Christ’s Emancipation of Women in the New Testament

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Jesus Christ: The Ennobler of Women and the Family Liberating Women and Ennobling the Family Women in the New Testament

By Lynne Wilson Jesus Christ’s treatment of New Testament women is revolutionary in its restoration of women’s dignity and the sacred nature of marriage and family.

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During His ministry, Jesus Christ restored sight to the blind and mobility to the lame. He restored the higher law of love and forgiveness. He restored Melchizedek Priesthood authority to act in God’s name. Yet one of the most important things Jesus Christ restored is rarely discussed: He restored the sacred nature of the family and marriage by re-­‐establishing a noble image of women and children.

Jesus Christ made a dramatic and empowering change to the roles and relationships of women, especially within the customs of segregation, communication, responsibilities, dress, and witness.

Segregation

Jewish pharisaic traditions taught men and women to stay physically segregated.1 Women were seen as a cause of temptation, so they were veiled, silenced, and kept away from men as much as possible.2 This segregation of women had been accepted for centuries as the social norm at the time of the New Testament. As one historian described it, women and girls were “confined at home as in a prison.”3 Inside wealthy Pharisee and Sadducee homes,4 “[women] were always kept in seclusion, and unmarried daughters were limited to the women’s quarter. Women, for modesty’s sake, shunned the eyes of men—even their closest relatives.”5 If a male guest came for a meal, the women and girls were not to eat at the same table, but could silently interact with the company as a servant.6 Synagogue worship was also segregated.7 While men were commanded to attend their Sabbath worship services, women were not. If a woman chose to go to the synagogue, she sat separately and silently. Women did not read the Scriptures, give their opinion, teach, or pray verbally during the service.8 Though women were segregated in hopes of keeping them chaste, this precaution was mainly to protect the public reputation of the father.9 In the city,

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Jewish women were discouraged from even going outside in order to avoid being seen by men.

Though a more relaxed attitude about gender separation existed in the rural

parts of Palestine, women were still inhibited in their ability to contribute within the community, to serve outside of the home, to join in public worship, and to access education.10 In contrast to Jewish custom, Jesus Christ choose not to live by these segregating restrictions, thereby restoring women’s place and value within family and marriage. This is beautifully illustrated in three synoptic Gospels on a crowded street in Galilee (Matthew 9:19-­‐22; Mark 5:24-­‐34; Luke 8:43-­‐48). A throng of people was accompanying Jesus to the home of Jairus, a ruler of the synagogue, to heal Jairus’s daughter. En route, an “unclean” woman tries to touch Jesus to receive His healing virtue. This woman was labeled “unclean” because, for over a decade, she had an “issue of a blood.”11 Socially this meant, for the past twelve years, the Mosaic law forbade her from going out in public, touching anyone, worshipping in the synagogue or temple, or sharing her husband’s bed (Leviticus 15:19-­‐28). As a result of her condition, her husband had probably divorced her (Deuteronomy 24:1).12 Since physical disabilities were seen as the consequence of sin, so at least some of her neighbors and family had probably rejected her.13 The Gospel of Mark also included that she was destitute after spending all her money on medical help (Mark 5:26).

Yet this faith-­‐filled woman sought healing from the Lord: “If I may touch but his clothes, I shall be whole” (Matthew 9:21; Mark 5:28). To do so, she broke the segregation protocol and went outside, hiding herself among those following Jesus.

When she touched the hem of His tunic, Jesus immediately felt “virtue” or more literally, “power” leave him (Luke 8:46). This moment led to her healing socially and emotionally as well. It took amazing bravery for the woman to answer Jesus’s direct question, “Who touched me?” (Mark 5:31).

“When the woman saw that she was not hid, she came trembling, and falling down before him, she declared unto him before all the people for what cause she had touched him, and how she was healed immediately” (Luke 8:47). Jesus offered no reproach for her breaching social propriety—instead he praised the depth of her faith: “Your faith has brought you salvation” (Luke 8:47, ABT). In this poignant story, Jesus set a new standard for the way all women should be treated.

