SODOM & GOMORRAH
And they struck the men who were at the doorway of the house with blindness.
—Genesis 19:11
“So in the heat of the day,” said the man, “the Lord appeared to Abraham as he was sitting by his tent door.” He looked down to his Bible and read:
When he raised his eyes and looked, behold, three men were standing opposite him, and when he saw them, he ran from the tent door to meet them and bowed down to the ground, and said, “My Lord, if now I have found favor in Your sight, please do not pass Your servant by. Please let a little water be brought and wash your feet, and make yourselves comfortable under the tree, and I will bring a piece of bread, so that you may refresh yourselves. After that you may go on, since you have visited your servant.”48
“I’m totally confused,” said the boy. “Who are these guys?”
“First of all,” said the man, “in this time and place, it was customary to rest from labor during high noon, as we see Abraham doing here. Second, because there were no inns or established places to rest like we have today, dwellers of the land would welcome travelers to join them for refreshments before moving on in the cool of evening. But Abraham recognized these travelers as three heavenly beings assuming human form, one of them being the Lord Himself.”
“Uh-huh,” said the boy. “And how does he know this if they look like regular men? Couldn’t they just have been random strangers?”
“Whatever visual cue Abraham sees isn’t detailed,” said the man, “but this fact is revealed shortly.”
“Alright,” said the boy, “let’s hear it then.”
“Abraham humbly bows and invites them to be his guests, and they tell him, ‘Do as you have said.’ So Abraham hurries into the tent and tells Sarah, ‘Quickly, make ready three measures of fine meal, knead it and make cakes.’”
“Yeah,” said the boy, “chop-chop!”
The man rolled his eyes and read on:
Abraham ran to the herd, took a tender and good calf, gave it to a young man, and he hastened to prepare it. So he took butter and milk and the calf which he had prepared, and set it before them, and he stood by them under the tree as they ate.
Then they said to him, “Where is Sarah your wife?”49
“Ah, okay,” said the boy, “there’s the giveaway.”
“Indeed. And at this point Sarah was behind the tent flap listening, so here’s what Abraham told them,” said the man:
“Here, in the tent.”
And He said, “I will certainly return to you according to the time of life, and behold, Sarah your wife shall have a son.”
Now Abraham and Sarah were old, well advanced in age, and Sarah had passed the age of childbearing. Therefore Sarah laughed within herself, saying, After I have grown old, shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?
And the Lord said to Abraham, “Why did Sarah laugh, saying, ‘Shall I surely bear a child, since I am old?’ Is anything too hard for the Lord? At the appointed time I will return to you, according to the time of life, and Sarah shall have a son.”50
“Looks like God didn’t care for Sarah doubting His miracle-working skills,” said the boy.
“No,” said the man, “and Sarah digs herself even deeper by denying it when she says, ‘I did not laugh,’ for she was afraid. But God says, ‘No, but you did laugh!’”
“Caught red-handed by the All Knowing,” said the boy.
“She was,” said the man, reading on again:
When the men got up to leave, they looked down toward Sodom, and Abraham walked along with them to see them on their way. Then the Lord said, “Shall I hide from Abraham what I am about to do? Abraham will surely become a great and powerful nation, and all nations on earth will be blessed through him. For I have chosen him, so that he will direct his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord by doing what is right and just, so that the Lord will bring about for Abraham what he has promised him.”51
“What’s going on here exactly?” said the boy.
“Well, their mission down on earth was not only to grace Abraham and Sarah with their presence, but they had business to attend to as well, the nature of which God tells Abraham here.” The man looked down and read:
“The outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin so grievous that I will go down and see if what they have done is as bad as the outcry that has reached me. If not, I will know.”52
“So Sodom and Gomorrah are nearby cities that are evil and need to be punished?” said the boy.
“Judged first,” said the man. “But apparently God debates on whether or not he should reveal his intentions to Abraham. I suppose He’s worried Abraham may influence His decision, which turns out to be true. God reiterates how Abraham is destined to be the great and mighty father of nations. Therefore, he has the interest of humanity in an act of retribution on Sodom. God also says, ‘blessed in him shall be all the nations of the earth,’ showing that all that concerns mankind, concerns Abraham when it comes to the dealings of mercy and judgment. So Abraham must teach his people to avoid the sins of the doomed cities and keep the way of the Lord.”
“Why would God be worried about His decision being influenced though?” said the boy. “Seems like He’s putting on a ruse so Abraham will step up and show concern about mercy and judgment.”
