Women in the Bible

Nowhere is the accurate translation of Scripture more pertinent than Genesis 3:1-19, concerned as it is with the misrepresentation of God’s speech and the resulting consequences for humanity. The passage is laden with implications, not least for our theological and aetiological understanding of the tensions and imbalances in male/female relations. Consequently, English translations face the challenge of maintaining accuracy and meaning while avoiding allowing existing traditions or convictions to colour translation. This paper examines the ESV, NIV and NLT translations, commenting on similarities and, in particular, differences with nontrivial potential to inform the understanding of readers in particular directions. The focus is on passages of speech, particularly as they pertain to the woman, and concludes with a proposal for the translation of God’s words to her in Gen 3:16.

Matthean scholars of intertextuality rightly incorporate the Gospel of Matthew’s allusions to OT men such as Moses and David into their understanding of Matthew’s contributions to biblical theology. Yet through a deep analysis of quotations, allusions, echoes, and narrative patterns related to women and female imagery, a more rigorous Matthean theology emerges. Tamar, Rahab, Ruth, “the wife of Uriah,” Rachel, and the Queen of the South are the OT women Matthew explicitly mentions to assist in portraying Christ. Many more of these intertextual references are found in the OT laws, gender pairs, and narratives with women in their encounters with Jesus. Moreover, biblical themes such as Woman Wisdom and God’s protoevangelium promise, in which the Seed of the Woman will crush the serpent’s head, can be considered to be fulfilled in Matthew’s good news. Using the framework utilized by G. K. Beale and D. A. Carson in their 2007 edited volume Commentary on the New Testament Use of the Old Testament, this project contemplates each of these intertexts in their New Testament context, the referenced text in its OT context, the text and similar texts in Second Temple literature, relevant textual factors, how Matthew makes use of the text, and his theological employment of each intertext. In total, the theological areas of Creation, Christology, Ecclesiology, Sacramental Theology, Eschatology, Soteriology, and Atonement are all enhanced by the biblical theology derived from these women’s stories and other female intertextual references in Matthew’s Gospel.

This new book from Kregel Academic distills Mariottini’s class on Old Testament Women taught at Northern Seminary. He challenges a common view that the Old Testament is misogynistic by collecting the stories of women and demonstrating that Ancient Israel valued women in the Law. That the book has forty chapters makes me wonder if this was originally designed for Kregel’s 40 Questions series. Although the chapter titles are not framed as questions, the book has a similar vibe to a 40 Question book.

The article presents an analysis of John 7:53–8:11, using the interpretive framework of symbolic violence to expose how patriarchy has been legitimised by Judeo-Christian tradition through the naturalisation of violence against women. Unlike moralising interpretations, which emphasise the contrast between female guilt and divine mercy, this study demonstrates that the core of the narrative lies in the instrumentalisation of the woman by their accusers. This constitutes an act of male domination legitimised ‘behind the narrative’ (in the Hebrew Bible), exercised ‘within the narrative’ by the accusers, and perpetuated ‘in front of the narrative’ in patriarchal reinterpretations of it. Thus, a suitable number of its receptions have reinforced symbolic violence against women by emphasising the guilt of the accused woman and ignoring the abuse she was subjected to by the circle of men who brought her before Jesus. Similarly, Jesus’ symbolic action of rejecting violence while confronting the conscience of the accusers, but comforting and restoring dignity to the woman, has not been sufficiently appreciated. It is proposed that Jesus’ attitude lays the foundation for an understanding of gender equality, and his symbolic act of rejecting violence is analysed.

Intradisciplinary and/or interdisciplinary implications: This approach to the story allows us to deconstruct the imaginaries and practices of violence against women and encourage those who have been abused to rebuild their lives and projects without fear of stigma or abuse.

