Feminine Threads

Women in the Tapestry of Christian History

Diana Lynn Severance

• Publisher: Christian Focus Publication
• Year: 2012
• eBook ISBN: 9781845509842

The New Testament Era:
One in Christ Jesus

Galatians 3:28

A history of women in Christianity must begin with those women who were part of the earliest church – the women we find in the New Testament record. The role and position of women recorded in the Gospels and the rest of the New Testament provide the foundation for the study of women throughout the history of the Christian Church. The New Testament contains not only historical accounts of women in the early Church but also includes instruction as to the role and position of women in the Church.

Women were an integral part of Jesus’ life and ministry as described in all four Gospels and were integral to the Church, which arose after His ascension. For example, Luke’s two-volume work on the life of Jesus and the early Church, the books of Luke and Acts found in the New Testament, includes references to at least 67 women from a variety of ethnic backgrounds, social classes, and economic positions.

Jesus’ Genealogy

Women, of course, had an important role in Jesus’ ancestry and birth. Five women are especially named or mentioned in the genealogy of Jesus that opens the New Testament and Matthew’s Gospel - Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, Bathsheba, and Mary.^[1]Interestingly, the first three of these women were Gentiles or non-Jewish women, and three of the five were known for their immorality. Tamar was a Canaanite widow who played the part of a prostitute to seduce her father-in-law Judah, compelling him to protect her and provide her with children. Rahab had been a prostitute before she came to worship the God of Israel. Ruth was a Moabitess who also came to worship the God of Israel and married into Boaz’s family in Bethlehem. Bathsheba was the wife of a Hittite and committed adultery with King David, later becoming the mother of Solomon, the greatest King of Israel. Whatever social, moral, or racial stigmas these women once faced, they are part of Jesus’ genealogical record. From positions of disgrace they were elevated to places of usefulness and honor.

Mary, the Mother of Jesus

Mary, the last of the women mentioned in Jesus’ genealogy and the mother of Jesus, obviously is important to any account of the history of women in the Church. It is necessary, however, to distinguish the historical Mary of the Scripture from the legendary Mary of later centuries. Several things can be learned about this most important Christian woman by carefully reading the texts that refer to Mary in the Gospels. Mary is shown to be a woman of faith and obedience. When the angel made his announcement to Mary that she would conceive and bear a son, Mary believed this word from God and submitted to this promise. She knew that bearing a child was impossible via the normal means of conception; yet, God had spoken, and with God she could believe the impossible.^[2] Mary was thoroughly acquainted with the Scriptures and humbly accepted the angel’s announcement to her as the long-hoped-for fulfillment of centuries of prophecies of a coming Seed, a Messiah, who would bring blessing to all nations.^[3] The very personal praise to God spoken by Mary when she met Elizabeth contained over twenty quotes or allusions to specific Scriptures:

My soul magnifies the Lord,
and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,

for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant,
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;

for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.

And his mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.

He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;

he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
and exalted those of humble estate;

he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent empty away.

He has helped his servant Israel,
In remembrance of his mercy,

as he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and to his offspring forever.^[4]

In the ensuing events surrounding Jesus’ birth, the Gospel writers showed Mary to be a woman of humility and faith in God’s power, goodness, and the truth of His Word. Mary not only knew God’s Word, but she meditated on the events brought into her life and how God might be working in them^[5].

Before the angel had come to Mary with the announcement of the special child she would bear by the power of the Holy Spirit, Mary had been betrothed to Joseph. Joseph too was a man of faith who was able to accept God’s revelation to him about Mary’s child. He agreed to marry her, becoming the legal, though not the natural, father of the child he was told to name ‘Jesus,’ meaning ‘Savior,’ for He would ‘save His people from their sins.’^[6] After the birth of Jesus, Mary’s firstborn, Mary and Joseph together had at least six other children – four boys and an unspecified number of daughters.^[7] Perhaps Mary became consumed by the affairs of her growing family; perhaps the ordinariness of life caused her to no longer meditate on God’s Word or His ways as much as she did when she was younger. At any rate, there are several scenes in the Gospel record that indicate Mary had difficulty understanding God’s ways or trusting His direction as readily as she did at Jesus’ birth. She still had to learn about God’s timing and purposes. When Jesus was twelve years old, she was amazed to find Jesus discussing theology with the Jewish scholars in the temple. She did not understand Jesus’ statement that He needed to be about His Father’s business.^[8] Had twelve years with the very human child Jesus dulled her awareness of His divine origin, nature, and purpose? Yet, eighteen years later, at the marriage feast in Cana, Jesus gently admonished His mother for rushing him into a public position before the time was right, saying, ‘Woman, what does this have to do with me? My hour has not yet come.’^[9].

