Equal at the Creation: Sexism, Society, and Christian Thought

Margaret Conrad is a professor of history at Acadia University. She is
the author of Intimate Relations: Family and Community in Planter Nova
Scotia, 1759–1800, and Making Adjustments: Change and Continuity in
Planter Nova Scotia, 1759–1800 and the co

The editors of this volume set themselves an ambitious goal: to explore
sexism throughout the entire history of Christianity and to do so in a
way that is accessible to students and general readers. Amazingly, given
the scope of their task, they have largely succeeded. The 10 differently
authored essays cover sexism and women’s responses to it at major
turning points in Western Christendom from Christ’s birth to
contemporary times, and do so in an engaging way, at least for those who
have some knowledge of history and of the Bible. In addition to lucid
introductory and concluding essays by the editors, there are discussions
of the patriarchal context of the “Jesus Movement”; an exploration
of the images—iconic, symbolic, and iconoclastic—of women in
Christian antiquity; a masterful survey of the roles of women in the
Middle Ages and the impact of scholasticism on the status of women; a
cultural analysis of the “virginity” of Elizabeth I; and two essays
exploring the development of gender ideology in modern Catholicism and
Protestantism, as well as reflections on Christian marriage and
ordination.

The progressive views on the status of women expressed by most of the
scholars represented here will not likely appeal to the Conservative
Roman Catholics and Southern Baptists (whose views on women are explored
in an article by Gaile M. Pohlhaus). However, the explicit acceptance
that discrimination against women is a negative phenomenon and the
suggestion that the achievement of even partial gender equality may be
“a sign of God’s reign in history” will come as a breath of fresh
air for women in Christian churches struggling to move beyond two
millennia of church patriarchy. Inevitably, much is left out in an
anthology such as this one. Although the editors acknowledge this fact
and attempt to outline in a rather curious “Afterword” some of the
topics and approaches that require attention, they might have better
served their readers with a bibliography of further readings and an
index so that the individuals and issues covered in this volume could be
more easily found.