Today I want to deal with the thorny question of what happened when a Hebrew female who had received her father’s inheritance because he didn’t have any sons married a non-Israelite or a foreigner.
The first thing you need to know is that daughters were provided for differently than sons.
When a father married off his daughter, he gave her a very valuable dowry.
In fact, there are records of wealthy men handing over entire cities to their daughters.
But obviously, such cases were not commonplace as the size of the dowry always depended on how well off economically the father was.
In the case of sons however, it wasn’t like they received nothing from their fathers when they got married.
Your average Hebrew son would receive a couple of acres of property and a handful of livestock (usually sheep) as his inheritance.
If his father was a craftsman, the son might also receive some of the tools of the trade he had inherited from his father like tools and metal cooking pots etcetera.
Massive transfers of land and wealth were more the exception than the rule.
Now here’s the important thing you need to understand about marriage customs in the ancient Middle East.
When a man married off his daughter, the dowry he gave her represented the END of any further responsibility he had for her.
Remember, wives in those days were considered property.
After the marriage, the wife was now the property of her husband and his family.
For example, if the daughter of a man from the tribe of Benjamin married a man from the tribe of Judah, she was no longer viewed as a Benjaminite but was now viewed as a Judahite.
So let’s get right down to the $64,000 question.
What happened if a Hebrew daughter married a man who was a gentile or a foreigner?
The answer is simple.
She made herself an outsider.
Think about it.
Let’s say you have a father who as in the case of Zelophehad only had a daughter and no sons and inherited her father’s land per the Torah ruling we just studied.
And then, let’s say that Hebrew daughter married a foreigner.
If you that happened, you would have a gentile or a non-Israelite taking possession of the Holy Land.
From a Biblical perspective, that would be a major HEELLLLLLLLLL NO!!!
Hence, the ruling that was established is that the daughter can only keep her inheritance as long she marries within her own tribe.
Even if the man she marries is still an Israelite, if he is not of her father’s tribe, the daughter could have her inheritance revoked under certain circumstances.
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