Mother's Day

"Faith of our Fathers! Holy faith! We will be true to thee till death." That was the song we sang in church.  Except on Mother's Day. Then fathers was changed to mothers and the church secretary put an insert in the church bulletin in case we forgot to substitute mothers for fathers. 

On all the other Sundays the deaconesses prepared the communion trays and set them out. When the service was over the deaconesses sent the children scurrying around the church collecting the tiny communion cups. The women washed the cups and polished the trays for next week.  

On all the other Sundays the deacons served the communion. They walked up the aisle during the communion hymn, stood with heads bowed at the front of the church, prayed aloud at the end of the hymn, distributed communion and replaced the trays on the table for the deaconesses to clean after the service.

But on Mother's Day the deaconesses got to do it all. Prepare the communion, say the prayers, serve the communion and clean up after communion. As one of those children who scurried around picking up the communion cups, I was surprised to discover that the deacons were not in the little kitchen cleaning up.

I was confused. Why weren't the deacons helping? The deaconesses always helped them. So, I asked my mom. "Oh" she said, "We're just better at it." 

Faith of our Mothers

My wonderful mother had faith and she passed it on to me and my sisters.  We were in church every Sunday. No sleepovers on Saturday because we couldn't miss church. I didn't want to miss church. I am a confirmed religion nerd. I have often heard it said, "You can't teach faith." I think that is probably true but you can look at the life of someone who has faith and learn from that faith. 

I cry at the sappy commercials on television as we get closer to Mother's Day. They remind me of how much I love her and how much she loved me, us. I cry because I treasure the faith I learned from her. I cry because, unlike my feminist self, who wants to be upset by the unfairness of the deaconesses cleaning up on the one day of the year they serve communion, my mom knew she and the other women did it because they were better at it.

Faith of my Mother! Holy faith! I will be true to thee till death.

Happy Mother's Day

Don't Call Me a Guy

This is a speech I gave last week at Toast Masters (Mavens) 

 Equality of the Genders

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all women are created equal, that we are endowed by our Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  

I want to be clear about who is included in the group of women created equal.  We are the white, educated women of property and means.  Men, the working class and poor women are not created equal to us.  They must labor to support themselves, their families and to provide goods and services for us in our pursuit of life, liberty  and happiness.  

Now, I know there are some men who believe that, as we form this more perfect union, women should not rule over men.  John Adams, bless his heart, in a letter to Abigail, while we were writing the Deceleration of Independence asked, "In the new code of laws I know it will be necessary for you to write, I ask that you remember the men, and be more generous and favorable to us than you ancestors. Do not put unlimited power into the hands of  the wives.  Give up the harsh title of mistress for the more tender and endearing one of friend.  Do not give power to vicious, lawless women to use us cruelly with impunity.  Women of sense in all ages abhor those customs which treat men only as vassals of the female sex."  Abigail was swift to let John know that the revolutionary war was not fought to prove that all men were created equal.  Abigail replied, "As to your extraordinary code of laws, I cannot but laugh."

Argument From Creation

Man clearly was not created equal to woman as demonstrated by the second story of creation, found in the book of Genesis.  He was created from the dust of the earth,  He was put in the garden of God to tend it, but was incapable of the task, so woman was created.  She was created superior to man, not from the dust of the earth but from living flesh.  She is the final and crowning achievement in God's act of creation!

Woman was endowed with the almost God-like ability to produce life, with the assistances of the tinniest male seed.  And where would we be if one women had not been courageous enough to eat the fruit from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.  She wanted to be more like God.  She wanted to be wise and so she took and ate while the man sat passively by and ate the fruit she gave him.  The fruit he had been told not to eat.  Woman had not been created when that command was given.  The truth is, life as we know it, could not have existed within the confines of the garden.

Using Our Brains

Does this argument sound absurd?  The Declaration of Independence written only for white, women of property.  Men created as lesser human beings than women.  Women divinely ordained to rule over men.  But the reverse of these arguments are some of the arguments used by patriarchy to marginalize and control women.