The old man’s eyes widened as he thought about it. With an agreeing nod, he looked down to read on:
Then the men turned away from there and went toward Sodom, but Abraham still stood before the Lord. And Abraham came near and said, “Would You also destroy the righteous with the wicked? Suppose there were fifty righteous within the city. Would You also destroy the place and not spare it for the fifty righteous that were in it? Far be it from You to do such a thing as this, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous should be as the wicked, far be it from You! Shall not the Judge of all the earth do right?”
So the Lord said, “If I find in Sodom fifty righteous within the city, then I will spare all the place for their sakes.”53
“So he bargains with God?” said the boy.
“That’s not the extent of it,” said the man. “Here, listen,” said the man:
Then Abraham answered and said, “Indeed now, I who am but dust and ashes have taken it upon myself to speak to the Lord. Suppose there were five less than the fifty righteous. Would You destroy all of the city for lack of five?”
So He said, “If I find there forty-five, I will not destroy it.”
And he spoke to Him yet again and said, “Suppose there should be forty found there?”
So He said, “I will not do it for the sake of forty.”54
“And Abraham continues to advance on God’s concessions, again and again and again, until God says, ‘I will not destroy it for the sake of ten.’ And notice,” said the man, “He did not cease granting until Abraham stopped asking. Only then did God go on His way and Abraham return to his place.”
“Those poor remaining nine,” said the boy, shaking his head. “So I guess the message here is that you can haggle God down to whatever you want?”
“Well,” said the man, “at least that He’s open to dialogue.”
The boy nodded and opened a palm toward the Bible, so the man read on:
The two angels entered Sodom in the evening as Lot was sitting in Sodom’s gateway. When Lot saw them, he got up to meet them. He bowed with his face to the ground and said, “My lords, turn aside to your servant’s house, wash your feet, and spend the night. Then you can get up early and go on your way.”55
“He just sees them as travelers, right? Or does he recognize them as holy?”
“As far as we know they appear as men, but perhaps he recognized something divine or special about them, as we see he greets them with a bow. But they tell him, ‘No, we will spend the night in the open square.’ But he insists again, so they turn in and enter his home. There he prepares for them a feast and they dine.”
“Looks like there’s at least one good man in Sodom,” said the boy.
The man smiled and read on:
Now before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, both old and young, all the people from every quarter, surrounded the house. And they called to Lot and said to him, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us that we may know them carnally.”56
“Carnally?” said the boy.
“Carnally,” said the man.
“What does that mean exactly?”
“You know,” said the old man, blushing slightly, “carnally.”
“The whole town wants to fuck ’em?”
“Well!” said the man, scarlet now. “Let’s just say they profess the wicked intention for which the city is named.”
“Wait a minute,” said the boy. “‘Sodom’ is a play on sodomize? What kind of people is Lot hanging around with?”
“Sinners,” said the man.
“The whole city though? Young and old?”
“I suppose it was something of an epidemic.”
The boy shook his head in disbelief. “Alright, well, what happens?”
The man looked down again to read:
Lot went outside to meet them and shut the door behind him and said, “No, my friends. Don’t do this wicked thing. Look, I have two daughters who have never slept with a man. Let me bring them out to you, and you can do what you like with them. But don’t do anything to these men, for they have come under the protection of my roof.”57
There was a long and awkward pause after the man stopped reading.
“What just happened?” said the boy, furrowing his brow. “A mob comes to his doorstep so he offers his virgin daughters to be raped instead of giving up strangers he’s known for five minutes? What kind of book are you reading me?”
“Well,” said the man, knotting his wrinkled fingers in his lap, “I’ve searched for some kind of reasonable explanation for this offering, but to be honest, I’ve found none that’s satisfying.”
“So it wasn’t a joke, or like a distraction tactic or something?”
“The explanations I’ve found say it was something akin to trading a smaller sin for a greater sin.”
“Feeding your daughters to wolves instead of some strangers is the lesser of two evils?”
“Well, you see, the laws of hospitality back then would have encouraged him to do his utmost to protect his guests.”
“‘The laws of hospitality’? That’s the best you can come up with? What is with this family and pimping out loved ones?”
“I agree,” said the man, “it’s hard to know what to make of that. But I didn’t write the book, my boy, that’s just how it goes.”
“Just,” said the boy, pausing to rub the bridge of his nose, “keep going.”
