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. 

The Ordeal of A Suspected Adultress

Where to Find the Law Concerning A Suspected Adulteress

I usually write about specific women in the Hebrew and Christian Scriptures.  Many of the interpretations I have been taught or the way women are treated in scripture I find disrespectful at the least and in some cases abusive. Although I have read most of the Bible, I continue to discover women or verses about women that I do not remember reading before.  This little jewel is from Numbers 5:11-31. I suggest reading the biblical text before the story below.  

The Woman Suspected of Adultery Tells Her Story

I had to suffer the ordeal, the humiliation.  There was no evidence against me. There was no proof, no witnesses to any infidelity.  There was no infidelity.  My husband  had a vague feeling of jealousy, a spirit of jealously and because of our laws I am the one who had to suffer humiliation.  He forced me to go to the temple with an offering of barley meal. I had to stand there, holding the jealousy offering, with my hair uncovered.  "Tell the truth" the priest shouted at me.  "Have you had sex with another man? You are under the authority of your husband. What did you do to make him jealous?" They concocted a drink made of water, dirt from the floor and their words of accusation. "If your drink this water your belly will swell and your thighs will rot. You will become a curse among the people. If you are not guilty God will grant you children." I will never let that man near me again.  

I drank their water with the dirt from the floor and their words of the accusation.  My belly did not swell! My thighs did not rot.  "What is his punishment for false accusations? " I cried. "I did nothing but for me there is suspicion and humiliation."  The priest laughed,  "For him there is nothing.  He is guilty of nothing.  He followed the law concerning his vague feeling of jealously. Be grateful you are not cursed." 

Observations on the Law Concerning the Suspected Adulteress    

This is one of those commandments you are not going to see on a monument outside a courthouse.  The stupidity and injustice of this law is almost comical.  It is an appalling commandment said to be given by God to Moses.  Verse 14b -15a even says, "If a spirit of jealousy comes on him, and he is jealous of his wife, though she has not defiled herself; then the man shall bring his wife to the priest." The injustice of this law illustrates how patriarchy has tried to control women and women's sexuality across centuries and cultures.  Sadly, there are women who suffer this kind of injustice and humiliation.   

The Rape of Susanna

Where to find Susanna's Story

In the New Revised Standard Version of the Bible, Susanna's story is found in the Apocryphal/Deuterocanonical books.  It is a stand alone story about a beautiful, pious, Jewish woman.  In the Catholic, The New American Bible: St. Joseph's Edition Susanna's story is chapter 13 of the book of Daniel.  In many Protestant Bibles, Susanna's story does not appear at all.

Susanna Tells Her Story

"I am completely trapped.  For if I do this, it will mean death for me; if I do not, I cannot escape your hands." Susanna says to the would be rapists, in Susanna 1:22     

They slunk into the garden while I was bathing.  How long had those voyeurs been hiding and watching me?  Where had they been hiding? How did they know I was alone?  How did they know I had sent my maids to get olive oil and ointment? 
They came rushing at me, "The garden doors are closed" they yelled.  "No one can see us.  You will have sex with us or we will testify against you. We will ruin you.  We will say we caught you having sex with a young man."  I was not going to give into those foul, old men so I cried out for help.   
They began shouting that they had found me with a man who was not my husband.  An accusation that was punishable by death. All my household came to see what the commotion was.  No one defended me.  The next day those odious, old men came to my home filled with their foul, wicked plan to have me put to death.  My husband, parents, children, relatives and servants were all there.  They all knew the kind of woman I am but still no one, not one defended me.  They listened to the lies.  The old frauds told how they were walking in the garden and saw me dismiss my maids.  They said a young man was hiding there and they saw us having sex.  Oh, they were eloquent in describing how they had tried to get the man, but he was to strong for them.  But they had captured me.  
When they pulled off my veil I knew it was just to get a better look at me.  They were going to have me killed but they couldn't hide their perversion from me or their desire to humiliate me.  
There was a man named Daniel in the group that was leading me to my execution. He told the group that he wanted no part in the shedding of my blood.  At that moment I was sure God had heard my prayers. He called them fools for not giving me a fair trial.  He demanded that we return to court.  He questioned my accusers separately and discovered their stories did not match.   
They were put to death for their false witness.  All my family rejoiced because I was innocent. But, if it hadn't been for Daniel they would have allowed me to be put to death without one word in my defense.  My relationship with them was irreparably damaged.

Observations on Susanna's Story

From the time I watched the movie Psycho, I knew to always lock the door and close the window when I took a bath or shower.  Bathing is a dangerous thing for women.  Then I watched The X Files and I learned that even if Scully locked her doors and windows when she took a bath, the alien was going to get her.  
Of course, Susanna is said to be a beautiful woman.  With the exception of Leah in Genesis, I can not think of a single woman in the Bible who is not describe as beautiful, if she is described at all.  Susanna is trapped.  If she gives into the elders and has sex with them she has committed adultery.  An act punishable by death.  If she does not have sex with them, they will accuse her of having sex with someone else.  An act punishable by death.  
Susanna courageously makes the choice to stay true to her convictions.  In a situation where she is not allowed a voice to defend herself she finds her voice to pray aloud to God, exclaiming her innocence. 
In the end, it is not Susanna who is proclaimed the s/hero of her own story.  Her fidelity to the law, her husband and her faith in God are not celebrated.  Rather it is the reputation of Daniel that is acclaimed.    

