100% fascinating and not what I expected. ( )

This book was entertaining, but overall more lightweight than what I expected from the author's excellent blog.

As the title implies, the author, Rachel Held Evans, spent a year exploring what biblical womanhood means. She took the Bible as her primary source, but also consulted with women from various faith traditions to see how they interpreted Biblical womanhood.

"Interpreted" is a key term. When it comes to defining what it means to live life according to a Biblical ideal of womanhood, all faith traditions use a lot of interpretation. Most of the Biblical texts about women are descriptive, not prescriptive, and they often describe a particular woman, not a generic ideal. Those parts which are prescriptive tend to be low on detail, so much of what passes for Biblical womanhood in a particular faith tradition extrapolates a lot from just a few words.

Evans approached this project with sincerity and with humor. She combined research (reading the Bible, reading commentaries, interviewing women from other faith traditions) with integrating practices into her life. She describes her experiences with honesty that sometimes surfaces as sincere reflection and sometimes as humorous acknowledgement of her own shortcomings. Although some of her initial resolutions were taken with an intention to drop them at the end of the project -- not cutting her hair, for example -- others left a lasting impression on her life, from the practical (cooking) to the spiritual (contemplative prayer).

Overall, this is a fun read for anyone who is a fan of Evans writing. For those who think that the Bible presents a simple image of biblical womanhood, it is a warm and welcoming invitation to explore the complex interaction between what the Bible says and what culture teaches. ( )

“… I have come to regard with some suspicion those who claim that the Bible never troubles them. I can only assume this means they haven’t read it.”

“…and the countless unnamed women who lived and died between the lines of Scripture exploited, ravaged, and crushed at the hand of patriarchy..”. And raped. And killed.

“Feminism is the radical notion that women are people.”

“A.J. Jacobs already did this, you know.” Well, true, he did, but this book is from the woman's point of view, and it is really good! The author details how much of the Bible is really burdensome on a woman, and what a woman is supposed to act like/be like in the Christian church. “The disturbing laws of Leviticus and Deuteronomy”, for example, are really frightening! And the 'ideal' of trying to live up to the Proverbs 31 woman is unrealistic and misogynistic. I am also a big believer in the concept of “biblical selectivity”, and how it seems that most conservative religious people only select some parts of the Scripture to follow, while completely ignoring others, oftentimes in the same book! Those type of people offend me.

If you have an open mind, and heart, this is a good book to explore what the Bible says, and demands, of the women in the church! ( )

Rachel is becoming one of my favorite writers. She can be both serious and very funny at the same time. In preparing this book she tried to do all the things that Bible says women must do. In the process she found that the perceived limits on women, such as obeying husbands and not talking in church, are not what so many say. The not talking in church admonition from St. Paul was a direction for a specific group of women in a certain time and place, it was not a universal law. So too was the statement that women could not lead in church. Rachel found many opposing citations in scripture that showed women had been leaders, prophets and apostles. The parts where she tried to defer to her husband were very amusing. Her husband, Dan , finally asked her to stop. Visits to women in Amish, Quaker and fundamentalist traditions were included. The author also spent a week in a monastic retreat to explore silence. She began an online friendship with an Orthodox Jewish woman in Israel which contributed to understanding how some people follow the Biblical laws. In a trip to Bolivia she met very poor women.
The trip to Bolivia inspired her to change her shopping habits and find ways to avoid supporting slavery, child labor and exploitation of poor farmers. Fair trade coffee and chocolate is more expensive but the right thing to do. This book was written in 2012 and her latter works are getting even better but this is certainly worth a read. ( )

LOVED this book. Evans really examines what it means to be a Christian woman, and her findings line up with my own faith journey, so admittedly, I'm a bit biased. This is a book that I will revisit--most likely during church when I am listening to people say things that aren't really all that reflective of what I believe Christianity should be. ( )