Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Off Topic Jesus the feminist

Okay, I admit it – I used the word ”feminist” to get your attention and to put you in a bit of a battle mood! “Feminist” is really a word of abuse these days, so it is likely to get everyone's hackles up. You have to wonder why.

However, no – Jesus was not a present-day feminist. He was very much a man of his time, and there are so many things about our modern societies that he wouldn't have understood at all. No doubt he would have been absolutely horrified at the practice of abortions, for example, and it is also likely that he would have condemned the use of birth control. After all, Jesus belonged to a society and a people that was all but obsessed with the idea of multiplying and inheriting the land.

(I also firmly believe that Jesus would have strongly disliked the NRA and other expressions of the defence and celebration of violence – remember that he told us to turn the other cheek - and surely he would have been shocked at the sight of the unchecked shopping frenzy that is going on all over the western world these days, ostensibly in memory of Jesus' own birthday.)

But, no. Jesus would not have told you all to vote for Hillary Clinton, or to champion all the causes that have ever been championed by Ms. Magazine. He was not that kind of feminist. He was, instead, the very best kind of feminist – the feminist that defends women.

That's it, huh? Surely that's no big deal? Surely the entire western society defends women? And surely our moral compass, the Bible, does that too?

Well, no. Frankly it's not like that. Back in 1985, I sat down to read the Bible from to cover to cover, and I really did it because I wanted to find out what the Bible says about women. The reason why I wanted to know that was because I had noted that the religious right in the United States seemed to champion many causes that would limit women's rights in society. Not only did they oppose abortions, and in some cases birth control, but they also wanted to cut down on the federal financial support that unmarried mothers would receive. In other words, it would become harder for women to avoid pregnancy and at the same time it would become harder for them to support their children! I was actually a bit shocked. I also learned that the religious right wanted to discourage women from working away from home at all, and they opposed the establishment of day care centers that would make it easier for women to combine parenthood with a job. Religious universities were established, which offered women university degrees in being good wives and mothers (there were no corresponding university degrees for men who needed to learn about being fathers and husbands, of course). A man sued his wife and demanded that she should be jailed for adultery. Finally, the last straw for me was a woman who was interviewed before the 1984 election. She was asked what she thought about Geraldine Ferraro, who was at that time the Vice President candidate for the Democratic party. The woman replied that she thought that Geraldine Ferraro was a blasphemer, who defied the will of God by aspiring for such an elevated political position. God, explained the woman, had ordained that women must be silent and obey, and they had no business trying to run society.

After I had heard this woman explaining that her own sex was unfit for, really, any kind of public office, I decided that I would read the Bible and find out what it says about women. And, well, what it said wasn't good – for the most part.

Let's begin right away with the bad stuff. Genesis. In the story about Adam and Eve, God creates Adam right from the beginning, because God obviously wants Adam to exist. But he creates Eve as an afterthought, because Adam needs her. (God doesn't necessarily need her.) But then Eve causes the fall and the expulsion from the garden of Eden, because she listens to the evil serpent and picks the forbidden fruit of good and evil and gives that fruit to Adam, too. This is what God says to Adam and Eve after the fall:

So Adam must rule over Eve, and he should be very wary about listening to her advice again.

When Eve held out that apple to Adam and asked him to eat it, she actually asked him to choose between herself and God. Well, because Adam was well aware that God had forbidden him to eat of the tree, but now Eve wanted him to eat of it. By accepting the fruit, Adam chose Eve over God, and that is what caused the great Fall. And indeed, in the Bible there are many more examples of men who are tempted by women and who are put in a situation where they have to choose between woman and God. The women want the men to act foolishly, and God wants them to act wisely, and all too often the men choose women and foolishness (and often sex) instead of God and wisdom. The best-known example would be Samson and Delilah. God had forbidden Samson to cut his hair, but he insisted on having sex with a woman who was allied with his enemies, and she nagged him about the secret behind his strength until he told her. Another well-known example is King Herod, John the Baptist and Salome. King Herod had jailed John the Baptist, but he was having second thoughts about it, and he wanted to release the famous prophet. But then Salome danced before King Herod until the king promised to give her anything she wanted. She demanded that the king give her John the Baptist's head on a platter, and Herod acquiesced.

There are many other stories in the Bible about men who are tempted by women to do wrong. A few, like Joseph, are able to turn the evil women down, but many more give in to the women's wishes, and catastrophe usually ensues. It's no wonder, then, that someone like Paul the Apostle admonishes women again and again that they must be silent and obey.

So in the Bible evil often emanates from women. Perhaps unsurprisingly, there are also some very harsh Mosaic laws about the punishment of women, and some Old Testament prophets like Ezekiel describe horrible punishments that will befall women because of their evilness:

It should be noted that Ezekiel talks about the kind of punishment that will befall evil and sinful cities. However, the cities are described as women, and there can be little doubt that Ezekiel considered women guilty of much or most of the sin of the sinful cities. Almost certainly he thought that the women of the cities deserved the harshest punishment of all.

So aren't there any good things in the Old Testament for those who believe in equality between the sexes? Well yes, actually, there are. There is Deborah, her people's judge and leader, who led the Israelites to victory against their enemies. (So it would seem that God doesn't necessarily mind women holding office.) There is the ode to a capable wife in Proverbs, a woman who makes her husband's life very prosperous and comfortable for him. There are my own two favourite books from the Old Testament: Song of Solomon and Ruth. Ruth is a fearless woman, enormously fond of and loyal to her widowed mother-in-law. And since Ruth is widowed herself and needs a new husband to provide for her and her mother-in-law, Ruth resolutely picks out a man that she likes and sneaks into his tent and his bed at night! Now that's what I call initiative!

As for Song of Solomon, it is just amazingly beautiful, erotic and – I was going to say feminist, but that is not the correct word. But Song of Solomon is an erotic love poem, praising the sweetness and beauty of what is quite possibly unmarried lovemaking, told primarily from a woman's point of view. It's amazing that this love poem is to be found in the Bible at all. It is a lot less surprising that preachers, ministers and priests hardly ever refer to it. This, of course, makes it less important, because it is for all intents and purposes a hushed-down part of the Bible. And it has to be admitted that the entire Song of Solomon could simply be removed from the Bible without the overall Biblical narrative and message losing anything at all. Deborah and Ruth matter more than the Song of Solomon, but the overall Biblical message isn't dependent on the story of these two women, either.

But Jesus? Isn't he what Christianity is all about? Shouldn't his words matter more than anybody else's? How can people who claim to be Christian possibly dismiss what Jesus said about men and women, and how can they disregard the way Jesus treated men and women?

Consider Jesus, the defender of women! Jesus is famous for his parables. Well, not in a single one of his many parables does he ever describe women as evil. Not once does he suggest that women have to be reined in and kept on a short leash, because otherwise they will influence other people badly. Jesus never says that!

Consider the parable of the ten virgins in Matthew 25. This is the only parable of Jesus' where women are punished and are seen to be in the wrong. However, the five unwise virgins are compared with five wise virgins, so it's not as if ten unwise women were compared with ten wise men. In other words, it is not their gender that makes the five virgins unwise, but their individual shortcomings.

And consider the parable of the prodigal son (Luke 15:11-32). This is how it begins:

11 And he said, “There was a man who had two sons. 12 And the younger of them said to his father, "Father, give me the share of property that is coming to me.' And he divided his property between them. 13 Not many days later, the younger son gathered all he had and took a journey into a far country, and there he squandered his property in reckless living.


And this is how it ends:

Look, these many years I have served you, and I never disobeyed your command, yet you never gave me a young goat, that I might celebrate with my friends. 30 But when this son of yours came, who has devoured your property with prostitutes, you killed the fattened calf for him!' 31 And he said to him, "Son, you are always with me, and all that is mine is yours. 32 It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found.'”

So here we are told how the young man squandered his father's property: he devoured it with prostitutes. But does Jesus, in his parable, blame the prostitutes for the young man's misfortune? No! The way Jesus tells the story, it is the young man himself who makes his own decisions. The mental image I get of this is of a young man who seeks out the prostitutes himself, not the other way round. Compare that with a story from the Old Testament (Proverbs 7:10-27):

10 And behold, the woman meets him,
dressed as a prostitute, wily of heart. [3]
11 She is loud and wayward;
her feet do not stay at home;
12 now in the street, now in the market,
and at every corner she lies in wait.
13 She seizes him and kisses him,
and with bold face she says to him,
14 “I had to offer sacrifices, [4]
and today I have paid my vows;
15 so now I have come out to meet you,
to seek you eagerly, and I have found you.
16 I have spread my couch with coverings,
colored linens from Egyptian linen;
17 I have perfumed my bed with myrrh,
aloes, and cinnamon.
18 Come, let us take our fill of love till morning;
let us delight ourselves with love.
19 For my husband is not at home;
he has gone on a long journey;
20 he took a bag of money with him;
at full moon he will come home.”

21 With much seductive speech she persuades him;
with her smooth talk she compels him.
22 All at once he follows her,
as an ox goes to the slaughter,
or as a stag is caught fast [5]
23 till an arrow pierces its liver;
as a bird rushes into a snare;
he does not know that it will cost him his life.

