First off, I appreciate Frymer-Kensky’s labeling of this story as “the Dinah affair”, rather than the often used “rape of Dinah”, because she had proved the likelihood of this incident not being rape based on the biblical language used. Additionally, what was interesting to me were the questions Frymer-Kensky considered at the end about small groups such as Israel attempting to survive against threats. This was interesting because none of these questions were about Dinah or the role of women in biblical or current Jewish societies. Frymer-Kensky establishes that Dinah herself is almost irrelevant to this story, a catalyst more than a character. The relation of a daughter to her family is not being called into question so much as the relationship of men in a family to outsiders.
Writing and other content
