• pt.
• 1. Comments on Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.--pt.
• 2. Comments on the Old and New Testaments from Joshua to Revelation.

The majority of essays in this collection discuss biblical narratives that mention particular women: Hannah, Martha, Mary, Mary of Clopas, Michal, Susanna, the Syrophenician Woman, the Samaritan Woman, Tamar, and others. In each case the discussion takes a different aspect: for example, the chauvinism of recent Bible translations, the place of Cynic philosophy in first century Palestine, the problem of the work ethic, the questioning of Jesus' attitude to women, and early Christian missionary activity. Other essays discuss methodological issues: the inheritance of the daughters of Zelophehad is assessed from the perspective of social anthropology; the significance of the femininity of "wisdom" is analyzed with historical critical rigour; the parables of the lost are examined from the point of view of post-modernist feminism; and the logic of the passages about women in Paul's correpondence with Corinth is reconsidered.
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• Introduction: Discovering biblical women in Early Modern literary culture - Victoria Brownlee and Laura Gallagher PART I: Women and feminine archetypes of the Old Testament
• 2. Overview: reading Old Testament women in Early Modern England, 1550-1700 - Victoria Brownlee and Laura Gallagher
• 3. A 'Paraditian Creature': Eve and her unsuspecting garden in seventeenth century literature - Elizabeth Hodgson
• 4. Christian liberty and female rule: exegesis and political controversy in the 1550s - Adrian Streete
• 5. Wives, fears and foreskins: Early Modern reproach of Zipporah and Michal - Michele Osherow
• 6. The politics of female supplication in the Book of Esther - Alison Thorne
• 7. Gender and the inculcation of virtue: the Book of Proverbs in action - Danielle Clarke PART II: Women and feminine archetypes of the New Testament
• 8. Overview: reading New Testament women in Early Modern England, 1550-1700 - Victoria Brownlee and Laura Gallagher
• 9. Christ's tears and maternal cannibalism in Early Modern London - Beatrice Groves
• 10. Mary of recusants and reform: literary memory and defloration - Thomas Rist
• 11. Stabat mater dolorosa: imagining Mary's grief at the cross - Laura Gallagher
• 12. St Helena of Britain in the land of the Magdalene: all's well that ends well - Lisa Hopkins
• 13. Imagining the enemy: protestant readings of the whore of babylon in Early Modern England, c.1580-1625 - Victoria Brownlee
• 14. Afterword - Dympna Callaghan Index.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

At once pervasive and marginal, appealing and repellent, exemplary and atypical, the women of the Bible provoke an assortment of readings across early modern literature. Biblical women in early modern literary culture, 1550-1700 draws attention to the complex ways in which biblical women's narratives could be reimagined for a variety of rhetorical and religious purposes. Considering a confessionally diverse range of writers, working across a variety of genres, this volume reveals how women from the Old and New Testaments exhibit an ideological power that frequently exceeds, both in scope and substance, their associated scriptural records. The essays explore how the Bible's women are fluidly negotiated and diversely redeployed to offer (conflicting) comment on issues including female authority, speech and sexuality, and in discussions of doctrine, confessional politics, exploration and grief. As it explores the rich ideological currency of the Bible's women in early modern culture, this volume demonstrates that the Bible's women are persistently difficult to evade.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

Biblische Frauen spielen eine bedeutende Rolle in verschiedenen Genres patristischen Schrifttums und in rabbinischen Texten: Etwa als Vorbilder fur Frauen, manchmal auch fur Manner, als Reprasentantinnen bestimmter Tugenden oder Laster, als Autoritaten in Streitfragen, als Ausgangspunkt fur bestimmte Praktiken. Die Bilder, die die (fast immer mannlichen) Autoren von den biblischen Frauen zeichnen, spiegeln stets den zeitgenossischen sozialen, kulturellen und religiosen Kontext wider, besonders im Hinblick auf weit verbreitete antike Vorstellungen uber Frauen und uber das Verhaltnis der Geschlechter zueinander. Der Sammelband fragt nach der Prasenz und Sichtbarkeit bzw. Horbarkeit und nach dem Bild biblischer Frauen in den spatantiken Texten. Er enthalt Beitrage zu Rahab, zur agyptischen Frau des Salomo, zur Geliebten des Hoheliedes, zu Judit, den vier Tochtern des Philippus und den Myrophoren der Evangelien, die Salben zu Jesu Grab bringen, und untersucht die Rezeption dieser biblischen Frauen in verschiedenen patristischen und rabbinischen Texten.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• Introduction and methodology
• Women in Judaism and the Greco-Roman world
• The infancy narratives (Luke 1:5--2:52)
• Galilean ministry (Luke 3:1--9:50)
• Travel narrative (Luke 9:51--19:28)
• Jerusalem narrative (Luke 19:29--24:53)
• The purpose and structure of Acts
• The birth of the Church (Acts 1--2)
• The Church in Jerusalem (Acts 3--12)
• The Church in the Greco-Roman world (Acts 13--28)
• Summary and conclusions.