24 And now, O sons, listen to me,
and be attentive to the words of my mouth.
25 Let not your heart turn aside to her ways;
do not stray into her paths,
26 for many a victim has she laid low,
and all her slain are a mighty throng.
27 Her house is the way to Sheol,
going down to the chambers of death.

The young man in this passage was previously described as a young man lacking sense, but that was his only sin. It was the woman, the prostitute, who caused his downfall and his death. Well, that is not what Jesus thought about men and prostitutes! Actually, Jesus never blamed the prostitutes. In Matthew 21: 31 Jesus said this to the high priests and the elders:

Jesus said to them, “Truly, I say to you, the tax collectors and the prostitutes go into the kingdom of God before you.

And in Luke 7:36-50 Jesus is invited into a Pharisee's house, and a woman who is a sinner comes there also. The Pharisee is displeased, but Jesus tells him that it is the woman, not the Pharisee, who has showed Jesus great love. The woman is forgiven; the Pharisee apparently is not.

In John 4, Jesus talks to a Samarian woman. He notes that she has had a chequered past, and she is now “living in sin”, but he does not criticize her:

16 Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” 17 The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, "I have no husband'; 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.” 19 The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet.

No sin was worse in old Israel than a woman's adultery. (Well, with the exception of idolatry.) Consider the following horrible law from Deuteronomy 22:

20 But if the thing is true, that evidence of virginity was not found in the young woman, 21 then they shall bring out the young woman to the door of her father's house, and the men of her city shall stone her to death with stones, because she has done an outrageous thing in Israel by whoring in her father's house. So you shall purge the evil from your midst.

All men in the city are obliged to help stone the young woman to death for her lack of virginity, even though it may very well be one of them who actually took her virginity. Compare this to what Jesus said about the stoning of an adulterous woman:

The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst 4 they said to him, “Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. 5 Now in the Law Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?” 6 This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him. Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. 7 And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.” 8 And once more he bent down and wrote on the ground. 9 But when they heard it, they went away one by one, beginning with the older ones, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. 10 Jesus stood up and said to her, “Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?” 11 She said, “No one, Lord.” And Jesus said, “Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on sin no more.”

Jesus never issued any general rule ordering women to behave themselves or to obey their husbands or to be silent. He did, however, tell men they had no right to divorce their wives (Mark 10:2-9):

2 And Pharisees came up and in order to test him asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?” 3 He answered them, “What did Moses command you?” 4 They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and to send her away.” 5 And Jesus said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment. 6 But from the beginning of creation, "God made them male and female.' 7 "Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, [1] 8 and the two shall become one flesh.' So they are no longer two but one flesh. 9 What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”

Luke puts it like this (Luke 16:18):
18 “Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery, and he who marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery.

It's no wonder, then, that Jesus didn't consider the healing and raising of women beneath him. (It apparently was beneath the even the mightiest prophets and holy men of the Old Testament, because they could never be bothered with restoring the health or the life of women.) In Luke 8, Jesus first cured a woman who suffered from constant menstrual bleeding (and who was therefore considered unclean), and then he raised a young girl who had died. In Luke 13, he healed a woman on a Sabbath:

10 Now he was teaching in one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. 11 And there was a woman who had had a disabling spirit for eighteen years. She was bent over and could not fully straighten herself. 12 When Jesus saw her, he called her over and said to her, “Woman, you are freed from your disability.” 13 And he laid his hands on her, and immediately she was made straight, and she glorified God. 14 But the ruler of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, said to the people, “There are six days in which work ought to be done. Come on those days and be healed, and not on the Sabbath day.” 15 Then the Lord answered him, “You hypocrites! Does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the manger and lead it away to water it? 16 And ought not this woman, a daughter of Abraham whom Satan bound for eighteen years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day?” 17 As he said these things, all his adversaries were put to shame, and all the people rejoiced at all the glorious things that were done by him.

Jesus also told a parable about a woman to make people understand the concept of the Kingdom of Heaven (Luke 13: 20):

20 And again he said, “To what shall I compare the kingdom of God? 21 It is like leaven that a woman took and hid in three measures of flour, until it was all leavened.”

He also told a parable about another woman to make people understand a fundamental aspect of God (Luke 15:8-10):

8 “Or what woman, having ten silver coins, [1] if she loses one coin, does not light a lamp and sweep the house and seek diligently until she finds it? 9 And when she has found it, she calls together her friends and neighbors, saying, "Rejoice with me, for I have found the coin that I had lost.' 10 Just so, I tell you, there is joy before the angels of God over one sinner who repents.”

It is fitting that the women stayed with Jesus when he was crucified, while his disciples and other male followers generally fled. And it is typical, and fitting, that it was a woman (or two women) who brought the message to the world that Jesus had risen from the dead (Matt. 28:1-10):

Now after the Sabbath, toward the dawn of the first day of the week, Mary Magdalene and the other Mary went to see the tomb. 2 And behold, there was a great earthquake, for an angel of the Lord descended from heaven and came and rolled back the stone and sat on it. 3 His appearance was like lightning, and his clothing white as snow. 4 And for fear of him the guards trembled and became like dead men. 5 But the angel said to the women, “Do not be afraid, for I know that you seek Jesus who was crucified. 6 He is not here, for he has risen, as he said. Come, see the place where he [1] lay. 7 Then go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead, and behold, he is going before you to Galilee; there you will see him. See, I have told you.” 8 So they departed quickly from the tomb with fear and great joy, and ran to tell his disciples. 9 And behold, Jesus met them and said, “Greetings!” And they came up and took hold of his feet and worshiped him. 10 Then Jesus said to them, “Do not be afraid; go and tell my brothers to go to Galilee, and there they will see me.”

How could Jesus be so remarkably “feminist” in view of the fact that he belonged to such a sexist society and such a sexist religious tradition? This is my personal guess. Jesus was born to a woman who was not married when she gave birth to him. Christian people regard Jesus' conception as a miracle, which happened because the Holy Ghost impregnated the Virgin Mary without destroying her virginity. But regardless what your own personal beliefs are in this matter, I hope you can agree with me that the Jewish society that Jesus grew up in was not likely to regard the conception of Jesus as the least bit miraculous. You'd think, perhaps, that the choir of angels outside the stable would be enough to convince the unbelievers, or the appearance of a brilliant new star in the heavens and the coming of the Magi. But you have to remember that according to the Bible Jesus was born in Bethlehem, but he grew up in Nazareth. Those who might have seen the miracles of Jesus' birth would not have accompanied him to Nazareth, and those who saw Jesus grow up in Nazareth would not have been present at his birth. The people in Nazareth would not have regarded Jesus as a prophet or as a holy man at all, but instead they would have thought that he was an illegitimate child, a bastard. This is what Mark 6 says about how Jesus was “welcomed” by his hometown when he returned there to preach and teach:

6:1 He went away from there and came to his hometown, and his disciples followed him. 2 And on the Sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue, and many who heard him were astonished, saying, “Where did this man get these things? What is the wisdom given to him? How are such mighty works done by his hands? 3 Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon? And are not his sisters here with us?” And they took offense at him. 4 And Jesus said to them, “A prophet is not without honor, except in his hometown and among his relatives and in his own household.” 5 And he could do no mighty work there, except that he laid his hands on a few sick people and healed them. 6 And he marveled because of their unbelief.

Please note that Jesus is described as “the son of Mary”. His father is not named. The fact that Jesus' father was unknown would have been a great shame and a dishonour in a society as obsessed with paternity as the Jewish society. Please note that the people of Jesus' hometown most certainly did not believe that Jesus was the Son of God.

So I'll argue that Jesus grew up being treated as a bastard child. I believe that he constantly met contempt and mockery because his father was unknown. I'll also argue that Jesus chose to take his mother's side in this. Instead of blaming his mother, thinking of her as a harlot and a whore, Jesus chose to think that the people who jeered and mocked her committed a greater sin than anything his mother might have been guilty of. (I should add that there is nothing in the Bible that suggests that Jesus himself regarded his mother as a holy Virgin, blessed and chosen by God.) In defending his mother, Jesus also defended all other women in his mother's situation. The prostitutes, for example. In Matthew 1:18-19, Joseph was thinking of divorcing Mary:

18 Now the birth of Jesus Christ [5] took place in this way. When his mother Mary had been betrothed [6] to Joseph, before they came together she was found to be with child from the Holy Spirit. 19 And her husband Joseph, being a just man and unwilling to put her to shame, resolved to divorce her quietly.

But what would have happened to Mary if Joseph had abandoned her? Hopefully she could have returned to her parents. But if they had been unwilling or unable to support her and her son, Mary might have been forced to sustain herself and Jesus by becoming a prostitute. I like to think that Jesus often watched the prostitutes and their children and thought to himself: There, but for the grace of God, go my mother and I. And that would have explained why he so fiercely defended the prostitutes and all other “sinful” and “fallen” women all the time. And it would also explain why he, unlike all other prophets, demanded that men must never divorce their wives.

