Could you embrace equality for all?
Alfred Brittain
writes in “Women of Early Christianity” about the inferior position of women in
the first Century. He says “A common
prayer was: "O God, let not my offspring be a girl: for very wretched is
the life of women." It was said: "Happy he whose children are boys,
and woe unto him whose children are girls."
Public
conversation between the sexes was interdicted by the rabbis. "No one", says the Talmud,
"is to speak with a woman, even if she be his wife, in the public
street."
A close friend
once said to me ‘I am following Jesus but at a distance’. She explained that
while growing up, she had internalised the message from the Bible that God was
only interested in men.
How sad to have
this perception of Jesus who loved and valued women differently to what culture
dictated and to whom women responded with love and gratitude. Women like Joanna
gave up the comfort of being the wife of Herod’s business manager in order to
travel on the road with Jesus. Mary Magdalene became his close companion. Mary,
sister of Martha, sat at Jesus feet and listened to his religious instructions
even though women were not to be taught the Torah by a rabbi and poured the
entire contents of expensive perfume over Jesus’ head in love and gratitude.
At the cross, all
the disciples except John fled fearing for their lives, while the women came
and watched, staying close to Jesus in his agony. Mary Magdalene and the many
other women who had come with him to Jerusalem (Mark 15:41) followed to catch a
glimpse of the tomb where he was to be laid, and through their tears and pain
of broken hearts prepared the spices and ointments to care for his body after
the Sabbath was over.
Early on the
Sunday morning the women returned to the tomb. Mary Magdalene, Joanna, Mary the
mother of James and several other women. How quiet the garden must have seemed.
The familiar voice of Jesus no longer heard. His laughter no longer ringing
out. When they arrived at the tomb they found to their surprise that the stone
had been rolled away and the tomb was empty. Mary Magdalene, grief-stricken,
stood outside the tomb weeping. Through her tears she did not recognise Jesus when
he spoke to her and thought he was the gardener. She pleaded with him to tell
her, if they had taken Jesus away, where they had put him so that she could go
and get him. But when Jesus said her name she recognised him and at a time when
the testimony of women was worthless Jesus instructed Mary Magdalene to ‘go
tell’ his disciples that he was alive. (Matthew 28)
Dorothy Sayers wrote: ‘Perhaps it is no wonder that the women were first at the cradle and
last at the cross. They had never known a man like this Man – there had never
been such another. A prophet and teacher who never nagged at them, who never
flattered or coaxed or patronized; who never made arch jokes about them, never
treated them either as ‘The women, God help us!’ or ‘The ladies, God bless
them!’; who rebuked without querulousness and praised without condescension;
who took their questions and arguments seriously, who never mapped out their
sphere for them, never urged them to be feminine or jeered at them for being
female; who had no axe to grind and no uneasy male dignity to defend; who took who took them as he found
them and was completely unself-conscious“
The tomb is
empty. If Jesus were to call your name how would you respond? Could you journey
with Him and embrace equality for all under God regardless of race, gender,
class or sexual orientation?
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