Did Muhammad believe in women’s rights? The article I wrote for the Christian Research Journal broaches the subject and asks harder questions for this difficult subject matter. Christian Research Institute Director, Hank Hanegraaff (“The Bible Answer Man”), interviewed me today about this article. Click HERE for the link to the MP3. To purchase the journal or to become a subscriber, click HERE.
MJ
Hey there Mary Jo,
What, exactly, did your Jesus do for women's rights?
He may be depicted as showing some level of respect to women, but nowhere does he indicate that women should be treated with the same respect and have the same rights as men. And there were no female disciples, and no women at the last supper.
On at least two occasions he shows little respect for his own mother.
Not once does he indicate that women should be admitted to schools and educated.
Although I do seem to recall him allowing a woman to wipe his feet one time. Way to go, Jesus!!
And then Jesus said "Blood sacrifice!!?. What kind of Neanderthal bullshit is that? What are we, living in the Stone Age?"
"No sane person will believe in that bullshit. Nobody's that stupid!!"
"Amen"
kilo papa,
What specific passages of the New Testament texts are you referring to in your examples of Jesus' treatment of women?
//What did your Jesus do for women's rights?//
Well, let me ask if you are willing to look into the culture in which Jesus lived and see how the things he said and did in that context were meaningful. If you are, there are many things he did that may have previously gone unnoticed.
1)For example, Jesus approached women as subjects, not objects. In Matthew 5:28 (the Sermon on the Mount), Jesus declares that a man commits adultery if he has lust in his heart towards a woman, not just if he acts out adultery with a woman. Contrary to his culture, Jesus taught that lust was not inevitable when it came to male relationships with women. It would make sense that lust would be the inevitable outcome of male-female relationships if a woman was primarily an object of sexual pleasure or for sexual purposes. But Jesus taught that sexual relationships with women were not the inevitable outcome of social relationships. Women are to be viewed as fellow subjects in God's creation, fellow human beings, and not reduced to primarily the object of man's desire. Once women could be viewed as not solely the object of sexual desire, then men and women, in general, would not need to be separated for the purpose of protecting the women (as was common in Judaism). Jesus completely shattered this objectified view of women as sexual objects with his teaching in the Sermon on the Mount and his inclusion of them in his teaching circles and travelling companions. The raised status of women Jesus gives in this passage, however, is remiss to those who do not understand the strict teachings for sexual contact present in Jewish society in the first century.
2)Jesus had compassion on women who suffered; to the point of ignoring legal and ritual purity in order to help them. After he heals a woman with a discharge of blood (legal and ritually unclean), he does not go through ritual cleansing for purification. Jesus shatters the traditions of ritual purity with regard to women. He addresses and cures their suffering no different from that of a man, though his culture did not accept such practices. He should have been considered defiled. However, as God, Jesus is setting the standard by which we treat women, not conforming to man's cultural expectations.
Even the Pharisees picked up on Jesus' contrary action to the traditions of men when the woman poured anointing oil on his feet and they said to themselves, "If this man were a prophet, he would have known who and what sort of woman this is who is touching him, for she is a sinner." Luke 7:39
more…
3) He reaffirmed that a man and woman were created equal according to the Genesis account in Mark 10:6-8 "But from the beginning of creation, 'God made them male and female.' 'Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.' So they are no longer two but one flesh."
Paul further develops the equal treatment of a woman as created in the image of God in his passage in Ephesians 5. Paul says that wives should submit to their husbands, but in the context of husbands loving their wives as their own body. Paul seems to have set up a paradox here. How can one spouse submit to another and yet both be required to have the equality of respect Paul mentions here? How have you treated this passage from the Biblical texts with regard to women's rights?
It appears that the wife is to be treated with no less respect than a husband would treat himself. That would make a good basis for women's rights. And it has. For example, the Women's Temperance union, a Christian organization of women, fought for suffrage, against prostitution, against the labor laws concerning women. Their basis was their understanding of the Christian texts. While I don't agree with all of their causes or beliefs, they did fight for important areas in women's rights. If you want to discuss how the Islamic texts differ in the view of women, I will do so.