All in all, then, Jesus was a wonderful feminist, defending the prostitutes and other “fallen women”, healing and raising sick and dead women, forbidding men to divorce their wives, and using images of women to help people understand the Kingdom of Heaven and God himself. So whenever I hear of or read about Christian people who want to fight for purity and morality by reining in women, by trying to control women, by lecturing women about humility and obedience and by putting the blame for societal ills mostly on women, then I think that these people are very strange Christians, indeed. They regard Jesus as their personal saviour, but they are not interested in sharing Jesus' actual beliefs or finding out what he actually said before he was crucified. Go figure.

Ann

Wow, this definitely has the potential to be a powderkeg!

You've hit the nail on the head explaining my own personal problem with the bible. When I went to Basic Training, we were only allowed to read two books: the military handbook and the bible. My book-loving soul chafed at this, so as the handbook was boring and quickly read several times over. I started to read the bible starting with Genesis. I read a few chapters a night before going to sleep. I got all the way to Kings, and by then I as ready to chuck it across the barracks. I realized that this was not my view of Christianity, having been taught love and forgiveness, not fire and brimstone. I stopped reading it right then and there, deciding that while it might be the Word of God, it had been interepreted and horribly skewed by the pen of Man.

Last year I resolved to start reading again, this time from the beginning of the New Testament. Sadly, I havent gotten very far, only reading on Sundays and usually forgetting. When I do read, I've taken to jotting down my thoughts and perceptions, writing down questions I have, things I've noticed, and how many things are so different from what other people preach. But so far, while there are some things I don't quite agree with, it's much closer to my personal view of religion.

As soon as I read this post, I knew I was going to respond to it. I couldn’t turn away. But such a thoughtful and well-written statement deserves more than a passing flip or an angry retort. I hope that this is received as it is intended, in a spirit of open discussion.

Ann wrote:

No, actually, I don’t wonder. I know.

When you say that “feminist” is a word of abuse, I think you mean that it’s often used as an insult, or at the least as a pejorative term. Or you may mean that the term itself is abused. Either way, I agree, the term is used for many more purposes than were originally intended, and I also agree that it is a politically explosive term. But you used it to get people to read your post, and since it obviously worked that’s probably a fair use of the term.

Would Jesus have been horrified by widespread abortion, rampant commercialism, or the widespread celebration of violence (which, by the way, is not endorsed by the National Rifle Association)? I think Ann is probably right that He would be. Would He advise us to vote for a particular candidate? I think not. The mission of Jesus was not a political one, and they didn’t vote for Roman emperors in that day anyway.

Was he the kind of feminist who defends women?

That’s an interesting assertion. It strongly implies that the main mission of Jesus was to defend women from oppression and free them from second-class citizenship. It implies that He came not to “seek and to save those who were lost,” but to champion a particular political cause.

Let me make this clear: I do not wish to attack anyone’s political point of view. I do not wish to offend anyone. I do not wish to insult anyone or censure anyone. But I do want to present my own point of view and defend Christianity from attacks such as the one above.

Ann also wrote:

My, my, Ann, we’re a bunch of terrible people, aren’t we? Let me respond to each of your assertions separately, because you’re being unfair by lumping all these issues into one.

1) Abortion kills children. That’s it. If that collection of tissue in the woman’s womb is not a child then she’s not pregnant. If you are honest, you must admit that abortion results in the death of an individual. Whether or not that individual deserves the same protection under the law given to older children is a related but separate question, and that’s not what I’m arguing. I’m simply stating that aborting a fetus results in a dead child.

We in Western society are fairly uniform on few issues, but one of them is child abuse. Few, if any, would defend the rights of adults to injure or torture or maim or kill a helpless child, irrespective if that child’s gender. Western religious conservatives generally believe that child abuse is wrong, and that such abuse includes the deliberate taking of human life in the womb. This is why the opposition to abortion has remained fairly constant for more than three decades, not because of a conspiracy by Christians to hold women “in their place,” whatever place that might be.

2) In general, American religious conservatives outside the Catholic church do not oppose birth control in principle. (I do not oppose it in principle, so any case to be made in opposition to it must be made by someone else.) The opposition is not against birth control, but against making it easily available to those who shouldn’t need it, namely teenagers who aren’t ready for the responsibilities of parenthood.

And to those who believe that the little darlings are going to experiment with sex no matter what we say, I must respond that you are at least partially correct. So why shouldn’t we reduce the number of teen pregnancies any way we can?

Because it’s a moral issue.

Ann wrote:

You’re wrong about removing it, Ann. This little narrative needs to be in the Bible. This is indeed a celebration of the joys of sex. It’s passionate, it’s intense, it’s brilliant, it’s gripping, and it’s necessary. Why? Because sex is part of who we are as human beings. It’s something that was given to Adam and Eve at the beginning, not something they had to endure because of the Fall. Sex is important, sex is vital, and sex is something that is beautiful.

But only in its proper context. Human females don’t have a mating period like most mammals, and mating between humans isn’t confined to a single season. But neither were we intended to couple willy-nilly without establishing a social context for both adult members of the family and any children of the pair. Sex within marriage celebrates mutual freedom and trust. It joins two people together in a closer bond than almost any other.

But sex outside the borders of marriage is a gamble. It’s a risk, not only health-wise but emotionally. Do you know what counselors and psychiatrists and college leaders all over the US are saying these days about the “hook-up” phenomenon? Or about the “buddy sex” craze? That it results in damaged people. That breaching that “intimacy threshold” without the commitment to a permanent relationship violates something within the person. Even absent the risks of sexually transmitted diseases, breaking this moral taboo results in ruined expectations, broken friendships, guilt, depression, loss of self-esteem, contributes to the dropout rate, and has so few positive aspects to it as to render the practice detrimental to society.

This is why religious conservatives oppose freely distributing birth control. It contributes to the breakdown of society as we know it. It sends a message to young people to go ahead and have sex, because the only bad outcome of having sex at such a young age might be a baby. And we’ve taken care of that with this little square package.

3) This is unfair because it paints a large segment of society with a broad brush of condemnation, not to mention that it simply isn’t true. There are many highly qualified child care experts – not all of whom are “religious conservatives” – who maintain that a child raised in a day care environment is more likely to be a problem child than one raised mainly at home by his or her family. This is not to say that eliminating child care will solve the problem of raising well-adjusted children. It won’t; the problem is much larger than that. Nor should anyone who uses a daycare or nanny or au pair or long-term sitter construe this as condemnation. I’m simply repeating what many (not all, of course) experts say about this issue.

This also goes to the issue Ann raised about women working, period. Look, I hate having to go to a job five or six days a week. It really takes a chunk out of my leisure time, and I’d rather be at home building memories with my wife. But I also recognize that if we want to function in our Western economy, we have to work. And sometimes it takes two incomes to maintain a viable standard of living.

The main problem most religious conservatives have with the issue of working mothers (not women in general, mind you, mothers with babies and/or small children) is that many young mothers work when their family economics don’t demand it. It isn’t that working women are somehow considered “unwomanly,” it is simply that it isn’t always necessary.

I can hear it now: “But many young mothers are alone and have to work to earn groceries and pay rent!” Sadly, this is true, and for those women who are going it alone because some scumbag man left them with no money and a bunch of little ones, my heart goes out to you. My wife and I have assisted women in such positions over the years, such help ranging from purchases of food and rent payments and child care, to allowing the women and their children to live with us for a period of time. So this is not an issue which I ignore, nor is it one for which I have no sympathy.

My point is aimed at those who do not have to work to make ends meet, yet they do. If a woman has young children and/or babies, and her economic situation will allow it, she should seriously examine her motives for maintaining her career.

Should she automatically quit? No. Is she automatically a sinful wretch because she works outside the home? Of course not. Any man who’s ever done the “Mr. Mom” thing for more than two days will back me up on this. Taking care of a home is hard work, y’all! I do, however, maintain that merely increasing the family income isn’t always a valid justification for adding to a woman’s responsibility.

4) I’m a bit surprised to see this as a complaint, Ann. Do you mean that you don’t think women should be held responsible for their actions? Do you mean that you endorse adultery, or at least that you excuse adulterous women? Do you mean that jail time isn’t a suitable punishment? Do you mean to condemn an entire society for the actions of a single person?

And the structure of the sentence makes this completely immune to rebuttal. I could say, “A woman shot her husband while he was asleep,” and without any context, there’s no way to determine the appropriateness of her action. Did he abuse her? We don’t know. Was she greedy for his fortune? We don’t know. Was she just stoned? We don’t know, and therefore can’t possibly determine whether or not what she did was justified. Combine this lack of detail with a complete lack of verifiability, and it approaches the level of urban legend.

That doesn’t mean that I don’t believe you. That doesn’t mean that it didn’t or couldn’t happen. I have no doubt that it did. But without any supporting details, it means nothing. It is simply an anecdote.

5) Once again, you are using anecdotal data to confirm a global hypothesis. There’s not one responsible astronomer in America or Sweden who would use a single point of data as the sum total of his or her proof. Offering this one woman’s point of view as being representative of all religious conservatives is irresponsible. It’s simply beneath you, Ann.

