Chapters 18 and 19 of Genesis constitute a single account about the righteousness, justice and way of God as practiced by Abraham and his household. In chapter 19 these themes are continued through the use of contrasts — the contrast between the household of Abraham and the city of Sodom, and the contrast between Abraham’s way of life and that of Lot and his family.  

 

Chapter 19 begins with the two angels/men who have left the tent of Abraham arriving in Sodom in the evening. Lot was at the gate of the city and immediately noticed them. He bowed to the ground in greeting, and promptly offered them hospitality for the night. They initially refused, but on his urging entered his home. This immediately aroused the ire of the people of Sodom:

 

But before they had yet laid down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, converged upon the house, from young to old, all the people from every quarter. And they called to Lot, and said to him: “Where are the men that came to you tonight? Bring them out to us, that we may know them. Lot went out to them to the entrance, and shut the door behind him. And he said: “I beg you, my brothers, do not act wickedly. See, now, I have two daughters who have never known a man. I shall bring them out to you, and you may do to them what is good in your eyes; but to these men do nothing inasmuch as they have come under the shelter of my roof.” And they said: “Stand back.” Then they said: “This one came to sojourn, and he acts as a judge; now will we deal with you worse than with them.' And they pressed sore upon the man, upon Lot, and drew near to break the door” (Genesis 19:4-9).

 

The two angels had come to Sodom to make an assessment — were there or were there not at least ten righteous people in the city that would justify it being saved?  If not, Sodom and Gomorrah were doomed. However, the text makes it very clear that there were not ten righteous people in the city. There was not even one! “All” the males of the city, young and old, and from all ends of the city had converged upon Lot’s house to protest what he had done.

 

Why was their behavior so objectionable to God? 

 

Comparing the Jews of his time in Babylon to the people of Sodom, the prophet Ezekiel has this to say about the former city of Sodom:

 

Behold this was the iniquity of your sister Sodom; she and her daughters had pride, excess of bread, and abundance of idleness, and yet she did not strengthen the hand of the poor and needy (Ezekiel 16:49).

 

This enables us to make the following presumptions. The people of Sodom were well off. They lived in a rich and fertile plain. They saw it as their civic duty to keep strangers out of their city in order to preserve the quality of their lives. If they encouraged hospitality or helped out the poor, even more indigents would come to Sodom. Therefore, the poor and distressed received no assistance, and anyone in Sodom attempting to offer assistance to strangers or the poor was molested. No wonder then that the “cry” from Sodom had come to God’s attention.  

 

However, it is not only tzedakah (righteousness) that is missing in Sodom, but there is also a breakdown of civic order and justice and the practice of sexual abberations.

 

The men of Sodom complained that Lot “is now acting like a judge.” This could be a reaction to Lot’s comment to them to “not act wickedly” (Genesis 19:7), or it could be that Lot was providing judicial activities for the city. The Bible mentions that “Lot was sitting at the gate of Sodom” (Genesis 19:1) when he saw the two men and invited them to his home. The gate was where communal activities of the city took place in ancient times, including judicial activities.

 

Where or not this was the case, a collapse of justice was imminent. The men of Sodom were about to act violently against Lot and his guests. 

 

The men of Sodom demanded from Lot that he “Bring them (his guests) out to us, that we may know them” (Genesis 19:5). To “know them’ is to have sexual relations with them. They were about to sodomize his guests. But why would they want to do this? It could be that they wished to use his guests for their sexual gratification. But when Lot offered his daughters to them (which was clearly inappropriate) they discarded his offer. In any case, it is difficult to see how an entire city could satisfy its sexual lusts on two strangers. The matter must be deeper than this.

 

More likely is that their demand to sodomize Lot’s guests was not for their sexual pleasure, but as a means of domination. In effect they were saying to his guests — now that you have deigned to come into our city, we are going to take over your physical being in its totality and do with you as we please. 

 

Righteousness and justice are closely linked values. When one collapses, there is the likelihood the other will too. The absence of righteousness has ramifications and one of these is the potential for lawlessness within society.

