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Jewish Women's History in the Roman Period: a Task for Christian Theology

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 June 2011

Bernadette J. Brooten
Affiliation:
Harvard Divinity School

Extract

As a teacher, as a scholar, as a dean, and as a churchman, Krister Stendahl has worked for decades to further Jewish-Christian relations and to promote women's studies and women. It is out of gratitude to him that I present these theses, which I see as a continuation of his work.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © President and Fellows of Harvard College 1986

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References

1 See Wahlberg, Rachel Conrad, Jesus and the Freed Woman (New York: Paulist, 1978)Google Scholar; Mollenkott, Virginia Ramey, Women, Men and the Bible (Nashville: Abingdon, 1977)Google Scholar; Wahlberg, Rachel Conrad, Jesus According to a Woman (New York: Paulist, 1975)Google Scholar; Faxon, Alicia Craig, Women and Jesus (Philadelphia: United Church, 1973).Google Scholar On this and the following points I have not attempted to give exhaustive references, but rather only examples.

2 See Jewett, Robert, “The Sexual Liberation of the Apostle Paul,” JAARSup 47 (1979) 5587Google Scholar, and the literature cited there; Swidler, Leonard, Biblical Affirmations of Woman (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1979)Google Scholar; Graham, Ronald W., “Women in the Pauline Churches: A Review Article,” Lexington Theological Quarterly 12 (1976) 2534Google Scholar; Swidler, Leonard, Women in Judaism: The Status of Women in Formative Judaism (Metuchen, NJ: Scarecrow, 1976)Google Scholar; Scroggs, Robin, “Paul and the Eschatological Woman: Revisited,” JAAR 42 (1974) 532–37Google Scholar; idem, “Paul and the Eschatological Woman,” JAAR 40 (1972) 283303.Google Scholar

3 On the debate on Jewish women's right to divorce in antiquity see Brooten, Bernadette, “Konnten Frauen im alten Judentum die Scheidung betreiben? Überlegungen zu Mk 10,11–12 und 1 Kor 7,10–11,” EvTh 42 (1982) 6580Google Scholar; Schweizer, Eduard, “Scheidungsrecht der jüdischen Frau? Weibliche Jünger Jesu?” EvTh 42 (1982) 294300Google Scholar, esp. 294–97; Weder, Hans, “Perspektive der Frauen?” EvTh 43 (1983) 175–78Google Scholar; Brooten, Bernadette J., “Zur Debatte über das Scheidungsrecht der jüdischen Frau,” EvTh 43 (1983) 466–78.Google Scholar

4 See Longstaff, T. R. W., “The Ordination of Women: A Biblical Perspective,” ATR 57 (1975) 316–27Google Scholar; Adinolfi, Marco, “Il silenzio della donna in 1 Cor. 14,33b–36,” BeO 19 (1975) 121–28.Google Scholar

5 Crouch, James E., The Origin and Intention of the Colossian Haustafel (FRLANT 109; Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1972) 160.Google Scholar Ronald W. Graham notes how scholars have explained and defended Paul: “A distinction can and should be drawn between what is of the everlasting order of things, e.g., ‘male and female’ (Gal. 3:28) and what is the product of history and therefore, given time, can and should be changed, e.g., ‘wives, be subject to your husbands’ (Col. 3:18)” (“Women in the Pauline Churches,” 34).

6 Robert Jewett proposes as possible influences on the sexual liberation of Paul (1) Roman influence, given the relative freedom and emancipation of Roman women; (2) the Apostolic Conference with its move away from the Jewish Law; (3) an androgyny campaign in Corinth during the time of the Corinthian correspondence (“Sexual Liberation of Paul,” 75–76).

7 See Kraemer, Ross S., “Bibliography: Women in the Religions of the Greco-Roman World,” Religious Studies Review 9 (1983) 127–39Google Scholar, esp. 130.

8 See Plaskow, Judith, “Christian Feminism and Anti-Judaism,” Cross Currents 28 (1978) 306–9Google Scholar, reprinted as “Blaming the Jews for the Birth of Patriarchy,” Lilith 7, 11–13, and in Beck, Evelyn Torton, ed., Nice Jewish Girls: A Lesbian Anthology (Watertown, MA: Persephone, 1982) 250–54Google Scholar; Brooten, Bernadette J., Jüdinnen zur Zeit Jesu: Ein Plädoyer für Differenzierung,” ThQ 161 (1981) 281–85.Google Scholar

9 Fiorenza, Elisabeth Schüssler, In Memory of Her: A Feminist Theological Reconstruction of Christian Origins (New York: Crossroad, 1983) esp. 160204Google Scholar; idem, “Word, Spirit and Power: Women in Early Christian Communities,” in Ruether, Rosemary and McLaughlin, Eleanor, eds., Women of Spirit: Female Leadership in the Jewish and Christian Traditions (New York: Simon and Schuster, 1979) 2970Google Scholar; idem, “Women in the Pre-Pauline and Pauline Churches,” USQR 33 (1978) 153–66Google Scholar; Gryson, Roger, The Ministry of Women in the Early Church (trans. Jean Laporte and Mary Louise Hall; Collegeville, MN: Liturgical, 1976).Google Scholar