“Right, anyway, here’s how the mob responds,” said the man:
“Stand back!” Then they said, “This one came in to stay here, and he keeps acting as a judge. Now we will deal worse with you than with them.” So they pressed hard against the man Lot, and came near to break down the door.
But the men reached out their hands and pulled Lot into the house with them, and shut the door. And they struck the men who were at the doorway of the house with blindness, both small and great, so that they became weary trying to find the door.58
“Blindness?” said the boy. “Wait a minute. So this whole story is some kind of moral about not sticking your you know what up other people’s…”
The man’s eyes opened wide, so the boy reconsidered his words.
“This is like that joke where the grandfather is telling his grandsons if you masturbate too much you’ll go blind. Then the boys say, ‘But, Grandpa, we’re over here!’”
The old man burst out laughing so hard a tear came to his eye. “I never heard that one before.”
“Really?” said the boy as the man gathered himself again. “It’s a classic.”
Wiping a tear under his eye the old man said, “I think what we’re intended to take away is a moral about how to treat the strangers that cross your path in life, because you never know who you’re dealing with.”
“Right,” said the boy, rolling his eyes. “The laws of hospitality or whatever. Just tell me what happens to the daughters.”
So the man read on:
Then the men said to Lot, “Have you anyone else here? Son-in-law, your sons, your daughters, and whomever you have in the city, take them out of this place! For we will destroy this place, because the outcry against them has grown great before the face of the Lord, and the Lord has sent us to destroy it.”
So Lot went out and spoke to his sons—59
“Wait, wait, wait. Two strangers come to his door claiming God sent them to destroy the city and he doesn’t ask who they are or how they plan to go about it?”
“Well, he just witnessed them blind an angry mob with divine power,” said the man. “Does he really need to ask? And now that we’ve seen the dangers of immediate sexual gratification in a place where social structure has collapsed, would you stick around?”
“I guess not,” said the boy. “Go ahead then.”
“So Lot goes out and speaks to his sons-in-law and tells them, ‘Get up, get out of this place, for the Lord will destroy this city!’ But his sons-in-law think he’s joking.”
“I’m not sure what’s more unbelievable,” said the boy, “the fact that Lot was so eager to offer up his married daughters, or that their sodomizing husbands hadn’t known them even after marriage.”
“I think there’s an implication of more than two daughters, but the ones married to the unbelieving son-in-laws perish with their husbands, while the two you’re thinking of escape with Lot. Here, listen,” said the man:
When the morning dawned, the angels urged Lot to hurry, saying, “Arise, take your wife and your two daughters who are here, lest you be consumed in the punishment of the city.”60
When Lot still hesitated, the angels seized his hand and the hands of his wife and two daughters and rushed them to safety outside the city, for the Lord was merciful.
When they were safely out of the city, one of the angels said, “Run for your lives! And don’t look back or stop anywhere in the valley! Escape to the mountains, or you will be swept away!”61
“Leaving daughters behind would certainly explain why he lingered,” said the boy. “Not to mention the home he’s built over the years with all his stuff.”
“I suppose this serves as a lesson for questioning whether or not you’re in a place in life that’s so bad you should leave and never look back, even if that place is your home.”
The boy gave a silent nod as he mulled that over.
“Fortunately for Lot, the Lord was merciful and made that decision for him,” said the man, reading on again:
But Lot said to them, “No, my lords, please! Your servant has found favor in your eyes, and you have shown great kindness to me in sparing my life. But I can’t flee to the mountains. This disaster will overtake me, and I’ll die.”62
“What is he afraid of in the mountains?”
“Perhaps frailty in old age,” said the man, “but whatever it is, it shows doubt in the Lord’s ability to provide strength and protection as he pleads to flee to a nearby city instead.”
“You think he’d take the advice for high ground knowing God has a thing for floods,” said the boy. “Anyway…”
“Anyway, here’s the response,” said the man:
“Behold, I grant you this favor also, that I will not overthrow the city of which you have spoken. Escape there quickly, for I can do nothing till you arrive there.” Therefore the name of the city was called Zoar.63
“Why,” said the boy, “what’s that mean?”
“A place of refuge, or sanctuary,” said the man, reading on again:
The sun had risen over the earth when Lot came to Zoar. Then the Lord rained brimstone and fire on Sodom and Gomorrah from the Lord out of heaven, and He overthrew those cities, and all the surrounding area, and all the inhabitants of the cities, and what grew on the ground. But Lot’s wife, from behind him, looked back, and she became a pillar of salt.64
“A pillar of salt?” said the boy.
