Does a Jew with a non-Jewish father have a tribe?

Vayikra 24:10 and on tells of an episode with a blasphemer. The torah tells us that he was the son of an Israelite woman and an Egyptian man.

From a Rashi comment there I found my way to Vayikra Rabbah 32, which gives some back-story apparently from Rabbi Chiya (quoted from Sefaria):

He had gone to pitch his tent in the camp of the tribe of Dan. They told him: "what [claim] do you have to pitch your tent in the camp of Dan?" He replied: "I am from one of the daughters of the tribe of Dan". They said to him: "It is written (Numbers 2:2) 'Every man [of the children of Israel shall encamp] by his own standard, that bears the signs of their father's house' - and not the mother's!" He went in to the judicial court of Moses to have the matter decided and came out (יצא) declared to be in the wrong. He then stood up and blasphemed.

Jewish status passes through the mother, so the man is Jewish. But he doesn't have a tribe, because tribal status passes through the father.

What happens to a Jew in this position, with respect to land holdings? Where does he go in the Yovel (Jubilee) year, when all are to return to their ancestral lands? What happened to such people when the land was apportioned out to the twelve tribes? From the story in Vayikra Rabbah it sounds like we don't fall back on the mother's tribe in the absence of the father's. Is the product of such a union just out of luck?

One could ask the same question about converts (and I'm curious about that too), but the cases might be different because a convert has a choice and can accept a restriction (not getting land) as part of that action.

posted almost 2 years ago

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Monica Cellio‭ staff

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