Quote:I'm a bit rusty, but I do believe that the Torah says that married Jewish women should get [...] & half the assets when the divorce is final. That seems pretty forward-thinking. I know some of that is from the Torah, and some probably from our friends and family, but I get so confused which is which.
I'm not sure what you're referring to, Cav. I do know though that a married man owned all of his wife's property, & a woman could regain her property only upon divorce or her husband's death.
There was also no provision for a woman to divorce her husband, though men could leave their wives rather easily
[size=11][url=http://www.biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?language=english&version=&passage=Deut.+24%3A1-4][b]Deuteronomy 24:1-4[/b][/url]
1 If a man marries a woman who becomes displeasing to him because he finds something indecent about her, and he writes her a certificate of divorce, gives it to her and sends her from his house, 2 and if after she leaves his house she becomes the wife of another man, 3 and her second husband dislikes her and writes her a certificate of divorce, gives it to her and sends her from his house, or if he dies, 4 then her first husband, who divorced her, is not allowed to marry her again after she has been defiled...[/size]
Divorced women also didn't have the same rights as married or never-married women.
The laws of inheritance certainly favored men, too. First, daughters were precluded from taking anything if their dad was survived by sons or descendants of sons. Second, the mother & her family were not heirs of a decedent. Third, a husband inherited from his wife, but a wife didn't inherit from her husband. One mention that covers a fair bit of this system:
[size=11][url=http://www.biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?language=english&version=&passage=Numbers+27%3A8-11][b]Numbers 27:8-11[/b][/url]
8 "Say to the Israelites, 'If a man dies and leaves no son, turn his inheritance over to his daughter. 9 If he has no daughter, give his inheritance to his brothers. 10 If he has no brothers, give his inheritance to his father's brothers. 11 If his father had no brothers, give his inheritance to the nearest relative in his clan, that he may possess it. This is to be a legal requirement for the Israelites, as the LORD commanded Moses.' "[/size]
Here's one law I always thought was interesting, though...
[url=http://www.biblegateway.com/cgi-bin/bible?language=english&version=&passage=Deuteronomy+24%3A5][size=11][b]Deuteronomy 24:5[/b][/url]
If a man has recently married, he must not be sent to war or have any other duty laid on him. For one year he is to be free to stay at home and bring happiness to the wife he has married.[/size]
The bottom line, however, is that women are consistently portrayed in the Bible as appendages & possessions of men. Exodus 21:7, for example, seems to condone men selling their daughters into slavery, and men also controlled their daughters' sexuality, as can be seen in the case of Lot (among many others) who offered his virgin daughters to homosexual men in Sodom ('tis at Genesis 19:8).
Caveat: I don't qualify myself as an expert on ancient Jewish law or anything like that.
I am hoping that someone more well-versed can bring up a reference regarding the sex thing though. The rest of my post was rather flippant. I am absolutely certain there were no references to gold cards in the Torah.
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