The Ten Forgotten Virgins

We talk about the Twenty Virgins: Ten Foolish and Ten Wise. But there is a forgotten story of ten other virgins. We know them as concubines, not quite wives, but not really whores. Who were these women? Like all women, they began as virgins. They were likely the daughters of kings, royalty in reality, but they ended their days as witless victims to a man’s lust or greed of power. I take my story from a small segment found in the book of Kings, Embattled King David is forced to flee Jerusalem as his son, Absalom, attempts a coup d’état. In his wake, he leaves ten concubines and their children to guard the palace and its belongings. One has to wonder what David was thinking.

Absalom said to Ahithophel, “Give us your advice. What should we do?” Ahithophel answered, “Sleep with your father’s concubines whom he left to take care of the palace. Then all Israel will hear that you have made yourself obnoxious to your father, and the hands of everyone with you will be more resolute.” So they pitched a tent for Absalom on the roof, and he slept with his father’s concubines in the sight of all Israel. Now in those days the advice Ahithophel gave was like that of one who inquires of God. That was how both David and Absalom regarded all of Ahithophel advice. (2 Samuel 16:20-23).

Absalom’s decision came from tradition; it was a conventionally Eastern idea. The grossest insult that one could offered to a king, and that a king a father, would be to lie with his wives and concubines, and this choice would strengthen the breach between David and Absalom.

 It was irreparable; it was vain to hope for any reconciliation. We talk of David and Absalom, Joab and Ahithophel; yet, few wonder, however, what happened to the ten concubines that were left behind. In scripture, they appear to be merely glossed over. Certainly, the Bible scholar is little concerned with their fate. Humiliation. Shame. Degradation.

 

 When the famous king is forced to leave Jerusalem with his wives, concubines, and children, it  is a day of great sadness. Indeed, it is a day of great shame. Critics speak of David’s humiliation but what of that of the women? To be taken, one after another and used, and then tossed away. Was it not bad enough to be left behind in Jerusalem, not taken with the rest of the king’s entourage? But now to add insult to injury, they are to be raped by the king’s son in view of all of  Jerusalem. Public Humiliation. Lest we imagine ourselves any better, when a rape victim is tried in the papers or it is suggested that she invited the abuse, we assume the same posture as those who stood that day and watched Absalom go in and lay with his father’s concubines.

 Ahithophel, one of David’s trusted counselors, advises Absalom to put up a tent of the place roof and publically humiliate his father be having intercourse with his concubines. Why is it that a woman seems to be voiceless at these times? Where were the voices that said, “do not do this thing? If not for the rape of your own sister, Tamar, do not do this thing. Do not use women like your brother Amnon used your sister Tamar and then discarded her. She had no place to go from her shame, these women will neither.”

No, but Absalom is furious; he has held his anger and grievance over David’s lack of action over his sister’s rape for almost ten years. For two years, he waited and plotted the murder of his brother Amnon. After the assassination, which he did during a pretext of throwing a party to which he invited his brothers, he fled to his mother’s country where he remained for three years. When he returned to Jerusalem, he was not greeted by his father for another two years.  Finally, he spent four years plotting his rebellion. Eleven years has passed for him to build up his rage; it must be spent.

At least someone grieved over Tamar; who grieved over these women? Did they cry together as they tried to wipe the shame away as they did the tears? They were now one flesh with father and son. They shared pain now on a deeper level, adding to their sense of rejection and humiliation.

One incident of rape had such great ramifications that it is hard to believe that we believe that there will be not cataclysmic effects for us in this generation. Like David, we are truly asleep at the wheel.

P.S.

Those ten concubines had no more choice in having sex with Absalom then Bathsheba with David. That would be akin to saying a serf or slave girl had a choice in having sex with her master. In fact, most feudal landlords and slave masters considered it their right to deflower a peasant or slave girl.

Still Ruminating,

MJ