10 See Wilkinson, John, Egeria's Travels to the Holy Land (Jerusalem: Ariel, 1981)Google Scholar; Wilson-Kastner, Patricia, et al., A Lost Tradition: Women Writers of the Early Church (Washington, DC: University, 1981)Google Scholar; Clark, Elizabeth A. and Hatch, Diane F., The Golden Bough, The Oaken Cross: The Virgilian Cento of Faltonia Betitia Proba (AARTS 5; Chico: Scholars Press, 1981).Google Scholar

11 See Brooten, Bernadette J., Women Leaders in the Ancient Synagogue: Inscriptional Evidence and Background Issues (BJS 36; Chico: Scholars Press, 1982)Google Scholar; Cohen, Shaye J. D., “Women in the Synagogues of Antiquity,” Conservative Judaism 34:2 (1980) 2329.Google Scholar

12 Philo describes the therapeutrides and therapeutai, ascetics who devoted their lives to the study of the Torah, in De vita contemplativa. See also Brooten, Women Leaders, 94–95; Goodblatt, David, “The Beruriah Traditions,” JJS 26 (1975) 6885.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

13 Stanton, Elizabeth Cady, The Woman's Bible (18951898; reprinted New York: Arno, 1972).Google Scholar

14 Plaskow, “Blaming the Jews,” in Nice Jewish Girls, 253.

15 For an analysis of the framework that led to the invisibility of the postbiblical history of Jewish men, see Langmuir, Gaven I., “Majority History and Post-Biblical Jews,” Journal of the History of Ideas 27 (1966) 343–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

16 See Brooten, Women Leaders, 144–47. Ross S. Kraemer is currently working on a longer study of this topic. She has presented preliminary results of her research at the Society of Biblical Literature Annual Meeting, Dallas, December 1983 and at the Sixth Berkshire Conference on the History of Women, Smith College, June 1984.

17 On Ross S. Kraemer, see n. 16. The larger scope of her research is women in Greek-speaking Jewish communities in antiquity. Umansky, Ellen M., Lily Montagu and the Advancement of Liberal Judaism: From Vision to Vocation (Studies in Women and Religion 12; New York: Mellen, 1983)Google Scholar; a collection of Montagu's sermons edited by Umansky is forthcoming; Kaplan, Marion A., The Jewish Feminist Movement in Germany: The Campaigns of the Jüdischer Frauenbund, 1904–1938 (Westport, CT: Greenwood, 1979)Google Scholar; Baum, Charlotte, Hyman, Paula, and Michel, Sonya, The Jewish Woman in America (New York: Dial, 1975).Google Scholar

18 For such analyses, see Heschel, Susannah, ed., On Being a Jewish Feminist: A Reader (New York: Schocken, 1983)Google Scholar; Beck, Nice Jewish Girls; Greenberg, Blu, On Women and Judaism: A View from Tradition (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society, 1981)Google Scholar; Lacks, Roslyn, Women and Judaism: Myth, History, and Struggle (New York: Doubleday, 1980)Google Scholar; Koltun, Liz, ed., The Jewish Woman: New Perspectives (New York: Schocken, 1976)Google Scholar; Priesand, Sally, Judaism and the New Woman (New York: Behrman, 1975)Google Scholar; and also Hamelsdorf, Ora and Adelsberg, Sandra, Jewish Woman and Jewish Law: A Bibliography (Fresh Meadows, NY: Biblio, 1980)Google Scholar; Cantor, Aviva, ed., On the Jewish Woman: A Comparative and Annotated Listing of Works Published 1900–1979 (Fresh Meadows, NY: Biblio, 1979).Google Scholar

19 Initial reports appeared in 1962: Yadin, Yigael, “Expedition D—The Cave of the Letters,” IEJ 12 (1962) 227–57Google Scholar; Polotsky, H. J., “The Greek Papyri from the Cave of the Letters,” IEJ 12 (1962) 258–62.Google Scholar See also idem, “Šlwš tʿwdwt mʾ rkywnh šl bbth bt šm ʿwn,” E. L. Sukenik Memorial Volume (1899–1953), Eretz-Israel 8 (1967) 4651Google Scholar; Fitzmyer, Joseph A. and Harrington, Daniel J., A Manual of Palestinian Aramaic Texts (BibOr 34; Rome: Biblical Institute, 1978) 162–63Google Scholar, 217 (nos. 61–63); BAR 7:4 (1981) 12.

20 See Kraemer, “Women in the Religions,” esp. 131–33.

21 For discussion of further issues of Jewish-Christian feminist dialogue, see McCauley, Deborah and Daum, Annette, “Jewish-Christian Feminist Dialogue: A Wholistic Vision,” USQR 38 (1983) 147–90.Google Scholar