Women and people of color read the gender specific language of the Declaration of Independence and think, "Oh, that means me."  But it doesn't.  John Adams thought it was laughable that his wife Abigail requested that laws be written to protect women from the cruelty of vicious, lawless men and to this day the Equal Rights Amendment has not been passed.

The second story of creation, in the book of Genesis, has been interpreted to prove that men should rule over women.  That women are responsible for the sin in the world.  That it is God's will that women should suffer in childbirth.  This interpretation also implies a literal, historical understand of an ancient story told and reload by an ancient people to explain the world they experienced around them.  It also ignore the simultaneous creation  of female and male, in the divine image, in the first story of creation.  

Language creates reality and "those who control how language is used control the most powerful instrument for shaping human consciousness."  (Kevin Giels. Priscilla Papers vol. 29, no. 1)  If we call human beings mankind, we make invisible everyone who is not male or does not conform to societal norms of what a kind of man is.  If we were to use woman kind to refer to all humanity, men would know they were not included.  It is considered acceptable to insult men by calling them girls or ladies.  Women want to believe that unmanned, manmade, chairman and mankind somehow includes us.  It does not.  Addressing a group of women or a mixed gender group as, "You guys" is culturally acceptable.  Addressing a mixed gender group as, "You gals" is not and you guys is used to refer to groups of women.

Many of us worked in the seventies to change male generic language.  Fireman became fire fighter.  Policeman became law enforcement officer.  Mailman became mail carrier and with the change of language came new career opportunities for women.

The erasure continues.  The original Star Trek used inclusive language but second generation Star Trek does not.  I was in Victoria's Secret and heard a woman's voice say, "Dude, look at this bra."  I looked up expecting to see a girl and boy shopping together.  I saw two girls.  Their culturally encouraged language had erased their gender.  Male generic language, dude, guy brotherhood, mankind simply express male as normative and female as other, non-normative.

To quote Albus Dumbledore, "Words are, in my not-so-humble opinion, are our most inexhaustible source of magic.  Capable of both inflecting injury and remedying it." It is sad that John Lennon was killed at such a young age.  He might have learned that we are not a "brotherhood of man." IMAGINE

Virgins Sacrificed to God in the Hebrew Scriptures.

Are there any passages in the Hebrew Scriptures that record virgins sacrificed as burnt offerings?   

Check next week to hear the story of the virgin daughter of Jephthah.

God is Good

Wonderful News

Yesterday I learned that Illumination Book Award, awarded my book a Gold Medal in the Bible study category.  I am so happy! I had a long walk with God this morning and thanked her for this award as conformation and assurance that I am following the path I am called to follow.  (FYI, I don't think God is gendered but I like to call her she, just to mix things up.) A link to the award is below.

http://www.independentpublisher.com/article.php?page=1904

Judith, The Warrior

Where To Find Judith's Story

The book of Judith is found in the Catholic and Greek Orthodox Scriptures but not in the Protestant Bible. The book of Judith is also in the Septuagint, a translation of the Jewish Scriptures into Greek done between 300-200 BCE. Her story is one of only four biblical books named for a woman.

Judith Tells Her Story

I was disgusted by the people and by Uzziah's capitulation.  Surrender, that is all they can think of to save us, surrender   So they are thirsty.  I have fasted every day for the three years since my husband died,  What kind of faith does Uzziah show?  "Hold out for five days and if God doesn't show us mercy we will surrender."  

I had a plan.  I sent my slave woman to bring Uzziah and the elders to me.  I said to them, "This is not right. Who are you to put God to the test.  You cannot penetrate the depths of the human heart or understand the workings of the human mind how do you expect to know the mind of God? If we fall all Judea will fall and our temple will be desecrated and plundered.  We will be slaves and bring dishonor on our God.  We are being put to the test just as Abraham, Sarah, Jacob and Leah were tested. We must set an example."

Uzziah spoke condescendingly, "No one can deny your word or your wisdom but the people are thirsty so pray for rain."

"Listen and do not ask me what I am about to do.  Be at the town gate tonight to let me and my slave out.  With  the help of our God, the Assyrians will be delivered into the hands of a woman before the day you have sworn to the people you will surrender."

