Hardly Happily Ever After: Trafficking of Girls in the Hebrew Bible

Abstract

This article examines elements in the stories of Hagar (Gen. 16:1–3), Abishag (1 Kgs. 1:1–4), Esther (Esth. 2:1–4), and the unnamed Israelite slave girl (2 Kgs. 5:1–4) through the lens of human trafficking, specifically trafficking girls. First, I will argue that our tendency to understand Hagar, Abishag, and Esther as women, not girls, is undermined by the vocabulary used to describe them, as well as other contextual clues. I will then outline the United Nations’ criteria for defining the transport of a person as human trafficking. Most of the article provides narrative analyses of the four texts cited above. By identifying elements of dislocation, trauma, and exploitation in the stories of Hagar, Abishag, Esther, and the Israelite slave girl, I suggest that parts of their stories meet the criteria to fulfill the pattern of human trafficking. This childist interpretation further maintains that these portrayals of girls being trafficked have multiple troubling commonalities, with each other and with human trafficking today.