Communication

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As a result of gender segregation, men and women did not directly communicate with each other. Jewish men were instructed, “Talk not much with womankind,” even his own wife.14 Wives were only to take counsel from their husbands, not to give it. They believed that Adam was cursed in the Garden of Eden, “Because he weakly submitted to the counsel of his wife.”15 Equally extreme, a renowned Rabbi Joshua claimed that any girl or woman found speaking to a man in the street was guilty of breaking the law of chastity unless there was evidence to the contrary.16 Regardless, speaking with the opposite gender was avoided for fear it might lead to adultery!”17 Jesus Christ rejected this lack of communication by speaking with women often, showing the importance of women’s voices in any situation, and especially within marriage and family. In Bethany, he spoke directly with both Mary and Martha (Luke 10:42). In Galilee, He called to a crippled woman and spoke healing words to her (Luke 13:12).

In Jericho, He conversed with Salome, the mother of James and John (Matthew 20:21). In Jerusalem, on the road to Golgotha, He comforted the crying women, “Daughters of Jerusalem, weep not for me” (Luke 23:28). Over and over again, Jesus’ example cut through layers of silence to offer dignity and deference to women.

The longest recorded conversation that Jesus had with a woman is His encounter in Samaria with the woman at the well (John 4:7-­‐28). As Jesus rested alone near Jacob’s well, “a Samaritan woman came to draw water, [and] Jesus said to her, ‘Give me to drink.’” (John 4:7). This was an unusual request because a religious Jew would never eat anything touched by someone ritually “unclean,” especially a Samaritan.

John’s record includes the woman’s astonishment at Jesus’s breach of social rules.18 The woman correctly asked Him, “How is it that thou, being a Jew, askest drink of me, which am a woman of Samaria?” (John 4:9). Jesus’s behavior disregarded Judaic social norms: He spoke to a woman, He spoke to a Samaritan, and He asked to drink water from an unclean pot.

Yet, Jesus had higher motives in mind than simply quenching His thirst. (John 4:14). Jesus wanted to free her from her spiritual bondage. So He taught her that He could provide her with living water (John 4:10) and divulged His knowledge of her five divorces, and the fact that she currently was living in sin. She, in turn, humbly acknowledged, “I perceive that thou art a prophet” (John 4:19).

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Her response after such a humiliating disclosure from a complete stranger shows the humble condition of her heart. Rather than feeling defensive or running away, the woman acknowledged Jesus as a prophet.

She then said, “I know that Messias cometh, which is called Christ: when he is come, he will tell us all things. Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am He” (John 4:25-­‐26). This bold declaration stands in contrast to the many times in the Gospels when the Lord limited what He divulged due to the skepticism of His audience (Mark 13:4; Luke 20:2-­‐8; 22:67; John 3:10-­‐12; 3 Nephi 17:2; etc.). But here He forthrightly communicated with a woman (in particular, a sinning Samaritan woman), honoring her with great insight. This became the earliest scriptural reference where John’s Gospel announced Jesus’ Messiahship.

John’s description of what happened next offers profound symbolism: she left her water pot. Her pot can be seen as emblematic of the cares of the world, her old life, and her old source of sustenance. She left it all behind for her new life that led her to share the living water.

Responsibilities

The most important duty of Jewish women at the time was to bear and raise children. Bearing children was so crucial that if a wife were barren for ten years, her husband had a religious obligation to divorce her.19 But even with its importance, raising children was often seen as a menial task on par with other household tasks.

A Jewess’s household responsibilities are enumerated in the Mishnah as the “duties which a wife must perform for her husband” and included “grinding flour and baking bread, washing clothes and cooking food, nursing her child, making his bed and working in wool.”20 Without slaves or children it fell to a wife to wash her husband’s face, hands and feet, and “prepare his cup.”21 22

A wife was also subservient to her husband, which was emphasized by Jews referring to a wife as her husband’s property.23 Jesus Christ elevated and expanded women’s responsibilities by allowing women to engage with spiritual things. By prioritizing spiritual learning over physical tasks, Christ taught that there is more to caring for oneself and one’s family than completing menial duties. And by never referring to women as possessions, Christ gave women an equal place within their marriage and their family, as well as a part in their and their family’s spiritual welfare. (Matthew 9:22; 15:28; Mark 14:6; Luke 13:12; John 4:4-­‐21; 8:10; etc.).

