Ideas of Gilead society are based on the Old Testament of the Bible, where in feminist terms the law of God can be interpreted as patriarchal authority. There's more references in the old than the new testament. In Gilead the archaic, old-fashioned language is used as social control: the bible patriarch, or 'father of the human race', Jacob, is the state hero. The name Gilead is closely associated with Jacob, for that was a place where, according to the biblical story, he set up his heap of stones as witness to God and established his household, family line, and flocks and herds.(1)
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