 

There have been countries that have elevated homosexuality to the highest form of love. This was not the homosexuality of Sodom. Rather, it was a form of sexual perversion unique to the Canaanites. This may be why it is already mentioned early in Genesis when describing the beginnings of Canaanite civilization:

 

And Noah, man of the earth, began and planted a vineyard. And he drank of the wine and became drunk; and he uncovered himself within his tent. And Ham, the father of Canaan, saw his father’s nakedness, and told his two brethren outside. And Shem and Japheth took a garment, laid it upon both their shoulders, and the walked backward, and covered their father’s nakedness; and their faces were turned backwards, and they saw not their father's nakedness. And Noah awoke from his wine, and knew what his youngest son had done unto him. And he said: Cursed is Canaan; a slave of slaves shall he be to his brothers (Genesis 9:20-25).

 

This is a puzzling passage since it is far from clear who did what to whom. It would seem that Ham, the youngest of Noah’s sons, perpetrated some disgraceful act on his father, and yet Ham’s son Canaan is cursed. Moreover, Ham seems to have done no more than gaze upon his father’s nakedness. Why then Noah’s curse?

 

Rabbinic sources suggest that Ham had homosexual relations with his father, or even castrated him.1 Cassuto agrees that Ham could have sodomized his father but suggests that it was not Ham’s son Canaan who was cursed by Noah but the Canaanite people of whom Canaan was the ancestor.2 

 

As discussed by Cassuto, the Bible appears to be suggesting that the values of a nation are often present at its very beginnings, and these values may be carried through the generations. This was true for Canaan with respect to sexual perversion, and it will also be the case for Abraham’s son Isaac with respect to righteousness and justice. Hence, a notable contrast in this passage is between the righteousness (tzedakah) of Abraham and his household and the absence of righteousness and justice in Sodom. 

 

There is, however, an important question that could be asked at this stage before going further. Why did the angels need to go to Sodom to investigate its righteousness? Is not God all-knowing? Is He not aware of everything that has been going on in Sodom in the past and that will continue to be in the future?

 

One answer of the Sages is that a moral lesion can be derived from this part of the story — “This has taught judges to issue a verdict in capital cases except through seeing.”3 It could also be that the Torah speaks in the way that people are used to hearing. There is the expectation that God will investigate the situation in Sodom even if from a philosophical perspective the answer is already known. Nevertheless, this entire passage does avoid the issue of God’s foreknowledge. Could it be that the Torah assumes that God did not know the results of this test?

 

This issue is discussed by Maimonides in his Mishneh Torah with respect to man’s free will and whether God knows the result of a person’s free will before a person has made his or her choice.4 If God does know, then this is a question as to whether man truly has free will, since his actions seem to be predetermined. If, on the other hand, God does not know the outcome of man’s free will, how then can He make promises about the future? Prophecy would seem to have lost its value. Maimonides admits that he is unable to resolve this issue. Nevertheless, he is not prepared to abandon the notion that God is completely cognizant of the future. This cannot be explained rationally but is a matter of faith.

 

It may well be, however, that the answer to this issue is contained within this story. God knows that there are not ten righteous people in Sodom. He is aware of the cries of the oppressed and realizes that it is unlikely that the people of Sodom will change their ways. He also knows that He must demonstrate to Abraham that justice is being done by investigating the situation and showing that there are no righteous people in Sodom. Nevertheless, I am suggesting that God does not know with certainty the result of the freewill of everyone in Sodom, although He does know the likelihood. This is why His descent to Sodom is neither showmanship nor a façade.

 

God can predict the future because He knows with a reasonable degree of certainty, although not a hundred per cent certainty, the results of everyone’s decisions based on His knowledge of their past behavior and the situation in which they are in. This is at an individual level. However, when considering an entire population, this slight element of uncertainty becomes almost cancelled out. God’s predictions then become a statistical certainty. God also has the capability of changing the future by direct intervention.

 

It is because of this small uncertainty within the realm of a person’s free will that God can legitimately “test” Abraham by asking him to sacrifice his son. If God is doing no more than demonstrating what He already knows, it is difficult to understand why this is called a test and not a demonstration. God is confident of the results of His test, but He cannot know with absolute certainty the results of Abraham’s free will. If He could, then Abraham would no longer have free will. 