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The Gospel of John tells us that Jesus “loved Martha, and her sister, and Lazarus” (11:5). When He went to their home in Bethany, He noticed that Martha was frustrated with her sister’s lack of help. Even if Martha had servants, her workload was huge.

From the perspective of most law-­‐abiding Jews, Martha’s sister Mary was out of line to sit at Jesus’ feet and learn from Him. Not only did Mary neglect her responsibilities, but she was also speaking to a male guest, and it appears that she delved into areas of learning The Law, both of which were forbidden to women.

Some rabbis taught that if a woman spoke with a man other than her husband, it was cause for a divorce.24 Other rabbis taught, “If a man gives his daughter a knowledge of The Law it is as though he taught her lechery.”25 On the other hand, Martha acted as an upright Jewess preparing the meal and home for her honored guest, Jesus. She asked Him to correct her errant sister: “Lord, dost thou not care that my sister hath left me to serve alone? bid her therefore that she help me” (Luke 10:40).

To that ancient society, Jesus’ response would have been utterly shocking: “Martha, Martha, thou art careful and troubled about many things: But one thing is needful: and Mary hath chosen that good part, which shall not be taken away from her” (Luke 10:41-­‐42). Jesus’ support of Mary’s behavior was a revolutionary endorsement of female spiritual engagement, learning and communication.

At that time everything a girl or woman earned or found legally belonged to her male guardian.26 A female had no claim on anything tangible—including her children, who were the property of their father.27 A female did not even have ownership of her own life: her father or husband could sell her into slavery.28 With this as background, we find even more meaning in the Lord’s promise that her relationship with Him—and her knowledge—could not be taken away.

In addition to the benefits of educating women, this story validated male and female interaction. Jesus’ example indicated that it was acceptable for women to participate in the world of the mind and of the spirit, and not exclusively in traditional domestic tasks.

Dress

In the Jewish world, strict modesty was necessary in order to communicate one’s chastity.29 Even though the Old Testament did not require it, the Jewish society of the late Second Temple era (20 BC to AD 70) required a married Jewess to be completely covered outside her home.30 If she did not entirely drape herself,31

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her husband could divorce her and not have to pay for the marriage contract fee. If a Jewess uncovered her head in public, it was interpreted as a sign of rejecting God: “You have departed from the way of the daughters of Israel, whose habit it is to have their heads covered, and you have walked in the ways of idolatrous women who walk about with their heads uncovered.”32 The veiling was so extensive that on one occasion, a chief priest in Jerusalem did not even recognize his own mother as the person in front of him being tried for adultery.33 Outside of the city, the dress code differed slightly.34 This is one reason why Jews in the city looked down upon their less pious kinsmen in the country.35 It was

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not practical for women in the country to wear such extensive wrappings because many farmers needed their wives’ and children’s help in the fields, and it would have severely impeded their productivity.

By ignoring the regulations of the Jewish dress code, Jesus Christ taught that

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repentance, the desires of one’s heart, and purity to God, marriage, and family are what matter to the Lord. The rigor of the Jewish dress code provides an interesting backdrop for the story in Luke about the woman who washed Jesus’ feet with her hair. Given that women were to be covered in public settings, one can better understand the shock of Jesus’s host when an uninvited woman approached Jesus and unbound her hair (Luke 7:36-­‐50). Instead of condemning the woman, Jesus acknowledged her thoughtfulness, humility, love, and faith as she wiped His feet with her hair. More astonishing, when the Pharisaic host questioned Jesus’s morals for allowing an uncovered woman to touch Him,36 Jesus condemned the host (Luke 7:44-­‐46).

I entered into thine house, thou gavest me no water for my feet: but she hath washed my feet with tears, and wiped them with the hairs of her head. Thou gavest me no kiss: but this woman since the time I came in hath not ceased to kiss my feet.