4) There were studied and educated women amongst the earliest followers of Christ. Priscilla, a convert during Paul's lifetime, was educated enough to aid in the correction of the great teacher of the Scriptures, Apollos (Acts 18:24-26). Priscilla was also commended by Paul for risking her neck for his life (Romans 16:3-4).
4) He taught that in the resurrection men and women would not be given in marriage. So, his theology included an end in which men and women ultimately stand as equals in the presence of God; no matter what the current culture or past culture dictates. To contrast this with Islamic paradise, one reward of heaven for a Muslim man is his earthly wives.
5) God gave women the first testimony to the foundational doctrine of the Christian faith: the resurrection of Jesus. Women were the first to know of the resurrected Jesus (Matthew 28:1-10). They were also the first to testify to Jesus' resurrection. In light of the first century Jewish view of a women's testimony as not being reliable–or at least as reliable as a man's testimony–this is an important difference between how man viewed woman in the 1st century and how God viewed woman.
By contrast, Muhammad taught that two women's testimonies were equivalent to one male testimony (Surah 2:282), specifically because women are prone to forgetfulness. He also stated that a women's deficient intellect was one of the reasons that women are a majority in Hell (Sahih Muslim 142).
Kilo papa – what text or source are you utilizing for establishing women's rights? Can you direct me to a source for evaluation?
Thanks,
MJ
kilo – sorry about the two #4's in my post.
In the second #4 – the "He" refers to Jesus. The reference for this teaching is Matthew 22.
Also, I don't normally post anything that includes cursing. If you'd like to discuss things further, it'll have to exclude any of that.
But, as far as your second post, what do you mean by that?
Thanks,
MJ
Mary Jo,
Let's see, I must have missed your quotes from Jesus explicitly teaching that women should be treated with the same respect as men, with specific references to the importance of educating young girls, which could have had life changing affects on women in ancient times.
Musonius Rufus, a contemporary of Jesus, taught that women should have the same education as men.(Discourses 3 and 4). He also taught charity, pacifism and forgiveness.
I guess Jesus was too busy warning his fellow peasants that the end of the world was near and just didn't get around to such trivial things as slavery and women's rights. (How's that end of the world thing working out for you Christians? Is Jesus just around the corner?)
And as far as women being the first to appear to Jesus, can you tell me where you read their personal accounts of that incredible experience? Oh, that's right, you don't have any personal accounts of any of the women from Jesus' life. And the apostle Paul is strangely silent on any women seeing Jesus, even though Paul gives a list with the names of those to whom Jesus supposedly appeared to first. And Paul does indeed portray women as helpful to their ministry, though he never advocates for their education. But strangely, no mention of any women witnessing Jesus' supposed resurrection.
And if there were women who supposedly first witnessed this astonishing event in humankind's history, what did they do with this incredible experience? Well, apparently, they disappeared from the face of the earth. Because virtually nothing is know about what happened to a single woman who was supposedly part of the ministry of the one and only son of god.
And a good book on the portrayal of women in the bible is Laurie Gaylor's "Woe to the Women:The Bible Tells Me so". It paints a slightly different picture than you do.
Here's the deal. The bible is at times a fascinating book of history, poetry and fables and myths. But it is also filled with some of the most primitive, barbaric, ignorant, Stone Age garbage that has ever been put on the written page.
The Bible is saturated with the blood of animal sacrifices,
including specific instructions on which parts of the animals intestines are to be burned as a "pleasing odor to the Lord".
Do you call this "enlightening"?
I call it Neanderthal horse manure.
The idea that two thousand years ago in the Middle East desert some kind of god/hybrid decided to trot around a bunch of superstitious, primitive minded peasants and allow them to hang him to a tree and savagely beat himself to death as some sort of barbaric, sickening, disgusting, vile, wicked, immoral blood sacrifice is without a doubt the single most ridiculous, asinine, pathetic, Cro Magnon bunch of absolute lunacy that the human mind has ever concocted in our entire history on this planet.
It is a sad, deluded mind that can believe is this ancient, primitive,cave man "blood magic".
