Daughters of Eve on IWD
INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S DAY AND WOMEN OF FAITH
On International Women’s Day it is very appropriate that our latest book – 'Daughters of Eve' (Lion Hudson, Oxford) – is about to be published (19 March). Women play an immensely important role in the Bible: from Eve to the Virgin Mary, Sarah to Mary Magdalene, Deborah to the woman who met Jesus at the well, Queen Esther to the woman suffering severe menstrual bleeding who was healed by Jesus. Women played an important role in the band of disciples; they were at the cross when the men had fled; and were the witnesses to the Resurrection which is the foundation of Christian faith. Then there are the women leaders in the early church, who are ‘hidden in plain sight’ in the letters of Paul, but are often overlooked. They are a sisterhood of faith.
As such, they challenge many of our assumptions about the role of women in the development of the biblical story; about the impact of faith on lives lived in the ‘heat and dust’ of the real world. In the book we meet the prostitute who ended up in the genealogy of Jesus; a national resistance fighter; a victim of male sexual behaviour who went on to challenge patriarchal power; a far from meek-and-mild mother of Jesus; and a woman whose life has been so misrepresented that she is now the subject of the most bizarre conspiracy theories, and more.
The latter woman was MARY MAGDALENE – and she exemplifies how later traditions have often distorted or obscured the lives of these women, despite how they are actually presented in scripture. In the New Testament there is not the slightest hint of sexual misconduct on her part. Yet, later (male-orientated) traditions conflated her with two other, completely different, women mentioned in the gospels in order to present her as a prostitute. That was before the second-century gnostic gospels took the story down a completely different path and gave the impression she might have been married to Jesus! Not a shred of first-century evidence exists to corroborate this claim. But from that claim has come the most bizarre and long-lived conspiracy theories, leading to famous books and films. The reality was that we know very little about Mary Magdalene, except that she must have been a truly remarkable woman. So well-known to contemporaries that she features in the gospels as a key witness of both Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection, the real Mary Magdalene deserves recognition and celebration. And her reputation needs liberation from the fog of misrepresentation that has swirled around her for 2000 years.
Writing this book was like meeting these remarkable women afresh.
We hope that those who read the book will be equally intrigued, challenged and encouraged by these women of faith; these Daughters of Eve.
On International Women’s Day it is very appropriate that our latest book – 'Daughters of Eve' (Lion Hudson, Oxford) – is about to be published (19 March). Women play an immensely important role in the Bible: from Eve to the Virgin Mary, Sarah to Mary Magdalene, Deborah to the woman who met Jesus at the well, Queen Esther to the woman suffering severe menstrual bleeding who was healed by Jesus. Women played an important role in the band of disciples; they were at the cross when the men had fled; and were the witnesses to the Resurrection which is the foundation of Christian faith. Then there are the women leaders in the early church, who are ‘hidden in plain sight’ in the letters of Paul, but are often overlooked. They are a sisterhood of faith.
As such, they challenge many of our assumptions about the role of women in the development of the biblical story; about the impact of faith on lives lived in the ‘heat and dust’ of the real world. In the book we meet the prostitute who ended up in the genealogy of Jesus; a national resistance fighter; a victim of male sexual behaviour who went on to challenge patriarchal power; a far from meek-and-mild mother of Jesus; and a woman whose life has been so misrepresented that she is now the subject of the most bizarre conspiracy theories, and more.
The latter woman was MARY MAGDALENE – and she exemplifies how later traditions have often distorted or obscured the lives of these women, despite how they are actually presented in scripture. In the New Testament there is not the slightest hint of sexual misconduct on her part. Yet, later (male-orientated) traditions conflated her with two other, completely different, women mentioned in the gospels in order to present her as a prostitute. That was before the second-century gnostic gospels took the story down a completely different path and gave the impression she might have been married to Jesus! Not a shred of first-century evidence exists to corroborate this claim. But from that claim has come the most bizarre and long-lived conspiracy theories, leading to famous books and films. The reality was that we know very little about Mary Magdalene, except that she must have been a truly remarkable woman. So well-known to contemporaries that she features in the gospels as a key witness of both Jesus’ crucifixion and resurrection, the real Mary Magdalene deserves recognition and celebration. And her reputation needs liberation from the fog of misrepresentation that has swirled around her for 2000 years.
Writing this book was like meeting these remarkable women afresh.
We hope that those who read the book will be equally intrigued, challenged and encouraged by these women of faith; these Daughters of Eve.
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