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Essays on women of the bible
The status of women in the bible
Christianity Impact on Society
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The Christian Tradition is one that has gained and lost respect and value for women in many ways as it has travelled across the globe and crept its way into new cultures and sustained itself through different historical circumstances. From the fetishization of motherhood to the persecution of witches to the rise of female leaders in the church, Christianity has shape-shifted in rituals, imagery and interpretation of the scriptures. Rosemary Radford Ruether, a feminist theologian who writes on the importance of female imagery and language to represent the divine argues: “women no longer stand in direct relation to God; they are connected to God secondarily through a male” (Ruether 151). The tradition has internally contested the correct role of women in the world, the family and the church since its inception. But while women were often condemned or essentialized through the interpretation of Biblical texts (not to mention the selection of those texts), these texts could also serve as a tool for social change. Ruether offers a message of hope for women looking to find a place within the Christian tradition by highlighting the fact that “the New Testament contains a renewal and radicalization of prophetic consciousness, now applied to marginalized groups in universal, non tribal contexts” (Ruether 156). Through Ruether’s analysis and primary texts throughout the history of Christianity, we see that the textual representations of women and interpretations of those texts serve as a vehicle of oppression by setting up dichotomies on women’s behavior, but that interpretation can also be used by women as a means of religious resistance.
One of the women in the Christian Tradition that fought for social justice at the onset of the Jesus...
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...ures that control religion and spirituality, but instead on each other. Women must learn to reconcile their beliefs and critiques, all the while navigating the dichotomy of reformer/revolutionary
Works Cited
Cady Stanton, Elizabeth. The Woman's Bible. New York : European Publishing Company, 1895. Web.
"Gnostic Scriptures and Fragments." The Gospel According to Mary Magdalene. The Gnostic Society Library. Web. 13 Dec 2013. .
King, Karen. The Gospel of Mary of Magdala: Jesus and the First Woman Apostle. Santa Rosa, CA: Polebridge Press, 2003. Web.
Malleus Malleficarum, excerpts. 1977. In Women and Religion, edited by Elizabeth Clark and Herbert Richardson, 121-130. San Francisco: Harper & Row.
Weaver, Mary Jo. 1989. "Who is the Goddess and Where Does She Get Us?" Journal of
Feminist Studies in Religion 5/1 (Spring): 49-64
In both The Martyrdom of Saints Perpetua and Felicity and Appeal to the Christian Women of the South, the women in the stories are using scripture to explain and justify the claims they make about their faith and the faith of others. They do this by sharing stories about their life and events in their lives to show how the spirit has been moved into them. Both texts describe how these women see themselves as readers of the Bible, what religious authority each is claiming, and what new social reality each woman is arguing that is in keeping of God’s will for human beings.
Meese, Elizabeth A. ?Ortality and Texuality in Their Eyes Were Watching God? Crossing the Double Cross: The Practice of Feminist Criticism. North Carolina Press, 1986. 59-70.
Ruether, Rosemary Radford. “The Normalization of Goddess Religion.” Feminist Theology: The Journal of the Britain & Ireland School of Feminist Theology 13.2 (2005): 151-157. Academic Search Premier. Web. 4 Nov. 2013.
Ruether, Rosemary Radford. "Anthropology: Humanity as Male and Female" in Sexism and God-Talk: Toward a Feminist Theology. Beacon Press, 1993, pp. 93-115.
...s the religion and the people who follow it truly. This is the main problem I have with religion; too many of the followers are not on the same path. However, everything must be pliant in order to keep going. If these religions weren’t resilient to changing views of people and societies, they would’ve ended many centuries ago. So, I think that feminism can be worked into these religions because they are not at complete opposite poles.