More accurate titles for this blog:
Confident Nuttery
Confident I'm Deluded
Confident Lunacy
Confident Insanity
Confident Jesus Is Dead
Confident I'm Mentally Unstable
Confident Cro Magnon Nutbaggery
Confident That The Other 5000 Gods
That Humankind Have Invented And
Worshiped Thoughout History Are
All Just Myths, Except Mary Jo's
//Musonius Rufus, a contemporary of Jesus, taught that women should have the same education as men.(Discourses 3 and 4). He also taught charity, pacifism and forgiveness.//
Rufus' argument is not quite the way you state it above. The statement above is too simplistic. Rufus thinks women should be educated in philosophy, but the ultimate outworking of that education isn't necessarily for improving women's rights. He has a more Platonic view of learning as a vehicle to developing virtue.
1) In discourse three, Rufus advises that the purpose for women to study philosophy is to be happy as based in reason, rather than at the mercy of the swaying pendulum of emotions. He comments that their studying of philosophy is not to lead to giving “up their households” and to “go about with men and practise giving speeches, and argue and attack premises.” His says they should study philosophy for the purpose of utilizing it in their work, such he previously mentions as “sitting at home spinning wool.”
2) In discourse four, Rufus states, “Well then, suppose someone says, 'Do you think that men ought to learn spinning like women and that women ought to practise gymnastics like men?' No, that is not what I suggest. I say that because in the case of the human race, the males are naturally stronger, and the women weaker, appropriate work ought to be assigned to each, and the heavier tasks be given to the stronger, and the lighter to the weaker. For this reason, spinning is more appropriate work for women than for men, and household management.”
While Rufus does argue, “Gymnastics are more appropriate for men than for women, and outdoor work likewise. Nonetheless, some men might appropriately undertake some of the lighter work and work thought more appropriate to women, when the conditions of their body or necessity or time demand it.”
Notice his qualifications here for when men should do “women’s work.”
Continuing on…”For all human work is a common responsibility for men and women, and nothing is necessarily prescribed for one sex or the other.” If Rufus had only said this (which the Bible alludes to in Genesis one), you’d perhaps have a stronger argument. However, Rufus continues…”Some tasks are more appropriate for one nature, others for the other. For that reason some jobs are called men's work, and others women's.” Plus, he states that the roles are not of his concern for his writing and he further clarifies what he hopes to accomplish with his argument: “I do not mean to say that women need to have clarity with or facility in argument, because they will use philosophy as women use it.” I haven't found a similar statement to this last statement in the Bible; that a woman will use reason or philosophy as "women use it." Rather, the apostle Paul holds all Christians accountable for the renewing of their minds–Romans 12:2–and for growing in their knowledge, Ephesians 4:11-15. No mention is made of female versus male usage of knowledge.
What Rufus wishes to make known is that the virtues associated with the learning of philosophy are important whether you are male or female. I agree! Kudos to Rufus here. The purpose of women learning philosophy is for the training of their virtue of nobility of character. It’s not to give them some new, radical place in society.
3) Did Gaius Musonius Rufus actually teach women himself? Can you point me to a reference for the evidence of that? All I have found so far is a reference to Rufus teaching slave women in Guy Davenport’s fictitious work on G. Musonius Rufus. But this doesn’t qualify as evidence.
Jesus taught women himself. He didn’t just teach on the teaching of women. God (Jesus) taught women personally; one-on-one, as well as in groups with men. One example here:
In the story of Mary and Martha in Luke 10:38-42, Martha was going about 'women's work' (as would be described by Musonius Rufus) and yet Jesus commended Mary for sitting at his feet learning from him, even calling Mary's actions "better":
"As Jesus and his disciples were on their way, he came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to him. She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what he said. But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!”
“Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.”
In the next post, I'll contrast this teaching of Jesus with influential atheist teachings from the 19th century.
