Hands off Jahweh
Sir: I assure Mr David Pugh (Letters, 4 February) that I was quite aware that two interpretations are possible of the story of Onan. Until quite modern times the `solitary vice' theory held sway, aS may be seen from the definitions of derivatives in all but the most recently revised dictionaries. For my own flippant purpose I naturally chose this version; the other would have given me no excuse for presumptuously canonising the old boy and bestowing his patronage.
I agree that the Victorian headmasters got the wrong message but please do not let us blame Jahweh. Surely he knew what He was at? The sin of Onan, so far from being an act of 'misplaced fraternal loyalty', was the opposite. It was his refusal to carry out the somewhat extreme fraternal duty enjoined upon him by the Hebrew law (Deuteronomy xxv, 5-10).
The precise mechanical means by which he achieved his purpose is therefore irrelevant, although the reference to `spilling on the ground' in Genesis xxxviii, 9 suggests that the Victorian headmasters did get their facts right, however misguided they may have been in their disastrous failure to appreciate the true nature of the `sin' which the story illustrates.
Colin Bayliss
8 Pentrefelin Street, Carmarthen
Previous page