And while I did not vote for Walter Mondale (the presidential candidate) in that election, my choice was not determined by the gender of his running mate. My choice was determined by an examination of the issues.

Reading the Bible just to inform your particular viewpoint is a lot like reading “Origin of the Species” just for the information on the Galapagos finches. (Actually, you’d be disappointed if you did, because there is very little in the first edition about the birds. And what data is there in later editions was added from the observations of others, not from Charles Darwin’s point of view.) If you were to do this, you’d miss Darwin’s racist attitudes towards non-white peoples and his sloppy data collections methods, not to mention his erroneous conclusions about such things as the inner workings of the single cell and the way the existing fossil evidence contradicts his “tree of life” model.

In the same way, your particular interpretation of Scripture seems to be guided by a conviction that the Bible was given to humankind in order to oppress women, especially the Old Testament. Your example of Adam and Eve is telling. There’s no hint in the text that God warned Adam not to listen to his wife. That’s your invention. And the main responsibility for the Fall rests on Adam, not on Eve. Even though he tried to blame her for the problem, he couldn’t escape his fate.

6) You’re flat wrong on this one. Paul never told women to “be silent and obey.” The one time he admonished women to “be silent in the church” was in 1 Cor. 14. This was part of a passage where he was correcting abuses of spiritual gifts by the entire congregation, not just by some women.

And every time he told a wife to obey, he also told a husband to love. The two always go together. A man who loves his wife “as Christ loved the church” (Eph. 5:25) will sacrifice his own desires to meet the needs of his wife. A man who puts his wife above himself in meeting her needs before his is one who meets the Christian qualifications of being a good husband.

7) I must agree with everything in the above quote. Jesus is indeed what Christianity is all about, but not because He talked nice about women. He is what Christianity is all about because He claimed to be the only savior of the world. Here’s a quote from Jesus. (note: all Scripture quoted from the Holman Christian Bible)

Here’s another.

And one more, this one when He was tried before the Jewish Sanhedrin.

Over and over again, Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, the Christ, the Messiah, the only Savior of the world. To isolate His words and focus only on what He said about women is not only short-sighted but intellectually dishonest. Yes, He did not treat women as less important than men, but only because as God He knows that’s the way we’re all supposed to act.

8) This scene has been used for so many purposes, from condemnation of capital punishment to investigating the mystery of the writing on the ground, that the underlying meaning has been lost. Let me fill in the blanks for you.

A) The Pharisees did not bring the woman to Jesus as an afterthought. They brought her to Him in order to entrap Him (note verse six). They were not interested in her guilt, her innocence, her death, or her continued survival. All they wanted to do was to discredit this pesky teacher.

B) The Mosaic law does indeed require that adulterers be executed. But there was no way the Pharisees could do that. Why? Because the Romans were in charge.

When Rome conquered a nation, they left as much of the bureaucracy in place as they could. They did, however, reserve several vital perks to themselves, like ownership of all taxes collected and the execution of criminals. When Jesus was brought before Pilate, the Pharisees told Pilate that they couldn’t execute the “criminal” because only the Romans could do that. That’s why Pilate had to pronounce the death sentence. And the reason this point isn't mentioned in the text is because any first-century or second-century reader would know this the same way we know that McDonald's serves Quarter-Pounders.

And that’s why this woman was in no danger of her life. The Pharisees weren’t upholding the integrity of the Law, they weren’t protecting society, they were only using her as a tool against someone else.

C) The Old Testament tells us in Deuteronomy and other places that if Israel follows God, they will be blessed, but if they fall away, God will bring chastisement on them, up to and including occupation by ungodly enemies. The Romans certainly qualified there. And the reason the Romans were in charge in Israel was simply because the people weren’t being taught to follow God. They were not being taught the Law of Moses. They were being taught to follow a complex, arcane, contradictory, and ultimately illogical set of rules and regulations (the Pharisaical law) and told that if they failed to do everything the Pharisees told them to do, they’d fail God.

No one could follow that law, not even the Pharisees. And because the people weren’t following God, He brought the Romans to oppress them.

But the reason the people didn’t follow the Lord was because the Pharisees – the same men who are now throwing this unfortunate woman to the ground before Jesus – weren’t teaching God’s ways. They were teaching men’s ways, men’s wisdom, men’s preferences, and they were holding on to what little political power they had with all their might. Therefore, the Roman occupation of Israel was ultimately the responsibility of the Pharisees. The people failed to follow God because the Pharisees failed to teach the people how to follow God properly.

But there were none without sin. They were all guilty of failing to teach God’s principles to God’s people and were responsible for the Roman occupation which forbade them to execute criminals. So Jesus set an unsolvable dilemma before them: follow the Law and stone the woman and then accept death from the Romans, or accept Jesus at His word and proclaim Him Messiah.

They did neither. They simply left.

D) But there’s one more aspect of this story. Jesus took the time to deal with this woman who was a sinner, but was also caught up in a political and religious power struggle. Jesus told her to “Go, and from now on do not sin any more.” He was the only one of the participants Who took the time to see to the needs of the one person who was least guilty in this escapade.

Christianity cares for the individual. Christians should also care for the individual, because Jesus did.

9) Ann commented:

I cannot agree more with this sentiment. In the Jewish courts of the time (determined, again, by Pharisaical law and not by Mosaic law), the testimony of a woman was not accepted by the court. This was not God’s intention. You will not find this restriction in the Old Testament. But it was the nature of the times, and this aspect of the story of Jesus is strong circumstantial evidence that the Resurrection is an historical fact. If not, then such a fanciful story would never feature mere women reporting it! Who’d believe them?

10) Religious conservatives, as a segment of American society, do not want to “rein in women.” They do not want to “control women.” They do not want to blame women for societal ills. There are fringe groups outside the mainstream, like the people who picket the funerals of military casualties to blame homosexuality for their deaths, but such folks are whackos. Every segment of society has them. There are even people who are so “green” that they will tell you straight up to your face that the problem with the Earth is the existence of humanity and that the only thing which will save the planet is the extinction of humankind.

Should we all commit suicide to placate them? Of course not. Should we dismiss all environmentalists as morons and idiots because of the actions of a few? Of course not. Christians as a whole do not fit the description Ann has presented in the above quote. Nor are Christians all cut from the same cloth. We are all at different levels of maturity, and to expect every Believer to act like every other Believer is like expecting a three-year-old to behave in as mature a manner as any head of state. Not all atheists believe the same things, but few critics make mention of this fact. The same goes for Buddhists or Wiccans or Hindus or any other organized (or any disorganized) religious faith.

If you want to criticize the behavior of people who claim to be Christians, you have plenty of choices. There are no individual Christians who are perfect, and therefore there are no groups of Christians who are perfect. But if you critique Christians for not finding out what He actually said, you need to be willing to submit yourself to the same test.

Let me leave you all with one sobering thought. If Jesus was and is who He said He was – namely, the Son of God – then ignoring what He said is extremely dangerous. If God is indeed God, then rejecting His word is also extremely dangerous. If we reject the Bible because it doesn’t fit our preconceived notions about God, then I submit that the problem is not with the Bible but with our preconceived notions. And if we persist in judging God’s actions by our own standards, we risk behaving in a manner which places us above God.

And wasn’t it ignoring God’s word what got Adam (and us) into this mess in the first place?

I'm glad you replied, Terry. I was hoping you would.

Unsurprisingly, you and I disagree about many things. In many cases I think it would be pointless to try to argue a specific point. For example, you most certainly know the American religious right so much better than I do, so how can I argue that you are wrong about what you say about it? All I can say is that the religious right looked antifeminist to me when I looked at it from outside. It did seem to me that very many of the measures that the religious right was asking for would circumscribe women's rights in society. I also noted that the religious right always seemed to refer to the Bible when they explained their reasons for wanting to change society this way. If people who seemed to want to make women less free were using the Bible to explain their reasons, then I wanted to read the Bible for myself to learn about the foundations for these antifeminists' claims.

I had grown up in a religious home, so it wasn't as if I was unfamiliar with the general and overall message of the Bible. I didn't approach the Bible as an ignorant novice. However, I wasn't sure what the Bible really and truly said about women, so I decided to read it to find out about that. Tell me, Terry - do you think it is wrong to read the Bible to learn about the Bible's views on a particular issue, when you are already familiar with the general and overall message of the Bible?

You do seem to misunderstand my reactions when it comes to abortions, and I want to put that right. I was not shocked that many people in America were strongly opposed to abortions. However, I saw a TV documentary which claimed that many of the same people who were opposed to abortions also wanted to cut down on the federal aid to unmarried mothers. In other words, the same people who wanted to make it impossible for women to terminate a pregnancy also wanted to make it harder for them to provide for their children. Now that shocked me. Because it seemed to me that if you were concerned with the well-being of children, then you would increase the federal aid to unmarried mothers at the same time as you made abortions illegal. If you made it harder for women to provide economically for kids that they didn't want in the first place, then you increased the risk that these kids would be condemned to a life of misery, didn't you? I strongly felt that if you want to force women to give birth to unwanted children, then at least you should help these women to provide for their kids.

