Christians - is the bible misogynistic?

[buckeejit]

I was raised in a staunch Presbyterian family. I'm basically the black sheep. I do believe in God & think some of the bible is good but I wouldn't take it all as gospel as so much of it is mental, outdated & doesn't remotely fit with my strong feminist views which are very liberal.

My eldest brother is a preacher & I'm seeing a lot of him lately as our mum is terminally ill. He has really been rubbing me up the wrong way & gives me strong superior vibes. He's not used to people disagreeing with him I guess but his sanctimonious manner is really pissing me off. It led me to reflect that I find that's the case with a lot of preachers & perhaps if they all believe everything literally in the bible, it's not any wonder they think women should know their place.

Just looking others thoughts & how you reconcile being a Christian with feminism & the bible? Or do most people pick & choose what they take from the bible?

I am very selective, and you are right, it does assume a patriarchal viewpoint.

I'm not all that fond of people - let's be honest, mostly men - standing up there at the front, pontificating (lol), and telling me how I should be interpreting bible passages. All too often, I find myself disagreeing with them. So I rarely ever go to church now.

Exactly the same here @waybill

I absolutely love the singing but can't endure the preaching. I've never heard a sermon that actually teaches me anything useful or makes me think. And yes, almost always men up there.

Anyone who doesn’t find large parts of the Old and significant bits of the New Testament hyper-misogynistic has either never felt the need to give it a moment’s passing thought, or has testicles, most likely both.

I think the bible is misogynistic as it was written by men.

I don't think God/Christianity is - a lot of prominent women in the early church and their have been basically been written out!

If you dig deep into the true translation and the culture of the time it's a lot less misogynistic than it gets interpreted/preached about today.

Even the famous passages such as wives obey your husbands - a wise preacher said "husbands if you love your wife as you should do, willing to die for her, she'll find you easy to obey" we'll because basically he would reassure, respect, honour her etc

While it has a lot of patriarchal stuff Jesus did associate with women like Mary and Martha and taught them with his disciples. He also healed the lady who touched his robe (and probably had a menstrual disorder, which at the time was like being an outcast in society, but he didn't judge her) There are also strong women like Ruth and Esther in there. Plus the old testament has quite a lot to say about infertility when you think about it. So while leadership viewpoints are quite male in the church women are featured strongly in the Bible and in some cases take the lead.

Christianity is fundamentally & institutionally misogynistic & homophobic to its core, as are all other major religions.

Look at what the bible has to say about specific women. Women were important in the bible.

I recommend separating out the Bible from the Church (of any denomination). I can highly recommend Jesus Feminist by Sarah Bessay if you want an accessible, theologically literate read on just how radically feminist Jesus was.

All religions are man made. It shows.
Can you name one religion that doesn’t regard women as being lesser?
All religions were created by men for men.

Yes it is, because the people who wrote it were men of their time. A very wise priest (I'm Catholic) told me that, since the Bible was written by humans, it's flawed, because all of us see life through the lens under which we are born and raised (I.e. society). That's why St Paul sometimes sounds like a prat.

This book women in a patriarchal world by Elaine Storkey is a very good read.

And yes, almost always men up there. - at the Anglican church I go to there are six people who preach regularly, four women, two men.

‘Man is the head of the house as God is the head of the church’ does seem ever so slightly misogynistic to me, or perhaps it’s my imagination…

I heard that there were many letters written by women like the Galatians, Ephesians, Colossians etc that were edited out of the bible in the first century or so purely as they were written by women. Also early church art shows women equal size and prominence to men but over the years men have slowly eroded them into smaller or peripheral places. I've not checked the source though so don't know it as fact

Yes mainly written by men (the books) put together by men translated by men and preached by men ergo yes highly misogynistic but I’m not a fundamentalist and I don’t see everything in the bible as true but a discussions point. But I do loathe how elders and their wives are usually put in to men - me preach wife- she make cup of tea and dinner men - I lead prayer women - run children’s group

Yes I agree with almost all of you. It makes sense that women have been diluted out quite a lot. The minority of strong women in the bible don't make up for all the other bad stuff.

Also from a logical point of view, it seems that mostly a load of men lined up eons ago & said God told me to write this...' and then all their books were gathered without question & thrown together. Perhaps strict adherence to the bible is more prevalent in some denominations than others.

I really miss the community of a church but I don't feel that I can faithfully join anywhere as my beliefs are much too liberal, (I do live in Bible Belt area) & I don't want to sit & listen to a man pontificate about a lot of things I don't agree with.

