
not for children or the squeamish. Lot’s story is like a David Lynch film – but
darker and way more disturbing.
It starts by focusing on two cities where everyone is doing
very bad things. You’ll recognize the names of cities, Sodom, from which we get
the word sodomy, and Gomorrah, from which hails the disease Gommorahria.
When God first mentions doing away with Sodom, the story
seems more Mel Brooks than David Lynch. Abraham says, “Surely you don’t want to
destroy 50 righteous people when you destroy the city?” , to which God calls
his bluff and says, “50 righteous people in Sodom? Right. You’re on.” Abraham
then says, “Well, how about 45?”, and continues working his way down in
increments of 5, until he gets to 10, and then calls it good.
Meanwhile, back in Sodom, a couple of angels stop by to
visit Lot. Lot offered to let them stay the night, but they said they’d just
stay in the town square. Lot said, “No, you really don’t want to do that,” so
they said OK and came on in.
But then the men of Sodom gathered around Lot’s house. They
demanded that he turn the strangers, the angels, out so they can have their way
with them.
OK, I’ve got a little aside here. I’ve heard this passage
quoted by people as an example of how God is against homosexuality. If you
believe that it is a common practice among homosexuals to form a gang-rape posy
every time a stranger comes to town, I now understand why you homophobic.
Anyway, faced with the mob at the door, did Lot his sword
and shout out, “Maybe I can’t stop you all, but I’m taking off the heads of the
first three people through the door!” Sadly, no. Instead he offered, “Take my
daughters. I’ve got two of them. They’re virgins. You can do whatever you want
to them.” At this point I’m thinking that Lot may be the biggest jerk in the
Bible.
The townsfolk were about to break down the door, but then
the angels struck them all blind. Again, this seems like a good opportunity for
Lot to go outside a settle some scores, but instead he just sneaks away. He
told his sons-in-law to be that God was going to destroy the city and they
should come with him, but they thought he was just kidding around, so they blew
him off.
As they were leaving the city, and fire rained down from
heaven destroying the city, Lot’s wife didn’t follow the instructions
carefully, and she looked back. She was turned into a pillar of salt. In a
conversation my friend Flippo challenged that this seemed like a pretty harsh
punishment for breaking some arbitrary rule. I countered that after a lifetime
of marriage to Lot, maybe being turned into a pillar of salt in the desert
really isn’t all that bad.
So Lot and his daughters got away, and found a nice cave to
live in. The daughters, the same whom I previously felt so sorry for, saw their
prospects for men as being very limited at that point, so they decide to rape
their Dad. You could say the Bible doesn’t say rape, but it does say they got
him so drunk that he didn’t know when they were coming and going, and had
intercourse with him in that state. I think even Todd Akins would agree that
that is rape.
The daughters get pregnant from this encounter, as planned,
and both have sons, who they name… or
never mind. This story has gone on long enough.
I’m not a Biblical scholar. I’m not even close. I haven’t
studied the original writings in their native language from thousands of years
ago. I can’t put this scripture in its proper context, as could someone who has
spent a few years in a good seminary. I’m not familiar with the canonization
process, or how exactly this x-rated trainwreck of a bedtime story ever made it
into the Bible to begin with.
But I know there are a lot of Bibles out there, and some of
them are even being read. Just because this story makes me want to shut my
Bible and go take a shower, I’m not arrogant enough to believe everyone should
have that same perspective.
Perhaps there is someone out there who has found himself in
a very dark place. And maybe he encounters an angel in his life who encourages
him to make a break from this place, to move on not look back. And maybe he
convinces his wife or girlfriend to make a break, too. But midstream, she can’t
make a clean break. She looks back on the old life, and she gets stuck there.
And he has to go on without her.
If that’s been someone’s life experience, and he reads that
part of this story, he may gain some encouragement by it. And he may feel like
he’s not alone after all.
Let’s pray.
“Dear God, we can’t fully understand the experiences of
another. We often don’t fully understand our own experiences. And there is much
in the Bible that we don’t understand. But may we have faith that people will
find their way to scriptures that intersect with their life in a way that will
give them hope. Amen.”