Well, here is where I think you are wrong, Terry. There are several places in the New Testament where Paul admonishes women to be silent and obey:

Corinthians 14:

14:34 Let your women keep silence in the churches: for it is not permitted unto them to speak; but they are commanded to be under obedience as also saith the law.
14:35 And if they will learn any thing, let them ask their husbands at home: for it is a shame for women to speak in the church.

Corinthians 11:

11:3 But I would have you know, that the head of every man is Christ; and the head of the woman is the man; and the head of Christ is God.
11:4 Every man praying or prophesying, having his head covered, dishonoureth his head.
11:5 But every woman that prayeth or prophesieth with her head uncovered dishonoureth her head: for that is even all one as if she were shaven.
11:6 For if the woman be not covered, let her also be shorn: but if it be a shame for a woman to be shorn or shaven, let her be covered.
11:7 For a man indeed ought not to cover his head, forasmuch as he is the image and glory of God: but the woman is the glory of the man.
11:8 For the man is not of the woman: but the woman of the man.
11:9 Neither was the man created for the woman; but the woman for the man.

(Please note that Paul says that the woman was created for sake of the man, but the man was not created for the sake of the woman.)

Ephesians 5:22-24:

22 Wives, submit to your own husbands, as to the Lord. 23 For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior. 24 Now as the church submits to Christ, so also wives should submit in everything to their husbands.

Colossians 3:18

18 Wives, submit to your husbands, as is fitting in the Lord.

1 Timothy 2:11-15:

11 Let a woman learn quietly with all submissiveness. 12 I do not permit a woman to teach or to exercise authority over a man; rather, she is to remain quiet. 13 For Adam was formed first, then Eve; 14 and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. 15 Yet she will be saved through childbearing—if they continue in faith and love and holiness, with self-control.

Please note that the woman is singled out as the transgressor and as the cause of the downfall of humanity.

Titus 2:3-5:

3 Older women likewise are to be reverent in behavior, not slanderers or slaves to much wine. They are to teach what is good, 4 and so train the young women to love their husbands and children, 5 to be self-controlled, pure, working at home, kind, and submissive to their own husbands, that the word of God may not be reviled.

1 Peter 3:1-6

3:1 Likewise, wives, be subject to your own husbands, so that even if some do not obey the word, they may be won without a word by the conduct of their wives, 2 when they see your respectful and pure conduct. 3 Do not let your adorning be external—the braiding of hair and the putting on of gold jewelry, or the clothing you wear— 4 but let your adorning be the hidden person of the heart with the imperishable beauty of a gentle and quiet spirit, which in God's sight is very precious. 5 For this is how the holy women who hoped in God used to adorn themselves, by submitting to their own husbands, 6 as Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him lord. And you are her children, if you do good and do not fear anything that is frightening.


There are not at all as many biblical passages urging husbands to love their wives. Ephesians 5:25-33 is by far the clearest:

25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, 26 that he might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, 27 so that he might present the church to himself in splendor, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish. [1] 28 In the same way husbands should love their wives as their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. 29 For no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ does the church, 30 because we are members of his body. 31 “Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.” 32 This mystery is profound, and I am saying that it refers to Christ and the church. 33 However, let each one of you love his wife as himself, and let the wife see that she respects her husband.

There is also Colossians 3:19:

Husbands, love your wives, and do not be harsh with them.

Maybe you could also include 1 Peter 3:7:

7 Likewise, husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, showing honor to the woman as the weaker vessel, since they are heirs with you [1] of the grace of life, so that your prayers may not be hindered.

To summarize, the Bible says so much more about womens' duty to obey their husbands than about men's duty to love their wives. However, I must admit that some of the most misogynic passages here, like the one from 1 Timothy, may not have been written by Paul himself at all.

I noted that you mostly quoted from the Gospel of John, Terry. I'm not surprised that John is your favorite gospel, because many Christians feel that way. As a non-Christian, I like John by far the least, and I like the synoptic gospels, Matthew, Mark and Luke, so much better. Why? Because I find Jesus so irritatingly self-obsessed in the Gospel of John. Compare what Jesus says about the same thing in John and in Matthew:

John 3:16:

16 “For God so loved the world, [9] that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

Matthew 25:31-46:

31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. 32 Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. 34 Then the King will say to those on his right, "Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.' 37 Then the righteous will answer him, saying, "Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? 38 And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? 39 And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?' 40 And the King will answer them, "Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, [1] you did it to me.'

41 “Then he will say to those on his left, "Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.' 44 Then they also will answer, saying, "Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?' 45 Then he will answer them, saying, "Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.' 46 And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”

According to Jesus in the gospel of John, it is enough to believe in him, in Jesus. According to Jesus in the gospel of Matthew, it is necessary to be a good person and treat others people with love and compassion, if you want to enter into the kingdom of heaven.

And in the synoptic gospels, Jesus just isn't so self-centered. Compare these two biblical passages:

John 8:12:

12 Again Jesus spoke to them, saying, “I am the light of the world.

Matthew 5:14:

14 “You are the light of the world.

Give me the synoptic gospels anytime. Ah, but even the Jesus of John is a feminist.

But, Terry, I would never suggest that Jesus' most important message is that women should be treated well. No, Jesus' main message is that the kingdom of heaven is coming, and people must repent so that they will be let inside.

As for the idea that the Old testament's main message is that women are dangerous and should be kept on a short leash... No, it's not the main message. The main message of the Old testament is that God created heaven and earth and man and woman, but there was a horrible rift between humans and God because the woman listened to the serpent and Adam listened to his wife. Later God made the children of Israel his chosen people and made a convenant with them. That is the main message of the Old Testament. But darn it, the idea that women are dangerous is a very recurrent theme, too.

Ann

I'm not going to touch most of this with a ten-foot pole - in part because my head hurts very badly and I don't have the time in general, and also because most of my points have already been made very eloquently by Terry.

I would like to point to the
Song of Solomon video series as an example of it being taught in churches. We did the video series in Sunday School a couple years ago and it was wonderful. There are also a number of Christian websites out there dealing with the same issues from a Biblical perspective [I'm not going to put links because of the necessarily 'adult' nature of the websites, but I would be happy to PM them to someone if anyone is interested]. But you are right, Ann, it's not often that it's taught from the sensual, sexual perspective in church.

I'm sure you and everyone else know this already but, documentaries etc. need to be trusted but verified. Evidence can be made to say just about anything anyone wants. Things that are 'true' aren't always 'true', if you know what I mean.

I have four kids [and get odd looks all the time - the last two times we announced babies were coming we got the 'you know how that happens right?' [to which DH replied more than once 'Yep and I enjoy it too'] or 'you know how to prevent that right?'], I choose to be a work at home mom and would love nothing more than to be a full time stay at home mom. DH supports me in that and you won't find me oppressed in any way. I get odd looks from 'both sides' if you will, because I have no desire to home school and even moved into a good district but I still desire nothing more than to be a stay at home mom - I believe, more than anything except perhaps being a wife to my husband, that is what I was created to do [yes, created but that's a different discussion ]. That doesn't mean I'm going to go to the extreme of the 'SAHM movement' as I know many have - including friends of mine who have finally agreed to disagree with me on the HSing thing.

A study shown on 48 Hours or 60 Minutes or Dateline or something [and this is true from our experience as well] said that when you actually sat down and crunched numbers - it's often cheaper for one parent to stay home [when you include the costs of childcare, eating out/ordering in more often, clothes for your profession, gas, etc] but many Americans at least don't look at all the costs that go into it. I have more than one friend who has done the Mr. Mom thing for a year or longer and it's been wonderful for them. It's not for everyone.

I agree more should be done by many people - and not necessarily the government - for single moms but there also needs to be protections for those who take advantage of the system [and this may be - in part - what that documentary was talking about - those who continue to have more and more children in large part for the welfare check - not all are that way, but some are]. Someday I hope to be able to say, as Terry did, that we've been blessed enough to have the finances to help with rent or even provide shelter for a time.

Okay I said more than I meant and my head hurts worse than it did when I started this and I know I didn't touch anything resembling 'Jesus as a feminist' but those were a couple of things in one or more posts that I thought I could contribute on. No offense was meant by anything said [Elisabeth and others - you have my utmost respect for home schooling, but it's not for me - I was a certified teacher at one point but let it lapse as I don't use it, but I know me and my kids and at this point at least, it's not for us].

Okay - back to Christmas with my family!
Carol

Absolutely, Carol. But as I said to Terry, it was a number of things that made me think that the religious right looked antifeminist. Not just one documentary, but various articles and interviews in magazines like Time and Newsweek, to which I subscribed at the time. Of course, it is possible that Time and Newsweek actually wanted to discredit the religious right, and therefore they may systematically have published articles and statements that created an exaggerated or unbalanced view of the religious right. Again, as I said to Terry: those of you who live in the United States must know so much more about these things than I do. All I know is what the religious right looked like to me, when I viewed it from the outside, through filters like Time and Newsweek and TV documentaries like the one I alluded to.