Jehoshaphat’s response to Jehoram in 2 Kings 3 exposes a serious failure.  Having previously suffered for his alliance with Ahab and received prophetic rebuke, he nevertheless repeats the same pattern with Ahab’s son.  His eager declaration of unity—intensified by the added אֶעֱלֶה, reveals unguarded commitment. Crucially, the pause that follows is used not to enquire of Jehovah, but to consider strategy: “By which way shall we go up?”  The question is not whether to act, but how.  Only when the campaign falters does he then seek divine counsel.  The pause, then, exposes not prudence, but a heart already decided.

This essay examines Jesus’s pause in John 6:65 as a deliberate moment of spiritual sifting.  Following hard sayings that unsettled many disciples, the silence exposed motives and prompted self-examination.  Some withdrew, unable to move beyond a literal or material outlook, while others remained, held by a deeper loyalty despite incomplete understanding.  The pause was perhaps an emotional moment for Jesus.  It was not coercive but allowed space for a response.  In this tense silence, allegiance was revealed and motives were tested.

This essay argues that the narrative of Jonah 1:7-11 deliberately mirrors the chaos of the storm through both its structure and Jonah's speech. The rapid succession of overlapping interrogatives conveys urgency, fear and disorientation, while the narrator's non-linear disclosure of information further reflects the tumultuous setting. Against this backdrop, Jonah's response appears fragmented and psychologically strained, revealing an inner conflict between his fear of Jehovah and his resistance to the divine commission. His moment of silence exposes Jonah's moral hesitation, as he withholds fuller disclosure and wrestles inwardly with competing impulses: self-preservation, responsibility and withdrawal. Ultimately, the essay contends that Jonah is portrayed not as a figure of satire but as a psychologically realistic character.

What does the name Sarah mean in Hebrew, and why did Sarai become Sarah? The standard answer — princess or noblewoman — is a late-stage residue of a richer and earlier reading. The Hebrew root H8280 (śārar) is declared a primitive root by conventional lexicons: etymology unresolved. This paper recovers what the etymology left behind.
The argument proceeds through the letter-level mechanics of the Sarai-to-Sarah transition in Genesis 17, the interpretive traditions that preserved the deeper reading before it was narrowed (Philo, Paul, the Zohar), the Afro-Asiatic root witnesses (Akkadian sharrat, Egyptian sr), and an independent African linguistic witness: the Luganda root okusala — a living Bantu language spoken as mother tongue in the Great Lakes region. Luganda okusala encodes not severance but line-making: the drawing of jurisdictional boundaries, the delivery of rulings, the determination of domains. The governance function is geometric before it is judicial.
The Sarai-to-Sarah transition, read through this root field, is a grammatical shift from object to subject of the sala function. Sarai (nsalira: the sala is performed for her) becomes Sarah (nsalawo: she performs the sala in her own domain). The renaming at Genesis 17:15 is not honorific — it is a territorial grant. The connection between Sarah and Israel, both deriving from the same verbal root, follows directly — and reopens the etymological road the primitive root designation had closed.

Location matters, and this article explores the depiction and significance of the Esther/Mordecai (Purim) panel's placement next to the Torah niche in the Dura Europos Synagogue. It aims to answer questions such as what the visual representation may have conveyed and which memories the panel might have evoked by its presence in that particular place. To address these questions, the article probes the historical, visual, and ideological context of the panel within the Jewish synagogue in the mid-third century CE. It shows how the local Jewish population engaged with the depiction of Esther and Mordecai, not only as Diaspora heroes, but also as figures linked to Jewish memory, identity, and resistance in a Roman-Persian borderland. In doing so, it showcases how visual media in antiquity served Jewish communities in constructing sacred memory, connecting past and future hopes, and asserting their cultural identity in imperial contexts. In addition, it presents a fresh analysis of the legacy of the by then long-defunct Achaemenid Empire and its enduring presence in the memories, imagination, and minds of Jews living at the crossroads of the Parthian and Roman Empires.

