Holy Misogyny: Why the Sex and Gender Conflicts in the Early Church Still Matter

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Overview

Shows how the 'female' was systematically erased from the Christian tradition and explores surprising early Christian attitudes to sex, sin and women.

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Overview

Shows how the 'female' was systematically erased from the Christian tradition and explores surprising early Christian attitudes to sex, sin and women.

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Editorial Reviews

Library Journal
DeConick (Isla Carroll & Percy E. Turner Professor of Biblical Studies, Rice Univ.; The Thirteenth Apostle: What the Gospel of Judas Really Says) begins her new book by briefly tracing the hints of a "lady God" in the Hebrew scriptures, noting a few echoes in the Wisdom literature, the Kabbalah, and elsewhere, before her disappearance altogether. The author then notes similar trends in Christianity, beginning with Jesus's call of female disciples—a departure from Jewish tradition and practice—to increasing restrictions upon female leadership as the early church developed. She articulates clearly the progressive degradation—partly under the influence of Roman culture—of women's bodies and women's leadership in the second and third centuries C.E. She then demonstrates how views of women have influenced Christian Trinitarian doctrine, polity, and subsequent Christian history even into the 21st century. VERDICT Highly recommended for readers willing to look at recent archaeological evidence to question traditional religious beliefs and conclusions.—Carolyn M. Craft, formerly with Longwood Univ., Farmville, VA
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Product Details

  • ISBN-13: 9780826405616
  • Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
  • Publication date: 9/22/2011
  • Edition number: 1
  • Pages: 200
  • Sales rank: 696,118
  • Product dimensions: 5.70 (w) x 8.60 (h) x 0.80 (d)

Meet the Author

April D. DeConick is the Isla Carroll and Percy E. Turner Professor of Biblical Studies in the Department of Religious Studies at Rice University (Houston, Texas).  She specializes in early Christian history and theology, noncanonical Gospels, and gnostic and mystical traditions.  Her books include Seek to See Him: Ascent and Vision Mysticism in the Gospel of Thomas (1996); Voices of the Mystics: Early Christian Discourse in the Gospels of John and Thomas and Other Ancient Christian Literature (Sheffield Academic, 2001); Recovering the Original Gospel of Thomas: A History of the Gospel and Its Growth (T. & T. Clark, 2005); and The Original Gospel of Thomas in Translation, with Commentary and New English Translation of the Complete Gospel (T. & T. Clark, 2006) and The Thirteenth Apostle: what the Gospel of Judas really says (Continuum, 2007).  She has also edited the collection of papers, Paradise Now: Essays on Early Jewish and Christian Mysticism (SBL, 2006).

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Table of Contents

Introduction    A Lady God?

Chapter 1    Where did God the Mother Go?
        The Jewish Spirit
        The Angel Sophia
        A Hebrew Goddess
       The Recovery of God’s Wife
Chapter 2    Why was the Spirit Neutered?
        Introducing Jesus’ True Mother
        Carried up Mount Tabor
        In the Name of the Mother Spirit
        Born from the Womb of Water
        Milking the Breasts of God
        The Mother’s Erasure
        God’s Gender Crisis
Chapter 3    Did Jesus Think Sex is a Sin?
        A Double Message
        Sex Limits
        Sex according to Jesus
        A Women’s Advocate      
Chapter 4    Did Paul Hate Women?
        The burgeoning of chastity
        To veil or not to veil
        Vanishing women
Chapter 5    Is Marriage a Sin?
        Rereading Genesis
        The Devil made me do it
        In defiance of the Creator
        It’s the end of the world
Chapter 6    Is Marriage Salvation?
        Sacred Sex
        The Law is a joke
        Soul Collectors
Chapter 7     Once a Woman, Always a Woman?
        The Church is a household
        Brides of Christ
        The Devil’s Gateway
Chapter 8    How do we Solve a Problem Like Maria?
        Mary caught in the crossfire
        The Male Mary
        The Sexual Mary
        The Apostolic Mary
Chapter 9    Because the Bible Tells Us So?

Further Reading Notes

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  • Posted March 7, 2012

    Excellent. An important work not only for scholars but for lay p

    Excellent. An important work not only for scholars but for lay persons seeking to understand the history of women's role in the early church -- an especially critical issue in light of the continued degradation of women in the religious sphere under the guise of fealty to proper tradition.

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