Abraham, Moses, Ruth, David, Samson, Joseph, Esther, Solomon. What do they all have in common? They were intermarried.
Thus begins Strange Wives: The Paradox of Biblical Intermarriage, a comprehensive and compelling exploration of the formative effects of intermarriage in Biblical times. This book provides a very readable guide to the history of intermarriage in the mixed multitude of cultures and practices and beliefs coalescing gradually, over centuries and millennia, into the people Israel. The authors conclude that the "early willingness to reach across tribal and ethnic boundaries was a source of strength, which Jews later forgot or chose not to remember."
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