Issue 28 Grief and LamentBlog | Digging for gold Part 3: Compassion
Digging for gold Part 3: Compassion
Author: Andy PeckPost Date: 17.09.21
He’d been sitting silently for some time, looking increasingly uncomfortable. When I called on him to speak, his words overflowed like a river undammed.
I was leading a small-group seminar in a university, and in preparation, the students had read Phyllis Trible’s extraordinary work on the rape of Tamar (Texts of Terror; 2 Samuel 13). The women in the group were engaging in a valuable discussion, grappling with Trible’s feminist approach to the text, and considering Tamar’s experience from that perspective. But there were also two men in the group, and one in particular was clearly ill at ease throughout the discussion. When I invited his thoughts, he expressed himself loudly and at length. ‘That’s not what this story is about! It’s not about Tamar, it’s about the downfall of the Davidic dynasty.’
Well, yes, this is certainly in the frame. But could it be about more? I invited him to consider whether a woman who had been sexually assaulted might read the text differently. But he was unable to see it. There was, for him, only one way to read the text and that was his way.
