Parshat Vayera: The Sins of S’dom
So in this week’s Parsha we read about the destruction of S’dom -- Avraham’s negotiations, if there are 50, 45, 40, 30, 20, 10 righteous people in the city!; the angels getting Lot and his family out (; the pillar of salt); the iconic fire and brimstone; etc. etc.
It’s Sodom and Gomorrah. It’s the classic story of punishment for sin.
... which was what, again? It’s not actually... in the text, anywhere.
Well. The traditional Christian answer, you can find in the nearest dictionary under “Sodomy” and “Sodomite”, or in the nearest newspaper editorial under a headline containing “Pence”.
More liberal Christians and/or those who would rather be more accepting of gay people tend to look around for something else, or else try to overlook the question entirely.
Judaism had a very different answer.
During discussions of “Who have no share in the World To Come”, in (a tangent in) Tractate Sanhedrin, daf 109a,b, they go over why it is they have no share in Olam HaBa, what terrible things they did to deserve the dramatic punishment in this world.
For the next 2-halves of the page, they list:
“They said: Since there cometh forth bread out of [our] earth, and it hath the dust of gold, why should we suffer wayfarers, who come to us only to deplete our wealth. Come, let us abolish the practice of travelling in our land,“
“Now Eliezer, Abraham's servant, happened to be there, and was attacked. When he went before the judge, he said, 'Give them a fee for bloodletting thee.'”
( Compare: Ferguson Police Charge Black Man With Getting His Blood On Their Uniforms )
And regarding the people, who simply did what everyone else was doing, which was barely anything at all:
“ If one had rows of bricks every person came and took one, saying, 'I have taken only one.' If one spread out garlic or onions [to dry them], every person came and took one, saying, 'I have taken only one.' “
And there were not ten innocent people in the entire city.
“ There were four judges in Sodom: Shakrai [Liar], Shakurai [Awful Liar], Zayyafi [Forger], and Mazle Dina [Perverter of Justice]. “
These, then, say the Rabbis, are the Great Sins of S’dom and Amorah: violence against the stranger, the enshrining of this violence in the courts and the law, and the people who allow it and benefited from it.