My late dad and I shared a favorite bible story, the story of Dina. To sum that up, Dina, Jacob’s only daughter, takes a walk from the herder camp into the big city of Shechm. The prince sees her, decides he needs her, and takes her. The herders and the burghers negotiate terms so that the rapist could marry his victim and the two sides would have a trade deal. Then after a mass circumcision, two of Dina’s brothers killed all the men in the town. I thought the story would make a great musical comedy, even though I had a tin ear and knew nothing about writing a musical, but I got beat out by Anita Diamant and her “The Red Tent,” an excellent book.
My second favorite snippet was the story of the Scapegoat. Every year, the Isaraelite High Priest would select two goats. The priest laid all of the sins of the camp on the head of one goat and drove it out into the wilderness. The other goat was dinner. SCAPEGOATS is the story of how these goats organize to relieve their terrible burden of bad deeds. Continue reading The Making of SCAPEGOATS