I prayed, but not for rain.  I prayed for a sword vengeance.  I called for the Lord's help. "Here are the Assyrians," I said.  "They pride themselves in their horses and foot soldiers.  They trust in their spears and shields.  They do not know you.  They plan to defile and pollute the sanctuary   Give me, a widow, the strength to crush their arrogance.  You are the God of the lowly, oppressed, weak forsaken and hopeless.  Use my deceitful words to remind the nation of your power and might." 

I am a very beautiful woman but I have hidden my beauty since the death of my husband, under sack cloth and ashes.  Not today, today I bathed and dressed in my finest clothes.  I put sweet smelling ointment on my body and wore my most precious jewels.  I packed food for myself and gave it to my slave to carry.  Then we went to the gate of the city.  Uzziah and the elders were there.  They were astounded by my transformation.  They made some speech about the God of our ancestors granting me favor to fulfill my plans so the Jerusalem would be exalted.

"Open the gate." I said. "So I can accomplish what you merely talk about."  As I hoped we were captured by the Assyrian guard.  I told them I had come to see their commander, to tell him of a way to capture the towns of the hill country.  They did not question me.  "Oh, we will take you to him.  Have no fear.  When he sees you he will, well..."  They were ridiculous, first they had to choose a hundred men to escort me.  Then there was excitement in the camp as notice of my arrival passed from tent to tent.  Eventually they were all standing outside the commanders tent looking at me.  Finally I was taken to the commander.

Do not be afraid, he told me.  If you chose to serve Nebuchadnezzar  the king of all the earth no one will harm you."

I laid it on thick. "I am your servant.  I tell you the truth, God will do great things through you.  I have heard you are the wisest and the most skilled in the whole kingdom.  I know Anchior told you that we could not be defeated because out God will defend us as long as we keep the commandments.  Well, the people are about to sin.  They are going to eat the first fruits and the tithes of wine and oil which are consecrated to God.  God has sent me to you to tell you when the people have sinned.  Then I can lead you through Judea to Jerusalem where you will set up your thrown." My words pleased him so I asked that I be allowed to go outside the camp every night to pray.  I told him God would tell me when the people had sinned and it was time to attack.

"You are beautiful and wise," he said.  "In fact no other woman in all the world looks so beautiful and speaks so wisely.  God has done well to send you to me."

I stayed in camp for three days.  Every night at midnight my slave and I went outside the camp to bathe and pray.  Finally on the fourth night he sent to me.  He was having a banquet and he told the eunuchs he sent to fetch me, "It would be a disgrace of we let such a woman go without having intercourse with her.  If we do  not seduce her, she will laugh at us." (NRSV) "Let the pretty girl come to me and drink wine with me and become like one of the Assyrian women who serve in the palace." 

I went but I did not drink his wine or eat his food.  He got so drunk he passed out.  All the servants and banquets guests left and closed up the tent.  I told my slave to wait outside.  We would go to pray a usual.  When everyone was gone. I grabbed him by the hair, said a prayer for strength and cut off his head.  It took me two blows but I did it.  I took the head out to my slave who put it in the food bag and we walked out of camp as if we were going to pray.  We kept walking until we got to the city gates.  At the gates we roused the sentry to open the gate.  All the towns people came out to see me because they had given me up for dead.  I pulled the head of the Assyrian commander out of my bag and said, "Praise God who has delivered Israel by the hand of a woman."  

Observations on Judith's Story

Finding a woman at the heart of the Christmas story is easy.  It is harder to find a woman in the Hanukkah story.  The book of Judith is dated during the Hasmonean dynasty which was established by the Maccabees.  First and Second Maccabees record the stories of the cleansing of the temple.  

If biblical women are described in the Bible  they are usually said to be beautiful.  Judith is no exception.  Judith 8:7 says. "She was beautifully formed and lovely to behold." 