My head with oil thou didst not anoint: but this woman hath anointed my feet with ointment.

According to Luke’s record, Jesus pointed out that the host had neglected to offer his traveling guests the opportunity to wash upon arrival. Decorum dictated that, at the very least, hosts provide basins of water for their guests; in more polite settings, the host assigned a servant or child to do the menial task of washing the guests’ feet.

Foot care was such a filthy job that it was often delegated to slaves.37 In their

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homes, children often had the assignment to wash their fathers’ feet each day.38 In washing Jesus’s feet with her own hair, this woman entered into the role of “servant” or “child” of Christ.

This act of submission to Jesus was a demonstration of her repentant heart, and Christ freely forgave her: “Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much” (Luke 7:47). His acceptance of her showed that He accepted social outcasts and rejected restrictive social norms for women.

Witness

Jewish magistrates did not allow women to act as legal or official witnesses in a court of law.39 Jewish law formally silenced a woman’s legal testimony because men did not think that women could be trusted.

Even outside of a court of law, some rabbis would not trust a woman’s word without additional proof. On a maiden’s wedding night, she had to produce various “tokens of virginity” because “we may not rely on her word, but she must be presumed to have been trampled of man unless she can bring proof for her words.”40 It seems that woman were guilty until proven innocent.

Jesus Christ showed that women were of value and demonstrated the equality and trust that should be present in marriage and family by validating women’s judgment and integrity and by having women witness of Him. Beginning with the birth narratives, we see God authorizing women as witnesses: the priestess

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Elisabeth, the mother Mary, and the prophetess Anna (Luke 1:41-­‐45; 1:46-­‐55; 2:36-­‐

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38).

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Perhaps the clearest witness of Jesus’s divinity during His ministry came from Martha. When Jesus asked her if she believed that He had power over death, she said, “Yea, Lord I believe that thou art the Christ [Messiah], the Son of God, which should come into the world” (John 11:27). Her vibrant testimony shines as a second witness beside Peter’s in Caesarea Philippi, voicing almost the same words (see Matthew 16:16).

Each of the Gospel writers documented that devout women remained beside Jesus at His cross and at the tomb (Matthew 27:55-­‐56, 61; 28:1; Mark 15:40-­‐41; 16:1; Luke 23:55-­‐56; 24:1-­‐10; John 19:25; 20:1). They also emphasized that these women were the first witnesses of the resurrection. Unfortunately, the social prejudice against women as reliable witnesses also affected the apostles. Initially they did not believe the women who ran from the empty tomb with the angel’s message that Jesus had risen (Matthew 28:5-­‐6): “their words seemed to them as idle tales, and

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they believed them not” (Luke 24:11).

Fortunately, Peter and John were curious enough to see for themselves. After the two men saw the empty tomb they returned to “their own home” (John 20:10).

But Mary Magdalene could not leave yet; she stood next to the tomb weeping when the resurrected Lord appeared to her. How beautiful and empowering that Jesus chose a woman as His first witness of the miraculous resurrection!

This act alone demonstrates Jesus’ veneration of women. Combined with the other female witnesses of Jesus’ birth, ministry, death, and resurrection, we see the Lord championing women with opportunities and power.

Conclusion

As decisively as He cleansed the temple, Jesus defied the cultural falsehoods and harmful traditions that surrounded Jewish family life. Whether for the woman with the issue of blood, the woman at the well, Mary and Martha, or the many other women Jesus Christ interacted with, He made radical changes that restored women to a place of value with eternal potential. Christ sowed new spiritual and social seeds like healthy gender interaction, communication, opportunity, standards, and trust that had the potential to provide a loving, nurturing, healthy family life. From the time of Jesus’ birth to His death on Calvary, Jesus Christ elevated women and children to a place of dignity, and in doing so He taught us that the family is sacred and everyone has a valued place within it.

