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Younger daughter of Lot (unnamed)

The younger, unnamed daughter of Lot, whose son by her father, Ben-Ammi, is identified in Genesis as the ancestor of the Ammonites.

Accounts of this vary across texts and traditions. This entry primarily follows Hebrew Bible (Genesis), with other tellings (Masoretic Text (Hebrew Bible), Septuagint (Greek translation), Jewish and Christian rabbinic and patristic tradition) noted where relevant.

Relationships

Parents
Lot
Children
Ben-Ammi

Introduction

The younger daughter of Lot, unnamed in the biblical text, is, with her elder sister, one of two daughters who fled Sodom's destruction with Lot. Following her sister's example, she too had relations with their intoxicated father, bearing a son, Ben-Ammi, identified in the text as the ancestor of the Ammonites.

Family

After Sodom

On the night following her elder sister's initiative, the younger daughter carried out the same plan with their father, and Genesis 19:38 records the birth of her son, Ben-Ammi, whose name is directly explained in the text as meaning "son of my people".

Ben-Ammi

Ben-Ammi is named as "the ancestor of the Ammonites of today", connecting this episode to the origin of another people who, like the Moabites descended from her sister's son Moab, feature repeatedly throughout the later Hebrew Bible in relation to Israel.

Sources

  1. Genesis 19:36-38 (primary text) — https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis+19%3A36-38&version=NRSVUE

This entry is independently written for myVamsam using the sources listed above. Where traditions differ, this entry identifies the relevant tradition rather than presenting one account as universally established fact.