Genesis 34 Summary

Dinah, the daughter of Jacob and Leah, goes out to visit the women of the land, and Shechem the son of Hamor the Hivite sees her, violates her, and then seeks to marry her. Jacob's sons respond deceitfully to Hamor's marriage proposal, requiring that all the males of the city be circumcised as a condition for intermarriage and coexistence. On the third day after the circumcision, while the men of the city are incapacitated, Simeon and Levi kill every male in the city, including Hamor and Shechem, and retrieve Dinah; the other sons of Jacob then plunder the city, taking its livestock, wealth, women, and children. Jacob rebukes Simeon and Levi for endangering the household by making it odious to the surrounding Canaanites and Perizzites, but his sons defend their action by asking whether their sister should have been treated as a harlot.