 

The testing of Abraham in the Akeida will soon follow the story of Sodom and Gomorra. This chapter is an essential preliminary to the Akeida, since Abraham can only engage in this test if he is truly convinced that God’s actions display nothing but righteousness and justice. 

 

 

A character study of Lot

 

An important contrast in this extended account is between the character of Abraham and that of Lot. 

 

High hopes had been placed on Lot when he accompanied his uncle to the Land of Canaan from Mesopotamia. Abraham and Sarah had a long history of infertility and Lot would have been his heir, certainly for his material assets and possibly also for his spiritual legacy:

 

And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother’s son, and all their substance that they had amassed and the souls they had made in Haran (Genesis 12:5).

 

However, as the story progresses and he and Abraham return to Canaan after their stay in Egypt, it becomes apparent that either there has been a change in Lot’s values or his true values are now showing themselves. The bond between them is fraying and Lot is distancing himself from Abraham:

 

And Abram went up from Egypt, he with his wife and all that was his — and Lot with him — to the south (Genesis 13:1).

 

Lot is now just “with him” — accompanying Abraham, but no longer emotionally attached to Abraham’s household:

 

By this time, Abraham’s and Lot’s material circumstances have changed and they are both much wealthier. Perhaps because of this, Lot now perceived his life outside the confines of Abraham’s family. The herdsmen of Lot and Abraham were also arguing over pastureland and it was clear to both Abraham and Lot that they needed to distance themselves from each other.

 

Says Abraham “Is not the land before you? Please separate from me: If to the left, then I will go to the right, and if to the right then I will go to the left” (Genesis 13:9). 

 

They were currently living between Bethel and Ai where they had previously pitched their tents before travelling to Egypt (ibid 18:3). Abraham had every intention of remaining on the central mountain ridge and he probably assumed that Lot would go either northwards or to south.  However, Lot rejected both these options and chose instead to go eastward, to the Jordan plain:

 

As previously discussed, the land of Canaan was called this by the Bible not because it was full of Canaanites, but because it was surrounded by Canaanites on its western and eastern borders. The Canaanites lived on the coastal plain by the Mediterranean Sea and along the sides of the Jordan Valley. Other tribes such as the Hittites, Jebusites, and Emorites lived on the hilly lowlands and central mountain ridge:

 

The Hittite, the Jebusite and the Emorite dwell on the mountain, and the Canaanite dwells by the Sea and on the bank of the Jordan” (Numbers 13:28).

 

In effect, the Canaanites had chosen the best and most fertile of the land and left the more difficult agricultural land to the other descendants of Ham. The “kikar Hayarden” was the most fertile of all this territory. It was well watered, resembling the Nile overflow plain. It could even be compared to the Garden of Eden with respect to its fertility:

 

And Lot raised his eyes, and saw all the plain of the Jordan (kikar hayarden) that it was well watered everywhere, before YHWH destroyed Sodom and Gomorra ­— like the garden of YHWH, like the land of Egypt, reaching Zoar. So, Lot chose for himself all the plain of the Jordan; and Lot journeyed eastwards; and they parted one from the other. Abraham dwelt in the land of Canaan, and Lot dwelt in the cities of the plain, and pitched his tent as far as Sodom. Now the men of Sodom were wicked and sinful to YHWH exceedingly (Genesis 13:10-13).

 

However, by moving eastwards, and in particular by pitching his tent close to the city of Sodom, Lot had made a decisive break with the legacy of Abraham. He was no longer his heir. This is why, immediately after Lot’s move, God appeared to Abraham and reassured him that he would make his offspring “as the dust of the earth” in multitude (Genesis 13:16).  

 

The story now highlights other distinctions between Abraham and Lot.

 

Clearly, Lot went out of his way to invite guests in need to his home even though this could lead to social disapproval from others in his city, and even danger for himself. The two angels had nowhere to sleep that night. Lot went out to meet them from the gate of Sodom, greeted them graciously by bowing his face to the ground, and prevailed upon them to stay in his home for the night: 

 

. . . . and Lot was sitting at the gate of Sodom, and Lot saw and stood up to meet them, and he bowed, face to the ground. And he said: “Behold now my masters, turn about please to your servant’s house; spend the night and wash your feet, then wake up early and go your way.” (Genesis 19:3).