"Luke-Acts contains many and diverse female characters, many of whom play significant roles in the unfolding drama of God's plan of salvation through Jesus and the early church. Women followers of Jesus are fully-fledged disciples who prove to be reliable and insightful, participating in God's mission at all levels. They act as interpreters of salvation history, God's prophetic mouthpieces, witnesses to the resurrection, proclaimers and teachers of the gospel, and patrons and leaders of the early church. At the heart of this narratival exposure lies a particular theology of women. This narratival presentation and theology is rich and quite remarkable given the socio-religious climate in which Luke wrote. An appreciation of this "narratival theology" is important not only for a well-rounded understanding of Luke-Acts, but as a vital part of the variegated witness of the New Testament regarding the role of women in God's new community"--Provided by publisher.

• Preface--
• 1. Getting in Focus: Reading with Feminist Lenses--
• 2. Those Riotous-Yet Righteous-Foremothers of Jesus: Exploring-- Matthew's Comic Genealogy--
• 3. Shall We Dance?: Women Leading Men in Mark 5-7--
• 4. "You Just Don't Understand!" (or Do You?): Jesus, Women, and-- Conversation in the Fourth Gospel--
• 5. Passions and Passion: The 'Loose' Woman, Lady Wisdom, and the-- Lukan Jesus--
• 6. Out of Mind, Out of Voice: Slave-Girls and Prophetic Daughters in-- Luke-Acts--
• 7. Women of 'the Cloth' in Acts: Sewing the Word of God-- Index.
• (source: Nielsen Book Data)

The women in Jesus' life are a raucous and rowdy bunch, including "riotous" foremothers, "loose women, " and "distressed daughters of Israel." Reading these new ways of interpreting women in the Gospels, male New Testament scholars have discovered liberating perspectives. In seven scintillating studies, Spencer explores among others the genealogy of Matthew's Gospel to discover the riotous yet righteous nature of Jesus' foremothers, slave girls and prophetic daughters in Luke-Acts, and women leading men in the Gospel of Mark 5-7. Scott Spencer, a virtuoso young New Testament scholar, provides his own lively forays into reading the Gospels through women's eyes. He shows what it is like for a man to read stories about the women in Jesus' life from a new perspective. Spencer is an able and inventive scholar whose broad-ranging insights and engaging style make his work very accessible.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

• The true witness
• Excursus: the "Virgin Mother" in Christian typology
• "The woman" and the women addressed as "Woman" in John
• Excursus: life and death in John
• The woman and the garden
• Our present and future life.

Was Jesus ever married? Yes, indeed, says Addison Hodges Hart, who boldly asserts that the church's tradition has always regarded Jesus as "married" - but not in the way that recent sensationalist writers have claimed. Rather, Christ is "the Bridegroom" of "the Woman" in John's Gospel. In this book Hart explores John's rich, poetic imagery, particularly the metaphorical significance of "the Woman, " embodied and imaged by Mary the mother of Jesus, the Samaritan woman, and Mary Magdalene. Hart shows what this image reveals about salvation, personal holiness, and the church as a whole. Inspired himself by the writings of early church fathers and medieval theologians, Hart presents John's Gospel as an incarnational, sacramental text and shows that it is primarily a revelation of salvation, deeply mystical and intended to lead its readers into a living relationship with the One who is the Bridegroom of his people. ADVANCED PRAISE: "The best books are short and deep, and The Woman, the Hour, and the Garden is just such a book...With the help of Christian art and piety Hart shows that 'woman' is an icon of the gathered community, which leads to the bold conclusion that Christ is indeed married and has taken a bride, the church. This is a book for meditation, to be read slowly with the text of the Gospel in hand." - Robert Louis Wilken, University of Virginia.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)

Engaging feminist hermeneutics and philosophy in addition to more traditional methods of biblical study, Salty Wives, Spirited Mothers, and Savvy Widows demonstrates and celebrates the remarkable capability and ingenuity of several women in the Gospel of Luke. While recent studies have exposed women's limited opportunities for ministry in Luke, Scott Spencer pulls the pendulum back from a negative feminist-critical pole toward a more constructive center. Granting that Luke sends somewhat "mixed messages" about women's work and status as Jesus' disciples, Spencer analyzes such women as Mary, Elizabeth, Joanna, Martha and Mary, and the infamous yet intriguing wife of Lot -- whom Jesus exhorts his followers to "remember" -- as well as the unrelentingly persistent women characters in Jesus' parables.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)