God defends forsaken women. His Word says so.
Yet we can easily miss this key truth because English translations say it this way: “A defender of widows, is God in his holy dwelling” (Ps. 68:5).
That statement is true, and it’s wonderful. It’s just not inclusive enough.
The Hebrew word alman means “forsaken.” An almanah is a woman bereft of her husband. She may be a widow, bereaved by his death. But also, she may be a wife forsaken in other ways, including rejection, abandonment, abuse, betrayal and divorce.
Almanah is typically translated widow in English Bible versions. If we render it, instead, as forsaken woman, we learn:
A defender, an advocate and a righteous judge for forsaken women is God, whose dwelling is holy.1
The Lord surrounds, supports, relieves and restores the forsaken woman.2
He will establish the boundaries of the forsaken woman. That is, he will secure and guard what is hers. And especially, he will establish every aspect of her personhood (in the face of those who would rob her of it), by standing between her and them.3
Why women?
Wives can forsake husbands in most of the same ways that husbands forsake wives. What’s more, God comforts and comes to the aid of all who call on him, regardless of gender. Yet repeatedly, Scripture tells us: The Lord champions forsaken women. Why?
“On their own in the ancient culture, unprotected widows became targets for abuse, exploitation, assault, and even trafficking,” writes Carolyn Custis James in her study of the book of Ruth, Finding God in the Margins. “Under patriarchy women have no independent legal rights and no voice.”
Women with no rights and no voice also have no protection against their own husbands. Historically, if a husband was not upright and kind, he could exploit, abuse or otherwise forsake a wife, and she had no recourse – no way to protect herself or her children, no way to provide for herself or her children if put out on the street.
Such injustices have not gone away. Rather, they’ve escalated. Massive, systemic human rights violations against women are taking place across the globe today.4
Even in the US and other places where we may take for granted rights still absent in much of the world, women who need the protection and justice promised by the law, the community and the church often find themselves forsaken on those fronts too.5
“Women are caught in the middle in a world where we are saying, ‘You are full equals,’ but we are unwilling to give them the full equality, without which they can’t defend themselves and survive,” says professor Evan Stark.6
God knows all this. He does not approve it, but instead, zealously opposes it.
There’s more
Scripture frequently links forsaken women with two other vulnerable groups – the fatherless and the foreigner. And God declares himself the defender of them all.
Do not mistreat or oppress a foreigner, for you were foreigners in Egypt. Do not take advantage of the forsaken woman or the fatherless. If you do and they cry out to me, I will certainly hear their cry. (Ex. 22:21-23)
For the Lord your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who shows no partiality and accepts no bribes. He defends the cause of the fatherless and the forsaken woman, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. (Deut. 10:17-18)
The Lord watches over the foreigner and sustains the fatherless and the forsaken woman. (Ps. 146:9)
With this in mind, the psalmist cried:
They slay the forsaken woman and the foreigner; they murder the fatherless.
The Lord is a God who avenges. O God who avenges, shine forth. (Ps. 94:6, 1)
The fatherless
The Hebrew word rendered fatherless in these verses is often translated orphan. It comes from a word that means “to be lonely; a bereaved person.” The term can refer to a child who has lost one or both parents to death. Yet also, children can be forsaken in multiple ways by parents who are alive, and even physically present.
The loss of one or both parents – whether from death, neglect, rejection, physical or emotional abandonment or abuse – leaves children bereaved and incredibly vulnerable. To the extent that a society privileges men, to that extent a child’s vulnerability increases if the missing parent is a father.
But you do see, [God]! You do see troublemaking and grief, and you do something about it! The helpless leave it all to you. You are the orphan’s helper. Lord, you listen to the desires of those who suffer. You steady their hearts; you listen closely to them to establish justice for the orphan and the oppressed. (Ps. 10:14, 17-18 CEB)
For in you the fatherless find compassion. (Hosea 14:3)
When my father and mother forsake me, then the Lord will take me up. (Ps. 27:10 KJV)
That last verse conveys something in Hebrew that English translations can’t quite capture: The Lord gathers the forsaken child to himself from the moment the forsaking begins.
