Women of Early Christianity

by Alfred Brittain; Mitchell Carroll

Yet it is scarcely to be supposed that in everyday Jewish life the pharisaical maxims quoted above were adhered to with any great degree of strictness. Especially in Galilee, where there was much more freedom than in the lower province, it may well be imagined that there existed a wide difference between these arrogant "counsels of perfection" and the common practice. There is no doubt that the rabbis and the scribes observed the traditions to the minutest letter; but inasmuch as in these days it would be misleading to delineate the common life of a people by the enactments found on their statute books, we are justified in concluding that ordinary existence in ancient Palestine was not nearly such a burdensome absurdity as the rabbinical law sought to make it. Human nature will not endure too great a strain. At any rate, we can but believe that, subordinate as she may have been, the Jewish woman found ample opportunity to assert herself. The rabbi may have scorned to multiply speech with his wife on the street, but doubtless there were occasions which compelled the husband to endure a multiplicity of speech on the part of his wife at home. It was not without experience that the wise man could say: "A continual dropping on a very rainy day and a contentious woman are alike."

The sayings of the scribes, which are derogatory to the female sex, are abundantly offset by many injunctions of an opposite nature which are found in the sacred and in the expository writings of the Jews. One of the first things drilled into the mind of a young Hebrew was that his prosperity in the land depended wholly upon his observance of the law that he should "honor his father and his mother." The virtuous woman portrayed by King Lemuel was still the ideal in the time of Christ: "Her sons rise up and praise her; her husband also extols her." The declaration in the book of Proverbs that "the price of a virtuous woman is set far above that of rubies" is not to be understood in the sense of irony. "Honor your wife, that you may be rich in the joy of your home," says the Talmud; and there was a proverb: "Is thy wife little? then bow down to her and speak." The Son of Sirach said: "He that honoreth his mother is as one that layeth up treasure ... and he that angereth his mother is cursed of God."

As among all other Eastern peoples, the education of Jewish girls was greatly neglected; but it can hardly be said that they were losers on that account. They were simply saved a great deal of profitless labor which fell upon their brothers. The learning of the Jews, so far as higher education was concerned, did not add much either to the grace or the enjoyment of life. It was pedantry of the driest and dreariest kind. It consisted of interminable glosses upon the Law and of the "traditions of the elders." It exercised no faculties of the mind excepting the memory and such powers of reasoning as are employed in subtle casuistry. There was in it nothing of art or science, or even of history, except Jewish history. Greek learning was abhorred by the strictly orthodox. They said the command was that a man's study should be on the Law day and night; if anyone therefore could find time between day and night he might apply it to Gentile literature. There were schools in abundance; but they are spoken of only in relation to boys. In the fundamental moral precepts, however, and in the highest national ideals, the Jewish girls were no less thoroughly trained than were their brothers. Ozias testified to Judith, who with feminine strategy and masculine courage overthrew Holophernes: "This is not the first day wherein thy wisdom is manifested; but from the beginning of thy days all the people have known thy understanding, because the disposition of thy heart is good." Of the chaste Susanna it was said that, her parents being righteous, they taught their daughter according to the Law of Moses. Timothy owed his early training to his mother Eunice and his grandmother Lois. The Israelitish mother, in the dawn of her children's intelligence, carefully taught them the lore of the ancient Scriptures and instructed them in the principal tenets of the Jewish faith. There never existed another nation that cared so thoroughly for the training of its young in the doctrines of morality and in those national memories which are efficacious in the perpetuation of an ardent patriotism. In all this the girls were privileged equally with the boys. As Edersheim says: "What Jewish fathers and mothers were; what they felt towards their children; and with what reverence, affection, and care the latter returned what they had received, is known to every reader of the Old Testament. The relationship of father has its highest sanction and embodiment in that of God towards Israel; the tenderness and care of a mother in that of the watchfulness and pity of the Lord over his people."