Carol, believe me - I don't think that a woman is oppressed just because she has many kids and is a stay-at-home mom! It is only when such women (or religious leaders) tell their own daughters (or other girls and women) that it's a bad thing not to have many kids and be stay-at-home moms, that I think we are talking about oppression. A woman's own decision is her own decision. Oppression is when you have no choice, or when you will be harshly criticized or ostracized for your choice of life style.

Hope your headache is better now, Carol. A Merry Christmas to you.

Ann

Ann - I knew I shouldn't have posted when my head hurt so badly . All I originally meant to post was about the SoS series as an excellent example of SoS being taught in churches, though it still isn't in many churches. And it still was an excellent study:).

I must have misunderstood - I thought it was one documentary [which didn't sound like you - to base things on one source of information], but it wouldn't surprise me to hear that there was a systematic representation by TIME and others as the media TENDS [using serious generalizations here] to not like the religious right anyway. I don't remember much of the 1980s as far as that kind of thing goes [I was barely in HS at the end of them], so I could be wrong on that, but I know I've seen things fairly recently that professes to describe an entire segment of people that I KNOW is not accurate for large chunks of it so the same thing could have happened then too but I don't know.

You're right about oppression. I'm thinking I probably read into your statements some of what I hear regularly from my nonSAHM acquaintances and more than one family member. Why would I want to do that when I can be a 'productive' member of society? What's more productive than raising happy, healthy productive members of society? That's not to say things can't go wrong and heaven forbid one of them rebel and become a druggie drain on society or something but it won't be for lack of trying that's for sure!

Anyway - Merry Christmas late back at ya.
Carol [off to take care of kiddos and maybe look at that nagging little ficathon thing...]

Carol, I find this absolutely appalling! To me, this is a form of oppression all of its own. First of all, I'm quite taken aback that nowadays some people seem to think anything over two kids is a lot or too many. That seems a rather strange notion. But if this is what you and your husband want and you are happy - sod 'em, quite frankly.

As for the idea that by doing what you are you're not being a productive member of society...well, words fail me. All I can say to that is a big, fat

LabRat

LOL! Labby you are too funny .

Most people I know are supportive of the SAHM thing - but there are some who are not, including my FIL.

The fact that our families are not terribly supportive of the kids thing is what bothers me the most. I dreaded telling my dad that #3 was coming [especially so soon after #2 - that surprised us as well] - I was actually almost glad that we almost lost her very early so that I could open with 'You believe God's timing is perfect right?' [he was raised the son of an Assemblies of God preacher and is still very rigid and probably part of what perpetuates some beliefs of 'oppression' in some ways - my mom always worked but play poker for a $1 buy in? Have a drink ever? Not gonna happen.] It's like 'how is it going to affect me? I'm going to have to spend more on Christmas presents now that you have more kids - how dare you!' rather than wondering if it's the best decision for US. But at the same time - I know they wouldn't actually want to 'get rid of' one of said kids now that they're here. Of course we have 'our boy' now and must be ready to stop *looks for eye rolling smilie *. If we do stop, that won't be why. I'm still up for 1 or 2 more - DH may be another story though .

And at the same time - we've had several couples come up to us and offer their support - one in particular has 8 children and they've been wonderful .

Thank you for your thoughts Labby - you're the best!
Carol [who really doesn't mean to highjack]

Normally, I don't touch these topics with a ten foot pole for obvious reasons, but for some reason I felt like it today.

Ann, you seem to relish debate so I'm putting in my two cents here. I've struggled with many of the same issues that you've struggled with, but I really can't say I've been able to resolve them as completely as you seem to have. So, in the spirit of intelligent conversation, I just thought I'd add an alternate interpretation to this:

I honestly think you're giving God a bad rap here--and I use "he" to refer to God simply b/c it's shorter, not b/c I think "God" necessarily implies a gender. I read this completely opposite. This moment is where God explains the consequences of sin entering the world. So, when he says that man will rule over woman, he's not saying man SHOULD rule over woman but rather that he WOULD, because sin messed up the way things should be, and everyone would suffer as a result. Man will suffer from having to sweat from labour, woman from childbirth and her husband ruling over her.

Also, I do want to agree with Terry and add that the view you see of the so-called religious right outside the USA is not necessarily a fair one, because, especially lately, no one really knows who is considered "right." John McCain is "right" if you're a Democrat, but he's "left" if you're Republican. Hillary Clinton used to be "left," but now they're saying she's "moderate." I certainly can't figure out if I'm left, center...bogged down in the mire. Not to mention, I can say from personal experience that what you say to the media is rarely what actually shows up on a news program. It's ludicrous at best and infuriating at worst. Everyone suffers because of it. It's the beauty of free speech and the spin.

This to say, I do happen to agree with you that Jesus was a great "feminist," but I also agree with Terry that he wasn't just interested in feminism. When I read the Bible I see someone who was interested in people. Period. I do also agree that Jesus would be morally against abortion. But then again, he would also be against incest, rape, and irresponsible sex. And isn't that really the reason most abortions become desired in the first place? What I find most thought-provoking is whether he would be accepting of abortions given the fact that he knew the world was full of sin and, as a consequence, all those problems he stood against existed. Would it be "two wrongs don't make a right" or "every child a wanted child"? Would he be someone "idealistic" or "practical"? And can we even use those terms in this case?

If you read to here and thought I was the WORST mess of all sorts of sides of everything, you would be right. I like to ask questions nobody else wants to ask, and then try to answer them. In my defense, I've been bred to be this way. It's not my fault. :p

Sorry that I keep coming back to this, Terry. But the questions implied have been on my mind. Is it right to read the Bible to find out what it says about one single issue (in this case, what it says about women)? And is it right to even focus at all on what Jesus said about women, when it is clear that his main message was not about the treatment of women, but about his belief that the kingdom of heaven was coming, and people needed to repent to be allowed inside?

My answers are yes, and yes. And the reason for that is, quite simply, that I am a woman. And I am also a non-religious person.

Consider, Terry. All religions that I am the least bit familiar with tell people that they have to live in a certain way, and obey certain rules, in order to be rewarded in the next life, the life that will come when this life is over.

But. What if there is no next life? What if there is nothing when this life is over?

That is what I believe. I don't know that there is no next life, of course. There is no way that I can know such a thing. Therefore I may certainly be wrong about my belief that there is nothing after death. But please take my word for it when I say that I have not arrived at this belief lightly.

So when I look at religions, they often look like a set of (sometimes harsh) rules that have to be followed so that those who follow the rules can get a reward afterwards - a reward that I don't think exists.

What exists, according to my belief, is this life. And I think that this life can be made miserable if all people, or some people, are forced to live according to some very harsh rules. If those rules come with religions, then religions can ruin the only life we get.

As a woman, I have noted that practically all religions seem to demand submissiveness of women. Women are not allowed to choose their lives themselves, but instead first their fathers and then their husbands are to choose it for them. And if they are technically allowed to choose their lives for themselves, then at least they are supposed to choose a life of submissiveness. And if you want to create a fertile soil for oppression, then it seems to me that you couldn't do better than decree that some people have to be submissive, for their own good, and because God demands it. How can such people protest when you oppress them?

In the 1980s, also before I read the Bible to find out about its views on women, I heard a documentary on Swedish radio. It was an interview a Norwegian woman, Helen, who was married to a fundamentalist Christian man, Mikael. Helen was interviewed by a woman named Eva Lundgren, who had come into contact with Helen and talked her into letting herself be interviewed to explain what it was like to live with a husband who, according to Norwegian law, beat her up. Helen agreed to the interview because she wanted to explain to everyone that, yes, Mikael beat her, but he did it only to save her soul. Yes, because she was such a sinner, and he had to drive all the demons out of her. Because if he didn't liberate her of her demons, her soul couldn't be saved.

Helen explained how she had grown up in a “normal” home, which was not particularly religious, and then she had met Mikael who had promised to give her salvation and a wonderful new life with God. She had married him and followed him up to a remote village in Norway, where he lived with his congregation. Soon after she became pregnant he started beating her. He said that she was disobedient. She was defiant. She was full of demons. So he started beating her, and afterwards he sat her down on the couch and read to her all the passages from the Bible which demanded that a woman must be submissive and obey her husband. He also showed her passages saying that a man must love his wife, but he explained to her that a man showed his love for his wife by disciplining her, just like God disciplines those that he loves. Therefore Mikael had to discipline Helen by beating her. I have to quote, from memory, a part from Eva Lundgren's interview with Helen:

“How does Mikael discipline you?”

“Well… I may be ironing some clothes, and then Mikael comes into the room… and then he can just feel right then and there that I'm full of demons… so he pushes me, hard, so I fall down, and then he throws the iron at me… well, that is a typical situation.”