"Women have a much better time than men in this world; there are far more things forbidden to them" (Oscar Wilde). As stated in this quote, all over the world women are restricted by their religions, from doing many things that men can do freely. An example would be to wear anything they want (pants), or pursue a career. Such situations are portrayed in various mediums including: Hillary Jordan's book When She Woke, Roland Joffé's film The Scarlet Letter, and Ida Lichter's article "Misogyny in the Muslim World: Bound by Culture or Religion?". In all three sources, religion is such a practice that imposes many restrictions on females, which results in women having to sacrifice their rights and face humiliation in front of society.
In her article, “Feminist Hermeneutics and Biblical Studies”, Phyllis Trible discusses the issues centered toward women in the bible (Trible). She addresses issues not just concerning equality, but also how men viewed women in biblical times. Trible examines the role of women in the bible, and the misconception they carry, that leads many into harms way.
The country is crying out for liberty and equality. Every man and woman has the right to express his/her opinions,” echoes Mariah S. Stewart, the first African-American female to speak amongst a mixed race and gender crowd. Since the very moment men dictated women to act as children, seen and not heard, fervent female voices refused the patriarchal oppression aimed at quelling the efforts of their female gender’s. With a social order firmly placed in position and accepted in large by those in political and social power, women activists continued to work towards impeding the subjection, which denounced them as the weaker, unintellectual, unspiritual, less virtuous and inarticulate sex. While some of these women used the power of Christianity as a vehicle to assert their concerns of women’s lack of freedom, they simultaneously chastised men for condemning their gender as less righteous, which was essentially against God’s order. The prevalence of women’s activist roots contextualizes women in a cultural manifestation of societal change. By tracing a synopsis of some of the key figures in the anti-slavery agenda, woman’s war on race and sexism, woman’s fight for equality in religiosity and ministerial vocation, and more exclusively, the women’s rights movement, we can identify in a historical tradition of rhetoric the preeminence of the female voice and her passionate declaration for individual rights to freedom and happiness
King, Karen L. The Gospel of Mary of Magdala: Jesus and the First Woman Apostle. Santa Rosa, California: Polebridge Press, 2003.
...tudy with both an understanding of contemporary beliefs and practices as well as historic norms and doctrines among these two religious communities will adequately portray how religion impacts the assigning of gender roles and the extent to which they might have changed or grown over time. With an understanding of this relationship between religion, society, and culture, I will be able to answer questions I have had about the role of women in religion and the extent to which these female gender roles might be evolving.
Hobbs, Herschel. A. A. An Exposition of The Gospel of Matthew (Grand Rapids: Baker). Book House, 1965). Layman, Charles; ed.
I have been taught that Christianity is a loving religion that cares for all, But this is not always the case. Upon reading, among other theological works, “Quest for the Living God” by Elizabeth A. Johnson, it becomes apparent that Christianity has been used to systematically marginalize women throughout history despite the teachings of the Bible. While it might not be intentional, the negative treatment of Women has been ingrained into Christian teachings over hundreds of years.
Hauke, M. (1995). God or goddess?: Feminist theology : what is it? : where does it lead?. San Francisco: Ignatius Press.
Corinthians 14:34 states, “Let the women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but let them be in subjection, as also saith the law” (Holy Bible, King James Edition). Edith Hamilton, "recognized as the greatest woman Classicist", says that the Bible is the only book before our century that looked to women as human beings, no better nor worse than men (Tanner). However, it cannot be said that this book was consistently favorable to women. Maybe not absolutely, but conditionally in personal opinion, the Bible shows numerous examples of a woman’s inferiority to men, an assessment that has been translated into the cultures of generations. In this essay I will address briefly instances in the bible pertaining to women, and continue on with thoughts on how I believe these notions have been interpreted into society.
The role of women in religious scripture dictates an inferior position in society. Beginning with the creation of Adam and then Eve, as his helpmate. Her purpose was that Adam would not be lonely. This origin provides the ground work for inequality of genders on the basis of religious scripture. The roles prescribed determined that women should be in a subordinate position to man. The female role and relationship with God is defined by the various books of the Old and New Testaments, the reported actions of Jesus Christ, and finally the Qur'an.