The Joseph Smith Translation is available for free with color-coded differences and side-by-side KJV/JST comparison at https://searchdiligently.net/joseph-smith-translation

Exodus 4:24-26 is widely recognized as one of the most obscure and contested passages in the Hebrew Bible. The King James Version preserves the ambiguity of the Masoretic Text, leaving unresolved the identity of the one God seeks to kill, the object Zipporah casts, the meaning of her declaration, and the theological logic of the entire episode. The Joseph Smith Translation provides a series of clarifications that resolve nearly every major ambiguity: it identifies the cause of divine wrath (Moses's failure to circumcise his son), changes the object Zipporah casts (the stone, not the foreskin), adds Moses's confession and repentance, and explicitly names Zipporah's act as the cause of Moses's deliverance. This paper examines each JST emendation, situates them within the broader Hebrew wordplay of the passage (particularly the karat root and the dual meaning of milah as both "cutting" and "word"), and argues that the JST elevates Zipporah from a mysterious figure performing an ambiguous act to an intercessory agent functioning simultaneously as priest, prophet, and covenant mediator. The paper further traces the typological connections between Zipporah's act and the Passover narrative, the covenant blood formula of Exodus 24:8, and the pattern of female agency in Exodus 1-4.

Artykuł podejmuje zagadnienie symbolicznego znaczenia złotego pasa Jezusa (Ap 1,13) w inauguracyjnej wizji Apokalipsy (1,12-20). Źródłem tego symbolizmu chromatycznego jest najpierw Stary Testament, w którego świetle złoty kolor wskazuje na Jezusa jako Boga, Króla i Arcykapłana. W zaproponowanej refleksji poszukuje się także możliwych źródeł (inspiracji) w antycznej literaturze greckiej, zwłaszcza w opisach bóstw mitologicznych: Zeusa, Posejdona, Artemidy, Apollona, Kirke. Ana­liza wybranych fragmentów, zaczerpniętych z Iliady i Odysei Homera oraz Hymnów Kallimacha, pozwala stwierdzić, że złoto jest ich dominującym kolorem, a wiele elementów stroju, ekwipunku i sprzętów, którymi posługują się greccy bogowie, zostało wykonanych z tego szlachetnego i cennego materiału. Można zatem powiedzieć, że barwa złota jest „kolorem bogów”, a sam kruszec kojarzy się w sposób naturalny w bóstwem. Autor Apokalipsy mógł zatem wykorzystać obrazy i motywy zapożyczone z mi­tologii i symboliki greckiej,...

Streszczenie. W artykule omawiam jeden ze współczesnych przykładów oddziaływania Apokalipsy na sztukę, jakim jest cykl ilustracji polskiego artysty Grzegorza Bednarskiego do wybranych fragmentów ostatniej księgi biblijnej. Przedmiotem analizy jest pierwsza ilustracja cyklu, nosząca tytuł "Pan świeczników i gwiazd" (Ap 1,12-20), która przedstawia wstępną wizję, otwierającą Apokalipsę. Po omówieniu genezy powstania ilustracji G. Bednarskiego, krótkiej analizie tekstu biblijnego, stawiam pytanie zapowiedziane w tytule: czy praca polskiego artysty jest tylko bardziej lub mniej udaną ilustracją inspirującą się tekstem biblijnym czy stanowi jego interpretację nie tylko artystyczną, ale przed wszystkim teologiczną i przyczynia się do lepszego odczytania przesłania Apokalipsy? Przeprowadzone analizy pozwalają stwierdzić, że artysta pozostaje wierny przede wszystkim profetycznemu charakterowi Księgi Objawienia. Jego twórczość jest sztuką interpretacji oraz aktualizacji orędzia biblijnego. Artysta staje się egzegetą, który pędzlem maluje i wydobywa teologiczne przesłanie Księgi, staje się "głosem", który "można i trzeba zobaczyć", także po to, aby lepiej go zrozumieć. W ten sposób obraz komunikuje to, co wydaje się niewyobrażalne, a jednak ważne, konieczne i niezbędne.

