The pain and fever associated with circumcision on the third day would be incapacitating, especially since the city of Shechem was unsuspecting the ambush.

Dinah’s brothers Simeon and Levi acted alone in the massacre, but Dinah’s other full brothers, the sons of Leah - Reuben, Judah, Issachar and Zebulun - did not join in the slaughter of Shechem. All the brothers joined them for the looting. The sons of Jacob (or, Israel) took the flocks, herds, donkeys, wealth, women, children, and possessions in the houses as plunder.

It would seem fairly clear that the behavior of Simeon and Levi was both treacherous and deceitful. In addition to the evil plan, their actions were an extreme display of vengeance. Jacob rebukes them in his final words of prophecy in Genesis 49:5-7:

“Simeon and Levi are brothers—their swords are weapons of violence. Let me not enter their council, let me not join their assembly, for they have killed men in their anger and hamstrung oxen as they pleased. Cursed be their anger, so fierce, and their fury, so cruel! I will scatter them in Jacob and disperse them in Israel.”

Proverbs speaks against the socially unacceptable behavior of plotting harm against someone who lives in trust next to you:

“Do not plot harm against your neighbor, who lives trustfully near you.” – Proverbs 3:29

But, yet, could their behavior have revealed, if nothing else, a positive trait of passion to defend purity and righteousness. For example, how can it be justified that Jacob offered these Canaanites entrance into the Abrahamic Covenant for commercial and economic reasons? Or, how can sexual violation be remedied with a financial exchange? Isn’t that why Simeon and Levi rebuked their father Jacob by saying, “Should he have treated our sister like a prostitute?” (Genesis 34:31) Also, marriages were planned and arranged by the parents or the leaders of the family. To go outside this cultural practice and take a daughter was to steal a valuable family possession.

A similar action by the descendents of Levi will earn them a place in the priesthood when in Exodus 32:25-29 they sided with the Lord and slaughtered the rioting Hebrews who had given way to idol worship of the Golden Calf and lewd immorality. Once order was restored The Lord separated Levi to be his own priesthood.

"Moses saw that the people were running wild and that Aaron had let them get out of control and so become a laughingstock to their enemies. So he stood at the entrance to the camp and said, “Whoever is for the Lord, come to me.” And all the Levites rallied to him. Then he said to them, “This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘Each man strap a sword to his side. Go back and forth through the camp from one end to the other, each killing his brother and friend and neighbor.’” The Levites did as Moses commanded, and that day about three thousand of the people died. Then Moses said, “You have been set apart to the Lord today, for you were against your own sons and brothers, and he has blessed you this day.” – Exodus 32:25-29

It would appear the Levi and the Levite’s desire to defend truth and righteousness was honorable and acceptable. But, when it was mixed with their sinful desire for vengeance and violence it was a curse.

By the time Gregory was asked to be Pope in 590, the bishop of Rome had become head of all bishops. Rome had lost its authority as capital of the Empire to Constantinople, but still maintained its position as head of the church. Gregory, who was born into a powerful Roman family and had political experience as a Perfect of Rome, originally rejected the offer to be Pope. The people of Rome persisted in their unanimous choice and Gregory used his experience to first deal with the invading Lombards. The Roman Empire in Constantinople refused to help defend Rome against these barbarian invasions, so Pope Gregory formed his own military, negotiated treaties to release captives and kept the peace in Italy. Gregory’s passion was to lead the people spiritually. He wrote “Pastoral Rule”, a book meant to help pastors lead believers. Gregory wrote about the early martyrs and saints, even collecting, identifying and venerating the remains of the saints (including bones, possessions, hair, clothes). Gregory introduced the doctrine of purgatory, services (masses) to relieve dead souls of suffering in the afterlife, and church music which included chants that would develop into what is known today as Gregorian Chants. Gregory sent Augustine of Canterbury,
a young missionary, into Britain to establish the church in the north.