The Bible is of its time and that was a harsh and patriarchal society. Applying the concept of misogyny to readings of the Bible is a form of presentism. You're applying our modern cultural norms to a very different era in human history. It's anachronistic thinking.

Equally I wouldn't be able to get on board with using the bible selectively to justify something in our time. So if someone is choosing just one quote from the bible and using it to justify 'women know thy place', then that person is an ass. If they're so stuck in the past maybe they should ride everywhere on a donkey, get water from a well and wash their clothes in a nearby stream. Best ignore the march of progress if it's not in the bible!

My own view is that the bible doesn't just tell us about Jesus and the culmination in the NT of the promise of the OT. I think it is one way of hearing the word of God. Its so open to interpretation that it 'speaks' to many situations. There's other ways to be attuned to God's voice.

I think it's a mistake to read it all literally but not everything in it is metaphorical. There is history in there.

The example set by Jesus was to be very inclusive, particularly to the marginalised in society. He had time for women and women had important roles in the early church.

@buckeejit I was going to say if you are struggling to find a community in person maybe go online.

I don't know if this blessed is she site is any good (bit Catholic) but it promises sisterhood, prayer and community.

Also I don't know if you've made it over to the Christian prayer and chat thread on the philosophy and religion board. We don't talk all the time but it's a slow moving thread to share prayer requests and Christian fellowship.

Jesus has a mother. No man was considered worthy to be his father.

The men ran away at the crucifixion, the women stayed.

Women were the first witnesses to the resurrection.

@Toddlerteaplease

Jesus has a mother. No man was considered worthy to be his father.

The men ran away at the crucifixion, the women stayed.

Women were the first witnesses to the resurrection.

Yeah, that’s exactly the kind of tokenistic nonsense the Catholic Church pulls when it’s choosing its priesthood dying out over people with vaginas celebrating Mass. The Virgin Mary, Mary Magdalen, the woman taken in adultery, mothers, women as bystanders, women’s special place and powers etc.

If there were significant numbers of women in prominent roles in the earliest days of Christianity, they’ve been carefully pruned out of the record.

The Bible is of its time and that was a harsh and patriarchal society. Applying the concept of misogyny to readings of the Bible is a form of presentism. You're applying our modern cultural norms to a very different era in human history. It's anachronistic thinking.

^This. Anything written even a few hundred years ago will be highly misogynistic by modern standards, never mind something written as long ago as the Bible. I'm not defending the Bible in general - I'm a staunch atheist and no fan of organised religion. But expecting writings from that long ago (religious or not) not to reflect the views and norms of the times they were written in would be ridiculous.

I was put off by my previous church as it was very patriarchal. Only men could preach at church, if you had a mixed gender small group a man had to lead it (but women could lead a women only small group)
Women were expected encouraged to do the background wife-work type jobs - coffees, catering, creche, sunday school, toddler groups etc.

Yes, large parts of it are. It was written and selected by men.

However, I believe Jesus himself was a “feminist” (although that concept didn’t exist yet) and that comes across in his dealings with women in the Bible.

Yes- this (above). Jesus shouldn't even have spoken to the woman at the well, asking her for a drink. This was a big cultural no no, yet he did it.

And definitely echoing ZenNudist and Lazylinguist as well - the Bible is very much of its time / culture / society and needs to be read taking the context into account when it comes to specifics - particularly around women. It makes a lot of Paul's letters make more sense.
I find it also helps to remember that Paul didn't intend his letters to be 'scripture' as we know them now. They were just that - letters written to churches addressing specific issues / problems that the emerging religion of Christianity was having. I don't think he ever thought that 2000 years later we'd be debating 'what he meant when he said', and yet the Church still gets hung up on an awful lot of it sometimes.

@ZenNudist so you read some parts of in a literal translation & some parts not? I struggle as the bible is kind of the rule book & obviously it's not as relevant to today's society but then, what's the point of it. Is the history part remotely accurate? For someone who has a strong faith in God but a guidebook that I don't feel much faith in, or sufficiently intellectually equipped to translate, it just makes me feel lost.

What is the point of a church service then -is it to listen to different (mostly men's), interpretations? Thank you for the recommendation-I will look up that site & the prayer thread.

@Toddlerteaplease yes but I guess I don't find that sufficient. I'm sure my current perception of my brother's misogyny - which admittedly is probably somewhat clouded by grief, is causing me extra struggle, although this has been a bugbear for many years. There doesn't seem anywhere to discuss these issues. I have zero interest in talking to a minister, even if one was interested in discussing it, as I can't imagine a situation where it would be a conversation among equals & another man pontificating & expecting me to agree would not be helpful.