My source for G. Musonius Rufus: http://www.stoa.org/diotima/anthology/wlgr/wlgr-philosophers.shtml
Atheist teachings on women:
What if we were to use Charles Darwin's texts on natural selection as the basis for women's rights? He states: "[Man] attains a higher eminence, in whatever he takes up, than can women—whether requiring deep thought, reason, or imagination, or merely the use of the senses and hands. If two lists were made of the most eminent men and women in poetry, history, painting, sculpture, music (inclusive of both composition and performance), history, science, and philosophy, the two lists would not bear comparison. We may also infer, from the law of the deviation from averages… [that] the average mental power in man must be above that of women."
Source: Charles Darwin, The Descent of Man in Relation to Sex (New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1896), 564.
We could also utilize psychologist and sociologist, Gustav Le Bon who says, "[Even in] the most intelligent races [there] are large numbers of women whose brains are closer in size to those of gorillas than to the most developed male brains. This inferiority is so obvious that no one can contest it for a moment; only its degree is worth discussion.…Women represent the most inferior forms of human evolution and…are closer to children and savages than to an adult, civilized man. They excel in fickleness, inconstancy, absence of thought and logic, and incapacity to reason. Without a doubt, there exists some distinguished women, very superior to the average man, but they are as exceptional as the birth of any monstrosity, as for example, of a gorilla with two heads. Consequently, we may neglect them entirely.
Source: Cited in Stephen Jay Gould, The Mismeasure of Man (New York: Norton, 1981), 104–5.
Atheist philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer had a lot to say about women's rights. He states, "The European lady is a creature which ought not to exist at all: what there ought to be is housewives and girls who hope to become housewives and who are therfore educated, not in arrogant haughtiness, but in domesticity and submissiveness…but when the law conceded women equal rights with men it should at the same time have endouwed them with masculine reasoning powers." He goes on to say that the marriage laws regard women as having equality with men, and states, "which they are in no respect."
Source: Arthur Schopenhauer, Essay and Aphorisms (New York: Penquin Group, 2004), 87.
If we go back to the atheist philosophy, the women are inferior as a matter of scientific fact. Schopenhauer not only thinks marriage rights were unnaturally alloted to women, but is the basis for his favorable view of polygamy. "On the other hand there appears no rational ground why a man whose wife suffers from a chronic illness, or has remained unfruitful, or has gradually grown too old for him, should not take a second." Further, he proposes the "restoration of woman to her rightful and natural postion, the subordinate one, and the aboliton from the world of the 'lady', with her ridiculous claims to respect and veneration." pg. 88
Does Laurie Gaylor's book discuss how women's rights cannot be grounded in either atheist philosophy or Darwin's natural selection, as well? And what is her most impacting argument?
I'll answer one more question here:
//And if there were women who supposedly first witnessed this astonishing event in humankind's history, what did they do with this incredible experience?//
They told Jesus' disciples, some of who recorded the women's testimony in writing.
//Well, apparently, they disappeared from the face of the earth. Because virtually nothing is know about what happened to a single woman who was supposedly part of the ministry of the one and only son of god.//
You seem to know about them. And it also appears that more is known about these women than some of the great empresses (princesses, queens, wives) of ancient empires and yet these women are essentially peasants.
Could you please address some of the questions I asked you?
#1. How can one spouse submit to another and yet both be required to have the equality of respect Paul mentions here? How have you treated this passage from the Biblical texts with regard to women's rights?
#2. What text or source are you utilizing for establishing women's rights?
Some of your questions are a serious misunderstanding of the Christian faith. I don't know your background or your personal investigation into understanding the doctrines and texts of Christianity, but I'm having a difficult time responding seriously to some of your questions. I hope this doesn't sound derogatory, but, for example, this:
//"I guess Jesus was too busy warning his fellow peasants that the end of the world was near and just didn't get around to such trivial things as slavery and women's rights. (How's that end of the world thing working out for you Christians? Is Jesus just around the corner?)"//
All I can ask is…where are you getting that from? Jesus says no one knows the end of times, not even the Son of God. The statement above does not demonstrate serious inquiry. If your only goal is to attack me personally for believing in God, then we need to be done with our conversation. That is an unproductive end.
And this: //It is a sad, deluded mind that can believe is this ancient, primitive,cave man "blood magic".//
If you want to impact the world for your own belief system and demonstrate the truthfulness of that belief, it seems you should demonstrate a deep understanding of the other beliefs and not attack a straw man of that belief. Of course, it is easier to tear down a straw man…especially through the use of lots of negatively-charged wording. But that does not make a good argument.