 

Initially they rejected his offer, but he prevailed on them and they eventually accepted. He prepared for them a meal and even personally baked matzah (unleavened bread). We note that no mention is made of his wife helping out with the cooking and it looks very much as if righteousness (tzedakah) in this home is not a family affair. 

 

As the men of Sodom converge upon Lot’s home to sodomize his guests, Lot comes out of his house and makes an offer to them — that his “brothers not act wickedly” (Genesis 19:7), but that they do with his two virgin daughters as they wish and leave his guests alone.

 

What is the reader to make of this offer and what does it tell us about Lot’s values? There are Jewish commentaries that come to Lot’s defense. Perhaps he knew the people of Sodom would ignore his offer?5 Perhaps his actions were justified in the extreme situation he found himself?6 However, the Bible makes clear that these daughters were engaged to be married to men from Sodom (ibid 19:4). It is not unreasonable to conclude, therefore, that Lot’s values have become distorted and that he has absorbed some of the sexual norms of his Canaanite neighbors.

 

Later passages in the Bible, when the Israelites are in the desert, are highly critical of the sexual practices of the Canaanite people:

 

And YHWH spoke to Moses saying: “Speak to the Children of Israel and say to them. I am YHWH your God. Do not perform the deeds, of the land of Egypt in which you dwelled, and do not perform the deeds of the land of Canaan to which I bring you and do not follow their decrees. Carry out My judgments and safeguard My decrees to follow them (Leviticus 18:1-4).

 

After listing various forbidden sexual relations, including incest, homosexuality and bestiality, the Torah says:

 

Do not defile through any of these; for through all the nations that I expel before you became contaminated. And the land became contaminated, therefore did I visit its iniquity upon it, and the land vomited out its inhabitants. But you shall keep My decrees and My judgments (mishpati) (מִשְׁפָּטַי), and not commit any of these abominations; neither the home-born, nor the stranger who lives among you (Leviticus 18:24-26).

 

Forbidden sexual activities in this chapter in Leviticus are variously called “justice,” “deeds,” “abominations,” “practices” and “decrees.” These are not to be imitated by the Israelites but are to be replaced by God’s decrees and God’s judgements (Leviticus 10:10-24).

 

But is Lot sufficiently a tzadik (an innocent person) to be rescued from Sodom and not be swept away with its sinners? Lot has learnt the value of tzedakah from his uncle — doing that which is morally right — but he has also absorbed Canaanite sexual norms. In view of this, it is difficult to make the argument that he is completely innocent and this is probably why the Torah indicates that Lot’s being saved had far more to do with the merits of Abraham than his own:

 

And it was when God destroyed the cities of the Plain, that God remembered Abraham, and He sent out Lot from the midst of the upheaval, when He overturned the cities in which Lot dwelt (Genesis 19:29).

 

After Lot and his two daughters have been saved and they settle in the mountains, the older daughter felt that they are alone in the world and she had no one with whom to marry.  She therefore plied her father with wine and had sexual relations with him. The younger daughter did the same the next night. Both conceived and the older daughter unashamedly named her son “Moab” (meaning from father) while the younger daughter names her child “Ben-Ammi” (the son of my people). Both children become progenitors of nations who will become Israel’s neighbors on the mountain ridge on the eastern side of the Rift Valley. The elder daughter’s child will become the progenitor of the nation of Moab and the younger daughter’s child that of Ammon. No place was reserved for Lot and his descendants in the land of Canaan and both nations will settle in what is now Transjordan.

 

Lack of sexual restraint will remain a characteristic of the nations seared by Lot, at least for the children of Moab. On their way to Canaan: 

 

Israel settled in the Shittim and the people began to commit harlotry with the daughters of Moab (Numbers 25:1).

 

Nevertheless, because of Lot’s relationship with Abraham, these two nations are due for special consideration when the Israelites pass through Transjordan:

 

And YHWH spoke to me [Moses] saying: “This day you shall cross the border at Moab, at Ar, and you shall approach opposite the children of Ammon; you shall not distress them and you shall not provoke them, for I shall not give any of the land of the children of Ammon to you as an inheritance, for to the children of Lot have I given it as an inheritance” (Deuteronomy 2:17-19).