Streszczenie. W artykule omawiam jeden ze współczesnych przykładów oddziaływania Apokalipsy na sztukę, jakim jest cykl ilustracji polskiego artysty Grzegorza Bednarskiego do wybranych fragmentów ostatniej księgi biblijnej. Przedmiotem analizy jest pierwsza ilustracja cyklu, nosząca tytuł "Pan świeczników i gwiazd" (Ap 1,12-20), która przedstawia wstępną wizję, otwierającą Apokalipsę. Po omówieniu genezy powstania ilustracji G. Bednarskiego, krótkiej analizie tekstu biblijnego, stawiam pytanie zapowiedziane w tytule: czy praca polskiego artysty jest tylko bardziej lub mniej udaną ilustracją inspirującą się tekstem biblijnym czy stanowi jego interpretację nie tylko artystyczną, ale przed wszystkim teologiczną i przyczynia się do lepszego odczytania przesłania Apokalipsy? Przeprowadzone analizy pozwalają stwierdzić, że artysta pozostaje wierny przede wszystkim profetycznemu charakterowi Księgi Objawienia. Jego twórczość jest sztuką interpretacji oraz aktualizacji orędzia biblijnego. Artysta staje się egzegetą, który pędzlem maluje i wydobywa teologiczne przesłanie Księgi, staje się "głosem", który "można i trzeba zobaczyć", także po to, aby lepiej go zrozumieć. W ten sposób obraz komunikuje to, co wydaje się niewyobrażalne, a jednak ważne, konieczne i niezbędne.

In this article I discuss one of contemporary examples of The Book of Revelation’s influence to the art, which is the series of illustrations, created by Grzegorz Bednarski, to the chosen parts of the last Bible’s book. “The Lord of Candlestics and Stars”, first work of the series, showing the initial vision of the Apocalypse, was point of my analysis. After discussing the genesis Bednarski’s illustrations and short review of the biblical text, I put a question presented in the title: Is the work of Polish artist is only a more or less successful drawing based on biblical text, or is rather theological interpretation, which enables to discover the real message of the Apocalypse? Analyses shows, that artist’s work primarily remain faithful to the prophetic message of The Book of Revelation and is the way of interpretation and actualization biblical message. Artist became an exegetist, who extracts theological message from the Book. He is “the voice”, which “can and should be seen” to...

“Wat die gewete betref, het die meerderheid geen mag om dit te beperk nie.” Om die vryheid van gewete te beskerm is die plig van die staat, en dit is die perke van sy gesag in godsdienssake. Elke aardse regering wat probeer om godsdienstige gebruike te reel of toe te pas deur middel van burgerlike gesag, sou juis die beginsel opoffer waarvoor evangeliese Christene so dapper gestry het ... “Die beginsels vervat in hierdie beroemde Protes . . . bevat die essensie van Protestantisme. Hierdie Protes het twee menslike gebruike wat die geloof betref, weerstaan: die eerste was die indringing van die burgerlike magistraat, en die tweede was die arbitrêre gesag van die kerk. In die plek van hierdie misbruike, het Protestantisme die gewete bokant die magistraat gestel, en die gesag van Gods woord bokant die sigbare kerk. In die eerste plek verwerp dit burgerlike mag in goddelike sake. En ook het die protesteerders hulle reg beklemtoon om hulle oortuigings van die waarheid vryelik uit te spreek ... Die Protes van Spiers was ‘n plegtige getuienis teen godsdienstige onverdraagsaamheid en ‘n verklaring van die reg van alle mense om God te dien volgens die inspraak van hulle eie gewete.

Writing for The Christian Century this International Women's Month, I turned to the women of Abrahamic sacred history for guidance in a turbulent moment. From Moses' mother's courageous resistance to the Queen of Sheba's masterful diplomacy, to the cautionary tale of a powerful woman who exploited the vulnerable and evaded accountability — for a time.