Thanks,
MJ
TruthOverFaith – LOL! That's a creative bit of ad hominem there.
It brings back memories of a talk I used to give to sixth grade students about how name-calling isn't this same thing as an actual argument. 🙂 They used to get called names for being in band.
Oh, Mary Jo! You are quite the ambitious little Jesus nutter, aren't you?
You say "Jesus says no one knows the end of times, not even the Son of God"
Now you're probably are smarter than that. The New Testament portrays Jesus as clearly stating that the end of times/kingdom of god is near.
You absolutely need to read Thom Stark's book "The Human Faces of God" where he abundantly and clearly demonstrates that Jesus did believe that his return would be during the lifetime of his followers. And he demolishes N.T. Wright's attempts to argue otherwise, along with several other apologetic attempts to save Jesus from his own ignorance about his "return". (Interestingly, Stark is a committed Christian)
"They told Jesus' disciples, some of who recorded the women's testimony in writing"
And please indicate a single place in any of the Gospels where the authors identify themselves as disciples? Or where they identify themselves as having ever laid eyes on Jesus personally? And please indicate where any of the Gospel writers indicate that they themselves ever met any of the people that they write about, including the women.
Maybe God just zapped the "testimony" of those women right into the anonymous Gospel writers brains, huh Mary Jo?
And apparently you weren't able to dig up a single piece of information about what happened to any of these women, including the mother of the Son of God herself. They personally experienced the one on only Son of God himself and then just "vanished' from earth, almost as though they were only part of a story line in an anonymous fable, right?
And regarding women's roles in the bible, Mary Jo, do you have an opinion as to why the Old Testament states that a woman who gives birth to a female baby is unclean for twice as long as a woman who gives birth to a boy? Is the vaginal discharge different for girl babies?
And isn't is kind of funny that in God's list of things not to covet that the wife is mentioned after the house, as though she were merely property? (Although the wife is listed before the oxen and ass!!)
And do you agree with Paul's statement that it is shameful for a woman to speak in church, or that women shall be submissive to men and that they shall not teach or have authority over men? Now I realize that most scholars don't think that Paul himself actually wrote these verses, but they are in your holy book, nonetheless. (Those passages, and many more, are what's commonly called forgeries, also known as lies).
And yes, Mary Jo, there are many people throughout history who were unfortunately biased against women, and some of them were atheists.
But your so called "word of god" is directly responsible for filling gullible people's minds with the belief that women are inferior to men because "God says so", and that pathetic, Stone Age mentality has caused thousands of years of harm and suffering for women. And continues to do so for the naive children who are raise in the religious nuttery of evangelical Christians who are too deluded to turn a skeptical eye towards their ancient book of fairy tales.
There are some great books available from authors who were once evangelical Christian nutters and are now agnostics and atheists. They go into great detail for the reasons that they now reject Christianity. You can find them with a quick google search. Do yourself a favor and let a little light in to your Jesus brain.
Oh, and regarding women and the bible, out of the thousands of words in the bible, can you point out a single sentence, or even a single word, that is believed to have been written by a woman?
Even one?*********Mary Jo, are you there? Hello?
But it's o.k. Mary Jo, I'm sure your all knowing god has a very good reason for not allowing his holy, precious word to be "inspired" by a woman. After all, women do have a pretty special connection to God that men are very jealous of. I mean, no matter special the bible tells us we men are, we never got a "personal" visit from the Holy Spirit directly in our "private" area, if you know what I mean!!
//Oh, Mary Jo! You are quite the ambitious little Jesus nutter, aren't you?//
Ad hominem. This is not an argument.
//Now you're probably are smarter than that. The New Testament portrays Jesus as clearly stating that the end of times/kingdom of god is near.//
Since it appears that you have investigated this topic on the New Testament reporting of Jesus’ words, please tell me where he says this and then clarify the author’s intent for that particular passage. Specifically, I will need to understand your comprehension of:
Context – Who was Jesus talking to? What was the point he was trying to make? How would the hearers have interpreted Jesus’ statement in light of their own culture and language?