   

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?       

Queen Esther

Where to Find Queen Esther's Story

Esther is one of only two books named for a woman in the Protestant Bible and one of only three books named for a woman in the Catholic Bible.  Her story starts in chapter two after Queen Vashti has been deposed.  

Esther Tells Her Story

"You know that I hate the glory of the pagans, and abhor the bed of the uncircumcised or of any foreigner." Esther C:26

  News of what Vashti had done spread like wild fire.  The Queen had said, "No" to the king in the presence of all his officials and they were furious.  The women thought this might bring a change in our lives but the officials made laws that controlled our lives even more.  

None of us expected what happened next.  The king appointed officers in all the provinces.  They were to search for all the beautiful virgins in the empire and take them to the king's harem in Susa.  We were torn away from our families and any life that we had hoped to have for ourselves.  We were put under the guard of a eunuch whose title was "custodian of the women."  We were given oil of myrrh, perfumes, cosmetics and beatifying treatments.  

Every night one of us was taken to the king's bed.  We were allowed to take on thing with us. In the morning we were sent to another harem, guarded by another eunuch.  Now we were concubines.  If the king liked us he might call for us again.  Otherwise???

In the tenth month of my captivity I was taken to the king.  I pleased him and he made me his queen!?   No one was more surprised than I.  I had not yet told him that I was a Jew.    

My foster father, Mordecai hung around the palace gate.  He wanted to get information about me and find out what was going to happen to me.  While there he overheard a plot, between two guards who were planning to harm the king.  He got word to me and I told the king what Mordecai heard.  The guards were killed and Mordecai was rewarded.  

There was a very evil man named Haman in the court of the king.  He wanted everyone to bow down to him.  Everyone did, except Mordecai.  We are Jews.  We do not give the honor reserved for G*d to a mortal man.  So this evil man decided that every Jew in the nation, man, woman and child should be put to death and all their possessions seized.  He convinced the king to issue a decree that on 12/13 every Jew should be slaughtered by the citizens of the empire.  It was a horrible thing for my people to face.  

Mordecai totally fell to pieces.  He tore his clothes, put on sackcloth and ashes and walked through the city, up to the palace gates wailing and crying.  No one is allowed to enter the gates in sackcloth, so I sent a eunuch to him with fresh clothes.  When the eunuch returned he gave me a message from Mordecai.  I was to beg the king for the lives of my people.

I had not been summoned to the king in 30 days.  Appearing before the king when one is not summoned is an offense punishable by death.  I wept and prayed along with my servants.  If I did not go before the king, all the Jews would be killed.  If I did go before the king, I would be killed first and then all the Jews.  It was clear to me that if my people were to be saved I was the one who had to do it.       

I bathed and dressed in my finest, royal attire.  I was terrified and leaned on my maid for support.  When I reached the king he looked up at me with such anger that I fainted.  When I awoke he was holding me and talking gently to me.  I had a plan to invite the king and Haman to a dinner which I would prepared.  I wanted to stay in the king's good graces and I wanted Haman to let down his guard.  I hosted two such dinners.  While the king was drinking wine at the second dinner I begged the king for my life and the life of my people.  I emphasized that the death of all the Jews would be a great financial loss to the empire.  As I hoped the king became angry and asked who had planned such a disaster.  Haman was petrified.  The king stormed out into the garden.  Haman began to beg for his life.  His final mistake was throwing himself on me.  When the king returned he thought Haman was violating me.  Haman's fate was sealed.

The Jews were saved.  The community celebrated the days that were meant for our destruction with feasting and rejoicing.  We called the celebration Purim and I commanded that Purim should be celebrated  every year.

Observation on the Story of Queen Esther

Not all commentators have been impressed with Esther.  As Sidnie Ann White points out in The Women's Bible Commentary, "The tendency among scholars was to exalt Mordecai as the true hero of the tale and to downplay or even vilify the role of Esther.  As late as 1971 Carey More stated, 'Between Mordecai and Esther the greater hero in the Hebrew is Mordecai, who supplied the brains while Esther simply follows his directions' (Moore, p.lii)" In the text Mordecai asks Esther to plead for her people, he uses shame to convince her of what he believes to be her duty, but he does not offer a plan. 

Other commentators, ignoring the fact that refusing the king's harem would have meant her death have  criticized her for becoming a member of the harem.  The implication being that she was there to gain power and wealth.  
  
Esther enters her story as the powerless, sex slave of a powerful king.  At the close of her story she is a powerful queen who has manipulated her circumstances and saved not only her own life but the life of all the Jewish people.  Like many women before and after her she has made a way for herself where there was no way.     



         

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.