Notes

1. John H. Elliott, Anchor Bible: 1 Peter (New York City, NY: Random House-­‐ Doubleday, 1964), 568.

2. Geoffrey W. Bromiley, International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, B.L. Bandstra and A.D. Verhey, “Sex,” 4. 431.

3. Skolnik, Encyclopedia Judaica, 21:161.

4. Philo, Philo’s Flaccus, 70.

5. Philo of Alexandria, Pieter Willem van der Horst, trans., Philo’s Flaccus: The First Pogrom (Boston, MA: Brill, 2003), 70.

6. Leonard J. Swidler, Jesus was a Feminist: What the Gospels Reveal about His Revolutionary Perspective (Landham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2007), 76. John Baggett, Seeing Through the Eyes of Jesus: His Revolutionary View of Reality and His Transcendent Significance for Faith (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2008), 128.

7. Michael Avi-­‐Yonah, “Synagogue Historical Roots,” Skolnik, Encyclopedia Judaica, 19.

8. Mishnah, Kiddushin, 4:13. Dan W. Clanton, The Good, the Bold, and the Beautiful (New York, NY: T & T Clark International, 2006), 23.

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9. Ben Sira, Ecclesiasticus, 42:11. Mishnah, Ketuboth 1:10.

10. Ben Sira, Ecclesiasticus, 26:14-­‐15.

11. Julie Smith, “A Redemptive Reading of Mark 5:25-­‐34,” Interpreter (2015).

12. Mishnah Gittin, 9.10; Yebamoth, 14.1.

13. Job 20:11; Exodus 20:5; John 9:2. See footnotes 591, 592, 593 in this book.

14. Mishnah, Avoth 1:5.

15. Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, I.1.4.

16. Mishnah, Ketuboth 1:8.

17. Babylonian Talmud, Nedarim. 20a.

18. For more information on the return from Babylon, see appendix 1.

19. See chapter 6 of this book under “Divorce.”

20. Mishnah, Ketuboth, 5:5.

21. Ken Campbell, ed., Marriage and Family in the Biblical World (Downers Grove, IL: Inter-­‐Varsity Press, 2003), 232.

22. Ben Sira, Ecclesiasticus, 44-­‐50. M. Jack Suggs, Katharine Doob Sakenfeld, James R. Mueller, eds., The Oxford Study Bible: Revised English Bible with the Apocrypha, 2nd Ed. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992).

23. Ibid., 36:26. “A headstrong wife is regarded as a dog.”—see page 28.

24. Mishnah, Ketuboth 1:8. See chapter 6.

25. Mishnah, Sotah, 3.4. Wirtherington, Women and the Genesis of Christianity, 7.

26. Witherington, Women and the Genesis of Christianity, 4.

27. Beryl Rawson, ed., The Family in Ancient Rome: New Perspectives (Ithica, NY: Cornell University Press, 1987), 36. See chapter 6 of this book.

28. Mishnah, Ketuboth, 3.8.

29. Judith Lynn Sebesta, Larissa Bonfante, The World of Roman Costume (Madison, WI: University Press, 2001), 8.

30. Skolnik, Encyclopedia Judaica, 21.161.

31. Judith Lynn Sebesta, Larissa Bonfante, The World of Roman Costume (Madison, WI: University Press, 2001), 155, 186. Also see chapter 6 of this book on “Divorce.”

32. Sebesta and Bonfante, The World of Roman Costume, 186.

33. Jeremias, Jerusalem, 359.

34. Sebesta and Bonfante, The World of Roman Costume, 186.

35. Jeremias, Jerusalem, 362.

36. Craig Keener, 1–2 Corinthians (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005), 92.

37. John 15:15; Luke 1:38. See chapter 8.

38. See chapter 7.

39. Josephus, Antiquities, IV.8:15. Encyclopedia Judaica, 21.161. Jewish Women A Comprehensive Historical Encyclopedia, Tal Ilan, “Post-­‐Biblical and Rabbinic Women,” jwa.org/encyclopedia.

40. Mishnah, Ketuboth 1.7 also 1.6.

Based on Lynne Wilson’s recently published book Christ’s Emancipation of Women in the New Testament.

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