To declare that your way is the only way effectively eliminates any fear that you might be wrong, or at least pushes it below the surface for a time.
– RACHEL HELD EVANS, A Year of Biblical Womanhood
Forget what you’ve heard about this book. And what you may have heard about Rachel Held Evans.
Because if you read this book with a clean slate, you’ll find a Bible-believing woman sincerely seeking to honor God, honor his truths in the Bible, and honor her husband in their marriage.
To do so, she places herself in a self-imposed, year-long experiment to look for and practice scriptural principles in the Bible concerning women.
Some are from the Old Testament, some from the New. Many are hard, and some are virtually impossible for our day. But all are to help her sort out mixed messages she’s heard all her life about the appropriate roles of women in the home, in the church, and in our culture.
I found myself inexplicably drawn to Proverbs 31:25: “She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come.” I was pretty sure I couldn’t find “strength” or “dignity” in the women’ section at Kohl’s, but when I considered the sheer absurdity of someone like me doing something like this, the best I could do was laugh at the days to come. And there was something strangely liberating about that.
Her monthly experiments revolve around these twelve virtues:
- Gentleness
- Domesticity
- Obedience
- Valor
- Beauty
- Modesty
- Purity
- Fertility
- Submission
- Justice
- Silence
- Grace
As she explains it, “I took my research way too seriously, combing through feminist, conservative, and liberal commentaries, and seeking out Jewish, Catholic, and Protestant perspectives on each issue.” She interviews a wide range of women: a polygamist, an Amish grandmother, a pastor, a Quiverfull daughter, an Orthodox Jew, and many more, all as she combs through her Bible to see which practices and principles line up, and which don’t.
Read the rest here
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