“In oriental countries it’s customary for the wife to walk behind her husband, so we can assume this was her position then, perhaps lingering a bit too far behind both physically and metaphorically. Looking back as the men warned them not to disobeyed a direct order of God and showed her longing to return to a sinful place. When she turned to face the brimstone and fire raining down upon the earth, she must have been stifled by sulfurous vapors, her body encrusted with salt that encapsulated her like a statue. If this was her fate, while Lot made it safely just a few paces ahead, we know how narrowly the rest of his family escaped.”
“She certainly got what she deserved for caring about those stupid daughters left behind,” said the boy, rolling his eyes.
“Yes, well…” the man trailed off absently. “Soon after seeing the smoke of the land roll up in the sky, Lot went out of Zoar and lived in the mountains, for he was afraid to dwell in a city after such a display. Then he and his two remaining daughters lived in a cave.”
“Jeez, now that his wife dies he’s feeling brave enough to climb into the mountains?”
“Sometimes paths of our own choosing, ones in which we don’t follow God’s, can prove unsettling. Here is a lesson that it’s okay if disappointment in choosing our own way finally leads us to the path God has chosen for us.”
“That or all the fire in the valley smoked him out,” said the boy.
“Either way, we can see that a man who once had so much wealth he could no longer live beside his uncle now had too much pride to seek shelter with Abraham again. Instead he chose to dwell in some miserable cave with his daughters.”
“Father of the year right there,” said the boy.
“Well I doubt you’re going to like this then,” said the man, reading on:
Now the firstborn said to the younger, “Our father is old, and there is no man on the earth to come in to us as is the custom of all the earth. Come, let us make our father drink wine, and we will lie with him, that we may preserve the lineage of our father.”65
“You’re kidding me…”
“I’m not,” said the man, reading further:
So they made their father drink wine that night. And the firstborn went in and lay with her father, and he did not know when she lay down or when she arose. It happened on the next day that the firstborn said to the younger, “Indeed I lay with my father last night. Let us make him drink wine tonight also, and you go in and lie with him, that we may preserve the lineage of our father.”66
“Good Lord. What is in this wine that makes everyone wanna f—” the boy caught himself “—lay with their fathers? I’m surprised it’s not illegal after that.”
“Well, I’m certainly not condoning the behavior,” said the man, “but I’ve sought answers to the same questions you’ve asked. What I’ve found is sympathy for their actions out of desperation, or perhaps recognition of their ignorance. Their father had no sons, they had no husbands, their mother and the rest of their family were dead, and they may never see another man again for all they knew. And so perhaps they thought these extreme circumstances would excuse this irregularity. And maybe this story highlights an echoing reminder that whatever was happening in Sodom followed Lot out of the city and caught him with his guard down.”
“More like his pants down,” said the boy. “I understand desperate times call for desperate measures, but preserving the lineage of your father doesn’t seem like a valid excuse. Is this a normal response to have a salt pillar for a mother, or something they picked up in Zoar? I mean, where do virgin children learn such behavior? Maybe you’re right about cities being evil after all.”
“It seems their principles were so corrupted by contact with the people of Sodom that they were prepared to commit an act of incest,” said the man. “Sometimes good intentions are abused to justify bad actions.”
“I have to say, this is not what I expected in the first few pages of the Holy Bible.”
“Remember,” said the man, “the Bible is as much a guide how not to live as it is one how to.”
“Tell that to the caveman who thinks his virgin daughters conceived by miracle. What a turnaround from feeding them to the mob,” said the boy. “Maybe God should’ve just left the whole family in Sodom.”
“Maybe, but that’s not how the story goes. Here, listen,” said the man, reading on:
They made their father drink wine that night also. And the younger arose and lay with him, and he did not know when she lay down or when she arose. Thus both the daughters of Lot were with child by their father. The firstborn bore a son and called his name Moab, he is the father of the Moabites to this day. And the younger, she also bore a son and called his name Ben-Ammi, he is the father of the people of Ammon to this day.67
“And they grow up to become leaders?” said the boy. “Did the law of genetics not exist then? What’s happening right now? I’m so confused…”
“Regarding that matter, I’m unsure,” said the man, “but I think considering how little the Scripture speaks of Lot moving forward, we can at least take away that as much as drunkenness makes you forget, it can also make you forgotten.”