Abstract
Concubines, שגליפ in the Hebrew Bible, are shadowy women whose presence weaves in and out of narratives of violence and conflict. Most of them are unnamed and appear simply in genealogies and harem lists. Their exact legal status is unknown; they stand between primary wives and slave-wives, seemingly legitimate yet treated with little regard or protection. This article examines the narrative patterns surrounding שגליפ. Four sets of texts are considered: Bilhah, Jacob's concubine (Gen. 35); the Levite's concubine (Judg. 19); Rizpah, Saul's concubine (2 Sam. 3, 21) and David's concubines (2 Sam. 5, 15, 16, 19, 20). These stories, taken together, reveal a picture of women whose lives were marked by sexual violence and coercion, precariousness and liminality, yet these were women whose legitimate position made them highly vulnerable within the political conflicts of their time. Narrative subtlety and intertextual echoes ensure that their stories indirectly provide a critique of polygamous marriage and mistreatment of inferior partners.
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