Not only feminine charms, but the highest feminine virtues are
sometimes strangely, nay, shockingly disregarded, as in the story of
Lot (Gen. 19:1-12), who, when besieged by the mob clamoring for the
two men who had taken refuge in his house, went out and said:
"I pray you, my brethren, do not so wickedly. Behold
now, I have two daughters which have not known man; let
me, I pray you, bring them out unto you, and do ye to
them as is good in your eyes; only unto these men do
nothing, forasmuch as they are come under the shadow of
my roof."
And this man was saved, though his action was surely more villainous
than the wickedness of the Sodomites who were destroyed with brimstone
and fire. In Judges (19: 22-30) we read of a man offering his maiden
daughter and his concubine to a mob to prevent an unnatural crime
being committed against his guest: "Seeing that this man is come into
my house, do not this folly." This case is of extreme sociological
importance as showing that notwithstanding the strict laws of Moses
(Levit. 20: 10; Deut. 22: 13-30) on sexual crimes, the law of
hospitality seems to have been held more sacred than a father's regard
for his daughter's honor. The story of Abraham shows, too, that he did
not hold his wife's honor in the same esteem as a modern Christian
does:
"And it came to pass, when he was come near to enter
into Egypt, that he said unto Sarai his wife, 'Behold
now, I know that thou art a fair woman to look upon;
and it shall come to pass, when the Egyptians shall see
thee, that they shall say, This is his wife; and they
will kill me, but they will save thee alive. Say, I
pray thee, Thou art my sister; that it may be well with
me for thy sake, and that my soul may live because of
thee."
And it happened as he had arranged. She was taken into Pharaoh's house
and he was treated well for her sake; and he had sheep, and oxen, and
other presents. When he went to sojourn in Gerar (Gen. 20:1-15)
Abraham tried to repeat the same stratagem, taking refuge, when found
out, in the double excuse that he was afraid he would be slain for his
wife's sake, and that she really was his sister, the daughter of his
father, but not the daughter of his mother. Isaac followed his
father's example in Gerar:
"The man of the place asked him of his wife; and he
said, She is my sister: for he feared to say, My wife;
lest (said he) the men of the place should kill me for
Rebekah; because she was fair to look upon."
Yet we were told that Isaac loved Rebekah. Such is not Christian love.
The actions of Abraham and Isaac remind one of the Blackfoot Indian
tale told on page 631 of this volume. An American army officer would
not only lay down his own life, but shoot his wife with his own pistol
before he would allow her to fall into the enemy's hands, because to
him her honor is, of all things human, the most sacred.