The foreigner
“The foreigners residing among you” are exactly who you might think. Immigrants, too, are vulnerable and bereaved.
They’re bereaved because they’ve left their families, their culture and the place of their birth. Often, extreme duress of one kind or another has led to their taking such a wrenching step.
Immigrants are vulnerable to injustice in a myriad of ways, some of which are happening very publicly right now. One psalmist wrote:
Oh, I’m doomed because I have been [and still am!] an immigrant in Meshech. (Ps. 120:5 CEB)
That psalmist cried out to the Lord, and God answered (v. 1).
The God of all gods and Lord of all lords “loves immigrants.” He is “the Lord who protects immigrants.”7
Repeatedly, he wrote their protection into his law.
Leviticus 19 sums it up best:
You must love your neighbor as yourself; I am the Lord.
When immigrants live in your land with you, you must not cheat them. Any immigrant who lives with you must be treated as if they were one of your citizens. You must love them as yourself. (vv. 19, 33-34 CEB)
“Love your neighbor as yourself,” said Jesus. He called it the second greatest commandment.
When asked, “Who is my neighbor?” Jesus told the story of the Good Samaritan. Thus, he both affirmed the Old Testament principle and added an unexpected twist:
- Your neighbor includes anyone you see who has become vulnerable to, and hurt by, injustice.
- Since those who have experienced injustice are more apt to help someone else being treated unjustly, the foreigner in the land may be the one who ends up helping you.8
This is God
If you have been forsaken – by your parents, by your spouse, by people around you who count you “not one of us” – know this:
When God finds you among the bereaved and discarded, he himself takes up your cause.
Remember, consider: He too has been forsaken. He sees. He knows. He cries with you. He is angry for you.
He wants you to cry out, “Rise up, O God!” He wants you to cling to him and even sing to him as you wait for him to act.9
He holds you up even when you can’t cling or sing, even when all you can honestly say to him is, “Lord, I cannot see that you are defending me at all.”
He is trustworthy. He will teach you to trust. No problem if your faith is only mustard-seed size. He can work with that. He can grow the tiniest seed of faith into something mature and strong – a faith not brittle with expectations or demands – a faith that can be rocked and even knocked down at times, but does not shatter.
He Himself has said: I will not in any way fail you nor give you up nor leave you without support. [I will] not, [I will] not, [I will] not in any degree leave you helpless nor forsake nor let [you] down! [Assuredly not!] (Heb. 13:5 AMPC)
Father to the fatherless, lover of the foreigner, defender of forsaken women – this is the Lord.
See also
- God Who Sees Me
- Defender of the forsaken, The Sequel
- Treachery and divorce: When God sees betrayal
- Divorcing: When God does what he hates
- The blessing of rest
Footnotes
- See Psalm 68:5, where the Hebrew noun dayyan carries all the meanings listed. ↩︎
- See Psalm 146:9, where the Hebrew verb uwd has all the meanings listed. ↩︎
- See Proverbs 15:25, where the Hebrew word rendered “establish,” “maintain” or “set in place” literally means “to take a stand.” ↩︎
- This has been well documented by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn in their powerful book, Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide. ↩︎
- This has been well-documented by Evan Stark in his landmark book, Coercive Control. ↩︎
- Prof. Evan Stark: Gender and Violence. In this talk, Stark gives a very helpful summary of Coercive Control. Fast forward 35 minutes to get to the introduction of Stark and his 1-1/2 hour talk. You can find shorter snippets of Stark’s insights into coercive control by googling Evan Stark YouTube. ↩︎
- See Deuteronomy 10:17-18; Psalm 146:9 CEB. ↩︎
- See Luke 10:25-37; Matt. 22:34-40. ↩︎
- See Psalm 68:1, 4-6. ↩︎