In the endorsement Reza Aslan wrote for my book he says, "The women warriors, prophets and disciples of the Bible have been miscast for centuries as demons, harlots and jezebels - and intentionally so.  For if the truth about who these women were and what they represented were more widely known, it would challenge most of the assumptions we have about Judaism and Christianity." Judith was one of those women. 

Job's Wife

Where to Find The Story of Job's Wife

The nameless wife of Job speaks two sentences in the book of Job.  They are recorded in Job 2:9.  She is also mentioned in 19:17 when Job declares that his breath is repulsive to her and in 31:10 where he defends his sexual integrity by offering his wife to other men if he has not been truthful.  "Let my wife grind for another, and let other men kneel over her."  

Job's Wife Tells Her Story

"Do you still persist in your integrity? Curse God and die." said Job's wife to Job.  Job 2:9

Gone!  Everything is gone!  My children, oh my children!  All our servants, the oxen, donkeys and camels are gone.  I think my husband has lost his mind.  He tore is clothes, shaved his head and is sitting in a pile of ashes.  If it could get any worse he has broken out in sores all over his body.  He will not let me help him.  He just sits in the ashes and scrapes the sores with a pot shard.  I tried to talk to him but he dismissed me, calling me a foolish woman.  After he called me foolish, he didn't speak for seven days.  Now his fool friends have shown up to comfort him.  Where is my comfort? My children, oh my children!

Observations on the Story of Job's Wife's 

She has lost everything.  The only difference between what happened to her and her husband is that there is no report of her being afflicted with sores.  In the wager between Satan and God, Job's wife, her children, their servants and the families of all the servants who were killed, are the innocent victims.  Job demonstrates no concern for anyone but himself.  He was a wealthy powerful man who bemoans the lack of respect he now experiences from people he considers beneath him.  

Job's wife tells him to curse God and die.  He calls her a foolish woman and then goes on to curse the day of his conception and birth.  He longs for death, the fate of a stillborn child.  Throughout the book he is self-righteous and selfish.  He regards his wife and her body as his property.  "Job's words are in keeping with the patriarchal perspective that saw a woman's sexuality as the property of her husband rather than the woman herself." (Woman's Bible Commentary, Newsom, p. 135)

At the end of the book Job's property has been restored and he has ten more children.  My question is, who had the pleasure of giving birth to ten more children?       

Forgotten Queen

Where To Find Queen Vashti's Story

In the book of Esther, Queen Vashti, was the queen Esther replaced.  When her story begins, Queen Vashti is entertaining women of the royal court.  She is commanded by the king to appear before the men so he can display her beauty.  Because she has no voice in the Bible we are not told why she refused his command, hence, many speculations.   "For instance, the Targum (the Aramaic translation of the Hebrew Bible) informs the reader that the king wished Vashti to appear naked before the company and that out of modesty she refused."  (The Women's Bible Commentary, P. 127)  Her story can be found in Esther 1:1-2:1

Queen Vashti Tells Her Story

"NO!" Vashti's declaration to the eunuchs who informed her the king had commanded her presence.

I knew the consequence could be sever if I refused, but he had been drinking for seven days.  His officers, ministers, nobles and governors were all there and just as drunk as he was.  When the eunuchs came to tell me I was to appear before the King wearing my crown, I knew it was only my crown he wanted me to wear.  I refused to go.  He said he wanted to, "Display my beauty."  As if my beauty belonged to him.  A room full of drunken, powerful men is no place for a woman, naked or not. 

He was furious!  They were all furious!  So the king asked his lawyers, "What does the law say should be done to Queen Vashti for disobeying my order?"

They were in a panic!  There was no law that dictated what was to be done to a woman who dared to speak up for herself.  "She didn't just wrong you" they shouted "she has wronged all the men in the empire.  If the women hear that the queen disobeyed the order of the king they will think they can disobey their husbands.  They will have contempt for us and will rebel against our rule over them.  You must issue an irrevocable royal decree.  You must forbid Queen Vashti form ever coming into your presence again.  The law must declare that the king can give the honor of the queen to someone more worthy.  When the women hear these laws, they will have to honor their husbands.  The law must demand that men are the lords of their homes.  