I also remember what Helen said about her and Mikael's love life:

“Mikael wants to do it every night… and I must always thank God before we start. I have to kneel down by the bed and thank God, so that I'm properly submissive… and then Mikael starts doing it. I… I… sometimes can't stand it, and sometimes I throw up afterwards. That just proves how defiant I am, so I understand that Mikael must discipline me… so when I've thrown up he presses my face down into the vomit. Once I… I longed so much for… well, for some other kind of togetherness… as a husband and wife, I mean… so I tried to help myself a little. I thought Mikael was asleep, but he woke up and saw what I did… he went into the bathroom and filled the tub with water, and then he took me into the bathroom and put me in the tub and held my head under the water… I thought I would die.”

Some years later, I saw an advertisement that Eva Lundgren, who had made this interview with Helen, was coming to the university of Lund, close to where I live, to give a lecture there. I went there to listen, and after the lecture, I asked Eva Lundgren quite a lot of questions about Helen and Mikael. Eva Lundgren told me that when Helen got very unhappy in her marriage, Mikael had taken her to the United States, where they had had some marriage therapy given by someone who was affiliated with a religious university. Helen was told by the therapist that her unhappiness in her marriage was caused by the fact that she was too defiant. She had to learn submissiveness, otherwise she could never be happy. And Mikael had to help her become submissive by being even stricter with her.

Eva Lundgren also said that after the interview with Helen had been aired on Norwegian radio, she had been contacted by angry members of Helen and Mikael's congregation.

“I can imagine they were angry,” I told Eva Lundgren. “I take it they insisted that what Helen had said on the radio was all lies.”

“Oh no, they didn't say that,” Eva Lundgren replied. “They didn't deny anything that Helen had said. No, they were angry because I had not made the radio listeners understand that Helen really was so full of demons that Mikael just had to treat her the way he did."

I understand – believe me, I do – that Mikael and Helen's case is an extreme one. After all, I grew up around religious people, and I never saw any signs of wife battery or any other signs of abuse. On the contrary, most of the marriages of the religious people I met seemed to be very happy ones.

But if you make the submissiveness of women a cornerstone of what Christianity is supposed to be, then you lay the foundations for more cases like Helen and Mikael. I really think you do.

As I said, I don't believe that there is life after death. If you believe that there is, and if the submissiveness of women is what it takes to get people, both men and women, to enter into the kingdom of heaven and live there in complete happiness for eternity in the life that comes after this one, then the oppression of women is a small price to pay for such a glorious reward.

But if there is no reward after death, then the oppression of women happened for nothing. The women suffered for nothing.

And who is to say that the oppression of women, or even the submissiveness of women, is so important? Who says that the kingdom of heaven is open only to those men who rule over their women, and to those women who obey their husbands? Jesus didn't say that. Jesus never said that.

Some Christian people seem to think that “family values” is the pinnacle of good morality. The way I understand “family values”, they seem to mean that women should devote their lives entirely to their husbands and children, and they should think of themselves purely as wives, mothers and housewives. No, please, I don't have anything against women who do this because they want to. I object to the implied pressure. If “family values” is the highest morality of a society, and if family values primarily means that a woman should devote herself fully to her family, then she isn't a good woman if she doesn't do that. Now that's the idea and the pressure that I object to.

And Jesus never said that a woman's job and station in life is to be a wife. He never said that! Never! He never talked about family values in the sense that a woman's place is in the home. He never said it! Never! And he never said that women must obey! In fact, when you read the Bible, you can see that Jesus interacts with a lot of women, but none of them are described as somebody's wife. In fact, all these women that Jesus interacts with seem to be more or less unattached to a man. And Jesus never says that they ought to go home and get married and stay at home and do wifely things.

So I think I'm entitled to asking why it is so important that women should get married, stay at home and obey their husbands in the name of Jesus Christ, when Jesus never said that women should do anything like that in the first place.

Ann

WOW...
what a thread...

while I admit that I have not read everything you guys wrote above... I just want to stress that paradoxically there is actually no dualist distinctions between being Christian and being a Feminist
although having not read 100% of the above post I apologise if someone has already said that

while I do not intend this post as any form of "Propaganda" and I am not going to put a lot of detail into my post... I want you to know that I do not come from an "ignorant" and "sheltered" background, my university studies include a lot to do with medical ethics etc. and as such I am well aware of any counter-arguments that you may throw at me...

I speak personally as a Roman Catholic who (at least tries to) follow all the teachings of the Church,
I emphasise that although my religious faith may "bias" me in some of your opinions, however in my opinion it does not bias me anymore than your beliefs do you, be it religious or athiestic... as westerner's we should all hold at least some semblance of similar values, in this I presume my reference back to the 1945 UN convention on Human Rights


What I do want to stress, however, is that to be a FEMINIST, all one really has to do is fight for "women's rights"


the definition of FEMINISM is what seems to be at stake....
where the boundaries for each feminist lie, as to positive and negative aspects of their causes, can be quite different (as different as myself and Ann for instance... hehe, not that I want to criticise her in any way)


there are many definitions of "Women's Rights" around...
including:
The RIGHT for women NOT to have their bodies violated through the trauma of abortion....-see UN on Medical treatments...

the RIGHT to BE BORN- when considering so many 1000s (millions???) of female babies aborted in China and other countries due to primarily their gender (Which incidentally enough is totally ignored by the family planning associations)


Now consider the Catholic Church's stance on contraception and consider this next RIGHT:

The RIGHT to have total control over their sexual lives
according to most popular formulations of feminism, one fundamental aspect to this is that of the right to have contraception and/or abortion on demand

however.....
In the eyes of many FEMINISTS (who may or may not be Catholic, it is besides the point now as long as they are arguing for the woman's rights) contraception (via the pill, mainly) on demand has lead to an attitude amongst men that it is almost the woman's responsibility to be taking contraception, that any failure of the method is the woman's fault, and hence abstaining themselves from any responsibility post intercourse...

this has lead to attitudes where it is EXPECTED of women to be already taking the pill, and hence if there is a pregnancy "Plausible deniability" could potentially be used (although not a legal excuse when it comes to child-care, one of our politician's favourite reasons...)

This means that women who want a relationship face considerable pressure to be on the pill, which has enormous volumes of evidence suggesting negative and harmful effects on the woman's health (not to be a scare mongerer, this is a whole other post to do with the politics of science and feminism see mainly the coalition on abortion and breast cancer who also have links to the pill and BC)

there are also relationship issues, where the pill has been linked to the rise in the divorce rates; as both the partners are often more willing to engage in intercourse pre-marriage due to lower fertility, hence they are supposedly more likely to be willing to engage in "active extramarital affairs" while still married...

there is also the "Pseudo rape" claim from a lot of feminists who argue that Viagra et al. create an environment where the women feel forced into encounters with their spouses, which they otherwise would not have, due to "lowered" risks and increased expectations.....


although it may not look like it from this post, which grew considerably larger than intended, I wanted this to be enlightening for you guys in that the definition of FEMINISM is what is really at stake....

so if the definition of FEMINISM is what seems to be at stake....
where the boundaries for each feminist lie, as to positive and negative aspects of their causes, can be quite different (as different as myself and Ann for instance... hehe, not that I want to criticise her in any way)

then I want to conclude that It is not an oxymoron to be a Christian/Catholic and to be a Feminist

Ann wrote:

No.

And here's why. What some people were complaining about was the (apparently) uniquely American phenomenon of "welfare mothers." This was (and still is) a woman who would get pregnant for the main purpose of receiving a larger welfare check from the Federal government. Not all mothers on welfare are "welfare mothers," but enough women at the time were using their reproductive organs to get free money to make this a national problem. These kids weren't unwanted, but it was a greedy kind of want, not a loving kind of want. And that has contributed to the spread of the gang problems we've had over the last few decades, also.

I don't think there are many welfare moms in Europe, partly because the welfare rules are different and partly because we're talking about two different cultures. The conservatives who so outraged Ann were not trying to make it hard for single mothers to raise their children, they were trying to reduce or even eliminate women from the welfare rolls who were popping out children as fast as they could for the main (or even the sole) purpose of getting a larger welfare allotment.

One thing that has been made clear in the past forty or more years, ever since President Lyndon Johnson (who succeeded Jack Kennedy in 1963) rolled out his "War On Poverty" is that people who are simply given all the tools to get out of poverty - money, nicer places to live, better schools - tend not to take advantage of these advantages. The percentage of families living in poverty in the US has remained roughly the same since then, no matter how much money has been thrown at the problem.

What has worked is identifying those who really want to change their economic level, allowing them to earn their way through school or vocational training or on-the-job skill enhancements, and guiding them through the process of learning how to provide for themselves more effectively. It doesn't always work, and it's certainly not the ultimate solution, but as long as there are people who refuse to take responsibility for their own improvement and their own upward climb, we in the US are going to have poor people who really don't have to be poor.

I hope this answers at least one of your concerns, Ann.

Capes wrote:

Sadly, no.

In 1987, the Alan Guttmacher Institute (a pro-abortion organization) collected data on the reasons women have abortions. Here is the result (respondents gave up to three reasons, so the percentages don't add up).

• Woman is concerned about how having a baby could change her life - 76 %
• Woman can't afford baby now - 68%
• Woman has problems with relationship or wants to avoid single parenthood - 51%
• Woman considers herself unready for responsibility of a child - 31%
• Woman doesn't want others to know she has had sex or is pregnant - 31%

Surveys taken since that time by other entities don't demonstrate remarkably different results.

