bed into his mother's tent and removed or overturned Bilhah's. This invasion of Jacob's privacy was viewed so gravely that the Bible equates it with adultery, and lost Reuben his first-born right to a double inheritance. In popular culture In the novels The Red Tent by Anita Diamant and Rachel and Leah by Orson Scott Card, Bilhah and Zilpah are half-sisters of Leah and Rachel by different mothers, following the Talmudic tradition. In Margaret Atwood's speculative fiction novel The Handmaid's Tale, the theocratic society depicted cites the relationship between Bilhah, Rachel and Jacob as the basis for role of handmaids as surrogates to high-ranking men and their infertile wives. References Book of Genesis people Jewish concubines Jacob Women in the Hebrew Bible Slave concubines Ancient slaves