He made a law, an irrevocable law that I could never be summoned into his presences again.  I refused to appear at his command and now he can never command me to appear.  What a happy consequence!

Observations on Queen Vashti's Story

How do our attitudes about biblical women influence our understanding of the atrocities experienced by women today?  Vashti's story is clearly a story of male dominance.  She is commanded to expose herself for the pleasure of her husband's friends.  If we believe she got what she deserved, that is being expelled from the court, as some commentators have said, then we probably believe women should be under the control of the men in their lives.  If we see her act of defiance as self protection we see a strong woman unwilling to be dominated.
When I first read this story I was surprised that such a shocking story of male dominance has remained in the Bible.  Obviously, the male translators and commentators saw nothing wrong with a husband demanding that a wife appear before his drunken friends.  Nothing wrong with all the men of the empire being afraid their wives might say, "no." Nothing wrong with the queen being deposed for standing up for herself.  Nothing wrong with laws being passed to insure woman would treat their husbands like lords.
The men knew their wives were unhappy and would rebel.  They knew their wives held them in contempt.  Rather than changing the way they treated their wives, they passed laws so the women could not act on their contempt.   

   

Another Woman Raped

Tamar, the Daughter of King David

Where to find Tamar's story

Tamar was the beautiful daughter of King David and Maacah one of David's many wives.  She was raped by her half-brother Amnon.  Her brother Absalom killed Amnon.  The Bible says the reason for the killing was revenge for the rape.  Her story is told to validate Absalom's killing of Amnon, but with Amnon out of the way Absalom was next in line to be king.  Her story is told in 2 Samuel 13:1-37 

Tamar Tells Her Story

"No, my brother, do not force me; for such a thing is not done in Israel; do not do anything so vile!"  Tamar said to Amnon in, 2 Samuel 13:12.

I could not stand to be around him.  He was always leering at me, making suggestive remarks, touching me when no one was looking.  I tried to stay away from him but our father sent me to take care of him when he got sick.  I knew he was faking.  I did not think I was in any real danger.  I was after all, a virgin and the daughter of the king.  

He watched me as I made the cakes he requested.  When they were ready he sent everyone away and asked me to come to his bedroom and feed him the cakes.  I thought he was just being creepy.  "Let me eat them from you hand" he whined.  When I entered the room he grabbed me and said he wanted to have sex with me.  I begged him not to do anything so vile.  I begged him not to shame me.  I begged him to ask our father if he could marry me.  I knew our father would say no and once he saw  the kind of man Amnon was it would be easier for me to stay away from him.  

It was no use.  He was stronger than me and I could not fight him off.  He raped me.  His rape was not about love but loathing and the desire to have power over me.  He had ruined me. I beg him to marry me as our law requires.  I said, "No, my brother; for this wrong in sending me away is greater than the other that you did to me."  He would not listen.  He had his servant throw me out and called me, "this woman."  He didn't even use my name.  I tore the robe I was wearing.  It was the mark of the virgin daughter of the king.  I put ashes on my head as a symbol of mourning and ran to my brothers house, crying all the way.  There was nothing left for me now.  I was not a virgin.  I would never marry and have a home of my own.  I would live in the home of my brother and serve him.  My brother tried to comfort me but I was desolate.

  

When our father found out about my rape he was angry but he did not punish Amnon.  I was of less value to him than his firstborn son. 

 

Two years later my brother killed Amnon.  He was very cleaver in biding his time.  He waited until the celebration of the sheep shearing and when Amnon was drunk he ordered his servant to kill him.  Absalom went into hiding for three years.

Observations on Tamar's Story

The cover of the winter/spring 2014 issue of MS. magazine declares, "1 in 5 Women Students on College Campuses Will Experience Sexual Assault"  One of the more blood chilling statistics reported is, 63 percent of men who admitted committing rape or attempted rape had raped an average of 6 women.  Another chilling statistic is that 1.5 million women are raped or assaulted by an intimate partner every year in the U.S.  

