This meme is easy. There are so many women scholars who have influenced me that I can quickly write over a dozen. These are not in any particular order. They all have influenced me in different areas of my work.
1. Matilda Gage
2. Elizabeth Cady Stanton
3. Rachel Elior
4. Jane Schaberg
5. Elizabeth Fiorenza
6. Daphna Arbel
7. Phyllis Trible
8. Rosemary Ruether
9. Holly Hearon
10. Elaine Pagels
11. Karen King
12. Anne McGuire
13. Elizabeth Clark
14. Virgina Burrus
15. Elizabeth Castelli
16. Madeleine Scopello
17. Ann Graham Brock
11 comments:
Wonderful. Thank you. I will post mine tonight. But I am so glad that you included Elaine Pagels and Karen King. There is something about their personal stories that have been very touching for me.
What about Mary? We have left her out. A revolutionary and a virgin. Never the mother of anybody. But made into a mother of Jesus by male Flavian 'historians'. This was what women were supposed to do. Have children and keep out of religion/politics, really just politics. Our Flavian historians pulled a fast-one on women, and our biblical scholars have swallowed it down the centuries.
Never mind that Mary was a virgin, stayed a virgin, and died a virgin. She was filled with the Spirit. A prophetess. She joined the prophets. A real character, and fiesty.
She came from a well-to-do background, and was probably a high priest's daughter. Ananias seems a good bet. She had been promised in marriage to the high priest Joseph, Caiaphus that is. But she left Joseph for the prophets. When the leaders of the prophets were banished by the high priest from Jerusalem, they travelled to Rome, and Mary went with them.
Geoff:
Where the hell do you get this stuff? You repeatedly make the wildest assertions as if you are certain they are facts, and you never give any evidence for these wild flights. I don't believe the Bible represents literal history, but you seem to have created a parallel fantasy. I don't doubt there are editors that distorted the original books of the bible, but you act as if you were looking over their shoulders and know exactly what they changed and when.
Hey, you know what? Mary actually won the right to vote for Roman women and murdered Caligula and took over his throne. As a Jew to boot! But she was deposed by Nero, who secretly was her nephew. This was all laid out in a book by Josephus' older brother before his works were edited by the early ancestors of Rupert Murdoch.
If you don't believe the bible represents literal history, what do you believe? That Mary went to Rome with James I support from Acts 1 and 2. The large house they were in that would hold 120 people (Acts 1:15) was not the sort of house one would expect to find in Jerusalem. "Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind and filled the whole house where they were sitting". They weren't "sitting" they were staying. (Acts 1:13). There were Jews present from a wide variety of nations. Such a large house was exactly the type of tenemented building found in Rome. This was the house of James, not Judas (Acts 9:11). He had rented or bought a house, and Mary was there with him. (Acts 1:14). The leaders of the prophets had been banished from Jerusalem. (Ant.18.3.5).
If you want more I will give you more.
Geoff,
The meme is about women *scholars* who have been influential. Mary doesn't count because she's never published anything. :-)
Also, most women who have been influenced by Mary will tell you that because of the way she has been portrayed by the church, her influence has been largely negative. It's only as they've been able to get out from under Mary's influence that they've been able to differentiate themselves from doormats.
The post was an excuse. On Sunday there was a TV programme which included a public discussion of Mary, with Germaine Greer, the ex archbishop of Canterbury (I forget his name) and a Catholic priest (I forget his name too). There was no-one present who could put a real alternative to the view that Mary was the mother of Jesus. This of course included some Muslims who believe in Mary as a mother of Jesus, but not a virgin. I am staggered how people can be so brainwashed, but then I was too. Mary's virginity was because she was a prophetess - she was filled with the holy Spirit.
Geoff, nothing you say in your 9/7 3:06 a.m. post is evidence for your previous assertions about Mary.
That is a matter of opinion.
The story about Paulina and Mundus was a Flavian garbled story about Mary and her worship in the Spirit in the sanctuary. Mundus never existed. He was invented to shame Paulina (Mary) - yet more denigration of women. (Ant.18.3.4)
Mary the prophetess was a key character.
Back to the intent of this thread, and to keep it from being hijacked any further, I really enjoy the following women bloggers/scholars, not previously mentioned:
1. Margaret Barker - OT scholar, Methodist preacher in Englan
2. Margaret Young - who is working great stuff in the LDS arena on race and women in Mormonism
3. Sarah (Sally) Barringer Gordon - really good writings regarding historical laws and how they relate to various religions
4. Jan Shipps - began the Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture at IUPUI.
5. Kathleen Flake - associate professor of American religious history at Vanderbilt University, blogged for a time at Washington Post's On Faith blog.
I know she is dated, but I'd still liked to add Classical Scholar Edith Hamilton to the list,through her writings, she taught a young man how to read.
Also, Novelist Anne Rice, though not formally academic, does do her homework for the historical background to her vampire novels. In the last 30 years has probably given more young teenagers in the midwest a better liberal arts education than anything being taught in their public schools.
And I just have to say that I just discovered blogging and i think it rocks!!
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