“Oh that you were like a brother to me, one who had nursed at my mother’s breasts” Breast Milk as a Kinship-Forging Substance

Human Reproduction and Infertility in the Hebrew Bible

“…However, Chapman argues that the formation of a child in the Hebrew Bible is understood to be “two-stage[d]”; a “maternally focused” process encapsulated in the Hebrew word pair “breast and womb” (2012: 25). She asserts that, “biblical authors imagined a child’s physical, character, and emotional development to begin at conception, continue during the time in the womb, and find completion through breastfeeding” (2016: 124).…”

“…Though Hagar’s child Ishmael would have been deemed a sufficient heir, the status of the mother determines the status of her child thus Sarah’s son Isaac is instead regarded as the “true” heir (p. 7). Indeed, Chapman argues that the matriarchs were required to be of the line of Terah because she will contribute this ethnicity to her children, the offspring of the patriarchs, children of the covenantal promise (2012: 123; see also Steinberg 1993: 5).…”