Women at Work in the Deuteronomistic History - International Voices ...

HIDE AND SEEK: MISCELLANEOUS WOMEN | 169
biblical and Ugaritic sources indicate clearly that the ytnm-netînîm were part of
the guild system of their respective societies. 19
Levine’s comparison of the formula ־ןב (“son of”) for a guild member at
Ugarit and in the Bible, and the parallel between these two societies in terms of
temple personnel is important for this study. 20
םימ יבאשׁו םיצע יבטח — The Wood Hewers and Water Drawers
Nehemiah 11:3 mentions also the המלשׁ ידבע ינב, who, according to Rabbinic
tradition, were descendants of the Gibeonites (Josh 9), whom David made
slaves—an inference which, Levine points out, does not find support in the
biblical text. In Levine’s opinion, the position that the המלשׁ ידבע ינב were
state slaves is wrongly inferred from 1 Kgs 9:15–28, where two different groups
are mentioned: those levied and enslaved from the native population, and a
group from the Israelites, who were Solomon’s “‘warriors, his royal officers, his
commanders, his šālîšîm, and the captains of his chariotry and cavalry.’ `abdê
Šelômô of vs. 27 are to be identified with the ‘royal officers’ of vs. 22, and not
with the levies of 20.” 21 Levine is right in pointing out that Josh 9 says nothing
about the המלשׁ ידבע ינב who returned with Nehemiah. On the other hand,
there is merit in the rabbinic tradition, because it picks up a lost trend and ties it
to another textual cord, so to speak, creating a semantic knot. Joshua 9 tells how
the Gibeonites managed to make the Israelites let them live, despite YHWH’s
commandment to annihilate every people on the land. Since the Israelites had
given their word, they made a compromise: they let them live but made them
“hewers of wood and drawers of water ( םימ יב אשׁו םיצע יבטח)
for the
congregation and for the altar of the LORD, to continue to this day, in the place
that he should choose” (NRSV). Hewing trees and fetching water would be
heavy tasks for the women; however, women have been (and still are whenever
these tasks are still done manually) responsible for fetching wood and water to
ensure cooking, cleaning and heating. Hewers alone, presumably males, appear
in other texts, such as Deut 19:5, Jer 46:22 or Ezek 39:10. But these are about all
the occurrences of this stem בטח I. With regard to water, most scenes at a well
in the Hebrew Bible involve women, not men. There, they meet prospective
19 Baruch Levine, “The Netînîm,” 212.
20 Levine, “Netînîm,” 207–12. The main concern of Levine’s paper is to claim that the םיניתנ and
the המלשׁ ידבע ינב were temple guilds but not slaves, and had been free also in pre-exilic times.
While his argument for these groups as guilds is well-taken, discussion about their slave status
requires far more information than there is available and is therefore debatable. See also Wilfred
Watson, “Archaic elements in the language of Chronicles,” Bibl 53 (1972): 204–5, 11.1, where he
adds to Levine’s list of parallel temple guilds at Ugarit and the Bible.
21 Levine, “Netînîm,” 209.