What the Text Says About the Sin of Sodom

Parashah: Vayera · Peshat

In parashat Vayera, Sodom disappears. And it is natural to ask what it did to deserve it. The Torah does not sum it up in one sentence, but it gives several clues, and the prophet Ezekiel adds one more. Let us read them just as they are written, with nothing added.

A sin that was already known

Before Vayera begins, the text had already warned us: “The men of Sodom were wicked and sinners against Hashem exceedingly” (Genesis 13:13). Chapter 13 says it just as Lot chooses to settle in the plain of the Jordan, near the city.

An outcry that rises

When Hashem shares with Abraham what He is going to do, He does not begin by speaking of a specific sin but of an outcry: “The outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is great, and their sin is very grave” (18:20). An outcry is the voice of someone who suffers. And notice what follows: “I will go down and see whether they have done according to the outcry that has come to Me; and if not, I will know” (18:21). Before judging, the text presents an investigation.

Abraham, for his part, intervenes with a question that has become famous: “Will You destroy the righteous with the wicked? […] Shall the Judge of all the earth not do justice?” (18:23-25). He takes it for granted that Hashem’s judgment must be just, and he says so out loud.

What happens in the city

Chapter 19 shows the city’s behavior. The two messengers arrive in Sodom in the evening and Lot receives them in his house, with food and unleavened bread (19:3). But “before they lay down, the men of the city, the men of Sodom, surrounded the house, from young to old, all the people, from every quarter” (19:4). They demand that the guests be brought out to them (19:5).

Two details of the text deserve attention. The first: it is not a marginal group; it is “all the people, from young to old.” The second: Lot tries to stop them and they answer with contempt: “This one came to live here as a stranger, and now he sets himself up as judge?” (19:9). Travelers are harassed, and the stranger who protests is despised.

What the prophet adds

The text of the Torah leaves us with the violence against the guests. But centuries later, the prophet Ezekiel does something unusual: he states explicitly what the sin of Sodom was. He writes it like this:

“This was the iniquity of your sister Sodom: arrogance, surfeit of bread and careless ease she had, she and her daughters; and the hand of the poor and the needy she did not strengthen. They were haughty and committed abomination before Me, and I removed them as I saw.” (Ezekiel 16:49-50)

It is a different and concrete list: arrogance, abundance that is not shared and no help to the poor and needy. Nothing in those sentences speaks of a single act; they speak of a way of life.

What appears when the pieces are put together

If we lay everything above on the table, the text describes a city with three traits: an injustice that cries out, a collective violence against the stranger and an abundance that closes in on itself. And at the same time, chapter 18 itself sets the opposite image before us: Abraham, sitting at the entrance of his tent, runs to meet strangers and offers them water, rest and food.

That is the simple reading, the peshat. What the sages added from here, and how they understood it, belongs to another level. You can read what they teach about visiting and hospitality.

This reading is part of the commentary on Parashat Vayera.