WOMEN IN EARLY CHRISTIANITYThe role of women in early Christianity has undergone tremendous tumultuous theses overthe centuries since Jesus Christ spread the Gospel. Viewing women’s roles in Christianity is an excellent example of the unevenness of women’s contributions to history. If one looks at the actions of Jesus as related in the New Testament, a positive picture emerges on how Christ viewedwomen and their role in his mission. In fact, some historians consider Jesus the first feminist. Paul the Apostle, Origen, Tertullian, and later the church fathers, St. Jerome and St. Augustine, succeeded in relegating women’s contributions in early Christianity back to the lower status of women in ancient Greece and Rome. Then, over the centuries, women’s role in early Christianity waxed and waned as the political structure of Western European society went from tribal to kingdoms. Currently, lay women and scholars have sought to recover and return to the original tenets of Christ’s messages. Sectarian interests in the last five hundred years have also played theirpart in the roller coaster role of women in the Christian church.What does the Bible tell us about the role of women during Christ’s lifetime and the next several centuries? Jesus’ actions according to the Bible consistently resonated his belief in the equality of women, and that woman could study, teach and preach. Luke 10:38-42 tells the story of Mary of Bethany’s right to study with male disciples around Jesus. Both male and female examples are given in the gospels’ parables. A woman sought a lost coin can be paired with a shepherd seeking his lost sheep. Another one whereby a woman, who sows leaven in a measure offlour is paired with farmers sowing seed in the fields. Accounts of Jesus’ life consistently mention five women companions: Mary Magdalene, Mary of Bethany (sisters of Lazarus and Martha), Joanna and Salome (women at the tomb) and the Samaritan, who Christ met at the well was called the First Apostle by the Orthodox church fathers. She was given the name Photina later.Mary Magdalen has been the most controversial female figure contemporary with Jesus. She was the one that went to the tomb and saw the risen Christ first. More on Mary can beadduced from the Gospel of Mary, which was discovered at Nag Hammadi in Egypt in 1945 and part of what became known as the Gnostic texts or Nag Hammadi library. In this non-canonical book it reveals much about the leadership role of Mary. It portrays Peter as her opponent. In another of the Nag Hammadi texts, The Gospel of Thomas, the conflict surrounding her position with Jesus is resolved when she is transformed into a male. Throughout the centuries many have conjectured that she was actually Jesus’ wife, and the story of the miracle of Jesus turning water into wine at the marriage at Cana, was actually his wedding to Mary. Mary is not called a prostitute in the Bible, but was an error in the 6th century when a pope mixed up her with anotherfigure. The Papacy or Roman Catholic Church apologized in 1956 for this egregious error. Her rise from a promiscuous prostitute to an apostle of Christ (the Eastern Orthodox Church recognizes her as such) has been the subject of biographies, novels, paintings, and justification for women’s subordination to men. How one interprets Mary’s place in Christianity seems to be determined by one’s view of women.After Jesus’ death, Christianity became the new driving force for the apostles and Christ’s followers. Perhaps Paul, the infamous persecutor of the early Christians, utilized women even more than Jesus. Paul, known before his conversion as Saul of Taurus, was a Roman citizen raisedin the Pharisee Jewish traditions, which were very conservative. Once his miraculous conversion took place, he energetically traversed the Roman and Greek world proselytizing. However, he was not alone. While the New Testament usually mentions the men who travelled with him, not allof Paul’s women companions were identified by name. In Paul’s epistles to the Romans he mentions thirty-six colleagues and sixteen of them are women. Junia, according to Paul “was foremost among the apostles” (Romans 16:7). Women, as leaders of their own congregations, corresponded regularly with Paul. In the city of Corinth, Paul even taught with a woman, Prisca or Priscilla. Just like Mary of Magdalen’s relationship with Jesus, Thecla of Iconium’s relationship with Paul is debated. She was engaged to be married when she left her family to teach with Paul. Accepted as a bona fide apostle by the early church, she is still regarded as such by the Eastern 2Orthodox Church. Paul ordained her as a preacher of the gospel and an apostle of Christ. In the first four to five centuries of Christianity before the canon of the New Testament was solidified, the book called the Acts of Paul and Thecla was widely read, and considered authentic biblical scriptures. Until it was barred from the official canon of the New Testament in 367 c.e., hardly anyone questioned its authenticity. Even St. Jerome, the translator of the Bible from Hebrew and Greek into Latin (The Vulgate edition), vouched for Acts of Paul and Thecla’s authenticity, and byextension for the historical Thecla. This book is now in the Apocrypha. (see the vignette for a more colorful rendition of Thecla’s life)What other specific roles did women engage in according to the New Testament? Four daughters of Philip attest to women as prophetesses. Two women, Euodia and Syntyche, preached the gospel with Paul and Barnabas (Philippians 4:2-3). Paul called Phoebe both a deaconand prostasis or leader of her community. Yet there seems to be an inconsistency regarding Paul’s treatment of women, or at least subsequent interpreters of the Bible’s thoughts on Paul’s view of women. This inconsistency perhaps can be explained by the concept of bifurcation between the general negative view of women, and the positive view of an individual woman. Or a more simple explication is forthwith. Drawing on Hebrew law and custom, Paul asserted that women should be veiled and keep silent in church. “For they are not permitted to speak, but should be subordinate, even as the law says. If there is anything they desire to know, let them ask their husbands at home. For it is shameful forwomen to speak in church.” Supposedly, this was written so that submissive and chaste wives would attract converts. This same