The Gospels do not show Mary regularly following Jesus in His earthly ministry. Perhaps she was in Nazareth caring for her younger children. Joseph apparently had died, and Mary was living in a town that rejected Jesus’ teaching and His claim to be the Messiah. The people of Nazareth even tried to throw Jesus off the cliff near the town.^[10] Mary’s other children followed the skepticism of the town and did not believe in Jesus during His years of ministry. Surrounded by skepticism and unbelief, Mary joined her children in trying to draw Jesus away from the crowds following Him, afraid people would think He was crazy because of His words and works. After all, hadn’t John the Baptist lost his head because of his forthright speech? Jesus implicitly rebuked His mother and His natural family for their lack of faith, claiming His true family consisted of those who believed in the Word of God and did it.^[11]

Yet, Mary remained at the foot of the cross when all the disciples fled. The angel had told Joseph over thirty years before that Jesus was born to ‘save the people from their sins.’ At the cross Mary saw the fulfillment of the angel’s word from God. In almost the last scene of Mary in Scripture, she is at the cross where her eldest son not only provided for her spiritual salvation, but provided for her physically by giving her into the care of the apostle John.^[12]

After Jesus’ resurrection, Jesus’ half-brothers came to faith in Him as well. Mary and her sons were among those who gathered with the apostles in the Upper Room for prayer. Mary was obedient to her Son, as she had been obedient to God’s earlier words to her through Gabriel, and remained in prayer with the other disciples in Jerusalem, awaiting the promised Holy Spirit, who had first come upon her in such a special way when she was yet a maid.^[13]

In Scripture, Mary is last seen meeting in prayer with the disciples and other believers. In the fourth century, a legendary Mary began to receive adulations and devotion. Some extra-Biblical works, such as the second-century Protevangelium of James, elevated Mary’s purity to the point of sinlessness. In these works, Mary was described as sinless from the time of her conception and ever a virgin, even after giving birth to Jesus.^[14] Such fictitious accretions to accounts of Mary’s life and person, however, should not obscure or devalue the historical Mary, part of the earliest Church in Jerusalem and the recipient of salvation from the Son to whom she had given birth. Though Mary’s faith was sometimes clouded, she was a woman of simple faith and obedience, strong in Scripture.

Mary Magdalene – Fact and Fiction

After Mary, the mother of Jesus, the woman most frequently named in the Gospels was Mary Magdalene. She was one of six Marys among Jesus’ female disciples, and she is mentioned twelve times in the Gospels. To distinguish her from the other Marys, she is called after the name of her native town – the fishing village of Magdala, on the western shore of the Sea of Galilee. At one time she was possessed of seven demons, but Jesus healed her (Mark 16:9). Mary became His faithful follower, joining the group of women who helped finance Jesus’ ministry (Luke 8:1-3). She was in Jerusalem for the Last Passover and remained with Jesus’ mother and other women at the crucifixion (Matt. 27:56; 28:1; Mark 15:40; Luke 23:55).

Mary was also with the women who came the following Sunday to properly prepare Jesus’ body for burial, and she was the first to see the risen Lord. (John 20:1, 16-18). Her obedience to go and tell the disciples that Christ was risen gained her the title ‘apostle to the apostles.’