Tamar's rape is a vehicle, a literary device presented to further the stories of the male biblical heroes.  We are not told about her life before the rape.  We are told that she was beautiful as if that is all that matters.  After the rape we know that she was a desolate woman living in her brother's home.  We are also told in 2 Samuel 14:27 that a daughter named Tamar was born to Absalom.  Miriam Therese Winter asks the question, "Was she Tamar's daughter?" 

I was never taught about the rape of Tamar in Sunday School or the laws which require a rape victim to marry her rapist.  Would the statistics of rape and assault be different if the church confronted these biblical stories of rape and assault?  If the church condemned the actions of the attacker would it make a difference?  Would there be less blaming of the victim if there were serious consequences for the rapist?  What difference would it make if this story were told, not as an incident in the life of a biblical hero but as the sad and ruined life of a biblical woman? 

Biblical Inerrancy

Biblical Inerrancy

I have not blogged for several weeks.  With the help of Cathy Winch and Vanessa Finney of Personhood Press I have been editing my manuscript for Prostitutes,Virgins and Mothers: Questioning Teachings About Biblical Women.  As I come to the end of this process I am compelled to draw a parallel between our editing process and the centuries of copying and recopying the biblical manuscripts. I am staggered by the amount of errors in the manuscript. Errors which either I made or were made by one of the four brilliant women who read and made editorial comments in the manuscript.  I'll tell you one thing I am never using a comma again!

Biblical Infallibility 

Halloween of 2009 a Baptist congregation in Canton, North Carolina used their belief in biblical inerrancy and infallibility to burn Bibles.  

Inerrancy

As Lee Martin McDonald states in The Formation of the Christian Cannon, "Those who would argue for the infallibility or the inerrancy of scripture logically should also claim the same infallibility for the churches in the fourth and fifth centuries, whose decisions and historical circumstances have left us with our present Bible." 

On the website Mainstream Baptist Dr. Bruce Prescott offers a test for "Inerrantist Truthfulness."  He says, "Here's a simple way to tell if you are getting a straight answer about claims for the Bible's inerrancy.  Ask inerrantists the questions listed below.

1. Is the Bible you read and hold in you hands inerrant?  If he says, "No," he is being honest.  If he says, "Yes," ask question 2. 

2. Do all the ancient manuscripts of the Bible say exactly the same thing?  If he says, "Yes," he or she is being honest.  He or she is simply uninformed about the history of the transmission of the Bible and needs to do some study. (2 Timothy 2:15)  If he says, "No," ask question 3.

3. How can you honestly say the Bible is inerrant when you know that all the manuscripts of the Bible have errors in them?  If he says, "The Original Manuscripts were inerrant."  Ask question 4.

4. Where are the "original manuscripts?" If he admits, "They have all been lost," or "They no longer exist on earth." Ask question 5.

5. Since God didn't bother to see that the Bible was preserved inerrantly, why is it necessary to believe it is inerrant?  If he says something like, "So men could be sure of their salvation." Ask Question 6.

6. Do you have to believe the Bible is inerrant to be saved?  If he says, "Yes," ask question 7.  If he says, "No," ask question 8. 

7. Do you have to place you faith in an inerrant book (unseen) before you can have faith in Jesus?  Doesn't that make the Bible an object of faith and another mediator between us and God? (1 Timothy 2:5)  Doesn't that make the Bible an idol?  Or, does belief in inerrancy prove that you are saved and is failure to believe proof that you aren't?  Is that why some inerrantists call Mainstream Baptist infidels? 

8. Why have inerrantist worked of 20 years to exclude Mainstream Baptist, divided the SBC and BGCO, and revise the Baptist Faith and Message to make it say the Bible is inerrant?  Was all the pain this has caused in the lives of God's people and churches really necessary?"   

I know this test doesn't work on several levels and it certainly doesn't work if one believes that it is the first King James translation which is inerrant.  I share it because of my passion for biblical literacy, my new found sensitivity to the errors that can creep into the written word and because of my experience at Liberty University where the doctrine of biblical inerrancy was used like a weapon.    

