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Bilha and Zilpah?

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oakandfig19

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 10:08 am

I never understood why Bilha and Zilpah are barely spoken about. They gave birth to some of the shevatim, but we don't consider them as imahot, and you don't see people naming their daugthers Bilha or Zilpah nowadays (or ever?). I've heard the idea that they were agents acting on behalf of Rachel and Leah, but that doesn't make sense because Rachel and Leah were not infertile (yes, Rachel had fertility issues but she still had children in the end).

There must be a reason they were chosen to give birth to the shevatim, so why does no one talk about it?

octopus

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 10:15 am

some say the name baila is a distortion of the name bilhah. they were righteous women. I think half sisters of rachel and leah.

elisheva25

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 10:20 am

No clue but that’s a very good question .

essie14

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 10:26 am

I know several women named Bilhah.
No Zilpas though

etky

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 10:34 am

Bilhah is uncommon but every now and then you meet or hear of someone with the name. I know several.
I only met one Zilpah in my life. She was an older lady originally from northern Iraq.
Bilhah and Zilpah are not really characters in their own right in Tanach.
They were considered as adjuncts of Rachel and Leah. They were given by their mistresses to Yaacov as wives with the objective of their children being attributed to Rachel and Leah - the primary wives- who actually named them when they were born and perhaps participated in their upbringing.
Basically, as maidservants they had no agency.

Last edited by etky on Wed, Nov 14 2018, 10:36 am; edited 1 time in total

heidi

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 10:35 am

In Israel Bilha is a name that's used. I've never heard of a Zilpah

PinkFridge

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 10:40 am

Excellent question. I read an article by Rabbi Dovid Orlofsky on this years ago and it's on IIRC Torah Anytime (given in Dec. 2016, again IIRC). He draws parallels between Hagar and Bilhah and Zilpah. The idea of Hagar was, as a talmidah muvhekes of Sora, she was molding herself in Sora's image and a child of hers would be raised as Sora would have raised him. The problem was, her ga'ava got in the way. She thought that she was as great as Sora. She wanted to start her own yeshiva, have her own students, go out on her own.

I heard this somewhere else, not Rabbi Orlofsky, though maybe he says this too, but I know that I recently came across this: The first paragraph explains her reaction to hearing that she would have son who would be a pereh adom. (And not an odom pereh but a pereh odom. The pereh was the essence.) She was happy that her son could be his own man, not beholden to anyone or any social strictures, because this was something that was so chafing for her.

Back to Rabbi Orlofsky, Bilhah and Zilpah got it right. They molded themselves on the model of Rochel and Leah, and their children ended up becoming part of the shivtei Kah.

amother

Tangerine

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 10:49 am

I know both bilha and zilpah both Sephardi women living in New York

amother

Pewter

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 10:53 am

We learnt in school that Bilah and Zilpah where not tzedaikos. I'll ask my hub to explain it better to me.

boots

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 10:59 am

etky wrote:

They were given by their mistresses to Yaacov as wives with the objective of their children being attributed to Rachel and Leah - the primary wives- who actually named them when they were born and perhaps participated in their upbringing.

another support for the position that mothers and not grandparents should get to name their children Tongue Out

amother

Gold

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 11:47 am

This is something I always wondered about. This summer I got to visit and daven by their kvarim for the first time. It felt nice to be able to at least give them that recognition.

amother

Scarlet

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 1:10 pm

essie14 wrote:

I know several women named Bilhah.
No Zilpas though

My great-grandma was a Zilpah. None of us would use it—it sounds too much like Zelda, with apologies to all Zelda’s. I assume that in F Scott Fitzgerald’s day it was considered a lovely name. Today, not so much.

Names come and go and their popularity or lack of it has little to do with how good or important the original character was. Huldah was a neviah no less than Avigayil, but do you know many—or any— Huldahs? Does anyone even know or care who she was? Yoel and Yonah are pretty popular, and Ovadiah has the Sefaradi market locked up, but were they any more deserving than Tzefaniah, Chagai and Chavakuk who appear in the same volume of your Tanach? Why Daniel and not his comrades -in -fire Mishael and Azariah?

Because that’s how it worked out. Don’t look for logic or reason in fashion.

amother

Bronze

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 1:45 pm

Actually my Hebrew middle name is zilpah. Not sure why.

InnerMe

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 2:50 pm

It's a question I've also wondered about, OP.
However you slice it, they birthed a part of the 12 shevatim. They must have been honorary women to have merited this.

amother

Ginger

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 3:13 pm

I know several Chuldas (all from the same family) and one Mishael.

An Israeli friend said she once asked her grandmother Baila if the name came from Bilha & grandmother was highly insulted. Doesn't prove anything though...

Chayalle

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 3:24 pm

I have a great-nephew named Azariah (his 2nd name, and he is called by his first name.)

zaq

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 3:33 pm

InnerMe wrote:

They must have been honorary women to have merited this.

Honorable. An honorary woman would be a non-woman who was granted status as a woman in recognition of having done something special.

InnerMe

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 3:34 pm

zaq wrote:

Honorable. An honorary woman would be a non-woman who was granted status as a woman in recognition of having done something special.

Zaq to the rescue Wink

zaq

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 3:35 pm

amother wrote:

Baila comes from either Italian/Spanish Bella meaning beautiful or Russian Byela meaning white.

Learning

Wed, Nov 14 2018, 3:40 pm

I think the stories about the avos are so high above us that we can’t even feel that it’s not fair for bilha and zilpa. I’m sure there is an explanation.
Like dd told me she doesn’t like dovid hamelech because he took a wife and killed her husband. I told her all the stories are beyond us and compare to us they are angles and we need to learn to understand the deep reasons for the Tora stories and sometimes we might even understand at all

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