Application – What are the readers supposed to take away from this statement?
//You absolutely need to read Thom Stark's book "The Human Faces of God" where he abundantly and clearly demonstrates that Jesus did believe that his return would be during the lifetime of his followers. And he demolishes N.T. Wright's attempts to argue otherwise, along with several other apologetic attempts to save Jesus from his own ignorance about his "return". (Interestingly, Stark is a committed Christian)//
Which argument of Stark would you like to discuss here? I do not have his book, so you’ll need to reference the material and quote him. What would really be impacting is a good argument from you on your understanding of what you have read; void of all the negatively charged wording. The reader should be moved by the argument, not by cleverly devised ad hominem intended to sway people through negative imagery.
MJ
//And please indicate where any of the Gospel writers indicate that they themselves ever met any of the people that they write about, including the women.//
Turn this request around: Please indicate where any of the Gospel writers indicate that they themselves never met any of the people they write about, including the women. (It is problematic to ask for an exact wording because this criteria can be turned around and used against that argument.)
Luke states, "Many have undertaken to draw up an account of the things that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed down to us by those who from the first were eyewitnesses and servants of the word. With this in mind, since I myself have carefully investigated everything from the beginning, I too decided to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the certainty of the things you have been taught." Luke 1:1-4
Luke discusses his journey with Paul in Acts 16:10-15, "And when Paul had seen the vision, immediately we sought to go on into Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them. So, setting sail from Troas, we made a direct voyage to Samothrace, and the following day to Neapolis, and from there to oPhilippi, which is a leading city of the district of Macedonia and a Roman colony. We remained in this city some days. And on the Sabbath day we went outside the gate to the riverside, where we supposed there was a place of prayer, and we ssat down and spoke to the women who had come together. One who heard us was a woman named Lydia, from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple goods, who was a worshiper of God. The Lord uopened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul. And after she was baptized, and her household as well, she urged us, saying, “If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay.” And she prevailed upon us." (Here is an instance where a Gospel writer mentions the business woman, Lydia.)
Luke writes of meeting a disciple named Mnason of Cyprus, and of Paul's meeting with James: Acts 21:16-19 "After these days we got ready and went up to Jerusalem. And some of the disciples from Caesarea went with us, bringing us to the house of Mnason of Cyprus, an early disciple, with whom we should lodge. When we had come to Jerusalem, the brothers received us gladly. On the following day Paul went in with us to James, and all the elders were present. After greeting them, he related one by one the things that God had done among the Gentiles through his ministry."
In Acts, Luke also writes of Peter, Silas, Timothy, Mark (John-Mark), Judas, Barnabas, and others but he is not giving your exact wording requirement as "I have met all these people."
Is the requirement here something like, if the Gospel writer doesn't write down that he met someone–in that exact verbage–that we must assume that he didn't meet them? If I offered first-hand testimony of my experience with a president of the United States, but I didn't say specifically, "I met the president of the United States," then this criteria would invalidate my experience even if the experienced were a real experience. Please explain this criteria. What am I seeing that is wrong here?
Correction: "then this criteria would invalidate my experience even if the experience was a real experience."
//Maybe God just zapped the "testimony" of those women right into the anonymous Gospel writers brains, huh Mary Jo?//
Speculation. Not argumentation.
//And apparently you weren't able to dig up a single piece of information about what happened to any of these women, including the mother of the Son of God herself. //
What kind of information are you looking for?
//They personally experienced the one on only Son of God himself and then just "vanished' from earth, almost as though they were only part of a story line in an anonymous fable, right?//
Wrong. They were recorded in the historical texts with the most manuscripts to cross-reference for accuracy in human history; which are the biblical texts. Repeating your original statement in a different format, doesn’t mean you’ve established anything.
