Feminism and the Fall

Hello, little friends! I'm back in Bristol between holidays and this is my first post about feminism in the Bible. 

Before I start I’d like you to know that I’m totally aware of the amount of baggage feminism carries with it, so there won’t be any bra-burning or man-hating on this blog. Feminism promotes gender equality not domination, and although it focuses on the empowerment of women much of the time there are also areas where men need to be empowered (for example suicide rates among men are 4 times higher than among women). So I hope I can write this in a way that doesn't alienate anyone, if I do please give me a heads up.

Where better to start than at the beginning? Genesis. The creation story. You’ve probably know it but it may be helpful to refresh yourself (Genesis 2:4 – 25 and 3: 1 – 24, you can search it on the internet if you don’t have a Bible handy).

A lot of elements in this story have been interpreted to show mans natural dominance over woman so let’s explore the main ones.

When Adam and Eve are made it seems pretty clear who’s boss: Adam is made first, Eve is a sort of afterthought, a playmate to keep Adam company, and she’s described as a ‘helper’ in verse 18.

But let’s look at it in more detail. First off, Adam translates as ‘human’, not ‘man’ so it’s been suggested that the act of removing his rib to create Eve was more an act of splitting the first human in two to separate it into male and female. (The Hebrew word for rib is more often translated into the word ‘side’ i.e. half of Adam).

And whether or not you agree with the amoeba theory (as I like to call it) God makes it clear that “it is not good for man to be alone.” In creating the first human alone God shows us that we are incomplete on our own, men and women are equal, complementary and integral to one another.

As for the Hebrew word used to describe Eve (translated as ‘helper’) it doesn’t mean helper like an ‘assistant’ or ‘subordinate’. The word azer k’negdo refers to powerful and vital aid and support. It is used throughout the Bible to describe the role of God himself, notably in 1 John 2:1.

Finally, the relationship between man and woman is really important: it illustrates the relationship between us and Jesus. We need Jesus’ aid and support, he brings life to us as life was brought to Adam through Eve (Eve means ‘life’). Only Jesus can complete us.

The second part I want to address is when Adam and Eve eat the fruit of knowledge. When I was younger I sort of got the impression that Eve (the temptress) was skulking about by herself when the snake shows up. The snake's all like “God’s a bit of an old fart isn’t he? Go on, eat a bit of this fruit.” And Eve says, “yeah I guess you’re right.” She eats the fruit and, having poisoned her own mind, runs off to find her hubby to trick him into eating some too. “hey Adam, fancy a nice apple?” “Have you licked this?” “Nah, I just had a tiny bite to check it wasn’t mouldy (heh, heh, heh).”

This story is wildly inaccurate. First off Adam and Eve were both there when the snake rocks up. Eve is discussing the tree of good and evil with it whilst Adam listens (could this be the first example of a women in leadership?). Genesis 3:6 says “she also gave some of the fruit to her husband who was with her.”

At no point does Adam pipe up “er, babe, maybe this isn’t such a good idea.” He eats the fruit when she passes it to him, so both of them sinned equally.

After this, one of their punishments meant that Adam would rule over Eve from that point onwards. And I don’t think this punishment exclusively affects women, the repression of women in many cultures has caused problems which affect both genders: they are no longer equals and no longer complete one another in the same way.

The creation story shows us that men and women are equal yet display contrasting and complementary aspects of Gods character. God made both genders in his own image so that means that all of us embody God, regardless of our gender, ethnicity, impairments, sexuality, dress sense etc etc.

“When God created human beings, he made them in his own likeness. He created them male and female and on that day he blessed them.” Genesis 5: 1-2

The next post will probably look at Jesus' and how he treated men and women equally (catchy title, I know). Also I’d like to thank the people who’ve told me that they enjoy reading this blog. I really appreciate it!

And the painting at the top of this post was done by a nun at our Lady of the Mississippi Abbey in Iowa, my mum found it on the internet somewhere.

How to begin the rest of your life

I can tell that everybody has missed my lengthy rambles. I’ve been on holiday for two weeks, first on a young adults Christian thing (Hill House) and then in Cornwall with some friends from school (affectionately known, in other circles, as my ‘hipster friends’). I’ve learned a lot. About God, about his plans for me, about myself, the people that love me and life in general. And I’d like to share a few things I’ve learned with you. Just in case any of it happens to be useful.

