ABSTRACT
The Book of Numbers contains a ritual known as the “law of the jealousies.” This “law” allows a suspicious husband to bring his wife before a priest to determine if she has been faithful. The priest makes her swear an oath, and gives her the “water of bitterness that brings the curse.” If she has been unfaithful, “her womb shall discharge, her uterus drop, and the woman shall become an execration among her people” (5:24, 27).1 Herodotus (fifth century BC) tells a story about young Libyan women who ritually battle each other with stones and sticks: “If any girl…is fatally injured and dies, they say it is a proof that she is no maiden [pseudoparthenoi].”2
