Women and Christian Origins

A collection of essays on the role of women in the New Testament and in the early church. The historical and social contexts of women's lives in the New Testament period is discussed, and the text then addresses issues surrounding the representations of women and the roles they played. This is a collection of previously unpublished essays on the role of women in the New Testament and in the early church. It begins by supplying the historical and social contexts of women's lives in the New Testament period. In the next sections, the authors address issues surrounding the representation of women in the Gospels and in the Pauline writings. Finally, they turn to a consideration of attitudes towards women in the early church, and the roles played by early Christian women.

This new collection of fourteen integrated, original essays by prominent scholars and experienced teachers provides a comprehensive and accessible entree to current research on women and the origins of Christianity. Engaging for both the interested reader and the specialist in religion, Women and Christian Origins is sensitive to feminist theory and attentive to distinctions between the (re)construction of women's history in early Christian churches and ancient constructions of gender difference