At Hill House a couple of guys really challenged us all. They’d been reading about the early church, the people that got together to try and live like Jesus said they should after Jesus had left and the Holy Spirit had arrived. And ohhhh boy, were they alternative! They ate together and shared food, met every day to praise God in the temple, and they sold land and possessions and gave the money to people who needed it, or put it into a big communal pot for anyone in the church to use.

I’d like to point out that these guys were not nuns or monks. And they weren’t beggars with nothing to lose, or crazy rich. They had day jobs, families to support, reputations to uphold. They were just like us and they completely changed their way of life to match up with what they believed in. They wanted to live in community, placing the needs of others alongside their own needs, and as a result they were ‘liked by all the people’. (How often is the church today described as ‘liked by all the people’?)

I digress. The main point I would like to make is that there is no ‘correct’ way of living, even if the world around us often insists that there is (and this way tends to place importance on annual salary, good grades, mortgage repayments, the launch of the iPhone 7, etc, etc). So we might as well live in a way which prioritises what we think is important, rather than what we’re told is important.

That will look different to all of us I expect: some people live in community houses because they want to share their home, time and meals, my parents buy their meat from the farmers market because they want to support local farmers, other people cycle to work for environmental and health reasons. 

For those of us just starting out in life, now is the ideal time to decide how we want to live, and for those who’ve already started it’s never too late. Don’t compromise your values, live ‘em.

We couldn’t help occasionally talking about employment (or unemployment!) in Cornwall. And someone said to me that if you aren’t doing something related to what you’re interested in then you’re just working for the sake of working, or living for the sake of living. He, like many of us, learned this the hard way: by spending a year in a job which he doesn’t really care about.

And alright, we aren’t going to get our dream jobs for a while yet, I expect many of us will never get our dream job (if we even have one that is). But if we’re just working for the money, to buy a flat, car, x-box (do people still play x-box?) is that really a good enough use of our time? How many people do you think lie on their death bed and regret not earning more disposable income in their life?

We all gotta eat. We can’t be so picky that we bypass every opportunity that comes our way, but many of us are very privileged in this country in that there are support networks available whilst we’re looking for work, and a range of jobs on offer. So, if I’m going to spend my days answering phone calls I could at least do it for a renewable energy company rather than for Texaco.

So there you go. Some stuff I’ve learned. I don’t know if it was helpful to you but it’s certainly shaped my perspective in regards to what I’m going to do next.

In other news: I don't know if you remember the fairytale I wrote a little while back (the Ash, the Oak and Yew) but here's the cover illustration for it. Butterfly wing cloaks are all the rage right now.

In my next few posts I’m hoping to tackle feminism (and misogyny) in the Bible. So if there’s any bits that people find difficult or confusing or just plain annoying please get in touch and I’ll look into them. Have a good week and I’ll see you on the other side of Soul Survivor Week B!

The Story of Farmer Harry

I've been on holiday for two weeks as you may know so, since I haven't had a chance to write a serious post yet, I thought I'd get back on the blogging-horse as soon as possible and post this fairytale that I wrote last October, along with a few illustrations I drew for it. I'm not an expert on farming so some parts are probably a bit questionable, but I hope you can forgive those bits and enjoy the story. And appreciate the moral of course.

The Story of Farmer Harry

Once there was a young man called Harry. He was from a poor farming family so as soon as he could he set out to seek his fortune. He travelled the country for a number of years, never getting any richer, until one night he got so drunk that he fell into a deep sleep. While he slept another man came and stole the little he had left. So Harry had no choice but to return to the village where he was born and try to make a living from farming.

   Harry’s father was old and had divided up his land between his sons while Harry was away so upon his return the son found that he had been left the worst field full of poor, sandy soil that hardly yielded any crops. But the young man was determined, because he couldn’t ask Emily to marry him without an income, so he ploughed the field and sewed it with wheat.

   When the time for reaping came the wheat grew short and sparse with small, scrawny ears and the soil beneath was even poorer and sandier than before. Still, Harry wasn’t one to give up easily so he went to visit the West Wind, because he’d noticed that when the soil got dry the wind would blow it away.

   The West Wind lived at the top of the highest hill with the steepest sides. When the young man got there the Wind was howling and billowing around the hilltop. Harry shouted: “West Wind! How can I stop you and your brothers blowing the soil of my field away?”

   Suddenly, all was still and quiet and the man heard the Wind murmur in his ear, “What will you do if I tell you the secret?”

   “Anything!” said the young man, “I’ll do anything.”

   “If I tell you the secret you must promise me to use it wisely and treat it like the wind would. Otherwise everything you grow will be taken from you.”