//And regarding women's roles in the bible, Mary Jo, do you have an opinion as to why the Old Testament states that a woman who gives birth to a female baby is unclean for twice as long as a woman who gives birth to a boy? Is the vaginal discharge different for girl babies?//
Flesh that argument out. What does discharge have to do with women’s roles? Where does the OT state that because of the difference of a woman’s purity rituals after a male or female child that the female child is ontologically different from the male and therefore her roles are different in society? Where explicitly? Muhammad actually related a women’s intellectual deficiency in her creation by God (S. 2:282) to her being a majority in Hell (Sahih Muslim #142). He made the explicit connection. Can you please do the same for your argument?
//And isn't is kind of funny that in God's list of things not to covet that the wife is mentioned after the house, as though she were merely property? (Although the wife is listed before the oxen and ass!!)//
Flesh this insinuation out into some kind of argument.
//And do you agree with Paul's statement that it is shameful for a woman to speak in church, or that women shall be submissive to men and that they shall not teach or have authority over men?//
Teach me about those passages. What do they say? Who was Paul speaking to and what situation was he addressing? I’m assuming you’ve come to a conclusion on these passages due to some research of your own. I’ve actually answered on the second passage you referenced on “wives”–not “women”—submit to your husbands—not “men”—in my response to kilo papa. It’s from Ephesians 5. “Paul further develops the equal treatment of a woman (actually a wife) as created in the image of God in his passage in Ephesians 5. Paul says that wives should submit to their husbands, but in the context of husbands loving their wives as their own body. Paul seems to have set up a paradox here. How can one spouse submit to another and yet both be required to have the equality of respect Paul mentions here? How have you treated this passage from the Biblical texts with regard to women's rights? It appears that the wife is to be treated with no less respect than a husband would treat himself. That would make a good basis for women's rights.”
Also these all appear to be teachings of Paul in letters he wrote to specific churches.
What did Jesus have to say about women? Can you use some of his specific words?
//And yes, Mary Jo, there are many people throughout history who were unfortunately biased against women, and some of them were atheists. But your so called "word of god" is directly responsible for filling gullible people's minds with the belief that women are inferior to men because "God says so…..//
Well, let’s see what you propose as a replacement text for grounding women’s rights. I address this later on.
//There are some great books available from authors who were once evangelical Christian nutters and are now agnostics and atheists. They go into great detail for the reasons that they now reject Christianity. You can find them with a quick google search. //
To use your terminology…there are great books available from authors who were once atheists and are now evangelical Christians. Clever put down, though, “nutter.”
//Do yourself a favor and let a little light in to your Jesus brain.//
What do you mean by that? Tell me specifically what you are insinuating.
//Oh, and regarding women and the bible, out of the thousands of words in the bible, can you point out a single sentence, or even a single word, that is believed to have been written by a woman?
Even one?*********Mary Jo, are you there? Hello?//
Flesh this argument out. What exactly would fulfilling the requirement in this question do and how do you know that?
BTW, this is a side issue, but notice you are using an anonymous pseudonym which allows you to not own up to your arguments publicly. While I usually do not point out such side issues, because I do not want to create a red herring, I'm pointing it out to you due to the amount of negatively charged wording you use while using a pseudonym. It doesn't speak much to me about your arguments when you are attacking a person's character (Jesus nutter, etc) anonymously.
//But it's o.k. Mary Jo, I'm sure your all knowing god has a very good reason for not allowing his holy, precious word to be "inspired" by a woman. After all, women do have a pretty special connection to God that men are very jealous of. I mean, no matter special the bible tells us we men are, we never got a "personal" visit from the Holy Spirit directly in our "private" area, if you know what I mean!!//
There might be an argument in there amongst all the poisoning of the well, but the last statement is a red-herring. This is just a lot of bad reasoning in place of thoughtful argumentation.
ToF –The article for this post was about the theology of Islam, Muhammad’s teachings and actions, and the attempt to reconcile those things with Western philosophy on women’s rights. Women’s rights in Western philosophy have, in part, been rooted in the Christian view of women according to the Biblical text (Women’s Temperance Union and suffrage, for example). In quoting your statement above: yes, there are many people throughout history who were unfortunately biased against women, and some of them were Christians. That relates to the culture. So I’m interested to know what you’ve looked at as far as the arguments for how Christian theology has provided grounding for women’s rights in the West. What do you know about this? Can you point me in the direction of some research? Maybe you’ve watched or read a debate on this issue.