I also want to say that I found errors in the  questions above.  Some I chose to leave in like Original Manuscripts and original manuscripts.  Others I chose to change like mainsteam to mainstream.  Biblical inerrancy?  I don't think so!  How many errors can you find?

Why Do We Need Christian Feminists?

Why We Need Christian Feminists

What male church leaders have had to say about women is truly disturbing.  What some of them say about Feminist is equally disturbing.  In his sermon, New Age Gnostic Feminist and Their Influence on the Church John McArthur informs women that they are confused about their God given roll in the church.  He couples this with a picture of four smiling women from the cover of  Gospel Today

titled, Women Pastors.  He also describes The Center for Research on Women, at Wellesley College as a"deadly think tank" and displays a picture of Hillary Rodham Clinton in a Nazi uniform with a Hitler mustache.  Displaying a picture of Sarah Palin he says, "Even Christian are falling under the spell of the feminist."  I have a feeling Sara doesn't think so, but I don't know for sure.

I am a Christian Feminist 

I am a Christian Feminist because I came to my Feminism through my faith.  I do not believe in a God who discriminates based on gender, ethnicity, sexual orientation or anything else. In her book, In Memory of  Her Elisabeth Schussler Fiorenza describes Jesus and His Discipleship of Equals.  I believe in a baptism which erases any form of inequality between male and female.  I believe in beautiful, brilliant women, created in the image and likeness of their creator and not confused about their "God given roll."

Biblical Women

What Have We Been Taught About Biblical Women?

I was having lunch with a friend on Saturday and she asked, "What do your want people to get out of your book?"  I thought back to my experience at Liberty University, being told that I could not be ordained because, "God doesn't call women."  "Well, I believe I am called"  was my response.  "Than you better discern who's call you are listening to."  The implication being that there was something satanic about my belief that I had a genuine call to ordained ministry.  I experience this same attitude in the Roman Catholic Church, which is why I am currently attending Pathfinder Church of the Risen Christ.  A Catholic Community, not associated with Rome, where all are welcome.

I also thought about what I had been taught concerning biblical women over the years.  In my Feminist Dr. on Ministry program I learned the word, conscientization.   My interpretation of conscientization is that moment when my experience does not match what I have been taught.  My ah ha moment came during a Sunday School lesson about the "temptress" Bathsheba although I did not recognize it at the time.  I sat there thinking, "wait a minute, she was spied upon by a powerful man while she was taking a bath, (everyone knows that if a woman takes a bath in a movie something bad is going to happen to her) the spy finds out who her husband is but doesn't care, he sends other guys to take her from her home, he has sex with her, he send her back to her home, when he finds out she is pregnant he tries to pass the baby off as her husband's, when that doesn't work he has her husband killed.  And she is the temptress and he is the man after God's own heart?  

Understanding Biblical Women

The answer to my friends question is this.  I would like my book to be a catalyst for reexamination of biblical interpretations that have been handed down to us.  Interpretations which have been used to limit the full  participation of women in the church.  Interpretations which misrepresent biblical women as, bad, prostitutes, virgins or mothers when they are so much more.  I would like my book to encourage readers to learn who wrote the books of the Bible, to whom they were written and when they were written.  

Empowering Women

Half the human experience of divinity is the female experience. Women who are created in the image and likeness of God.  The Bible is so much more than proof texts, taken out of context to prove a point.  I would like my book to encourage women to interpret biblical women using women's experience as we develop biblical literacy.   

      

Holy Thursday

Today  the Christian Church celebrates the washing of the disciples feet by Jesus.  All four Gospels tell the story of women who anoint Jesus.  Mark tells of a woman who anoints his head.  Matthew and Luke tell of a woman who anoints his feet and in John it is of Mary of Bethany who anoints his feet.  Jesus is reported to says, of the woman who anoints his head.  "I tell you, where ever the good news is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will be told in memory of her."  Jesus seems to think that her actions were so important that the good news the Gospel should be told in her memory yet her name was not recorded.  In my life time of being a Christian I have never heard the Gospel proclaimed in the name of this nameless woman.  So today as we celebrate Jesus' model of selfless service, tell the story in memory of her.