 

and

 

And YHWH said to me: “You shall not distress Moab and you shall not provoke war with them, for I shall not give you an inheritance from their land, for to the children of Lot have I given Ar as an inheritance” (Deuteronomy 2:9).

 

It as if the Bible is saying to the future Israelites — these people will be your neighbors.  Be nice to them because of family kinship.  But their values are not yours.

 

 

Why Sodom and Gomorrah?

 

The question is an obvious one. Why did God pick on Sodom and Gomorrah? Were they really the only wicked cities in the world at that time?

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Perhaps they were. Or at the very least, they represented the worst case of unrighteousness.  However, Nachmanides makes another suggestion which will have significant implications for Jewish history. This is that the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah was bound up with their location:

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You should know that the judgment of Sodom was due to the lofty [spiritual] level of the Land of Israel, for Sodom is included in the heritage of God which does not tolerate people [who commit] abominations. And just as [this land] would [one day] disgorge the entire [Canaanite] nation because of their abominations (see Leviticus 18:25), it proceeded that by disgorging this people [the Sodomites] for they were more evil than all of [the other Canaanite nations] both toward Heaven [God] and toward their fellow human beings. Heaven and earth became desolate for them, and their land was destroyed without remedy forever because they became haughty on account of their prosperity and the Holy One, Blessed is He, saw fit that it should be a [warning] sign for rebellious people for the people of Israel who were destined to take possession of the Land of Israel. As He warned them: [The later generation will say. . . when they will see the plagues of the land] ‘ . . . sulfur and salt, a conflagration of the entire Land . . . . like the upheaval of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, which God overturned in His anger and in His wrath’ (Deuteronomy 29:22). [We can show that the severity of their punishment was related to the land] for there are among the nations others who are exceedingly wicked and sinful, and yet [God] did not perpetrate such [destruction] again them. However, it was because of the lofty [spiritual] level of this land that all this happened, for the Palace of God is there.7

 

The Land of Israel has an intrinsic holiness and cannot abide social injustice, sexual perversion and idolatry, whether their source be the Canaanites or Israelites. The nations that perpetrate these evils on this land will eventually be ejected from it.8

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Nachmanides also points out that if Israel is forced to go into exile because of its failure to adhere to the covenant, the desolation of the land will be a reminder of the destruction of Sodom and its neighbors and why this destruction occurred. As the Bible says:

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The later generation will say — your children who will arise after you and the foreigner who will come from a distant land — when they will see the plagues of that land and its illnesses with which God has afflicted it. Sulfur and salt, a conflagration of the entire land, it cannot be sown and it cannot sprout, and no grass shall rise upon it; like the upheaval of Sodom and Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, which God overturned in His anger and wrath. And all the nations will say: ‘For what reason did God do so to this land; why this wrathfulness of great anger?” (Deuteronomy 29:21-23)

 

References:

1. Rashi to Genesis 9:23 based on TB Sanhedrin 70a. Rashi does not regard Ham as being the youngest son, but reinterprets “small” as meaning defective and disgraceful. Hence, it was Ham who was cursed. However, according to the chronology of Nachmanides, Ham was the youngest son.

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2. The Story of Noah’s Intoxication in A Commentary on the Book of Genesis. Part Two. From Noah to Abraham by U. Cassuto, p154, The Magnes Press, The Hebrew University, Jerusalem.

 

3. Rashi to Genesis 18:21.

 

4. Maimonides. Mishne Torah, Hilchot Teshuva 5:5.  The explanation provided in this essay is contrary to the opinion of the classic Jewish philosophers.

 

5. This suggestion is made by R’ Chananel. The Arbanbanel suggests that he made this offer in order to gain time for his guests to flee.

 

6. See Pirkei d’Rabbi Eliezer.

 

7. Nachmanides to Genesis 19:5.

 

8. Nachmanides similarly comments on the Biblical verse “For the inhabitants of the land who were before you committed all these abominations and the land became contaminated. Let not the land disgorge you for having contaminated it, as it disgorged the nation that was before you” (Leviticus 18:27-28) that this land will disgorge anyone who contaminates it, and it is unable to tolerate those who worship idols or engage in sexual immorality (See also Sifra, Kedoshim, Parshesa 4, perek 12:14).