Fleshing out the difference between a women’s ontology in Islam, Christianity, and atheism would help answer many of your questions. Yet, you have not engaged in any of those differences. Perhaps you don’t care about those differences, but that would relate back to the problem how we ground the foundation for women’s rights. Let’s remove the biblical texts as a possibility in accordance with your view. What we have left is the “unfortunate” atheist philosophy as well as Darwin’s scientific grounding for the inferiority of women as based in natural selection. All three of the examples above utilized the explicit language of which you requested of the biblical texts.
*But’s let say we argue for some atheists’ view over other atheists’ view, we now have the problem of how we determine who has the fundamentally correct view to which all people should subscribe. And who gets to say who is correct? Why should I utilize a 20th century philosopher over an 18th century philosopher? What about the scientific evidence of inferiority of women? I’ve asked kilo papa for a determining text on grounding women’s rights. Do you have one?
Thanks,
MJ
Ahh, Mary Jo. So sad, so sad.
Regarding the authors of the Gospels being eyewitnesses- do you really want to try to suggest that the authors just didn't think it was "important" to mention the little fact that they themselves personally witnessed the incredible events that they relate and that they personally interacted with the people that they describe? Including Jesus himself!!?
So the Gospel authors just didn't feel the need to "sweat the details" right? I mean, why give the incredible support of being an actual eyewitness to the events to which you're writing? I mean, it's only the message of salvation to humankind!!!!
And regarding your little "meeting the President" analogy, do you really expect anyone to believe that you would relate that experience without any indication that you had actually been in the presidents personal company!!?
And you can write that "Luke writes…" all you want, Mary Jo, but surely you know that no serious New Testament scholar(remember I said "scholar") believes
that "Luke" wrote anything in the entire New Testament. And no New Testament author ever identifies himself as Luke. If you can point out that passage, that would be most helpful.
And also regarding that first paragraph from "Luke" that people like yourself like to trot out–
What you have is an anonymous author writing that the anonymous sources for his information were "eyewitnesses". Gee, Mary Jo, any idea why the author doesn't identify a single one of those supposed "eyewitnesses", or identify himself, for that matter?
And regarding that passage from "Luke", allow me to quote from a review of John N. Collins "Re-thinking 'Eyewitnesses' in Luke 1:2:
"Collins goes on to look at how the term 'eyewitnesses'(autoptai) is used at the beginning of Luke's gospel. He argues that Luke's 'autoptai' are not the oral tradents that Bauckham suggests, but those who are working with a literary tradition,..which began significantly later.."
Read this paper, it's too long to reproduce here. As is Thom Stark's terrific takedown of N.T. Wright and other apologists who attempt to argue against Jesus as a end-of-times preacher.Stark's entire book is worth a read and re-read. You would be doing yourself a huge favor if you allowed yourself to engage these arguments.
Gen. 3:16-Unto the woman he said, I will greatly multiply thy sorrow and thy conception, in sorrow thou shall bring forth children; and thy desire shall be thy husband, and he shall rule over thee."
Do you think the above passage is beautiful, Mary Jo? Do you teach your children about that passage from your loving God?
There are literally dozens more just like this one. Think you can explain them all away?
Of course you can!! That's what the deluded do, whether it's Christianity or any other religion.
And if one of your children asked you why none of the Bible was written by women, what would you say?
And saying that the women in the New Testament were "recorded in the historical texts" is quite funny!!
Saying that they are "historical" doesn't make it so, Mary Jo! And surely you know that the number of texts in existence is meaningless as to the accuracy of those texts? You do get that, don't you?
Their "testimony" was recorded decades later by anonymous authors, who wrote in Greek, a language that neither Jesus or his followers likely spoke!
But that's all it takes for you though, huh, Mary Jo? The bible says so!! So Mary Jo believes!
And lastly, Mary Jo, are you aware that some Muslim's don't take kindly to someone criticizing their beloved prophet, Muhammad? And when I say don't take kindly, I mean….well maybe you should just google that subject.