Most of these reasons have to do with the comfort of the woman or her economic status. Few abortions are actually performed for the benefit of the child. In fact, one might argue that no abortion benefits the child.

The reasons given by those trying to justify abortion would carry more weight if women actually sought abortions for those reasons.

When I lived in Texas in the early 1990's, the state began a lottery. It was sold to the voters as a way to fund education, but its main supporters glossed over the fact that any profit from the lottery to the state would go into the general fund instead of directly into the education fund. When this was made apparent, many of the same voters who were so enthusiastic about bringing in the lottery "for the good of the children of our state" were quite angry. The justification for something so controversial was not so just after all.

In the same manner, abortion is often portrayed as one of the cures for social ills. Legal abortion has been touted as a way to reduce child abuse, lower the teen pregnancy rate, improve the status of those living in poverty, reduce the stress on couples or single women with little money, and reduce the number of abandoned children.

It has done none of these things. I agree that if abortion were done away with tomorrow these problems wouldn't go away, but abortion doesn't solve them either. The issues are far more complex than that.

I'm rather sorry that this has veered very off-topic, and the last posts have not at all discussed the main point that I wanted to raise, namely, whether Christianity, and therefore Jesus, wants morality to be established by controlling women's behaviour. Whether, in fact, immorality is caused by the fact that women's lives are not suitably controlled, and whether it is therefore a very serious moral problem that women are allowed to make their own decisions.

I want to ask you once again - if you want to discuss abortions specifically, please do so in a separate thread. Please ask yourself the following. Should morality be established and restored by making women submissive to men in our societies? Does immorality happen mostly because women make their own decisions? Should the blame for most of the ills of society be put chiefly on women? Should we concentrate our efforts to root out societal evils by controlling the behaviour of women? Would dissension, discord, poverty, unemployment, selfishness, laziness, anger, envy, greed and theft all go away, or at least become less serious, if women had to defer to the will of men? Would our societies in fact be qualitatively better and more moral if men ruled over women, the way God told Eve that Adam would rule over her? Is that the right way to achieve the best possible earthly righteousness and morality? Is that the best way to make people ready for the kingdom of heaven? And is that what Jesus would have taught?

Ann

Wait, so people have stepped out of the thread's established topic to talk about something that's important to them, but only tangentially related (at best) to what you were trying to talk about?

Well, we don't have any rules against thread drift here. There are boards that do, but I find that sort of thing oppressive and stifling, myself. Some of the best discussions come from a free-flowing conversation.

Still, I take your point. Sometimes, having a thread taken over can be irksome. Luckily, FoLCs are generally polite. Hopefully, they'll understand and respect your wishes.

The historical Jesus was just another charismatic cult leader who may have had political ambitions. (depends on how you interpret the history) Anyway, as our profs used to caution us: Beware The Whig interpretation of history!

But the baby Jesus story, although derivative of earlier religious mythologies and later reinterpreted by the Roman Catholic Church, is a very sweet story, imo.

c.

Ann demanded:

The suggestion that women's behavior is the cause of immorality is absurd on its face. There is no teaching in the Bible that morality is established by controlling the behavior of women or men or children or horses or dogs or any living creature.

One either meets the moral standard imposed by God or one does not. That moral code was not established in order to subjugate the female gender. It was established so that men and women could live in a peaceful society while honoring God as Lord.

Honestly, Ann, if you had stated your thesis this plainly at the beginning, we could have avoided using a lot of bandwidth. The answer to your stated question is "NO!" And the implication that Christians are dedicated to making women slaves to men is offensive to me. It simply isn't remotely true. And you should know better.

Carol wrote:

If Jesus was just another cult leader, why is the movement still around? What other "cult" has lasted for two millenia, has survived in every culture the world has seen in that time, and whose primary message is still being taught?

None. The primary message brought by Jesus was that He was the Son of God and that He came to save His people from their sins. The "Whig interpretation" is one written by the winner of the conflict, but Christians aren't a warrior people. There are no legitimate Christian organizations today dedicated to organized rebellion or violent rule or even armed defense. When Christians in the New Testament were threatened with persecution or even death, they chose one of two paths: leave or suffer. They never fought back against their persecutors. And they never made the enslavement of women one of their articles of faith.

And the story of the baby Jesus is not derived from earlier pagan religions. Those religions never prophesied about a virgin giving birth to a child in humble circumstances who would be the Son of God. Any such resemblances are subsequent to the fact of Jesus' birth, not preceding it.

If you want to complain about how people improperly use the Bible to justify their behavior, then we have common ground. If you want to object to people misusing Scripture to justify treating women as less important or less valuable than men, we have common ground.

But people aren't God. If I claim to be a Christian (and I do), then my actions should back up that assertion. That means that if I steal tips off tables in restaurants or I consistently drive in a reckless manner which endangers other drivers or if I'm deliberately insulting to my coworkers and acquaintances or if I sell illegal drugs in school playgrounds or if I beat my wife and children then I'm not behaving in a manner consistent with my profession of faith. And that would make me morally wrong.

But if you take the position that Christianity, at its core, treats women as less than human, you're wrong. Jesus did indeed treat women like human beings during His life. He did indeed ignore many societal rules and regulations in order to behave towards women as God would have all of us to behave. The apostle Paul wrote that in Christ there is no east or west, no Jew or Greek, no slave or master, no male or female. In Christ, all people are equal in God's sight. Each of us is just as big a sinner as the next person and as much in need of Jesus' sacrifice for our sins as the next person.

Ann, I hope I've answered the question you posed in a satisfactory manner.

As I said, Terry, it is clear that in the Old Testament evil often emanates from women. There's not only Adam and Eve, Samson and Delilah and Salome and John the Baptist, there is also, say, Solomon, whose mighty kingdom became weakened because Solomon was badly influenced by his many wives (I Kings 11:4). There is king Ahab, whose evil wife Jezebel is seen as one of the main reasons for the complete downfall of Israel. There are the Jewish men in Egypt, who allow their wives to make offerings to the "Queen of heaven", which means that they will lose favor with God forever. (Jeremiah 44:15-30). There is the story from Numbers 25, where women from Moab or Midian make Israeli men take part in wild heathen offerings and sexual excesses, and God punishes Israel by killing twenty-four thousand people.

And there is Ecclesiastes, who says that woman is more bitter than death (Ecclesiastes 7:25-29).

Remember, too, that Paul and others in the New Testament repeatedly tell women that they must obey their husbands.

When Christian Europe took up the fight against Satan in the 16th and 17th century by trying to root out Satan's servants during the witch hunts, about 80% of those who were killed for witchcraft were women. Was it pure coincidence that Christian Europe took it for granted that most of Satan's closest human associates were women?

As I said, when I watched what was reported about the religious right in the United States during the eighties, the reports mostly seemed to deal with efforts to control women's behaviour. Strong efforts were made to control women's sexuality, whereas, interestingly, seemingly nothing was done to make men's sexual behaviour more responsible. I never read anything about any big campaigns to admonish young men to be careful with their sexuality, to stay chaste or to use condoms, and to always shoulder their responsibility if they happened to make a girl pregnant after all. I never saw any Christian campaigns to make deadbeat dads pay their child support. I never saw any Christian campaigns to the effect that if a woman stays at home to take care of her and her husband's children, then half of her husband's income should automatically go into an account that is controlled exclusively by the wife. I never saw any Christian campaigns that men should be more loving and understanding husbands or more involved fathers. No, the campaigns I saw, that were reported in Europe, said that women and girls should be forbidden abortions, should have only restricted access to birth control, should not work outside the home, and should obey their husbands. And remember the Christian marriage therapist that Mikael and Helen from Norway saw in the United States. This therapist told Helen, the battered and abused wife, that her problems could only be solved if she became even more obedient and submissive!

Terry, can you seriously say that there is nothing in the Bible which suggests that women's behaviour is the cause of immorality and evil? And can you seriously say that Christian people, now and in the past, have not repeatedly acted as if women's behaviour is the cause of immorality (and evil)?

Ann

2 questions above:

1. Islam, Bhuddhism

2. The Whig Interpretation of history: - the tendency to interpret the events of the past in terns of contemporary values. It arose from the tendency of British historians to look for the seeds of British liberalism when studying the past rather than putting events in the context of the times in which those events occurred. While I suppose you could see liberals as the "winner" of the historical process at that point, I'm not sure you would call them "warriors".

Onward Christian Soldiers.

There seems to be some similarity between the story of Mary's birthing the "son of god" and earlier stories of Isis. But of course the New Testament gives us the story in the framework of a different time period. Btw historical Jesus was probably born in our April, but the early Catholic Church found it useful to merge the story of Jesus's birth with pagan year end celebrations.

Happy Saturnalia, everyone

Have now alienated all believers in god plus the American Right. I'm sorry.

I must add that I do respect people's need to believe in the irrational. Above all that is a tribute to hope and imagination. And maybe it's hope that leads us each to our own truth

c.