Religion was the breath of Jewish life. It is absolutely impossible to touch on Hebrew history, customs, or ideals, in any period or to any extent, and not to come into contact with Hebrew religion. This, as we know, was full of burdensome ritual and formalities; the Law, with all its elaborate ramifications, governed the minutiae of daily existence. Yet it is again necessary to be careful not to judge too broadly of Jewish life by the rules which the Talmud shows were laid down by the rabbis. The Pharisees, who made the formalities of religion their one business in life, could observe all the multitudinous feasts and fasts, all the ritual of washings, and bear in mind the innumerable possibilities of breaking the Sabbath--such, for example, as accidentally treading on a ripe ear of grain, which would be the act of threshing; but that the common people lived thus straitly is impossible of belief, and for this reason they were held in contempt by the strictest sect. How some of these troublesome laws related to the women is suggested by Edersheim; "A woman (on the Sabbath) must not wear such headgear as would require unloosing before taking a bath, nor go out with such ornaments as could be taken off in the street, such as a frontlet, unless it is attached to the cap, nor with a gold crown, nor with a necklace or nose-ring, nor with rings, nor have a pin in her dress. The reason for this prohibition of ornaments was, that in their vanity women might take them off to show them to their companions, and then, forgetful of the day, carry them, which would be a 'burden.' Women were also forbidden to look in the glass on the Sabbath, because they might discover a white hair and attempt to pull it out, which would be a grievous sin; but men ought not to use looking-glasses even on weekdays, because this was undignified. A woman may walk about her own court, but not in the street, with false hair."

These are only instances of regulations which were so numerous as severely to tax the memory of those who did little else but study to observe them. We are sure that they could not have characterized the common Jewish life; yet there was not a man, however loose in conduct or humble of birth, who was not well versed in the moral precepts of Moses and in the exalted national ideals of the Prophets. In the cases--and they were many--where this wisdom was not justified of her children, the punctilious observance of outward forms, conjoined with the most extreme arrogance of race, laid the Jew open to the contempt of both Greek and Roman. Yet there was enough latent impetus and genuine religious life in Israel to form the basis of that Christianity which was destined to overreach Greek philosophy and to revolutionize Rome; and there are many indications in the Gospels that the credit for the incalculable service of preserving alive the smouldering embers of piety must, to a predominant degree, be awarded to the mothers and daughters of Israel. Elizabeth, no less than Zacharias her husband, was a type of many who "walked in all the commandments and ordinances of the Lord, blameless." There was also one Anna whose devotion was so great that she seemed to make the temple her constant home. Nevertheless, in religion, as in other things, the Jewish women, as all of their sex in the ancient world, were obliged to be content with an inferior position. In the great temple at Jerusalem they were allowed to occupy only the second court: to the Court of Israel, where their male relatives worshipped, they could not penetrate. They had no occasion, however, to complain of lack of space, for in this Court of the Women there was room for over fifteen thousand persons; and, for their convenience, the priests had very considerately placed therein the treasury chests. It was here that the poor widow whom Christ eulogized cast in her "two mites." In this court also was Solomon's Porch, where the Master, recognizing no inequality, taught both sexes alike. In the synagogues, the women of Palestine were obliged to occupy as inconspicuous a position as possible, and on the way thither it was required of them that they should take the back and less frequented streets, in order that the minds of the men might not be diverted from sacred meditations by their presence. This bit of hypocritical phariseeism not only indicates the inferior plane which women were supposed to occupy, but also that, however honored they may have been as wives and mothers, they enjoyed no portent of that chivalry which afterward grew from and was fostered by Christianity.

The existence of the Jewish woman was by no means secluded. She was allowed to mingle freely in outdoor life. She accompanied her family on their journeys to the great festivals which were held in Jerusalem. Indeed, we read of Galilean women following Jesus into Judæa, evidently unescorted by male relatives. Females also entertained mixed companies in their own homes. It is probable, however, that there was more freedom of movement among the lower-class women than was enjoyed by their sisters of high degree. While the former dwelt in mean and small houses, in which there was little possibility of seclusion, the latter had large and luxurious homes, with great interior courts and special apartments for their own use. The luxuriousness of these wealthy women rivalled that of Rome itself. We read of one Martha, the wife of a high priest, who, when she went to the temple, had carpets laid from her house to the door of the temple. Upon the poorer women were imposed the hardships of labor: "two women grinding at the mill" was a common sight in every home.

