Seduction from the Torah's Perspective

In this week's parsha, the Torah circumscribes the bounds of parental influence in a girl's choice of a man, and delineates a perspective on marital relations that seems to not align very well with current modern perceptions. 

Were a man to seduce a girl - states the Torah - the girl's father would decide whether or not to acquiesce to the man marrying his daughter. If he agrees, Mazal Tov. If not, the seducer pays 50 silver coins (the amount identical to that a rapist would pay) to the father of the girl. 

In modern times, it would be hard to imagine any woman desirous of marrying the man who raped her, and the same would probably go for a man who seduced a woman. The image of date rape, either narcotically or alcoholically induced probably comes to mind. What the Torah is speaking of, though, is not spiking an alcoholic drink but rather, and much more banally, a man of the age of majority, 13 and over, sleeping with an underaged girl, i.e. under the age of 12. 

In biblical times, indeed, the father had the sole right, and perhaps ever more so, the obligation to marry off his daughter. And the time was short. At the age of 12 and a half, a woman was already considered most certainly beyond her prime, but more palpably, pretty much unmarriageable. A Cohen Gadol, or High Priest, was not allowed to marry a woman over the age of 12.5; after hitting that date, it was like the clock striking midnight in Cinderella. It was irreversible, not biologically, but rather the woman at that point got free rein to decide who to marry but presumably her prospects dwindled exponentially. 

Ipso facto, it is in this context that the Torah's take on consensuality, or lack thereof, can be better understood. A minor, be it male or female, was exonerated from responsibility for their actions; hitting the age of majority, though, made you fully responsible for everything you did. 

A father, thus, had a right to marry off his daughter at any age he desires until she hits 12 and a half. Were a man, our Torah portion of Mishpatim, or "Laws" (or "Ordinances") teaches us, to sleep with a woman under the age of 12 it would be considered rape, and between the age of 12 and 12 and a half, seduction. Rashi calls it, "Speaking to her heart until she listens to him." Nowadays, a nicer term might be wooing her, a less nice one, "hitting on her," but at the end of the day, the man is painted in a very predatory light even though the act was consensual. 

And why is that? 

Again, our current perspective flies in the face of that prevalent, or extant in the time of the Torah, but a woman's value fell precipitously after losing her virginity and given that construct, a doting daughter, living with her parents (as was the norm) would never allow herself to become unmarriageable if not for a man violating the social trust on which a society was founded, the predominance of the familial unit and the father's exclusive right to choose who his daughter would marry, for if the clock kept on ticking, he'd be doing her a horrible and wretched disservice. 

I wonder if we can ever fully understand that norm or modality, simply because nowadays, the place of the individual is so much more pronounced, both for men and for women, but I believe this explanation helps contextualize the nature of male-female relations and father-daughter relations at the time of the Torah. Furthermore, the amount stated by the Torah of 50 shekels, or silver coins was tantamount to millions of dollars, though strictly symbolic given the distress and duress a woman underwent, but still it was on par with the maximum amount of money in Erchin, or monetary value the Torah attributes to different parties based on age and gender, i.e. my understanding being their productive capacity. 

For a sense of comparison, were a farmer's ox to gore and kill another's slave, the price he would pay was only 30 shekels, meaning that the Torah clearly communicated the gravity and monetary repercussions of rape, and its counterpart seduction, which were punished equally.