The Burning Times: fascinating docu on women's power before Christianity

Alice, thanks for the Crossbones link :) Interesting!

I think that is a good point SAF. It would be good if a film was made about types of identity and points in history that could help women build their own identity. This film was part of a series (I think) and it may be that other films addressed that more explicitly.

I might try and think up examples of role models, archetypes and so on to tell DD about.

I do think swallowed that is totally fair. Looking back for symbols makes sense to me. I think my problem was I felt that that film presented what they were doing as more factual than that, and I did feel it was dishonest and offensive. I understand it may not seem so to everyone, and everyone's going to weigh differently the importance of inspiring women now, and respecting women in the past.

It is good if the film inspires women - but I would worry a lot that a woman who watched it might take it as truth rather than a story, and that would make them (and by extension feminism and feminist history) look stupid. Which is rotten.

I can't help being upset at the casual way they played with history, because to me it's real people's lives - no-one should lie about it, even to make an inspiring story. Sorry. I just can't feel any other way than that. I think it's especially important for women because we are so often told we're liars about all sorts of things - rape, especially, of course. It seems like a doubled oppression to falsify women's history.

But I do take your point that bits of the film were beautiful and could inspire people, and it is good to feel empowered, of course it is.

But haven't women always had special powers? If you look at Romany gypsies, isn't it mainly women who are fortune tellers. Wasn't this also true in ancient times? Didn't some women have this spiritual power? Didn't people seek them out for healing and blessings?

I think ancient cultures knew this and accepted it. I don't think they killed women because they had these powers. But it does seem that most probably teh Church fathers at some point instigated a witch hunt against women healers in order to eliminate their spiritual competitors. Apparently 15% of witches were also men, and they eliminated them as well.

There is a major error in that documentary. They claim 9 million witches were burnt to death, but it seems that most historians estimate the figure at about 100,000. There are some other errors in the programme, and it is obviously biased to a pagan world view, but it is an interesting programme that does throw light on the persecution of witches. But large errors do leave it open to being challenged and don't help.

Ok, fair enough, we interpreted it differently. That I can respect, but I stand by my view. I don't see how you can take a film seriously when it pretends centuries just didn't really happen, because it wants to make a better narrative. If they truly wanted to help women, or be respectful towards women, they would have told the truth, not gone for the pretty story. If you watch it as a pretty story, yes, it has some great camera work and it is evocative, but why didn't they admit it was an imaginative myth about how they'd like to think about women in the past, a way to inspire women, not a real history?

'and who gives a shit at that exact moment of the discussion - wasn't it more interesting to look at her point of why would it all swell into such a hub of activity at one moment rather than to just correct her without addressing what she said at all?'

Sorry, say again? Whose point?

There are a range of Abrahamic texts with divine feminine archetypes in them, notably Sophia in the Gnostic tradition. Of course those texts weren't the ones chosen as the official version of the religion, and I wonder why God became entirely male in the Abrahamic religions. Of course they were operating within patriarchal societies, but that is true of many other religions that didn't end up viewing God as entirely male.

claig - early Modern.

I don't think it is taking a female role and giving it to a man, though. I think it's saying that Christ is feminine.

There have been loads of women (and men) who have insisted that God is feminine or has a feminine aspect. This does not mean they did not live in societies that oppressed women. So why on earth does anyone imagine that finding a statue of a woman goddess in some way proves that women had special powers they were then able to pass on in a long tradition to the modern day? Yet that is precisely the chain of events that film shows us. Why? Because it's hoping we're too thick to see it's rubbish.

'claig, the majority of Witch Trials aren't medieval.'

When are they? Before or after?

'Unfortunately, her powers didn't extend to concealing the $50m dollars she had stashed in a New York bank account'

I didn't know that. I'll have to read up about that.

Taking a female role and giving it to a man doesn't sound entirely pro-women to me.

claig, the majority of Witch Trials aren't medieval.

swallowed, you said they didn't 'see the feminine in the divine'. IMO, seeing Christ as a mother rather knocks that theory back.

I think Christianity is a patriarchial religion, especially in the period we're talking about ... but based on the iconography and imagery, you could draw the same conclusions about woman power that people draw from pre-historical female images and artefacts. This is not exactly rocket science, just an excellent reason to be cautious about making up stories.

Claig,

Miracles are attributed to St.Brigid and Mary, of course (although, unsurprisingly, none have ever been reliably documented) Given that Mother Theresa is well on her way to beatification, I suspect that all manner of supernatural wonders will be superimposed upon her. Unfortunately, her powers didn't extend to concealing the $50m dollars she had stashed in a New York bank account (and that is just one of many, apparently) Journalist Christopher Hitchens wrote a book on her called "The Missionary position" which is well worth your effort