A Woman’s Place: House Churches in the Earliest Christianity
Carolyn Osiek and Margaret Y. MacDonald with Janet M. Tulloch, A Woman’s Place: House Churches in the Earliest Christianity (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2005), vi+ 345 pages, ISBN 9780800637774.
Carolyn Osiek, Charles Fischer Catholic Professor of New Testament at Brite Divinity School of Texas Christian University, and Margaret Y. MacDonald, Professor of Religious Studies at St. Francis Xavier University, have created a work that examines the day-to-day life of the women in the early church. They cover a variety of topics that would have affected every woman: marriage, birth, child rearing, childhood, motherhood, wet nurses, nannies, slaves, wives, widows, and grandmothers. Chapter 1 introduces three views that are commonly used to examine women in the early church: patriarchy vs. the discipleship of equals, public vs. private, and ascetic vs. domestic life. They also discuss basic activities of the house church such as hosting the assembly, education, communication, socialization, charity, evangelization, and mission.
Chapter 2 focuses on wives noting that the Biblical ideal was not often reality. Evidence for this period regarding Christian women is fragmentary. Despite this, the authors insert this evidence into an “imaginary scene (18) based on what we know of a typical Roman family.” The chapter examines Colossians and Nympha’s role, on Prisca, Ananias and Sapphira as well as other ancient texts. Chapters 3 and 4 cover birth, childcare, and raising children in the house church. Topics include abortion, infanticide, exposure, nursing, and mortality rates for both mother and child. Besides using Roman medical texts the authors also, use the writings of Plutarch, John Chrysostom, The martyrdom of Pertpetua and Felicitas, the life of Macrina and the infancy gospel of Thomas.
Chapter 5 deals with the female slave and builds on the work of Jennifer Glancy (Slavery in Early Christianity) and J. Albert Harrill (Slaves In The New Testament: Literary, Social And Moral Dimensions) to illustrate the problems of Christian female slaves and the church’s problem with them. This chapter is loaded with Roman law, rabbinic writings and non-Christian authors. The sixth chapter examines Eph. 5:22-33 using two points of view: the first as a document against Roman ideology and the second as an apologetic ideal representing the church. Asking if the injunction to marry as an option could have been a way for women to wield influence in the house church is the topic of chapter 7.
Chapter 8-9 covers women in leadership roles and as patrons of the church. Evidence from the Pythagorean letters, Musonius Rufus, Philo, and Plutarch regarding the role of wives as household manager is used to place Christian women of the day in context. Other evidence such as the images from the Roman catacombs showing women as banquet hosts leads Janet Tulloch (chapter 8) to conclude that these portray the changing role of women in society. The authors also discuss how the system of patronage allowed women to exercise authority. It contains an analysis of the patronal relationship as applied to Jesus as well as Paul, and the early church.
Chapter 10 focuses on the role of women in missions concluding that since the house church was a key element in the early church and the home is a women’s place, women were therefore important in the spread of Christianity. Eleven is the concluding chapter.
This book offers many insights and raises additional issues. It adds to the debate on ascetic vs. domestic life in the early church by arguing: 1) ascetics were probably in the minority, 2) therefore we cannot assume that women listed without mention of a husband were ascetics. 3) Home churches were the basic unit of the church therefore women played a major role and 4) the authors challenge the perceived opposition between ascetic and domestic.
Osiek and MacDonald seem to reach conclusions based on common sense rather than evidence. As they point out, there is little evidence to use, and what evidence there is shows women “in such a way as to further the agendas of male authors (222).” The authors employ not only ancient texts but also recent literary, textual and gender critical secondary literature to see through a 2000 year old window. A house church was a home in which children were raised and daily life was carried on, but the reader has difficulty in envisioning the house church present by the authors. Did all the functions of the church occur in one home or were the duties spread throughout the community?
Reviewed by Patricia Riley
See a preview of this book here: http://books.google.com/books?id=NXFSIV7dNggC
