שרה בבית אבימלך (בר' כ): על רקע חוק אשורי והמגילה החיצונית לבראשית

M.D. Cassuto surmised that the gifts of Abimelech to Abraham following the abduction of Sarah (Gen 20: 14ff) should be explained against the background of Assyrian law. According to the latter a man who took with him a woman on a (business) trip, not knowing that she was married, shall swear to that effect and pay indemnity to the husband of that woman (MAL § 22). Cassuto however could not adduce evidence for an oath given by Abimelech as is the case in the Assyrian law. Surprisingly enough the Genesis Apocryphon discovered in Qumran supplies the missing evidence for this oath. There we read (XX: 30–31) that Pharaoh swore an oath to Abram and gave him precious gifts (as reparation). It should be noted that the Qumranic midrash ascribes to Pharaoh, by way of analogy, the things attributed to Abimelech in the Biblical story itself. According to the latter Pharaoh presents the gifts to Sarai when he takes her and not when he sends her away, as presented by the Qumran scroll. The legal procedure found in the Assyrian law in connection with the abduction of a married woman is thus attested in the Genesis Apocryphon and might reflect a judicial practice which existed for hundreds of years in the ancient Near-east. An allusion to a purgatory oath may be found in the Abimelech story where the king protests his innocence by declaring: 'It was with clear conscience and in all innocence that I did this' (Gen. 20:5).