   Harry didn’t understand what the wind meant about using the secret wisely but he agreed hurriedly and the West Wind told him what he had to do.

   Next, Harry went to the forest to find the Queen of the bees because he’d also noticed that insects had been eating his crops. The wild bees lived in a bright clearing which was full of late summer flowers and the humming of a thousand insects.

   He called out: “Queen Bee! How can I stop your cousins from eating my crops?”

   All the bees went very quiet and the man heard the Queen of the Bees whisper in his ear, “what will you do if I tell you the secret?”

   “I’ll do anything!” he said.

   “If I tell you the secret you must promise me to use it wisely and treat it like the bees would. Otherwise everything you grow will be taken from you.”

   Again, Harry didn’t quite understand but he agreed eagerly and the Queen of the Bees told him what he had to do.

   Finally, the young man went to see the Wise Woman because he’d noticed that his field was on a slope over which the rain ran quickly making the soil dryer and sandier than ever. She lived in a tiny dark cottage on the edge of the village and people went to her in secret when they had a problem that they couldn’t find a solution to. They didn’t do so casually; it was said that she had the power to predict the future and even weave magic spells.

   He knocked on the door and went inside, the Wise Woman was hunched up in a chair and wrapped tightly in blankets. Harry asked: “Wise Woman, how can I stop the rain running over the tops of my field instead of soaking into the soil?”

   The old woman closer her eyes and said in a creaky voice, “what will you do if I give you the secret?”

   “I’ll do anything,” replied the young man.

   “If I tell you the secret you must promise to use it wisely and treat it like an old person would. Otherwise everything you grow will be taken from you.”

   Again, Harry didn’t completely understand but he agreed earnestly and the Wise Woman told him what he had to do.

The next spring when he ploughed his field he followed the West Winds advice and planted beans and clover between the rows of wheat so that the wind couldn’t get at the soil. Then, as the Queen of the Bees told him, he planted chamomile and marigolds around the edge of the field to keep the insects away. Finally he followed the Wise Womans instructions and dug a deep ditch along the top of the field and put sand and stones in the bottom of it so that when it rained heavily the ditch caught the water and allowed it to flow through the soil instead of over the top.

   By harvest time Harry had so much wheat that he had to build a larger barn to store it in! People from the village wondered at the young man’s good fortune. His brothers had all suffered hard years, losing portions of their crops to insects and bad weather, and they asked Harry what he had done to grow so much wheat. But he remembered what the Wind, the bees and the Wise Woman had told him about using the secrets wisely and refused to tell anyone.

   That autumn a strong wind came blowing down from the hills and when Harry went to his barn he found that the wind had forced the door open and blown a large part of his crops away! He was disappointed but locked the doors firmly, telling himself that there was well over half left.

   Not long afterwards a great swarm of insects was seen flying over the fields. All the farmers rushed to check their harvests but the only person to find any food missing was Harry who had lost half of his remaining crop to the ravenous insects.

   A few days later black storm clouds came marching inland from the sea and the heavy rain that they brought lasted a whole week. When the downpour finally stopped Harry found that it had washed the last of his crop away.

   Downcast and ashamed he went to Emily to tell her that they couldn’t marry. And he explained to her everything that had happened, beginning with asking the West Winds advice to losing everything he had worked for all year.

   At first she was sad too but then she began to think and she finally asked, “what exactly did the Wind say to do with the secret?”

   “To use it wisely and treat it like the wind would,” replied Harry.

   “Then you should have spread the secret!” she cried, “because the wind spreads everything it can pick up. What did the Queen of the Bees tell you to do?”

   “To use it wisely and treat it like the bees would.”

   “Then you should have told your brothers about it when they asked!” she said, “because bees work together and share everything among themselves. And what about the Wise Woman? What did she say?”

   “To use the secret wisely and treat it like an old person would,” replied Harry.

   “Then you should have passed it on,” laughed Emily, “because the elderly pass on their knowledge to the next generation.”

   “Of course!” said Harry, “but what can I do now? I don’t have any money or food to last the winter.”

   “You still have the secrets,” she replied, “tell them to your brothers in exchange for food for this winter, then next year everyone will have good harvests. We can marry in the autumn.”

   So that’s exactly what Harry did, and his father gave the couple his most sincere blessing.

Moral: community is better than competition. Things are better when we work together than when we try to beat one another and act selfishly.

This story is dedicated to Richard Spalding and Alan (really sorry can't remember his surname!), two of my lecturers who are genuinely questioning a lot of the practices in agriculture and development which we take for granted, and who taught me to question them too.