Polly’s Reviews > Women Talking > Status Update

(Translator's note: There is no medicine for Agata in the colony, other than either and the veterinarian spray, belladonna, used to knock out cows and horses--the same spray used on the girls and women of Molotschna.)

But not biblically speaking, says Mejal.
We can't read, says Salome, so how are we to know
what is in the Bible?
You are being difficult, says Mejal. We have been told
what is in the Bible.
Yes, says Salome, by Peters and the elders and by our
husbands.
Right, says Mejal. And by our sons.

Yes, says Mejal. But I have one further question I'd
like to raise. It has to do with the Biblical exhortation that women obey and submit to their husbands. How, if we are to remain good wives, she says, can we leave our men? Is it not disobedient to do so?
Our first and more pressing duty, says Salome, is to
our children, to their safety.
But not biblically speaking, says Mejal.

Yes, says Mejal. But I have one further question I'd
like to raise. It has to do with the Biblical exhortation that women obey and submit to their husbands. How, if we are to remain good wives, she says, can we leave our men? Is it not disobedient to do so?
Our first and more pressing duty, says Salome, is to
our children, to their safety.
But not biblically speaking, says Mejal.

Unless heaven is part of a dream, says Ona. Or unless dreams are illogical.
Well, that they are, says Agata.
I don't know, says On a, perhaps they are the most logical experience we can ever have.

Ona is a ghost to him, or less, because of her Narfa, her spinsterdom, and her burgeoning belly.

"Nothing is so firmly believed as that which a man knoweth least "

vote on our excommunications, to speak at the burials of our own babies while we remain silent, to interpret the Bible for us, to lead us in worship, to punish us! We are not members, Mariche, we are commodities

The entire colony of Molotschna is built on the foundation of patriarchy[...]where the women live out their days as mute, submissive and obedient servants. Animals. Fourteen-year-old boys are expected to give us orders, to determine our dates, to

In Molotschna luck does not exist. It is a sin to believe in luck. It is shameful to cry. All is God's will, nothing is left to chance in God's creation.