The third-century writer Hippolytus identified Mary Magdalene with Mary of Bethany, Lazarus’ sister, and with the sinner at Jesus’ feet in Luke 7:37-50. In a series of powerful sermons preached in 591, Pope Gregory I combined the three women into one Mary Magdalene and also described her as a prostitute, causing many to equate her with the woman caught in adultery in John 8:1-11. The depiction of Mary Magdalene in art followed this blending and showed her as a weeping, penitent prostitute. The English word ‘Maudlin’, meaning weakly and sentimental, is derived from this picture of ‘Magdalene.’ Though the Western church blended the women in these Scriptural passages into one, the Greek Church always distinguished between Mary of Bethany, Mary Magdalene, and the sinner of Luke 7. In 1969, the Vatican also formally recognized the identities of the three as separate.

A second or third-century Gnostic writing called the Gospel of Mary depicted Mary as the recipient of secret knowledge from Jesus. The description of Mary’s vision of the soul ascending through the various cosmic powers was typical of Gnostic thinking. Andrew and Peter confronted Mary, challenging her authority as a woman, but Levi intervened to substantiate her authority. Based on the Gospel of Mary, several feminist scholars claim that Mary Magdalene was an apostle, and indeed was the ‘disciple whom Jesus loved.’ Some have even claimed Mary wrote the fourth Gospel attributed to John. In their reconstruction of history, these scholars contend the early Church was really led by women, who later lost a gender struggle over control of the Church. Once the men gained authority, they supplanted such works as the Gospel of Mary with their own version of the gospel, which is what is found in the Bible. Such fanciful reconstructions ignore the evidence for the authenticity of the New Testament and are driven more by the personal agendas and creative imaginations of the writers than the evidence.

Jesus’ Treatment of Women

Throughout Jesus’ earthly ministry, women were among His followers, learning from His teachings and being healed and transformed by His miracles. As Jesus went through the cities and villages preaching the Kingdom of God, Luke wrote that ‘the twelve were with Him, and certain women.’ These women were described specifically as having been healed by Jesus either from evil spirits, such as Mary Magdalene out of whom Jesus cast demons, or from physical infirmities, such as Susanna and Johanna, the wife of Herod Antipas’ steward. Many other unnamed women provided ‘from their substance’ to support Jesus’ ministry.^[15]

While the Jewish rabbis of the day often had a demeaning view of women, refusing to speak to or even greet a woman, Jesus included women in His teaching and counted them among His friends. It was to a woman that Jesus first clearly revealed that He was the long-anticipated Messiah of Israel – and to a Samaritan, a woman of mixed Gentile and Jewish ancestry.^[16] It was the offering of a poor widow that Jesus held up as an example and praised to His disciples.^[17]

Jesus’ friendship with Lazarus of Bethany embraced the friendship of his sisters Mary and Martha as well. Mary was always described as learning at Jesus’ feet, as a disciple learning from a rabbi. Not only did Jesus praise her learning, but He rebuked her sister Martha for being consumed with work and not choosing to learn as Mary did. When Mary came and anointed Jesus’ feet shortly before His death, Jesus commended her and said she was anointing Him for His burial. Of all Jesus’ followers, she alone seems to have understood Jesus’ words about His coming suffering and death.^[18]

Many of Jesus’ miracles recorded in the Gospels involved women, and undoubtedly there were other unrecorded women miraculously touched by Jesus. The miracles recorded included Jesus raising the son of the widow of Nain, healing the woman crippled for 18 years, healing Peter’s mother-in-law, raising Jairus’ daughter, healing the woman with an issue of blood, and healing the daughter of the Syrophoenician woman.^[19]

Jesus’ parables also included references t...

Table of contents

• Reviews
• Title
• Indicia
• Tribute
• Contents
• Preface
• Note to the reader
• 1. The New Testament Era
• 2. Christian Women in the Early Church
• 3. Christian Women in Late Antiquity
• 4. Christian Women in the Early Middle Ages
• 5. Christian Women in the Late Middle Ages
• 6. Women in the Early Protestant Reformation
• 7. Christian Women in the Counter-Reformation and the English Reformation
• 8. Heiresses of the Reformation
• 9. Reform and Revival
• 10. A Benevolent Society
• 11. Victorian Women
• 12. At the End of Two Millennia
• Bibliography
• Christian Focus