Letter to Basemath (Gen 36)

Dear Basemath,

You interest me a lot. You were one of Ishmael’s daughters. Due to the genealogy of Esau we know is involved timewise and so I am not sure if that means you were from the tribe of Ishmael rather than an actual daughter of Ishmael. I suspect the former, although he could have impregnated your mother in his old age.

I have a soft spot for Ishmael and his mother Hagar. I guess knowing your own family story may have helped you have a great deal of sympathy for Esau and the way he’d been treated.

What was your relationship with God. I ask because I suspect it was an interesting one, knowing that Hagar, Ishmael’s mother had encountered God face to face when she initially fled Sarah, but that it was not the God of her own country. I suspect that you were very culturally mixed and that there was a lot of fusion going on in the community you lived in especially with the different backgrounds of the wives.

In many ways I suspect if we knew more about your day to day living it might help us understand a lot about multi-faith relations. Although I guess we would still struggle somewhat because just as you lived in a polygamous society and we live in one where monogamy is the norm so your society was probably much more polytheistic than ours where people of belief have been much more monotheistic. However, that is an interesting one because as secularisation occurs and spirituality rises we seem to be going back to that approach.

In many ways I find that mix and match culture much more comfortable and appealing myself. Yet, it raises a problem for me because much as I want to be a universalist it raises huge questions for me about why one of Jacob’s distant descendants Jesus then had to live and die if all roads can lead to heaven and we mix and match between beliefs.

What was your son Reuel like? Did you have daughters too? Their names aren’t mentioned. How old was he when you moved?

You seem to have a much clearer idea of when land was sustainable and when it wasn’t and moved accordingly. I find that really interesting because I live in a world where we are becoming more aware of sustainability issues and the issues that is causing. I think we need to examine much more what we need to use and how to deal with it when resources run out.

One of the problems for us is we live under a system called capitalism where consumption is the key aim in order to gain profit.

You had four grandchildren. Did you live long enough to see them? I wonder what the average age expectancy was in your time.

We have issues because we live in a culture where we believe in promoting living as long as you can even if there is not a good quality of life. I think we have lost a balance and now artificially keep people alive too long rather than embracing the natural process of aging and death. That is not to say I agree with the withdrawal of all medical treatment. I just think that we have a lot of people being encouraged to live longer than they may want to. I am in many ways glad my mother died at what is considered a young age these days but at what I think is a more natural age. That is controversial to say I know but it I see posters in the doctors promoting the idea you should seek as high a life expectancy as you can get and I think but I do not want to live past the point at which I can feel my life has quality. That is not to say I will be intentionally unhealthy or that I do not greave when people die way too early but I do think we need, as a society, to allow nature to take course more.