This article explores the exegetical and linguistic evolution of the biblical jewelry term "kumaz," appearing in Exodus 35:22 and Numbers 31:50. While classical rabbinic literature described the kumaz as a female anatomical adornment (seemingly linking it to promiscuity in the context of the Midianite women), a distinct interpretive tradition emerged in medieval Europe beginning with Rashi. Analyzing Judeo-French (La'az), Yiddish (Taytsh), and Ladino glossaries, the study reveals a consistent translation of kumaz as a "lock" or "locket," utilizing terms such as loket, malen-schlos, and cadenado. This linguistic shift reflects (and perhaps influenced) a broader reframing by medieval exegetes, such as Rabbeinu Ephraim, who reinterpreted the kumaz (in the context of the Israelite women) as a modesty-preserving device resembling a lock. By tracing these translations alongside rabbinic commentaries, the paper demonstrates how the kumaz was conceptually transformed from a symbol of transgression into an emblem of feminine modesty and family purity.

Ce volume explore les perceptions et les fonctions des fluides corporels dans les sociétés d’Égypte et du Proche-Orient anciens. Il réunit des contributions croisant approches lexicographiques, historiques, sociologiques, médicales et religieuses. L’ouvrage analyse le rôle de ces substances, humaines, animales et divines, dans l’équilibre cosmique, social et individuel. Certaines, comme le sang ou le lait, participent au cycle de la vie, tandis que d’autres, telles que les déjections, peuvent menacer l’ordre établi. Présents dans les pratiques médicales, les mythes et les représentations sociales, les fluides corporels constituent une clé de lecture des conceptions culturelles et symboliques du corps dans l’Antiquité. L’ouvrage contribue ainsi à renouveler l’étude des représentations du corps et offre un nouvel éclairage sur les pratiques et les croyances des sociétés antiques.

A pesar de que su especialización académica se enfoca en la arqueología bíblica, Rodrigo Silva ha mantenido un interés constante en el Jesús histórico, lo cual puede verse plasmado en dos importantes obras de su autoría. En 2001, publicó Um Desconhecido Galileu: Uma abordagem histórico-cientí ca da vida e obras de Jesus de Nazaré, 1 que procura ser un acercamiento crítico al Jesús histórico y un análisis de la historicidad de los evangelios. Mientras tanto, en 2018 publicó la primera edición de Enciclopédia histórica da vida de Jesus, 2 cuyo propósito es establecer un contexto sociocultural para reconstruir el Jesús histórico. Naturalmente, el interés en esta temática lo llevó a explorar el círculo íntimo de Jesús, lo cual, como se reconoce ampliamente, "contribuye a nuestra comprensión de Jesús y sus enseñanzas tal como están presentadas en el Nuevo Testamento y fueron recibidas en diferentes comunidades cris-

In questo volume si presenta l'inedita traduzione italiana del Targum Jonathan del primo e secondo libro dei Re. Si è voluto fornire uno strumento agevole a coloro che sono interessati ad approfondire una ramificazione del pensiero e della prassi del Giudaismo e a trarre profitto per una migliore comprensione della Scrittura. I targumim rappresentano, infatti, un importante testimone di come le antiche comunità ebraiche interpretavano i testi biblici. Si è scelto di premettere alla traduzione un'introduzione che accompagni anche i meno esperti a comprendere i dati essenziali della letteratura targumica in generale, per poi avere chiare le principali caratteristiche di 1-2 Re secondo la traduzione aramaico-targumica. Nella traduzione a seguire, sono graficamente messe in risalto le differenze rispetto al testo ebraico, in modo che si possa individuare immediatamente l'originalità della versione targumica. Se in certi casi la fraseologia in italiano sembra troppo letterale, è proprio perché si è voluto offrire una resa che permetta di cogliere la forza delle espressioni originali. In nota, sono infine presenti anche rimandi tecnici che rendono possibili confronti con altre fonti e approfondimenti con distinti rappresentanti dell'omiletica e dell'interpretazione biblica.