In that momentous drama the leading figure of which was the Son of Man, women of greatly varying character and position played a part. There were Herodias, and Procla, the wife of Pilate: these were the highest ladies in the land; there were Martha of Bethany, and Joanna, the wife of Herod's steward, representing the middle class; Mary, the mother of Jesus, from among the poor; and Mary of Magdala, from among a class of women who were numerous in Palestine, one of whom the Gospel designates as "a woman who was a sinner."

Of the two first mentioned little may be said in this connection, as they were far from being Christian women, though the wife of Pilate earned for herself the respect of all succeeding generations by pleading for the life of Jesus.

Herodias is connected with this story only on account of the cruel determination with which she sought and compassed the death of John the Baptist. The grand-daughter of Herod the Great, she inherited not only his impetuous ambition, but also his ferocity. She had been married to Herod Philip, her uncle. This son of the first Herod was a wealthy private resident of Jerusalem; but Herodias could not be content to stand aside as a mere spectator of the brilliant game of governing. So she seized the opportunity which the presence of Antipas in her house, by her husband's hospitality, gave her to begin an intrigue, which ended in her marital union with the tetrarch. By this conduct she trampled on Jewish law and offended the people. Not that the severing of the marriage bonds was a thing unusual among the Jews; indeed, the facilities for divorce were exceedingly liberal. A man could put away his wife for the most trifling cause. "If anyone," said the rabbis, "see a woman handsomer than his wife, he may dismiss his wife and marry that woman." It was considered ample cause for divorce if a wife went out without her veil. The disciples of Hillel even went so far as to hold that if a woman spoiled her husband's dinner, by burning or over salting it, sufficient cause was given him, if he so chose, to put her away. This is the point of the question with which the Pharisees came to try Christ. "Is it lawful," said they, "for a man to put away his wife for every cause?" So, then, that which shocked the Jews and caused them to agree with John in his denunciation of Herod was not that the latter divorced his first wife, the daughter of Aretas, but that he took Herodias, she not having been put away by her husband, Philip. Here is some very remarkable moral sophistry. It would have been right, in the sight of Jewish law, for Herod and Philip to have exchanged wives, after legally divorcing them for any cause which might have seemed to them proper; but there was no law, nor was there any conceivable wrong, which could give Herodias the right to leave her husband of her own free will. Women could not gain divorce. So, according to the Jewish idea, the fault of Herod consisted solely in the fact that Philip had not yet seen fit to release Herodias. Whether or not John the Baptist concurred with the ideas of his time on this subject we do not know; but the One who came after him put marriage on a far higher basis and restricted divorce to its essential cause.

Herodias plotted and achieved John's destruction perhaps as much on account of her fear of the effect of his influence upon Herod's ambitious projects as because of her resentment at his charges against herself. She was determined that Herod should be a king, like her brother Agrippa; but the latter was a great favorite with Caligula, and when his letters were presented to the emperor at the same time that Herod appeared, in obedience to the importunities of his wife, to press his suit, the husband of Herodias was deposed and exiled to Lyons. The only praiseworthy thing that Herodias ever did, so far as is known, was on this occasion. Caligula wished to allow her to retain her own fortune, and told her that "it was her brother who prevented her being put under the same calamity with her husband." This was her reply: "Thou, indeed, O emperor, actest after a magnificent manner, and as becomes thyself in what thou offerest me; but the kindness which I have for my husband hinders me from partaking of the favor of thy gift; for it is not just that I, who have been made a partner in his prosperity, should forsake him in his misfortunes." Thereupon Caligula sent her into banishment with Herod, and gave her estate to Agrippa.